Back in early February I shared a National Geographic magazine front cover. The cover story was entitled: "Polygamy in America: one man, five wives, forty-six children and 239+ grandchildren." Yes this still exists in America!
This was not the first time I have heard about the controversial group called: "Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints" (FLDS).
History: This group split from the Mormons in 1930s because the Mormon church did not believe in plural marriage. An estimated of 38,000 people are a part of this new group who does believe in polygamy and are living in fourteen different cities in America.
I picked up this article because I was curious about the way they lived and
how could one be okay with polygamy. Girls wore old fashioned modest prairie dresses with elaborate coiffed hair. Boys in jeans and buttoned down long sleeve collared shirts. They lived with barely any electricity and modern day equipment and yet the ladies were not computer illiterate, had used a cell phone and could drive, but didn't want to escape. It was hard for me to picture a life like this, where everyone worked together, believed in the same morals and values and did the same type of work.
What caused the most questions and curiosity for me was the
"Plural marriage." This community believed that the "sole primary purpose for a woman in FLDS was to bear as many children as possible, to build up the "celestial family" that will remain together for eternity". This justified the marrying of six to over 80 wives to one man. The wives could be sisters and could be as young as fourteen. If their husband became ungodly they could be separated and given to another man.
So what kind of woman would want to stay? What kind of mother would let their teenage daughter be married to a middle aged man? What kind of wife would want to share her husband with 20 other women? They say one reason women stay is because of the power. They are held to higher standards, respected more because without them how could the men continue on with the "celestial family". The men also had lower power or so it felt like because they couldn't pick the wives they married and they couldn't decide if they were worthy of marriage. That was solely up to the prophet. So it almost seems to be a matriarchal society instead of patriarchal.
But still would this small honor and respect make you stay? You have no choice on how many children you give birth to and all you do is raise the children and work on the farm. Why stay?One woman said that it was because it was the only world she knew. "If we stepped outside of our home it would be server cultural shock." The girls and family say that they like it because we are a closer unit, "we do everything together. We are all going somewhere after this life so why not build a family to go with you?" Another young woman says, "I enjoy sharing my life with my sister and we are not like the media says." The media and probably many of us in this class believe is: "that they are a brainwashed cult and these girls have no say in the matter and are trapped." This lady said that it was nothing like that.
No matter how hard I try to figure it out or try not to judge them I am still confused and baffled by these decisions. I still don't see how this kind of culture could survive this long in America. Yes it would be cool to try to live the simple lives they lived but I couldn't live under the rules of marriage and so forth. It was defiantly interesting and eye opening read.
