Kids, and Plygs, and Tilda Swinton

Of course you’ve all heard about it by now:
From CBS News via AP:
“More than 400 children, mostly girls in pioneer dresses, were swept into state custody from a polygamist sect in what authorities described Monday as the largest child-welfare operation in Texas history.

The days-long raid on the sprawling compound built by now-jailed polygamist leader Warren Jeffs was sparked by a 16-year-old girl's call to authorities that she was being abused and that girls as young as 14 and 15 were being forced into marriages with much older men… Still uncertain is the location of the girl whose call initiated the raid. She allegedly had a child at 15, and authorities were looking for documents, family photos or even a family Bible with lists of marriages and children to demonstrate the girl was married to Dale Barlow, 50.”

Let me say at the onset that I have a policy of zero tolerance when it comes to child abuse—particularly sexual abuse of a child. If these children were being married off at such young ages (and no, I don’t believe any of it can be considered “consensual”) then that absolutely constitutes child abuse in my mind. I don’t believe the law should allow any kid to be married before age 18—regardless of parental consent. I mean, what good could come of it? If, indeed, that’s what was happening, then by all means, get those kids out of there. (And, while you're at it, can we charge these folks with erecting an eyesore? I didn't think west Texas could look any worse...but I'll be damned!)

But there’s another issue at hand here—are these folks being unfairly targeted because they’re polygamists? No, I don’t subscribe to the same doctrine at the core of FLDS beliefs. (In fact, every time I hear them referred to as “fundamentalist Mormons,” I cringe a little…only moments after waking from my stress-induced coma.) But there are multitudes of lifestyle choices to which I do not subscribe, yet I do not believe differences between us gives the government a free pass to raid at will.

For example, anyone recognize the name Tilda Swinton? Well, let me introduce you. Tilda Swinton is an Academy Award-winning actress (2008, Best Performance by an Actress in a Supporting Role, “Michael Clayton”.) She lives in Scotland, with Scottish painter John Byrne, the father of her twins, Xavier and Honor. However, she maintains a relationship with Sandro Kopp, a New Zealand painter, while continuing her live-in relationship with Byrne. She has been with Kopp since 2004 and the relationship has Byrne's blessing.

I do not agree with Tilda Swinton’s lifestyle. I think she’s a weirdo of monumental proportion and I think her living arrangements demonstrate a gross degree of selfishness. In fact, I’ll go so far as to say that what she’s doing is by far worse than what the polygamists are doing. (After all, when plygs sleep around, at least they publicly vow binding, life-long commitments to those with whom they make babies, right?) But I would not support a raid on Tilda Swinton’s home based on an unsubstantiated allegation, nor do I think anything of the sort would ever take place, simply because, in our culture, infidelity is a more acceptable lifestyle choice than is polygamy.

Now, my guess is there’s something we don’t know—maybe the raid was based on more than the phone call, maybe the phone call was the last straw—who knows? In addition to that, we have to consider location—after the Branch Davidian episode, you can’t expect Texans to suffer residents of “compounds” of any sort.

But, there was a report yesterday of a “standoff” at the FLDS temple wherein members would not grant access to law enforcement officials who were, ostensibly, in search of the girl who’d made the initial phone call. This was as disturbing to me as the entire rest of the story. How would I feel, how would I respond, given the same situation? Would I grant government access to a building I believed to be holy simply because the government had demanded it? It’s a hard call.

I’m wanting some feedback here, people!