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My Life in a Polygamist Compound
Slate ^ | 04/16/08 | Torie Bosch

Posted on 04/18/2008 8:38:05 AM PDT by DFG

When Texas authorities seized 416 children in a raid on a compound of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, Americans quickly learned that the religious group encourages polygamy and the marriage of young girls to older men. Escape, a memoir published last fall, offers a more detailed portrait of life with the FLDS. In the book, Carolyn Jessop, a sixth-generation polygamist describes her life as the fourth wife of Merril Jessop, who ran the recently raided Texas compound. Carolyn left Merril in 2003, before he moved to Texas, but her memoir sheds light on the man and on the beliefs and practices common within the insular community. Below, Slate flags Carolyn's most intriguing, strange, and heartbreaking allegations.

(Excerpt) Read more at slate.com ...


TOPICS: Crime/Corruption; Culture/Society; News/Current Events
KEYWORDS: escape; flds; jessop; mormon; polygamy
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To: PennsylvaniaMom

Did a man write the book? Get off the gender kick. I would consider it very problematic if an ex-husband were to write a tell-all book also.


61 posted on 04/18/2008 9:46:47 AM PDT by DoughtyOne (McCain is rock solid on SCOTUS judicial appointments. He voted for Ginsberg, Kennedy and Souter.)
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To: pissant

“nads” makes sense as in; short for go-nads.

I guess we added the “r”....as in Lardy Ge-argia, that’s a gargeous arange farmal.

“nards”. LOL


62 posted on 04/18/2008 9:47:43 AM PDT by colorcountry (To anger a conservative, lie to him. To anger a liberal, tell him the truth.)
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To: DoughtyOne

You’d have to ask the authorities about that, but personally, I can see why it might be necessary. DO, we’re just going to have to agree to disagree on this one. The more I read about these people and this cult, the more I feel I need to go wash my brain out with clorox to get the horrific images out of my mind.


63 posted on 04/18/2008 9:48:42 AM PDT by MizSterious (The Republican Party is infected with the RINO-virus)
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To: PennsylvaniaMom

BTW, there are many walking wounded after conventional marriages also. There are also a lot of women who stay in these relationships out of choice. While I do find the atmosphere to objectionable even under circumstances with no child abuse, I am by no means convinced that every woman who is in these groups feel like they are being abused. The tell all books are prooblematic for me. Sorry you can’t understand why I might be coming from.


64 posted on 04/18/2008 9:51:13 AM PDT by DoughtyOne (McCain is rock solid on SCOTUS judicial appointments. He voted for Ginsberg, Kennedy and Souter.)
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To: DoughtyOne

They weren’t “arrested” and you knew it, removing children from a rape cult to protective custody is a rescue.

Read post 33.


65 posted on 04/18/2008 9:52:22 AM PDT by ansel12 ( "Keep Sweet"? This cult stuff is grossing me out.)
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To: PennsylvaniaMom

“So you still don’t believe her because she is a ‘woman?’”

Sounds like the author of that thread posted last night.

Guilt by Group

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2003193/posts


66 posted on 04/18/2008 9:53:56 AM PDT by metmom (Welfare was never meant to be a career choice.)
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To: JAKraig

I’m sortof sitting on the fence on this one. There is need for investigation and prosecution if truly warranted, but I am sympathetic to the children first and moms second. I lean right now toward keeping the families together as much as is reasonable, and removing kids as circumstances warrant later on.

Some of these folks may be guilty of nothing. Destroying parental involvement in these children’s lives is a crime, if there were no abuses involving the specific parents and specific children.


67 posted on 04/18/2008 9:54:36 AM PDT by DoughtyOne (McCain is rock solid on SCOTUS judicial appointments. He voted for Ginsberg, Kennedy and Souter.)
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To: GourmetDan

So you’d rather sacrifice them to their cult than allow the government to do anything to protect its citizens from harm done to them by others?

It’s OK for the cult to rob someone of their Constitutional rights but not OK for the government to stop them?


68 posted on 04/18/2008 9:56:31 AM PDT by metmom (Welfare was never meant to be a career choice.)
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To: Theophilus

At first I didn’t get your last comment, and then it sunk in. Agreed.

The more I see of CPS, the less I like. They give a whole new meaning to: “We’re here to help.”


69 posted on 04/18/2008 9:56:39 AM PDT by DoughtyOne (McCain is rock solid on SCOTUS judicial appointments. He voted for Ginsberg, Kennedy and Souter.)
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To: burroak
I believe what they did was the right thing, that is remove the kids first, allow any women to leave with them and then separate the women from the kids when you want to question the kids. I believe most the women that left with their kids did so to attempt to keep the kids quiet about what has went on in the compound.

As far as the men go, If they had tried to arrest them first or tried to take them in for questioning they would of probably started a war of shooting propensity that could end up like Waco or Ruby Ridge, either way they still haven't dragged in any men yet for arrest, questioning, or for DNA tests so it could get nasty before it is all said and done.

70 posted on 04/18/2008 9:57:30 AM PDT by ReformedBeckite
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To: metmom

Metmom, please tell me what you would call it if you were taken into custody and refused any contact with your family, friends our outside contacts. Wouldn’t you call it an arrest?

Why do you see it differently, just because kids are involved?

Were charges filed? No. Does it really matter? I know folks are reticent to call this an arrest, but it sure walks like one and talks like one.


71 posted on 04/18/2008 9:59:52 AM PDT by DoughtyOne (McCain is rock solid on SCOTUS judicial appointments. He voted for Ginsberg, Kennedy and Souter.)
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To: NTHockey

Islam is the world’s biggest cult. You betcha!


72 posted on 04/18/2008 10:00:18 AM PDT by DFG
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To: DoughtyOne

Given the fact that others (who have left this cult) substantiate Ms. Jessop’s claims; the news accounts dribbling out of Texas (the interviews with the babyish voiced, zombie like emotionless women; the ‘tours’ of a compound that housed 416 children and yet there is not a swingset, a ball, a toy truck in sight); the accounts of young men who have been forced to leave their homes for the crime of reacing maturity...its kind of hard to discount ‘Escape’ as a ‘tell all book.’ Sorry this isn’t Ivanna Trump dishing the dirt on the Donald...


73 posted on 04/18/2008 10:00:18 AM PDT by PennsylvaniaMom (PaMom--a broken glass DINO til 4/23/08)
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To: JAKraig
I really feel sorry for all these kids and their moms. They just want to be left alone.

Me, too.

I'll bet those girls would be more than happy to have been left alone at the compound.

That's why the pervs should be put in jail with their leader on rape charges.

74 posted on 04/18/2008 10:00:29 AM PDT by metmom (Welfare was never meant to be a career choice.)
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To: burroak

There is no mother child bond. The children are given to different mothers in this cult, and many children did not know who their mothers were, hen asked to identify them, and pointed out several women.


75 posted on 04/18/2008 10:01:53 AM PDT by prayforpeaceofJerusalem
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To: DoughtyOne; ansel12
Ansel, what do you call it when someone is taken into custody and forced to stay in an enclosed area? While charges are obviously not filed against these kids, they are non the less in custody.

Which is not the same as being arrested.

Making up definitions to try to sway the argument or discredit you opposition is disingenuous, at least.

It smacks of hysteria and fear mongering.

76 posted on 04/18/2008 10:03:27 AM PDT by metmom (Welfare was never meant to be a career choice.)
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To: lucysmom

From the link” Page 195: Some of Carolyn’s stepdaughters were married to Jeffs, and she feared his temper. She writes: “One day he brought one of his wives into the [school] auditorium, which was packed with boys. Annette had a long braid that fell past her knees. Warren grabbed the braid and twisted and twisted it until she was on her knees and he was ripping hair from her head. He told the boys that this was how obedient their wives had to be to them.””

This is the most evil cult spawned on USA soil and needs to be dissolved and all the perpetrators arrested and charged with slave trafficing of the worst kind.


77 posted on 04/18/2008 10:05:26 AM PDT by prayforpeaceofJerusalem
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To: DoughtyOne; PennsylvaniaMom

Well, then, read and learn before shooting off your mouth. There’s testimonies of other men that can be found by googling, too.

OUTSIDE LOOKING IN (Interview of ex-FLDS member...male)

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2003232/posts


78 posted on 04/18/2008 10:05:46 AM PDT by metmom (Welfare was never meant to be a career choice.)
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To: MizSterious

Separation anxiety is a very real problem. I was given to my grandparents to raise when I was two and a half years old. They were 1500 miles from my parents. I am fifty-six years old today, and it still bothers me. It took me over a year to quit telling my grandparents that I hated them and wanted my parents. Five years later I remember asking my bus driver if he thought my parents would ever get back together and want me again. Being ripped away from my parents in the middle of my bonding with them, created relationship problems that lasted me decades. I don’t really know how much of my abilitiy to bond with people was destroyed by that act.

We can agree to disagree on this one. I don’t mind. You take care.


79 posted on 04/18/2008 10:07:16 AM PDT by DoughtyOne (McCain is rock solid on SCOTUS judicial appointments. He voted for Ginsberg, Kennedy and Souter.)
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To: DoughtyOne

You are clearly no lawyer.

Words have meanings. The children were NOT arrested.

Get a grip. They’ve done nothing wrong, they haven’t been accused or charged with any wrong doing, they are not in jail.

Return them to their mothers? Fine. Figure out who they are first. Oh and do you expect that to be done instantaneously, like so many others on this forum? You think genetic testing can be done over night?


80 posted on 04/18/2008 10:11:17 AM PDT by metmom (Welfare was never meant to be a career choice.)
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