FLDS, Islam, Oneida, age and sex
One point that comes up in both news stories about the FLDS and discussion on my blog is that relatively young women—how young is not yet clear—were having sex with considerably older men. Many people see as obviously a very bad thing. One commenter took it for granted that having sex at twelve or thirteen was something which "99% of the world" would find abhorrent.
That particular claim is clearly wrong. According to Islamic tradition, Mohamed consummated his marriage with Ayesha when she was nine. I doubt that many modern Muslims consummate marriages that early, but I gather that in some communities twelve or thirteen is not unusual. And Mohamed is supposed to be an exemplar for mankind, so if he did it it cannot be abhorrent to a believing Muslim.
This is also relevant to Ms Voss justifying the removal of boys from their parents on the grounds that "I believe that the boys are groomed to be perpetrators." Pretty clearly what she means is that they are being taught a system of beliefs which justifies FLDS marriage patterns. Anyone brought up in traditional muslim beliefs is being taught that both polygamy and marital sex with women well below the current U.S. age of consent are entirely proper. Presumably, if she knew that and was consistent, Ms Voss would want to remove all Muslim children from their parents.
A further interesting point concerns the Oneida commune, also mentioned in an earlier post. They quite deliberately and openly paired up younger women with older men and younger men with older women; I have a brief explanation in a comment to the previous post. The same pattern which lots of moderns see as outrageous they saw as optimal.
Getting back to the question I raised in my comparison of FLDS and Oneida, it occurs to me that the problem FLDS is having may be in part due to the accident of simultaneously offending left and right. The left dislikes them because they are patriarchal, the right because they are not monogamous.
Which leaves almost nobody to defend them.