Our local paper ran an article on Bob Foster. I’ll paraphrase from the article. Bob Foster is the guy who carved a polygamist community out of a cliff in Moab, Utah, starting back 1979, when he signed a 50 year lease on 82 acres from the state school board trust. He only leased the land, as he fully expected the state government not to last that long. Was this a sound gamble you think?
Foster said he’d worked in a uranium mine so as to learn how to “shoot” rock. He then put that knowledge to work to cut into a red rock sandstone cliff face. To date the “Rockland Ranch” is home to 70 to 75 people, half a dozen homes, a water system, an orchard, a power generator, and solar panels. They’re working on a “charity house” that will include 12 apartments, a library, chapel, baptismal font, dining area, pantry, and laundry. The homes are quite comfortable warm in the winter and cool in the summer.
Foster had been a member of the mainstream LDS church but was excommunicated in 1972 after he became a fundamentalist and took up three wives. Foster says of polygamy: “If God has a man he wants multiplied, he puts him into plural marriage. It’s not a sex party; it’s to get children here.” And Foster has indeed multiplied, having fathered 38 children.
Though Foster is a fundamentalist Mormon, he’s not affiliated with any of the other Mormon fundamentalist sects such as the FLDS. Said Anne Wilde, a fundamentalist Mormon who has known Foster for 35 years, “I greatly admire him for his desire to provide an opportunity to raise their children in an atmosphere where they learned to garden, raise animals, get water and power, repair machinery and build homes along with their academic schooling and religious training.” One of the children who was raised at Rockland Ranch, Enoch Foster, commented, “I loved it. It was just awesome.”
He’s got a web site at www.strongdelusions.com .
My own observations: Fair warning to all women: As a guy, I know first hand how, as that song goes, we will apply “any trick in the book now baby, all that I can find.” We can’t help ourselves here. Millions of years of evolution have selected us to be ingenious scammers of women and have also selected women for being effective subjects for such scams. Keep that in mind when you hear a line such as “If God has a man he wants multiplied, he puts him into plural marriage.” It’s been done to death, but then again, you find something that works, you stick with it.
I confess I’m a just a tad jealous of Bob Foster. Were I to get onto a soap box and proclaim that God wants more of me in the world and I need wives to this end, would I get any takers? “No really, listen. God wants more guys like me in the world. He really really does. I’m just as surprised by this as you are, but there it is.” I guess I’d have to try it to find out. I might surprise myself. There seems to be a small but dependable population of females in these parts ready to buy into this sort of a scam. Course it has to be sincere. If you can fake sincerity, you have got it made, and your genes will be cast upon the future more numerous than stars in the sky.
Ok, so Rockland Ranch doesn’t jump out to me as a place to worry about. Not the first generation of it, anyway, or the second or maybe even third generation of it. Come along towards the fourth and fifth generations of it, however, you might start to see some of the same sorts of issues like we’ve seen with our LDS and then with our FLDS, a surplus of boys to be disposed of, inbreeding, genetic disorders, religious indoctrination displacing genuine education, despotic corrupt philandering prophets, an atmosphere of paranoia, and self-fulfilling bad relations with humanity at large.
Then again, America is an experiment in progress. I thank these people for being willing to try this out again. It’s been a train wreck for everyone who’s attempted it so for, but hey, if you’re up for it, then give it the old college try again.
This will be my attitude right up to the point where an experimenter proclaims that “God has given me your property.” Or, “God would have you take charge of this unworthy boy for whom we have no further use.” Or “God would have me help hasten the demise of your evil government by ‘bleeding the beast’”. Or, “God thinks you need atonement for your evil doings.”
Full Version: article about Bob Foster
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Chaser,
Unless the residents of Rock Ranch come up with (if I remember correctly) a rather large amount of money to renew the lease on the land there will BE NO fourth and fifth generations to worry about. They will all be displaced and disbanded. AND (again if I remember right) the lease this next time around will be more after the value of the improvements has been added to it.
As for reproduction: (And I REALLY hate to admit this, but here goes....ahem....) Many of the mammal species of which humans are a part, naturally live in family groups of one male/ several females. For example: Apes, loins, horses, etc. And also, if you take into consideration the bodily function of males and females, you will see that it is the most effective for propagation of the species for mammals to behave in this manner, ie. females can only reproduce at certain times whereas males can at any time. Thus we see the most efficient reproduction method would be for one male to impregnate several females to ensure survival of the species.
But we aren't living in the stone age any longer and the human race is so well established that we have to wonder about our effect on the planet, our numbers are so many, rather than if we will survive the next cold season with humans remaining alive.
So, the question is: Is it beneficial to evolution for human to be polygamists or monogamists?
Unless the residents of Rock Ranch come up with (if I remember correctly) a rather large amount of money to renew the lease on the land there will BE NO fourth and fifth generations to worry about. They will all be displaced and disbanded. AND (again if I remember right) the lease this next time around will be more after the value of the improvements has been added to it.
As for reproduction: (And I REALLY hate to admit this, but here goes....ahem....) Many of the mammal species of which humans are a part, naturally live in family groups of one male/ several females. For example: Apes, loins, horses, etc. And also, if you take into consideration the bodily function of males and females, you will see that it is the most effective for propagation of the species for mammals to behave in this manner, ie. females can only reproduce at certain times whereas males can at any time. Thus we see the most efficient reproduction method would be for one male to impregnate several females to ensure survival of the species.
But we aren't living in the stone age any longer and the human race is so well established that we have to wonder about our effect on the planet, our numbers are so many, rather than if we will survive the next cold season with humans remaining alive.
So, the question is: Is it beneficial to evolution for human to be polygamists or monogamists?
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| QUOTE (bbgae @ Jan 27 2008, 10:45 PM) |
| So, the question is: Is it beneficial to evolution for human to be polygamists or monogamists? |
I'm thinking there are general advantages and disadvantages to each approach.
One obvious plus of a few males doing the lion's share of breeding where your males duke it out in ritual contests to determine who gets to breed, that's a fairly efficient method of selecting your meanest badest most fit of males for breeding. That's an efficient method for counteracting entropy, the natural tendency within all systems to run down toward disorder.
Course the FLDS' methods of selecting the males for breeding doesn't quite fit that model the way it does in say big horn sheep, but you might could argue that human polygamy has some of the same merits in selecting males for success for control of resources.
One problem with that method as practiced by people, it tends to devolve to where the contest for breeding rights gets rigged in favor of the folks who've already gotten themselves ensconsed into power.
Warrne Jeffs, for example. His power didn't derive from winning any ritual contest but rather derived from the mere fact that he was Rulon's idiot son. Also, many of the boys who've been tossed out aren't necessarily inferior breeding stock but just haven't sucked up sufficiently to those who hold all the cards of power in the community.
Another drawback, ritual contests cost a lot of time, energy, and resources. This is basically what your bible is all about: You had these geezers, see, and they spent a huge amount of time and energy and gnashing of teeth and tribal warfare by which the winner got to have a huge harem and a book of the bible named after him.
Guys who are continually duking it out for breeding rights don't have as much time for cooperating with their fellows. A harem is difficult to obtain and difficult to maintain.
Where you have a highly social crittere such as ourselves, monogamy seems a better model. Males can copperate more readily when they're not having to be gnashing the teeth at rival males quite as much.
Monogamy is also better suited for rearing offspring that benefit from long resource-intensive childhoods. Notice how the offspring of your polygamous animals tend to mature quickly and with a minimum of investment in resources compared with monogamous animals.
We humans take forever to grow up and we also require huge investments in resources for education, but then again, look at the spectacular benefits we get from that.
Far and away, we are the most successful species on earth today. Too darned successful actually.
Now, the problem for us, as you have pointed out, bbgae, has become to survive our success.
You know, this question of polygamy vs. monogamy, I think that is the question for humans to decide just now. As I see it, there are a couple of different ways humanity could go now:
Plan A: Let's get back to the good old bible. Continuous ongoing tribal warfare, plagues, and famines will provide two important services for us, keeping our populations in sync with the carrying capacity of the land and keeping us genetically fit. The weak will simply be killed off or die of disease. Walla. Problem solved. It's cheap, easy, and requires no dificult planning or thought process of any kind.
Essential to plan A: we absoulutely MUST displace genuine education with religious indocrtination. It is absolutely vital that we put an end to science pronto. Otherwise, our inept ill informed applications of science will destroy the earth's capacity to support us.
Plan B: We continue to develop science and technology.
Essential to plan B: we absolutely MUST develop envronmental ethics, including voluntary limiting of our fertility. It's also vital that we fully educate and enable everyone to their full potential as best we can. Without these, our chances of survival are zip.
Some challenges of plan B: Application of science and technology does help us to meet challenges but it's always a two-edged sword. Consider, for example, modern medicine. It has solved some problems but has created others. For one thing, we now need to find alternative means of maintaining genetic health. We've lost the simple easy solution of plan A above. Now that we've interfered with nature to solve a problem, we're now obliged to interfere again and find technological ways to maintain our genetic health. That's the deal with science and technology, see. It will forever be requiring more science and technology to deal with the unintended consequences of applying science and technology.
That's bascally what the choice comes down to here; either we fully accept the rigors and requirements of technology, or we scrap it and get back to the good old bible.
My personal preference: Plan B. It's more challenging and interesting. Plan A has already been done to death. As humans, I think we're genetically programmed to want to explore new territory.
Plan A: Let's get back to the good old bible. Continuous ongoing tribal warfare, plagues, and famines will provide two important services for us, keeping our populations in sync with the carrying capacity of the land and keeping us genetically fit. The weak will simply be killed off or die of disease. Walla. Problem solved. It's cheap, easy, and requires no dificult planning or thought process of any kind.
Essential to plan A: we absoulutely MUST displace genuine education with religious indocrtination. It is absolutely vital that we put an end to science pronto. Otherwise, our inept ill informed applications of science will destroy the earth's capacity to support us.
Plan B: We continue to develop science and technology.
Essential to plan B: we absolutely MUST develop envronmental ethics, including voluntary limiting of our fertility. It's also vital that we fully educate and enable everyone to their full potential as best we can. Without these, our chances of survival are zip.
Some challenges of plan B: Application of science and technology does help us to meet challenges but it's always a two-edged sword. Consider, for example, modern medicine. It has solved some problems but has created others. For one thing, we now need to find alternative means of maintaining genetic health. We've lost the simple easy solution of plan A above. Now that we've interfered with nature to solve a problem, we're now obliged to interfere again and find technological ways to maintain our genetic health. That's the deal with science and technology, see. It will forever be requiring more science and technology to deal with the unintended consequences of applying science and technology.
That's bascally what the choice comes down to here; either we fully accept the rigors and requirements of technology, or we scrap it and get back to the good old bible.
My personal preference: Plan B. It's more challenging and interesting. Plan A has already been done to death. As humans, I think we're genetically programmed to want to explore new territory.
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| QUOTE (bbgae @ Jan 27 2008, 03:45 PM) |
| As for reproduction: (And I REALLY hate to admit this, but here goes....ahem....) Many of the mammal species of which humans are a part, naturally live in family groups of one male/ several females. For example: Apes, loins, horses, etc. And also, if you take into consideration the bodily function of males and females, you will see that it is the most effective for propagation of the species for mammals to behave in this manner, ie. females can only reproduce at certain times whereas males can at any time. Thus we see the most efficient reproduction method would be for one male to impregnate several females to ensure survival of the species. But we aren't living in the stone age any longer and the human race is so well established that we have to wonder about our effect on the planet, our numbers are so many, rather than if we will survive the next cold season with humans remaining alive. So, the question is: Is it beneficial to evolution for human to be polygamists or monogamists? |
Finally, something worth commenting on. The list of critters here have diverse reproductive strategies with variable relevance to humans. Evolution shapes mating strategies based on the metabolic and other economics of producing gametes and ensuring offspring survive to reproductive age. Across mammals, sperm is cheap; therefore, males can benefit from spewing it around a bit. Nonetheless, human infants and children require exorbitant amounts of parental care and resources, so human males have tremendous evolutionary incentive to form pair bonds with the putative mother of their children, in order to ensure the child or children have the resources to survive. This is where female choice enters in. Human females (hell, all females) seek the best possible sperm contributors AND mates who can provide the resources, protection, etc to ensure survival of their off spring, especially through the tender years when they are the most vulnerable. Nonetheless, females can benefit from extra-pair matings when the genes are too dang good to pass up, or when the sneaker male can augment the resources provided by the other mate. Choosing a partner who has other children to provide for is evolutionarily unwise, unless he's THAT good at providing.
Essentially, evolution has provided us with a tendency to form single pair bonds (at least temporarily), with the occasional screwing around, which is more pronounced for males, but certainly present in females.
A notable feature of polygynist societies is that they have interupted the ages old, evolutionary heritage of female choice through control - usually some stupid patriarchal, monotheistic gobbledegook. Women become property of their fathers, who sell them to men. Control of women's sexuality becomes urgent in these societies as males still have the evolutionary disincentive to provide for another man's child, yet women will still operate on their evolutionary heritage to get the best sperm. This is why we see female genital mutilation, burquas, and lashing of women who interact with men who aren't their husbands under Islam, and the prairie dresses, strictures to keep sweet, and segregation of sexes in Colorado City.
LARA!! You're back! Dangit girl, I thought we'd lost you when Aimoo's ecology collapsed. Glad to see you made it across the A-I extinction boundary, so to speak.
| QUOTE |
| - usually some stupid patriarchal, monotheistic gobbledegook. |
I see you haven't forgotten Onthestreet either. If you ever happen to watch "Big Love" which is available on Netlfix now, there is a character played by Bruce Dern. Oh yea, they must have known about Onthestreet when they thought that character up.
Anyway, it seems to my unlearned mind that another thing about our mating habits is human survival has always depended on cooperation within the group. We aren't like Elk where the old bulls stay off by themselves all year, then fight to the death over harems during breeding systems. We depend on complex cooperative arrangements that would never hold up under that model. If our males acted like that we would have gone extinct long ago.
Also, I don't quite agree that polygamy is a more efficient way to reproduce, even if population expansion is the goal. If you were only concerned with population expansion, then the only concern would be to get the woman pregnant as quickly as possible. You do that with an attentive monogamous male standing by ready for the moment. The only way to increase that efficiency would be to have polyandry, with several males ready to pile on as soon as she becomes fertile. This is the way frogs do it and is the source of the term "cluster f**ckl".
| QUOTE (chaster @ Jan 28 2008, 01:21 PM) |
| Monogamy is also better suited for rearing offspring that benefit from long resource-intensive childhoods. Notice how the offspring of your polygamous animals tend to mature quickly and with a minimum of investment in resources compared with monogamous animals. |
You and me are the models of this theory working? Just checking... it's good to be sure about these scientific things.. you know what I mean?
Hello.. btw. It's good to see you found the forum.
| QUOTE (Lara Avara @ Jan 29 2008, 12:48 AM) |
| Finally, something worth commenting on. The list of critters here have diverse reproductive strategies with variable relevance to humans. Evolution shapes mating strategies based on the metabolic and other economics of producing gametes and ensuring offspring survive to reproductive age. Across mammals, sperm is cheap; therefore, males can benefit from spewing it around a bit. Nonetheless, human infants and children require exorbitant amounts of parental care and resources, so human males have tremendous evolutionary incentive to form pair bonds with the putative mother of their children, in order to ensure the child or children have the resources to survive. This is where female choice enters in. Human females (hell, all females) seek the best possible sperm contributors AND mates who can provide the resources, protection, etc to ensure survival of their off spring, especially through the tender years when they are the most vulnerable. Nonetheless, females can benefit from extra-pair matings when the genes are too dang good to pass up, or when the sneaker male can augment the resources provided by the other mate. Choosing a partner who has other children to provide for is evolutionarily unwise, unless he's THAT good at providing. Essentially, evolution has provided us with a tendency to form single pair bonds (at least temporarily), with the occasional screwing around, which is more pronounced for males, but certainly present in females. A notable feature of polygynist societies is that they have interupted the ages old, evolutionary heritage of female choice through control - usually some stupid patriarchal, monotheistic gobbledegook. Women become property of their fathers, who sell them to men. Control of women's sexuality becomes urgent in these societies as males still have the evolutionary disincentive to provide for another man's child, yet women will still operate on their evolutionary heritage to get the best sperm. This is why we see female genital mutilation, burquas, and lashing of women who interact with men who aren't their husbands under Islam, and the prairie dresses, strictures to keep sweet, and segregation of sexes in Colorado City. |
Oh wow. Another of those other kinds of people who are kind of like us guys but different.
Ole OntheStreet was almost starting to look good to me, but you can forget about that now, Street.
| QUOTE (sayitaintso @ Jan 29 2008, 02:00 AM) |
| You and me are the models of this theory working? Just checking... it's good to be sure about these scientific things.. you know what I mean? |
I think I need about three lifetimes to mature. I might could get it right on the third pass or so.
That movie Groundhog Day was kind of along that theme. He had to keep repeating that day until he got it right. There were some days where he almost made it to the end of the day witthout blowing it but then he'd botch it at the last moment and it was back to square one the next morning. But then, finally, he got beyond all the mean petty little things that were holding him up and being his own worst enemy. And then he got the girl. Man, that'd be the curse to have.
You guys who have afterlives to look forward to, you have it made. I've got just the one.
eh?
Jim and Chaster's Reply after deleting the Post.
Jim and Chaster's Reply after deleting the Post.
| QUOTE (Cactus Jim @ Jan 28 2008, 06:25 PM) |
| LARA!! You're back! Dangit girl, I thought we'd lost you when Aimoo's ecology collapsed. Glad to see you made it across the A-I extinction boundary, so to speak. I see you haven't forgotten Onthestreet either. If you ever happen to watch "Big Love" which is available on Netlfix now, there is a character played by Bruce Dern. Oh yea, they must have known about Onthestreet when they thought that character up. Anyway, it seems to my unlearned mind that another thing about our mating habits is human survival has always depended on cooperation within the group. We aren't like Elk where the old bulls stay off by themselves all year, then fight to the death over harems during breeding systems. We depend on complex cooperative arrangements that would never hold up under that model. If our males acted like that we would have gone extinct long ago. Also, I don't quite agree that polygamy is a more efficient way to reproduce, even if population expansion is the goal. If you were only concerned with population expansion, then the only concern would be to get the woman pregnant as quickly as possible. You do that with an attentive monogamous male standing by ready for the moment. The only way to increase that efficiency would be to have polyandry, with several males ready to pile on as soon as she becomes fertile. This is the way frogs do it and is the source of the term "cluster f**ckl". |
Yep, where the male's contribution beyond his genes count in ensuring success of his offspring, the less polygny will be a successful strategy. Other evidence suggesting a polygynous strategy did not shape human evolution is the relationship between body size and testicle size. GREAT BALLS of FIRE, bull elk have large testicles compared to their body size. All the better to impregnate as many cows as possible. In contrast, human males have relatively puny 'nads - no point in investing energy in sperm machinery that won't be used.
Jealousy, which is hard-wired into our genes, provides additional evidence for the selective pressures influencing mating patterns. Moreover, gender differences in jealousy reflect differences in selective pressures between the sexes. Males must be vigilant that a sneaker male doesn't impregnate his partner, such that he ends up expending his energy providing for a child who does not share his genes. Across cultures, human males exhibit behaviors to prevent this kind of extra-pair mating. Human females become more jealous when a male exhibits an emotional bond with a nother female. Loss of his affection may result in less care for their shared offspring. "Mean Genes" (Burnham and Phelan 2000) provides an intriguing discusion on these issues along with substantial evidence to support the hypothesis.
Wow, Lara! I am enlightened by your presence. I am going to make my husband read this last little reproductive discussion. 
So... after the length of the human off spring maturity period and the female and male hard wired reproductive instincts are entered into the equation, it must then be best for the human species to continue on as mostly monogamous.
Perhaps the reason things are the way they are now is because the human race and possibly the world are in a state of transition and evolution. We are progressing from polygamous, religious bible plan "A", to monogamous, enlightened scientific plan "B" with only a few pockets of non evolving humans (like the FLDS and Street) holding on tight to the past.
So... after the length of the human off spring maturity period and the female and male hard wired reproductive instincts are entered into the equation, it must then be best for the human species to continue on as mostly monogamous.
Perhaps the reason things are the way they are now is because the human race and possibly the world are in a state of transition and evolution. We are progressing from polygamous, religious bible plan "A", to monogamous, enlightened scientific plan "B" with only a few pockets of non evolving humans (like the FLDS and Street) holding on tight to the past.
| QUOTE (bbgae @ Jan 29 2008, 10:02 AM) |
| Perhaps the reason things are the way they are now is because the human race and possibly the world are in a state of transition and evolution. We are progressing from polygamous, religious bible plan "A", to monogamous, enlightened scientific plan "B" with only a few pockets of non evolving humans (like the FLDS and Street) holding on tight to the past. |
More accurately, the advent of agriculture allowed for accumulation of wealth and development of a culture (the said silly, montheistic gobbledegook [SMG]) that allowed for some subversion of evolved system that was based on a foundation of female choice of mates and cooperation in raising children. If submission and sexual fidelity for women were the natural coarse, why do they need to go to such extremes to enforce it? Thanks to enlightenment values, and a sputtering attempt to apply these to our societies, many are seeing that the SMG system undervalues women, their contributions, and limits their potential. Unfortunately, neither many Islamic countries nor the FDLS has experienced the enlightenment, and still embraces the SMG that preserves control of all women, and many men under harsh strictures. Of course, Huckabee and other religious fundies would like to see SMG preserved and pushed down the throats of all of us.
As an enlightened society, we should acknowledge our evolutionary heritage that entices us to screw around, eat too much, and become jealous, then use the big brains we evolved to employ judgment in our lives. Not because some supernatural power will punish us, but because life is more rewarding and happy when think things through and behave morally.
The cultural trappings that are influencing society now are really a blink of an eye in terms of our evolutionary legacy.
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I haven't seen mentioned yet one of the most fundamental reasons for large families in fundamentalist groups--one that I heard thousands of times over the pulpit. "We aren't going to get converts from outside. We are going to have to raise them up"
(If Street can edit his post and remove what I was rebutting, I guess I can remove my rebuttal paragraph).
(If Street can edit his post and remove what I was rebutting, I guess I can remove my rebuttal paragraph).
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| QUOTE (Onthestreet @ Jan 30 2008, 01:13 PM) |
| By the way, furnace, it's Jim and Chas that are deleting files, not me. But I'll repost it and see if they'll leave it alone |
Actually, it's just me deleting Street's posts. Street, strange you mention that just now. Tyler and me were just discussing whether it would be worth banning you again, or restricting you to your own Mad World. If you keep up this sexual innuendo and keep posting stuff that amounts to harrassment of normal menbers, I'm going to flush you altogether - again.
| QUOTE (bbgae @ Jan 29 2008, 10:02 AM) |
| So... after the length of the human off spring maturity period and the female and male hard wired reproductive instincts are entered into the equation, it must then be best for the human species to continue on as mostly monogamous. |
I guess lots of things will shape what is "best" for humans in terms of mating strategy. Although our evolutionary heritage shapes our drives, cultural and demographic considerations can't be ignored. Polygyny thrives where women have low social status and a lack of education (FLDS and muslim countries). Where we value and educate women, polygyny is rare to nonexistent, as women exercise their evolutionary perogative of mate choice.
Demographics: In the US, a lack of unmarried women in reproductive ages poses a bigconstraint to polygyny (see http://www.census.gov/population/www/docum...s0483/fig02.pdf
) for analysis of ratios of unmarried men to women in different age groups. Essentially, in the US, there is a surplus of unmarried men for the 20s through mid-30s, a women's reproductive years. There are simply too few available women to support polygny without considerable social control of women and low ranking men (think Lost Boys). By the time the tides turn, and unmarried women outnumber unmarried men, women are past reproductive age. Polygny at this point has no reproductive advantage.
The concept of "best" has also changed with our ability to engineer beyond the hardships that shaped our earlier evolution. Economics and happiness figure largely into what is the "best" strategy. Forming a social contract to stay together, honor, and respect each other, and remain faithful makes tons of sense. It makes life easier and happier.
| QUOTE (bbgae @ Jan 29 2008, 05:02 PM) |
| Perhaps the reason things are the way they are now is because the human race and possibly the world are in a state of transition and evolution. We are progressing from polygamous, religious bible plan "A", to monogamous, enlightened scientific plan "B" with only a few pockets of non evolving humans (like the FLDS and Street) holding on tight to the past. |
If you don't mind my asking, bbgae, could you talk about your experience with Mormonism a bit? Were you born into it or a convert? When did you see the light so to speak?
Me, I was raised into the mainstream LDS faith but stopped believing oh around age 16 or so. I can't recall any one great crisis of faith or anything but just never got the "burning in the bossom" that others raptuously praised about it. I kind of liked taking LDS seminary in high school because it was an easy C. I took Book of Mormon studies and remember reading these passages about the "great whore of the false church." I think that was in reference to Catholicism. People get a great burning in the bosom over this stuff, I thought? What am I missing here?
Gradually, I've come to regard Mormonism less and less about spirituality and morality and more as an instrument of extreme right wing politics, which I was beginning to rebel against and still am.
On the other hand Mormons are my family, and you always have to take in family no matter what.
So, like lots of people raised in Mormonism, I have this love/hate relationship with the culture and people.
I bear my testimony here and now that the love prevails and I'm about helping this culture to survive for the long haul. As I see it, though, this culture is a train wreck in progress. It really does greive me to witness this culture being so maladaptive on so many fronts.
Stupid Crap from Street deleted by Admin:---
Street, you've shown that you can post coherent thoughts that are at least readable, if not sensible. But you keep cramming this stupid gibberish at us. I gave you an entire Forum of your own for your stupidity. By the way, I think you forgot to thank me for that? Maybe you were so busy thinking up names to call me you overlooked it.
If you can't at least sound sensible here I'm going to keep deleting you. Nobody wants to read this crap. You crave attention. You want people to pay attention to your posts, yet you persist with this stupid and offensive garbage. Goddammit, why can't you grow up. Act like you are more than 12. You make me sorry I unbanned you.
A way I could deal with you is I could restrict you to posting in your own "Street's Wisdom" area. You are getting real close to that bud.
Jim Ashurst
Street, you've shown that you can post coherent thoughts that are at least readable, if not sensible. But you keep cramming this stupid gibberish at us. I gave you an entire Forum of your own for your stupidity. By the way, I think you forgot to thank me for that? Maybe you were so busy thinking up names to call me you overlooked it.
If you can't at least sound sensible here I'm going to keep deleting you. Nobody wants to read this crap. You crave attention. You want people to pay attention to your posts, yet you persist with this stupid and offensive garbage. Goddammit, why can't you grow up. Act like you are more than 12. You make me sorry I unbanned you.
A way I could deal with you is I could restrict you to posting in your own "Street's Wisdom" area. You are getting real close to that bud.
Jim Ashurst
Chaster-
I was born into the FLDS. My family was the only one I know of who were asked to leave by their prophet Leroy Johnson and after ten years invited to return by him. I was born during the time my family lived among the "gentiles", But by the time I was old enough to go to school we had returned. I grew up and went to school in Colorado City.
I guess you could say my female instinct toward the free choice of an "Alpha male" was a lot stronger than a good Polyg girl's ought to be. There was a giant catastrophe when I was eighteen because I was in love with a young man my same age. I didn't so much as share a conversation with him more than brief cordial pleasantries when it was acceptable to do so but I loved him with all of my heart. Part of me still does. Part of me always will.
But (believe it or not, Say) I also had a very strong desire to do what was "right". I was terrified my love for him would eventually lure us both down to hell. I couldn't do that to him. Not if I really loved him. All I wanted was for him to be sent over by the prophet to marry me. But I refused to ask for him because I had heard Warren on one of the Alta Academy Home Economics tapes say something along the lines of, "And when you go to the prophet, if a name is mentioned, fine. But ladies, don't you think the prophet knows the spirit of revelation best? Don't you think he alone knows the will of the Lord?" I thought it would be wrong to ask.
But it got so bad with me I didn't eat, sleep or talk for three days. My parents realized something was wrong and in a desperate effort to save me nagged Rulon Jeffs until he finally sent my brother-in-law over to marry me.
Suffice it to say after four months of hell I left him when he threatened to beat me with a large stick upon his return home. Warren told me I had broken my covenants by leaving and that I would never have a place in the Celestial kingdom.
I went to Canada for my repentance and re baptism. While I was there I found out I still belonged to my brother-in-law as his eternal wife and I would have to go back to him. But Winstone was very good to me and asked me if there was anything he had said or done that might make it so I couldn't go back. I remembered in a phone conversation he told me he didn't want me back. Winstone told Warren and Warren answered him that if my brother-in-law didn't want me I didn't have to go back. Winstone married me to a man in Canada.
I am happy with him and have been for years. He never had a strong testimony either and I was just so glad to be with someone who loved and respected me that I wasn't too upset when we started to stray a little from the way we were taught. But a little here and a little there led to us being asked to leave. We knew we probably would be asked to go.
But a big factor in our leaving was Rulon's death and the way Warren ran things after he died. Rulon wasn't supposed to die. He was supposed to be renewed and lifted up. And then everyone started playing "musical houses" and Sunday meetings were put to a stop and it was very clear to me that Warren was relocating people to Texas in secrecy and that was why things were happening the way they were.
My faith had been cracked by the events surrounding my first marriage. So many things happened that I KNEW were not right. But Warren's deception and Rulon's death were the final blow.
I am not bitter. I take full responsibility for my own actions and their consequenses and do not think of myself as a victim at all.
I was born into the FLDS. My family was the only one I know of who were asked to leave by their prophet Leroy Johnson and after ten years invited to return by him. I was born during the time my family lived among the "gentiles", But by the time I was old enough to go to school we had returned. I grew up and went to school in Colorado City.
I guess you could say my female instinct toward the free choice of an "Alpha male" was a lot stronger than a good Polyg girl's ought to be. There was a giant catastrophe when I was eighteen because I was in love with a young man my same age. I didn't so much as share a conversation with him more than brief cordial pleasantries when it was acceptable to do so but I loved him with all of my heart. Part of me still does. Part of me always will.
But (believe it or not, Say) I also had a very strong desire to do what was "right". I was terrified my love for him would eventually lure us both down to hell. I couldn't do that to him. Not if I really loved him. All I wanted was for him to be sent over by the prophet to marry me. But I refused to ask for him because I had heard Warren on one of the Alta Academy Home Economics tapes say something along the lines of, "And when you go to the prophet, if a name is mentioned, fine. But ladies, don't you think the prophet knows the spirit of revelation best? Don't you think he alone knows the will of the Lord?" I thought it would be wrong to ask.
But it got so bad with me I didn't eat, sleep or talk for three days. My parents realized something was wrong and in a desperate effort to save me nagged Rulon Jeffs until he finally sent my brother-in-law over to marry me.
Suffice it to say after four months of hell I left him when he threatened to beat me with a large stick upon his return home. Warren told me I had broken my covenants by leaving and that I would never have a place in the Celestial kingdom.
I went to Canada for my repentance and re baptism. While I was there I found out I still belonged to my brother-in-law as his eternal wife and I would have to go back to him. But Winstone was very good to me and asked me if there was anything he had said or done that might make it so I couldn't go back. I remembered in a phone conversation he told me he didn't want me back. Winstone told Warren and Warren answered him that if my brother-in-law didn't want me I didn't have to go back. Winstone married me to a man in Canada.
I am happy with him and have been for years. He never had a strong testimony either and I was just so glad to be with someone who loved and respected me that I wasn't too upset when we started to stray a little from the way we were taught. But a little here and a little there led to us being asked to leave. We knew we probably would be asked to go.
But a big factor in our leaving was Rulon's death and the way Warren ran things after he died. Rulon wasn't supposed to die. He was supposed to be renewed and lifted up. And then everyone started playing "musical houses" and Sunday meetings were put to a stop and it was very clear to me that Warren was relocating people to Texas in secrecy and that was why things were happening the way they were.
My faith had been cracked by the events surrounding my first marriage. So many things happened that I KNEW were not right. But Warren's deception and Rulon's death were the final blow.
I am not bitter. I take full responsibility for my own actions and their consequenses and do not think of myself as a victim at all.
Thanks for sharing, bbgae. Did your husband have other wives?
Yes, Cactus. He was married to my sister. I was the second wife.
What Cactus said. Thanks for that, bbgae.
| QUOTE (bbgae @ Feb 1 2008, 11:00 AM) |
| Yes, Cactus. He was married to my sister. I was the second wife. |
Thanks for sharing your story! If you're ever looking for a ghost writer for your memoirs, keep me in mind!
Warren's failure to protect you from an abuser, then essentially curse you for leaving is chilling. I hope he's in the general population.
| QUOTE |
| Thanks for sharing your story! If you're ever looking for a ghost writer for your memoirs, keep me in mind! |
Wow Lara! Thank you.
I have already started writing a book but I just might take you up on your offer.| QUOTE |
| I hope he's in the general population. |
Who did you mean? My ex- "husband"? Yes, he's still in Colorado City. The man I loved before? Yes, he's still there too.
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