Stopping Polygamy Thru Taxation
It's the same way they shut down Al Capone, right? From NYT:
HILDALE, Utah, April 19 - Thousands of polygamists are engaged in a highly unusual standoff here over property taxes that could ultimately cost them their houses or thrust them into a mainstream America they fear and despise.
In one corner is a group of 8,000 or so adherents of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, an offshoot of the Mormon Church that had long paid the property taxes of its members, sometimes even rolling a wheelbarrow through meetings to collect the needed cash.
At the other corner is a stocky accountant from Salt Lake City, Bruce R. Wisan, who says he is determined to help the church members even if they do not want it.
The church hierarchy is in chaos. Its former leader is on the run, facing criminal charges of arranging sex between a minor and an adult in a polygamous marriage, leaving the old tax-collection system in shambles. Now the property taxes for hundreds of houses - around $1.3 million - are overdue and mounting.
[...] On Wednesday night, Mr. Wisan took the extraordinary step of convening a town hall meeting to wheedle, threaten and beg residents to break with tradition and pay their individual tax bills - and thus, in a very real way, enter the American mainstream.
For those that don't know, Hildale, Utah is a twin city to Colorado City, Arizona:
which is home to the largest concentration of FLDS polygamists.
If consenting adults want to get together in a polyamorous relationship, that's cool with me. In fact, I've had a couple friends on LJ and even IRL who swear Poly is a great lifestyle, if you know what you're getting into, can handle the jealousy, etc etc.
But I have MAJOR problems with fundamentalist, religion-based polygamy. In contrast to secular poly relationships that people choose on their own, most of the people in FLDS polygamist marriages never had a choice - these women were born into a cult-like lifestyle and basically forced into "marriage" at early ages, often while still teenagers. It's abuse, plain and simple. If it were going on in another country, we could cry "Oh, the humanity!" but it's going on right in our own country, and no one cares to pay attention.
Don't get me started on stuff like this:
The Colorado City/Hildale, Utah area has the world's highest incidence of fumarase deficiency, an extremely rare genetic condition which causes severe mental retardation. Geneticists attribute this to the prevalence of cousin marriage between descendants of two of the town's founders, Joseph Smith Jessup and John Yeates Barlow; at least half the double community's roughly 8,000 inhabitants are descended from one or both.
UGH.
HILDALE, Utah, April 19 - Thousands of polygamists are engaged in a highly unusual standoff here over property taxes that could ultimately cost them their houses or thrust them into a mainstream America they fear and despise.
In one corner is a group of 8,000 or so adherents of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, an offshoot of the Mormon Church that had long paid the property taxes of its members, sometimes even rolling a wheelbarrow through meetings to collect the needed cash.
At the other corner is a stocky accountant from Salt Lake City, Bruce R. Wisan, who says he is determined to help the church members even if they do not want it.
The church hierarchy is in chaos. Its former leader is on the run, facing criminal charges of arranging sex between a minor and an adult in a polygamous marriage, leaving the old tax-collection system in shambles. Now the property taxes for hundreds of houses - around $1.3 million - are overdue and mounting.
[...] On Wednesday night, Mr. Wisan took the extraordinary step of convening a town hall meeting to wheedle, threaten and beg residents to break with tradition and pay their individual tax bills - and thus, in a very real way, enter the American mainstream.
For those that don't know, Hildale, Utah is a twin city to Colorado City, Arizona:
which is home to the largest concentration of FLDS polygamists.
If consenting adults want to get together in a polyamorous relationship, that's cool with me. In fact, I've had a couple friends on LJ and even IRL who swear Poly is a great lifestyle, if you know what you're getting into, can handle the jealousy, etc etc.
But I have MAJOR problems with fundamentalist, religion-based polygamy. In contrast to secular poly relationships that people choose on their own, most of the people in FLDS polygamist marriages never had a choice - these women were born into a cult-like lifestyle and basically forced into "marriage" at early ages, often while still teenagers. It's abuse, plain and simple. If it were going on in another country, we could cry "Oh, the humanity!" but it's going on right in our own country, and no one cares to pay attention.
Don't get me started on stuff like this:
The Colorado City/Hildale, Utah area has the world's highest incidence of fumarase deficiency, an extremely rare genetic condition which causes severe mental retardation. Geneticists attribute this to the prevalence of cousin marriage between descendants of two of the town's founders, Joseph Smith Jessup and John Yeates Barlow; at least half the double community's roughly 8,000 inhabitants are descended from one or both.
UGH.