I’ve lived in the area of Creston for approximately two years. On at least six occasions, I was close enough to “catch” snatches of conversation (yeah, I’m nosy).
Mostly they were amongst girls in their teens. All seemed to be under the local merchants’ marketing spell. Giggles and happy interactions seemed the norm. It was of no consequence as to what was said, but the tone and flavor of these very short snippets of unfettered young polygamist babble sounded like common social intercourse for that age group, to me.
From casual distant observation, these groups were totally free, happy and normal, except for their dress (but then, Sikhs dress different, too) than any other knot of culturally defined youth. I say, from what I have witnessed in Creston personally, read, and cobbled together via inductive reasoning, and lateral, LSD enhanced thought processes, speaking as an Oracle now, “If you allow religious exemptions, religious oppression through moral judgment laws, of any kind, you will reap a harvest of social dishonesty and strife.”
This current “legal” dilemma is due to the confusion caused by the entrenchment of one religious view over another in law. Christians don’t believe in Polygamy. They (Emily Murphy and other Christian movements) have entrenched their views many times, as they did their racists views, through the exclusion of certain cultures (defined by their use of the “Black Candle” Hashish.)
Think about the trauma caused to our society by this law of prohibition of Cannabis throughout its history. Can you spot the crime organizations; general lawlessness, founded on that piece of morality based religious legislation? From its sly introduction without a single word of debate on the bill register, to the fact that there was not a single incident of Cannabis use in this country at the time the law was enacted, and for more than a decade after. The obvious situation which has resulted is a clear indication to me of the contra effectiveness of this type of moronic religious based, racist legislation. Christian judgmental supremacy, still today, causes unrest and conflict in our Society. In my opinion, that is all that is presently at the root of Wally Opal’s stand on the Polygamists in Bountiful, today: This is a state sponsored religious persecution.
If Canadians want social peace, we must treat people equally in their choices under the law. Someone else’s lifestyle should be of no concern to us. Fair is fair, freedom of choices must be supreme. There are many laws on the books already, which deal with abuse when it truly occurs. These laws have been commonly defined in a secular way.
What happens in a private family home, its structure, or what practices they follow, or what substances they consume, is not the business of anyone else, or the state, unless there is a complaint of abuse as defined under our secular laws. What is so hard to understand about that? I’m tired of our Canadian lack of sophistication in the freedom department, past tired of judgmental Christian attitudes being ensconced into our laws by myopic fundamentalists. I’m tired of Stephen Harper’s, “God bless Canadians” and all the marketing which flows from that.
What I have experienced with my own two judgmental eyes in Creston is not of any concern to the rest of Canada, if we are to be free of religious interference in secular laws. Until someone complains there is no reason for us to be concerned any more than anyone else’s religious freedom, or anyone’s equal right to be free FROM another's religion. Until we understand that, Canadians are practicing hypocrisy, as usual.
No more Polygamist children suffer abuse at the hands of their parents than any other sector of society, including Catholics, Protestants, or Sikhs.
