I lived in Utah for a while but couldn't take the culture there and left. There are some very.... unusual folks there.

I am sure the sentence was probably affected, in large part, by this:
The woman, now 21 and the mother of three children by Fischer, refused to cooperate with the prosecution and was among 130 people to send letters vouching for his character to the judge.

It is very difficult to force an unwilling witness to testify well, and it is very difficult to win a case when your star witness hates you.

Of course, there's an excellent argument that she is/was essentially in a cult, and isn't/wasn't responsible enough to make her own decisions. But LEGALLY SPEAKING that's a tough hurdle to get over.

Wow. It's gotta be frustrating as all hell to be the prosecutor on that case.

It's been such a nightmare to prosecute the bigamists out there, from what I hear--I'm actually impressed they managed to get a conviction that actually had jail time attached to it.

I know that it's just completely beyond me, but what the fuck do a 14 and 40 year old "husband and wife" talk about? Why the hell would anyone see this as a type of "relationship" that they would want to be in?

I just finished taking a summer school in college and one of the assignments we had to do involved an essay to which we had to present to the class an issue affecting us in this country. One woman stood in front of the class and told how she had been raped at 13 by a family member, got pregnant, and only after her child was 2 did she tell her parents, and eventually the 'judicial' process was begun. Her rapists sentence; 6 months of house arrest!She offered the solution chemical castration as she rightly figured if they have sexual urges that are harmful they shouldn't be able to use them.

Can someone tell me how it is legal for an adult to marry a 16 year old but illegal to have sex with her? I don't get it.

Most people have heard of Stockholm Syndrome but I don’t think most can really wrap their minds around how frighteningly easy it can be to brainwash someone.

Mark Dutroux of Belgium was a sex trafficker and child rapist who became rich selling young Polish and Slovakian girls into prostitution throughout Europe. Dutroux owned seven houses in Belgium where he kept the girls he kidnapped and raped to “season� for selling into prostitution and pornography production. In 1989 he served three years in jail for raping five young girls, but he rose to international notoriety in 1996 when police found the bodies of numerous missing girls buried on his properties and in one house they found two captive girls in a basement-cum-dungeon.

When 14-year-old Laetitia and 12-year-old Sabine were released from the basement Dutroux had been using for years to break kidnapped girls into prostitution they thanked him and kissed him goodbye. Sabine was riding her bike to school in May 1996 when she was abducted and by August 1996, a mere 80 days later, she had been raped and tortured into believing Dutroux’s lies that he was protecting her and keeping her safe.

80 fucking days. Breaking a human mind with sexual torture is so much easier to do than anyone wants to believe.

WCgoddess, I believe that it is legal to marry AND have sex with a 16 year old IF:

1) Her parents/guardians sign the appropriate paperwork.
2) The marriage is legal in all other respects.

I'm going to assume that the 2nd condition was not met - if he was already married or if the wedding wasn't performed by the appropriate people, then the "marriage" would not be legal and, therefore, the ensuing sex wouldn't be either.

That's my assumption.

I'm surprised they even NEEDED the girl's cooperation - statuatory rape is statuatory rape.

And, BGS, I'm cynical, but I doubt they "talked" about anything at all. He probably had sex with her at night and she cleaned the house during the day and considered herself lucky to have a good man. The brainwashing of these poor girls doesn't begin with the "husband" - they get it from day one from their parents.

How did these charges come about? Who turned him in?

I'm very uncomfortable with this decision, not because I disagree with any of the previous comments about brainwashing, Stockholm syndrome, or the likely role of the wife, but because it's an incredibly dangerous thing to start governmental religious persecution -- and that's basically what this is.

1) Polygamy is legal in that area (it just apparently has a technicality of invalidating a subsequent marriage).

2) Marriage to a 16-year-old is legal in that area

3) Sex with a 16-year-old wife is legal in that area.

4) The wife is happy about her current circumstances

5) (speculation based on prior experience in the area) The wife was likely happy about her marriage when it happened.

A quick note on #5, since it's not directly supported by evidence in the article: I have friends in Utah with daughters. They were longingly thinking of marriage when they were 14. One didn't wait much longer than that to get pregnant, and subsequently married, though to a kid about her own age. Some of the others only just barely held out until they graduated high school, and promptly started churning out babies.

EJ's point about the problem beginning at day 1 from the culture in whch they are immersed is critical here. The court made special use of a technicality to penalize someone with an unpopular but legal religious practice of polygamy, not for marrying and sleeping with a 16-year-old. That's a practice that is considered perfectly acceptable in that area for non-polygamists.

My guess is that the judge has succeeded not in convincing this group that 45-year-olds marrying 16-year-olds is a bad idea, but that the law is out to get them, and thus they don't have any particular moral obligation to comply with any law they don't like. If he'd made the punishment stronger, it would have only succeeded in creating a martyr on top of that.

This is not a problem that can be fixed by prosecution at this stage, and indeed, I fear it not only makes the problem worse, but makes it easier for judges to try to go after other unpopular religions -- or atheism, which is more unpopular than any religion in most places.

In general, I also don't trust the government to break up families based on ideology even when I agree with the ideology used. That's the kind of weapon that can eventually be turned on you. It's one thing to provide a safe exit for any woman to wants out. It's another thing entirely to break her family pre-emptively when she doesn't -- whether or not that's because she's been brainwashed.

This has to be fixed generationally at the cultural level. Trying to do it punitively after the deed is done just causes futile misery and starts a slippery slope to judicial abuses.

one important differenciation to make is that between Mormons and Fundamentalist Mormons. The Fundamentalist sect of the Mormon church broke off from the mainstream church around a century ago in order to follow the "true and unpoluted" faith. these Fundamentalists are the one's practicing polygamy, a practice banned by the mainstream Mormon church long ago.

a note on plural marriages: only the first marriage is considered legally valid. all subsequent marriages, though recognized encouraged by the church, are not recognized by the U.S. government. many of these marriages are, in fact, between middle aged men and teenaged girls. not only this, but many of these marriages are often to cousins, nieces, step daughters, etc.

these young women have no choice but to live this life. if they refuse, they are turned out on their own with no money and few skills, knowing no one in the outside world.

Zed,

Unless I'm completely wrong, polygamy isn't legal anywhere in the United States.

If you marry legally - i.e. are legally married by an ordained priest/justice of the peace and accompanying marriage certificate - then you cannot be legally married to ANYONE else unless your first spouse is dead or divorced from you, again by legal channels.

Now, obviously, polyamorous relationships occur in Utah (and elsewhere) where several adults live together and consider themselves "married" in the eyes of their church but they are not legally married.

In other words, being not legally married, they do not have access to the "perks" of marriage, such as tax deductions, hospital visitation rights, and (in the case of a 16 year old "bride") sexual privileges.

Anyway, having spliced the difference between polygamy and polyamory, I don't particularly mind one way or another that the government trampled on religious convictions in this case. Any religious conviction that calls for the harm of a minor (and I do consider this to be a clear cut case of rape) is a religious conviction that deserves to be flung into the streets and danced upon.

Otherwise, we're going to have to give the coach from the 14-year-old prostitute thread the benefit of the doubt that he was acting on HIS religious convictions, too. After all, the girl wasn't unhappy enough to inform an elder about the situation. But, no. Religion cannot and should not be a catch-all shield for abuse.

deep red,

I didn't see your post or I wouldn't have repeated much of what you said. (sheepish)

I read a story once by a woman who had escaped fundamental Mormonism. She'd been something like 12 when she'd been married to a 30 year old uncle. It was terrible and very sad.

EJ:

According to the article, it is legal in Arizona, where the arrest was made.

EJ:

One more note as well: there's a substantial difference between not contacting authorities for help, and actively speaking in defense of the accused.

What the article says is "Although polygamy is unconstitutional in Arizona, it is not a crime."

I'm not sure what the legal distinction is, there, but it doesn't sound like polygamy is legal in Arizona (if it were, I'm sure we would be hearing about it very often from right-wing pundits as they fulminate against same-sex marriage; on the other hand, it would make it easier to get health insurance in AZ). Perhaps it's that the state refuses to recognize multiple marriages, but does not arrest those who do it either? (Unless they're creepy, child-abusing sleazebags, obviously.)

EG is right. The "marriages" are not legally recognized unions. The only difference is that it's not a crime to be "wedded" multiple times.

In some areas of the country, bigamy and polygamy are actively crimes. Which is to say, if Zed marries me, then marries EG, he has committed a crime. That said, even in Arizona, his subsequent marriage to EG is not valid or legally recognized - I would be his only legally recognized wife.

That's how I understand it, anyway.

And, Zed, my point about the coach was more that relgious freedom is a slippery slope for child abuse. A better example would perhaps be people who have to be court-ordered to provide their children with life-saving blood transfusions because they believe it's a form of cannibalism prohibited by their religion.

EJ:

I understand what you're saying, and to a certain extent I can even agree with it.

But it's a slippery slope in the other direction as well. If your family can be broken because the husband is a polygamist, the family can also be broken because the mother is a Wiccan. (This has actually happened. The grandparents fought to remove the children from their parents house on the grounds that the parents were unfit for practicing paganism, and won. Encouraging this practice scares the hell out of me. How long before athiests can't have kids either?)

The second point is that this court decision doesn't help solve the problem. A court order to provide an immediate life-saving treatment actually does something useful, and the child is likely to be grateful. This court case is just going to create more hostility and disrespect for law in its target audience. The man's wives aren't going to leave him. Girls in that subculture aren't going to suddenly believe that becoming a second wife is a bad thing. Girls that do believe that, but have nowhere to go, still won't have anywhere to go. Prospective husbands aren't going to change their minds about whether it's "right".

If one is going to do something incredibly dangerous in a courtroom, it should at least be useful.

I understand what you mean, and you picked better than you might realize with the Wiccan example as I have a lot of Wiccan friends and I know that's a concern that they share - that the government will break up their families due to prejudices.

Those are prejudices, though, that Wiccans are bad parents. This is not a case of a child being removed from a parent but rather a child bride being removed from an abusive (from a statutory sense if nothing else) husband. In other words, this is about the government's ability to separate a child from someone not her parent or legal guardian.

Furthermore, I do feel like we have laws regulating sexual relations between children and adults for a reason. If the girl was 16 and her husband was 20, that might be one thing. We might dislike the polygamy aspect, but accept the "marriage" as valid. But in the case of a 16 year old girl and a man nearly in his 40s, I'm not convinced it's a bad thing to go after this guy. Polygamy or not, he was in a sexual relationship with a minor. Now, granted, were this a monogamous relationship, the union *could* have been made legal through the proper channels, most notably the permission of her parents. That's not, however, the point.

This girl will, hopefully, be able to leave the situation that compelled her to marry a man more than twice her age and may, later on, be terribly grateful that the government stepped in. That's my hope anyway.

EJ:

If they had gotten to her when she was still 16, and showed her how much more she could make of her life, offered her a way out (i.e. paid for a plane ticket out and a college education), got her to accept, and then prosecuted him, I could possibly agree with you.

If they got to her when she was 7, taught her how much more she could do with her life, and once she got into trouble gave her those opportunities (i.e. paid for a plane ticket out and a college education), and arrested him before he could force her into a marriage that she'd agree to only because she couldn't get away, I'd absolutely agree with you.

Getting to her now, when she's been married for five years, has three kids, and loves it, and all she wants is to get her husband back, and then not even offering her anything...

No. Your hope isn't realistic. This arrest doesn't help her at all anymore. It's too late. All it does is reduce her income and hurt her and her children. It won't act as a deterrent to someone strongly religious, so it won't save any of the current sixteen year olds -- or seven year olds, a decade from now. In fact, it's probably going to make it worse, because now (if they weren't before) these kids are going to be solidly inculcated with a distrust of law enforcement officials and judges and anything they might say. They're going to be taught that the law took their daddy away for standing up for his religion, and obeying God before the king.

I can respect it from the standpoint of a matter of principle, but not at the cost of all the collateral damage, and especially not when it's futile.

This makes me think about neo-con politicians who say that if we legalize gay marriage then we’ll have the legalize polygamy. How is two consenting adults who want to get married the same as some guy who feels like he needs to get laid by 7 different (potentially underage) wives? I’m sorry, but it isn’t acceptable for a 40 year old man to have sex with a 16 year old in any situation. This isn’t about religious freedom; this is about women being abused.

Zed,

I hear what you're saying, but you thesis seems to be that since they didn't catch this guy when the girl was 16, and since the gov isn't in the habit of handing out college educations for free, then we just shouldn't do anything at all.

Furthermore, I don't think my hope is unrealistic at all. Having been freed from the controlling influence of her husband, I think her mind will be opened to a much larger world. Yes, she has children. But life doesn't end just because you have children and no college education. There are many government aid programs out there to help her; there are many feminist and religion-oriented aid groups as well.

Is it possible that everything will swing the opposite way and, like you said, she'll be unhappy and distrust the government even more. Yes, it's possible. Is that a compelling reason to not go after pedophiles? I, personally, don't think so.

I find it interesting that people here think it's ok for a minor to decide on their own to have an abortion, but not decide on their own who they can have sex with. No one here knows whether the 16 yo bride was willing or whether they were happy in the situation.

Is a 39 yo and a 16 yo relationship not normal? Yes. Bad? Not neccesarily, depending on its dynamics.

You're absolutely right, themoderate. We've really misjudged this guy. I'm sure he and his young bride had a very loving, egalitarian relationship. It's an often overlooked fact that 16 year old girls who aren't fully physically or mentally developed have a great deal in common with 39 year old men. Probably the relationship was a match made in heaven.

EJ, you do realize that 16 yo girls can be fully developed, don't you?

But that's besides the point. Do you think it's ok for her to make the decision to have an abortion at not at the mentally developed age of 16? Apparently, you don't, judging from your response.

I'm not saying that the relationship is healthy. I'm saying we don't KNOW if it is or not.

Yes, it has the ick factor, but it also has the ick factor if she was 18 and he was 39.

You're comparing apples and oranges.

If I support a 16 year old's right to an abortion so she isn't saddled with an unwanted child for the rest of her life, then I must (for some reason) also support pedophilia?

Please.

First off, it's not pedophilia. Look up the term. It doesn't fit here. Though, that word is misused so much, it might as well fit your misuse.

Second, who says she can't make a choice in both decisions? Who to have sex with and whether to have an abortion? You're saying she's only fit to make the 2nd one. Nevermind that you think she's mentally incapable of making that decision. So she's a woman in one case and a little girl in the other.

Please.

Did I say she shouldn't be allowed to have sex? No.

Did I say that men more than twice her age shouldn't be allowed to take advantage of her? Yes.

Gawd. I'm so sick of these discussions turning into some shit-flinging fest with a troll who insists that we should do away with statuatory rape laws so that 12 year olds and 50 year olds can be together. You know what? I'm just not going to feed the trolls this time. If you HONESTLY can't see why a 16 year old and a 40 year old is sexual abuse, then nothing I can say will change your mind.

You know you've lost the argument when you bring extremes in.

Where did I say that we should do away with statutory rape laws? And where did I saw that it's ok for 12 yo's to have sex with 50 yo's?

Do you even know that in many states the age of 16 is the age of consent? So, even if I thought it was okay, that's not doing away with any statutory rape laws.

I just find it interesting that you can't defend why it's ok for a 16 yo to decide to have an abortion when you don't think they're mentally able to.

The fact that you haven't even tried to defend the last point, shows you can't.

Oh, and calling someone a troll is the lamest argument there is. That's the last grasp of someone who can't defend their viewpoint. Touch'e.

Lastly, you may think a relationship between a 40 yo and 16 is abuse, but morally it's not clear cut.

I'm not for or against these things. I'm moderate. I like looking at all view points. Not just view points that immediately come to me. Perhaps you should.

EJ:

A better reduction of my point is that if the only thing we can do is make the situation worse, yes, the correct thing to do is nothing at all. I don't believe in taking principle so far that it ends in futile misery. I gave some examples of what would probably be necessary to actually make the situation better, but I'm not limiting the possibilities to just those. I'm just making stark contrast with the fact that nothing at all was proposed to help the victims in this case.

Side note with respect to themoderate's comments, though I'd rather not get dragged into heated discussion: the correct word is ephebophilia, not pedophilia. Also, I've deliberately avoided discussion of whether or not there are situations in which it is morally permissable for a 40 year old to marry (or sleep with) a 16 year old because I don't think it's relevant to this case -- this particular religious subculture is pretty clearly sealing off options for young girls and trying to make sure they never learn about them, and doing so for the benefit of its elder males -- but I think you are jumping to poorly supported conclusions about it in general (and conclusions that are not uniformly held even in the United States, where a number of states do set the age of consent at 16 years, if I remember correctly). I suggest some caution before anger.

I'll note that I don't believe 16 year olds should be allowed a marriage license, but for reasons that probably neither you nor themoderate would like.

LOL. Themoderate, if you think I'm bringing in a crazy extreme, you weren't here a few weeks ago when that very thing was suggested and, quite frankly, I'm sick of having to explain over and over again why we have statuatory rape laws. I'm especially sick and tired of people insisting that a relationship like that could possibly be healthy just so they can stir everyone up - that's trolling by my book. Sorry if you don't think so.

The sky is blue, grass is green, and 39 year old men shouldn't be having sex with 16 year old girls. To me, it's just that obvious. Sorry if you don't feel that way. Anyway, we're just going to have to agree to disagree and, I assure you, I'll keep my personal feelings on you (and the other posters who post things like that) to myself. :)

EL, no problem. We'll agree to disagree on this.:-)

EJ, I mean!

For the record, too, I didn't call you a troll because I disagree with you. I disagree with a lot of folks.

You basically barged in here and called us all hypocrites for being pro-abortion, yet not pro-pedophilia. For all your protested innocence in saying you just want a discussion, you've yet to explain a single reason why you think a 16 year old and a 39 year old is a healthy relationship. You've just told us that it IS healthy and that if we're not all in favor of such a relationship, then we basically need to revoke this girl's abortion rights or resign ourselves to being hypocrites.

Barging into a discussion, assuming you know everyone's viewpoints, making a statement as if it were fact, comparing it to something completely unrelated, and then telling everyone they must agree with you or be two-faced smells suspiciously like trollish behavior. All I'm saying is that's why you got the name tossed at you and you might want to keep that in mind next time.

And if you really want to make a good case for this relationship being healthy, then for god's sake say WHY you think it's healthy. Don't just make a ridiculous comparison and when I refuse to debate on your terms say, "Yay, I won!" Which is basically what you were doing when you said,

"The fact that you haven't even tried to defend the last point, shows you can't."

I didn't defend the abortion point because I reject your premise that the two are related at all! This is clear cut troll-ism, so try not to do it again.

Peace out.

"You basically barged in here and called us all hypocrites for being pro-abortion, yet not pro-pedophilia... You've just told us that it IS healthy and that if we're not all in favor of such a relationship, then we basically need to revoke this girl's abortion rights or resign ourselves to being hypocrites." - EJ

Just for the record, I don't think themoderate ever said these things.

noname:

The argument that themoderate made is basically that since there is a presumption that a 16 year old girl is old enough to decide to have sex, and old enough to decide to have an abortion, then that same 16 year old should be old enough to decide to marry a much older man, and it should not be presumed that coercion was in play. This can well be described as pro-permitting-ephebophilia, which is misnamed pedophilia by a lot of people (pedophilia specifically refers to prepubescents).

The primary question, which EJ is assuming will come out one way and themoderate is assuming will come out another, is whether or not the inherent imbalance in experience between an older man and the girl invariably means that the older is manipulating the younger for his own sexual or domestic needs, which violates the principle of informed consent and constitutes abuse.

Since it's pretty clear that in the case of these polygamists, that is true, I don't think it's a discussion relevant right now, though.

EJ, as noname indicated, I didn't say those things. You're taking my viewpoints and distorting them.

Zed is correct in explaining my viewpoint in his previous comment.

I just don't like the basic assumption that it IS unhealthy. I never said the relationship IS healthy. That's why I didn't explain it.

one important differenciation to make is that between Mormons and Fundamentalist Mormons.

This has come up in three different threads that I've read today. No, it isn't important to make that distinction. I'm tired of people defending their relgion (or a religion) by pointing out that they aren't practicing whackjobs. To an athiest there isn't any visible distinction.

I wish I believed that these prosecutions would help.

themoderate:

Please don't take my comment as a strong defense, by the way. Your argument does in fact break down to claiming that it is hypocritical to claim that a 16 year old can choose abortion, but not choose a 40 year old husband, and implicit in that is that ephebophilia can be acceptable (though I balk at going all the way to calling that pro-ephebophilia, for the same reason that I find it inappropriate to refer to reproductive rights supporters as pro-abortion).

What I wanted to bring to the front was the implicit assumptions about the nature of the power imbalance contained in both your and EJ's positions.

I agree with EJ that if think that if you seriously believe that the culture in which those girls are raised (speaking not to the generalization here, but to the case specifically under discussion) is healthy, you are carrying a view of reality sufficiently disjoint from ours that we're probably going to have a hard time having a discussion.

I'm just not willing to take that conclusion to the general case you introduced. (And I think what's getting you called a troll is that you did jump out of a discussion of a specific case to attacking the general case, while managing not to even mention the fundamental power imbalance problem that underlies the general case. That's a form of straw man attack, though I am inclined to grant the benefit of the doubt that it isn't a deliberate one.)

(And on my final edit pass, sheesh, I wrote this as formally as I know how for a quick response, but I still feel like a little kid sticking his tongue out and going "but you're both wrong, so nyeah!". I think I'm going to bow out now.)

Zed,

You're probably correct in that I was addressing the topic more generally than to this specific case outlined in the article. I was doing that because some of the earlier responses were more general in nature, like this one:

"know that it's just completely beyond me, but what the fuck do a 14 and 40 year old "husband and wife" talk about? Why the hell would anyone see this as a type of "relationship" that they would want to be in?"

Nowhere in the article is there a mention of someone 40 and 14. People respond and make it look even worse than the facts state, and there's no need for that if the facts speak for themselves.

Perhaps I should have addressed the power imbalance more. Maybe next time.:-)

The power imbalance is the key, and it's so deeply ingrained in the culture of Colorado City and similar communities that I'm having trouble coming up with even a perfect-world solution. My folks are nurses at the hospital in Flagstaff, and as a result ride herd on a steady parade of young girls coming in from the Arizona Strip. 18-year-olds having their second or third baby, accompanied by a few of the "sister wives," the invariably much-older husband sticking his head in the room, grunting, leaving. They pamper the newborn for a night before sending the baby and child-mom home to the trailer the old man keeps parked in the yard behind the main house. These girls are physically exhausted years before the average American girl even thinks about marriage, and education is a laughable afterthought. They're married off as young adolescents to their old uncles and kept as brood mares, and are raised to think it's the only possible life to lead.

That's the bit that angers me and tends to make me lose my focus on how to construct a logical argument that simultaneously protects these girls and doesn't serve up any nasty precedents that might be used to deny religious (or a-religious) liberties to anyone.

"I just don't like the basic assumption that it IS unhealthy. I never said the relationship IS healthy. That's why I didn't explain it."

Textbook trollism.

You guys always rip in here and argue semantics. So let me get this straight: You object to the *assumption* that the relationship is unhealthy. But you're not saying it ISN'T unhealthy. Well, if you aren't saying it isn't unhealthy, then why do you object to the assumption???

If you think there is a possibility that this relationship could be healthy, then please say why - Which is what I've said. If you don't think that's possible, then don't get your knickers in a knot because we assumed it.

And, oh, saying "I find it interesting that people here think it's ok for a minor to decide on their own to have an abortion, but not decide on their own who they can have sex with....So she's a woman in one case and a little girl in the other." IS calling us hypocrites in so many words. So don't give me the innocent act because it's not working.

Since you've yet to give a single reason about why this relationship MIGHT be healthy, I stand by my assuption that it isn't.

Your argument does in fact break down to claiming that it is hypocritical to claim that a 16 year old can choose abortion, but not choose a 40 year old husband, and implicit in that is that ephebophilia can be acceptable

Whoops. On a second pass through I see Zed already explained why you were calling us hypocrites. Thank you, Zed. :)

Perhaps I should have addressed the power imbalance more. Maybe next time

Considering you didn't address it at all, maybe you should.

And now you've changed your defense from "I objected to the assumption!" to "I saw someone misread the girl's age so I felt it was my responsibility to troll!"

The reason the girl was called "14" instead of "16" has nothing to do with someone evilly twisting the facts to make the case seem worse, as you claim. I realize you have to be a non-troll to realize that it was an honest mistake. Two headlines came out the SAME DAY: One involving a 16 year old girl in a polygamy relationship and one involving a 14 year old girl forced into prostitution. It was a simple question of mixing two stories when posting.

If you REALLY objected to that, a simple statement would have set the record straight instead of bursting in and calling us two-faced.

Noname, I'm starting to like you, so I'm going to explain why I said what I said about themoderate, since you think I'm out of line.

Barging into a discussion, assuming you know everyone's viewpoints,

Themoderate stated that, "I find it interesting that people here think it's ok for a minor to decide on their own to have an abortion, but not decide on their own who they can have sex with." He assumed we all think minors should be allowed to have abortions, and on their own say-so. He has no way of knowing this since we haven't even discussed abortion in this thread.

making a statement as if it were fact,

Themoderate said, "Is a 39 yo and a 16 yo relationship not normal? Yes. Bad? Not neccesarily, depending on its dynamics." This is a statement of opinion, but he states it as fact. He gives no examples of normal, healthy "dynamics" for us to debate, he just informs us that they exist.

comparing it to something completely unrelated,

Do I really need to explain this one? Minors having abortions and minors having sex with people twice their age are completely unrelated topics.

and then telling everyone they must agree with you or be two-faced

Zed and I have already tackled this one.

So there you go, noname. A breakdown of why I said what I said and why, in fact, themoderate DID do all those things. Enjoy! :)

EJ, I don't really feel like arguing about this more. I just wanted to address one point:

You wrote: "He assumed we all think minors should be allowed to have abortions, and on their own say-so. He has no way of knowing this since we haven't even discussed abortion in this thread."

Nice statement of fact. Haven't you considered the slight possibilty I've read threads about teenage abortion on here, like this one:

http://feministing.com/archives/005440.html

or this one

http://feministing.com/archives/003145.html

or this one

http://feministing.com/archives/005428.html

Two of the three posted within the last month or so. But I must be a troll, and haven't be following anything. *rolls eyes*

I'm not sure if it's directly related, but there was recently a pro-polygamy rally in Utah, where the children in polygamist families spoke out in favor of it.