Rather I would say that in terms of religion, people can be factually what they claim - we just don’t know the facts.
I agree, it does seem defensive and overly concerned with PR, and frankly a little hypocritical, considering their own desire to be considered Christian despite their theological differences with historical Christianity.
The point about the traditionalist Catholics is a very good one…among these traditionalists, there are those (like Mel Gibson), who do not like the Vatican II reforms, but accept them as valid. At the opposite end of the spectrum are schismatic groups who do not accept these reforms, do not believe that the last few popes were validly elected, and even go as far as to elect their own popes, such as Pope Michael and Pope Pius XIII. Are these guys Catholic? They are no longer members of the Roman church, but they consider themselves to be “true” Catholics, and since they adhere to traditional Catholic doctrine, I don’t see how you can take the name “Catholic” away from them. It’s certainly correct historically.
I am very confused with the protests in this thread. I have in the past been told to consider the Salt Lake Mormons as Christians when they seem to have little in common and yet a Mormon group that uses the same book as the Salt Lake Mormons should not be called Mormons.
This makes no sense at all to this outside observer.
BTW: Back to the poor op who lost his thread to a fight over a word.
I think this is another good example of why home schooling should not actually be legal or at least as unregulated as it appears to be.
So much room for so much abuse.
A point about the AP style guide.
It is a style guide, not an arbiter of fact. If you check the many threads in GQ on style issues, you’ll see that there are numerous style guides in use and that they frequently contradict one another. More importantly, they are suggested guidelines, not mandates. Papers are free to modify or outright ignore the styles. The newspapers in Utah, which should understand the issue better than any outside group, do ignore the style. They report in so many words that the breakaway sects are fundamentalist Mormon groups. That should settle any debate that brings in newspapers as evidence.
Why does the AP style guide reflect the official LDS Church position? This is speculation, but the only correct answer is money and power. All churches are vocal about promoting their beliefs as correct and equally vocal about punishing those who do not accept these beliefs. Any writing about religion that is not as completely positive and true to that religion’s precepts as humanly possible is immediately pounced upon by a million Montys, whether the writing is factually accurate or a sincerely held opposing position about non-fact matters. All media, just like all businesses and all politicians, go out of their way to avoid offending powerful religious beliefs.
Al the evidence we have, including that from those intimately familiar with the FLDS, says that they call themselves a Mormon church group. They may be apostates to LDS beliefs, but no outsider should let the LDS decide who can and can’t be called a Mormon.
It is a pertinent and fair point to call the LDS church on hypocrisy for insisting that others call its members Christians even when some Christians deny them this label and then to turn around and deny others the right to call those who have virtually the same beliefs Mormons because they differ on one major issue. History is nothing but a long litany of schisms in churches and religions. We don’t change the names of schismers unless they themselves choose to deny the label. That doesn’t appear to be the case here.
Either there is one special rule that only applies to Mormons or they abide by the same rules that every other religion is the world are held to. I vote for the latter.
Yes, but I think it’s a tradeoff…maybe a bit of a deal with the devil, so to speak…in order to have our Constitutional protections. I don’t think you can legitimately take homeschooling away from people, although I do think it’s reasonable to have guidelines to ensure that there is actual curriculum and learning that goes on. How that should get policed, I don’t know…maybe every homeschool should have to have a license and a caseworker?
I haven’t given much thought to it but I am not sure that forbidding home-schooling would have constitutional implications. Not sure on what theory that would arise.
Having said that, it would be a bad idea. Generally speaking, parents motivated to teach kids themselves are going to put a lot of work into it.
If the objection is that they’re indoctrinating them with wacky religious beliefs, well, they could do that even if the kids were in public school (and, they’re entitled to do so).
If the objection is that we have no way of knowing our home schooled kids is actually learning (despite the evidence of the spelling bees), and that a home-schooled kid could come out of the experience not knowing how to read, write, reason, or do math – sounds like home-schooling would have achieved parity with about 30% of my high school graduating class.
Well, in the case of these kinds of groups, I think the case could be made for freedom of religion.
I think you are right, except in the cases where there really isn’t any intention to teach them anything. There are some folks who still think that what children really need to learn to do is run a farm, and that means the girls especially don’t get a lot in the way of what we think of as formal education. I think a case could be made that this is not in the children’s best interests, but on the other hand, for groups such as the Amish this is intimately tied up with their religion. Is it constitutionally appropriate to tell them this is not acceptable? I don’t know.
Agreed on these points. I think what they don’t teach is perhaps more of an issue than what they do teach.
I definitely think that it’s bad logic to assume that homeschooling is inherently worse than regular schooling (or vice-versa, for that matter). It depends on a lot of variables, so I don’t think that it’s appropriate to blanketly condemn or outlaw home schooling. I think that this particular case shows a need for some kind of oversight, not just because of the educational issues, but because of the separatist nature of the group. Is the reason that they are homeschooling so that they can keep people from finding out that children are being molested? If so, that’s a problem much deeper and more serious than whether the kids are learning enough math. And, more imporanatly, more the business of the rest of society, the government, and law enforcement. Maybe the real question is, what constitutes probable cause to go in and see what this “home schooling” they are doing is all about?
Monty, please don’t put words in my mouth. I said the following:
The mainstream LDS church puts out their own style guide here. I meant their own style guide, not the AP style guide.
The AP style guide is written to be - in their words - inoffensive, unless there is an overriding reason, central to a significant news story, to include potentially offensive words or concepts.
Having been a big user of the AP Style Guide in a past life, I can say with certainty that “Mormon” is acceptable use in a print article, at least in Utah. Let me see if I can find an online Style Guide.
Ah…from the University of Utah Guide to AP Style found here:
Just because the LDS church says to do something, doesn’t mean journalists have to follow their guidelines. But journalists also strive to be inoffensive, and that includes following an organization’s requests, when an overriding concern does not exist.
I think it’s a matter of perception, here.
In the case of a major (NBA, hollywood, rock star, whatever) celebrity sleeping with a 16 year old, an argument might be made that the girl willingly consented to the sexual activity.
In the case where the young girl is kept isolated from mainstream society at large, and raised to believe that she has no say in who her sex partner/husband is, etc. (note the term “brainwashed” was used in the thread), the perception exists (as viewed by the outsiders) that she did not really give consent.
I know, but the point of statutory rape laws is to create a legal presumption that a sixteen year old is legally incapable of giving effective or sufficient consent, for a host of reasons, including the ones you identify in connection with the cult girls. Thus, any statutory (as opposed to forcible) rape charge presupposes that the girl (and the guy) thought she “willingly consented.”
Statutory rape laws are inherently paternalistic. They assume that sixteen year old girls are pretty stupid (consistent with my experience, would apply to boys too). They assume that they can be unduly influenced by a host of factors that should not properly have undue influence in a decision to have sex. One of those factors could be celebrity or wealth of the guy or a desire to be near famous people. One could be that dating an older guy is a status symbol. One could be religious conditioning. I am not sure I see a prima facie argument for why only the latter form of undue influence needs to be proscribed. Being told “you have to ‘marry’ me and have sex because it’s God’s will” is pretty heavy handed, and may arguably be too much for a sixteen year old to handle; but I am not sure it is objectively any worse than being told “Yo, whatever, I got plenty of girls who’ll sleep with me, if you won’t, I’m outta here” by a 22 year old thug boyfriend.
Put differently, I could argue that girls in certain lower socioeconomic milieus are sufficiently “isolated from mainstream society” that they are effectively almost incapable of making rational decisions as to whether to have sex – when the average girl starts having sex at 12, illegitimacy has no stigma, having a baby is a status symbol, your own mother is very likely to have been a teen mom; the deck is kind of stacked against making a reasoned decision, for the right reasons, to have sex with your gangsta boyfriend, or with Rasheed Wallace, or whoever. I just wonder why the government doesn’t get as worked up about that fact pattern as it does about “polygamy.” I think they should merit just about the same degrees of concern and control (whatever level that is).
To me, polygamy busts are almost Victorian. It just seems like the culture has gone past the point of caring about the sorts of activity that are actually involved here (boning lots of, possibly underage, chicks) except when they call it “plural marriage.” It’s kind of like when I see the cops busting an “illegal numbers game.” I’m thinking: Dude, should have just played the state lottery – but I just can’t get too morally outraged by the underlying conduct, deplorable or detrimental though it might well be, given that the state and society so widely tolerate it when it goes by another name.
And anyway, they’re providing a great deal of entertainment for the rest of us.
I didn’t. Don’t try to do it with me either, okay? The rest of your post was completely disingenuous.
Could you please explain your comment?
I found every line of Rico’s post to be flatly factual. If you think there is anything there that is not a simple truism*, I would very much like to hear your reasoning.
*a claim that is so obvious or self-evident as to be hardly worth mentioning, except as a reminder or as a rhetorical or literary device.
Say what? I thought the age of consent here in Texas was 17 , and had been so much longer than that. (At least as long as I’ve been old enough to care, albeit hypothetically.) Was someone pulling my leg? How does one get married without consenting?
Age of consent and age of marriage are different issues legally.
If you can show me one place in that post where I was not factual, or I put words in your mouth, then your statement can stand. Otherwise, I believe an apology is in order for calling me a liar.
Additionaly, when someone attacks your position on the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, you either reply with something completely different, trying to draw the other poster off the subject, or you nitpick the way the poster has referred to something. And you’re very good at getting me to fall for it, Monty.
Back to the question I originally asked: Why don’t the FLDS have the right to be called “Mormons?” And simply because someone in your church said so is not an acceptable reason. That’s the equivalent of Ford trying to convince people that Toyotas are not true cars because their leaders don’t do things the same way.
That’s a hoot. So until 2004, Texans could get married at 14, but couldn’t legally consummate the marriage until they were 17. Ah, Texas politics!
I believe that, in states where the age of marriage is lower than the age of consent, the statutes outlawing sex with minors always indicate that it only applies to people who are not married to each other.
What I find amusing is that, from the way the laws are written in the states I’ve studied, even an emancipated minor is breaking the law when they have sex with a non-spouse. Even if they’re married and legally able to have sex with their spouse, if they divorce their spouse and have sex with somebody else, or commit adultery, they’re breaking the law.
Actually, I think I inadvertently bent a concept in my previous post. Is the minor breaking the law? Or is the only lawbreaker the one who has sex with the minor?
Also, in Texas there can be an exception when both parties are of the same age (within three years). Even in that case, though, I’m pretty sure they both can expect a stern talking to.
Right. The statutes historically are not about sex, but about marriage. Most religious organizations, and certainly the ones who influenced legislation and pressured politicians, saw sex outside of marriage as a sin to be stamped out.
The acceptable age of a girl for marriage, as the FLDS correctly points out, was traditionally was around the age of menses, which historically appears to have been around thirteen. Teenage marriages were common throughout all segments of U.S. society in previous centuries.
Sex in marriage was assumed and sanctified (be fruitful and multiply, everyone). What a man did to his wife was his business.
Sex with a girl of marriageable age wasn’t that huge a deal and even pregnancy wasn’t a disgrace: as long as the couple immediately got married.
It’s only in recent years that age-old problems like wife-beating or child abuse have become issues for public discussion. But the law has only begun to catch up. In virtually every state - Texas is absolutely typical, not an exception - a man can legally marry a minor (though often only with parental or court approval) and have every sort of degraded sex with her a dozen times a day, but the same man, if unmarried, cannot even touch a minor girl without facing the real possibility of criminal sanctions. (And not just sex, but forced sex: It’s extremely recent historically that a man was likely to be legally charged with raping his minor wife if she resisted sex, remember.)
What is a breakaway sect reading their holy books literally supposed to do when religious hypocrisy is enshrined in the law but their religion’s traditionally prescribed behavior is now considered illegal? Who decides who’s right when the law one religious group or another forced through conflicts with the beliefs of another religious group?
Well, the religious group with the most money and power, of course. The rest of us have to try to listen to the hypocrisy without our heads exploding.