Christian Gender Equality.

[Pure]

Comment?

(Fortunately the specific practices below only apply to a couple thousand women ... in Utah, Colorada, and Arizona. Oh, and there is likely just this one prosecution which has a good chance of failing to prove its case.)

http://www.religionnewsblog.com/16616/preliminary-hearing-for-polygamist-warren-jeffs

Preliminary Hearing for Polygamist Warren Jeffs

CNN, Larry King Live, USA
Nov. 21 2006 Transcript


ReligionNewsBlog.com • Item 16616 • Posted: Tuesday November 21, 2006


TED ROWLANDS, GUEST HOST: Tonight, Warren Jeffs the polygamist, captured after an FBI manhunt, in court for a preliminary hearing facing a tearful former child bride. She says he forced her to marry an older man against her will as her godly duty. Jeffs says he’s being persecuted for his beliefs.
Now, hear from other women who risked it all to flee his arranged marriages, next on “LARRY KING LIVE.”

Hello, everybody. I’m Ted Rowlands, in for Larry King tonight.

Unbelievable testimony today in the pretrial hearing of Utah polygamist Warren Jeffs. On the stand, a young woman who says she was 14 when Jeffs forced her to marry a 19-year-old first cousin. Spectators sat quietly as she detailed the events leading up to her marriage ceremony.

We’ll get to our guest in a moment. But first, let’s listen to a portion of the young woman’s gut-wrenching testimony. We’re going to listen to a lot of it throughout this next hour.

In this first clip, she talks about realizing for the first time that she was being ordered to marry her first cousin.
(BEGIN AUDIO FEED)

UNIDENTIFIED VICTIM: When I finally realized who they were going to have me marry, I was devastated. I immediately stood up and walked out of the room. I wanted — I mean, it shocked me so much that I just couldn’t handle it. I walked up to my mother’s room. I told her, Mom, I know who I’m going to marry. And she says, really, who? And I told her you’re going to have me marry Allen. And she said, no, they’re not, He’s your first cousin. They wouldn’t do that.
(END AUDIO FEED)

ROWLANDS: Very emotional day in court today. Our panel — two of the folks that we’ll be talking through the hour were in court. We’ll get their first-hand perspective.
Mike Watkiss is a reporter for the Phoenix station KTVK. He’s reported extensively on Warren Jeffs and his FLDS Church and its polygamist practices.
Sarah Hammon was also in court for today’s dramatic testimony. She was raised in a polygamist household with more than 70 children and some 19 sister-wives. Says her father, who was once a contender to become prophet in the church, sexually abused her. To avoid a forced marriage, she ran away from the community as a young teenager.

Fawn Broadbent said Warren Jeffs would not allow her to leave his FLDS group when she wanted to at the age of 16. So she escaped. She’s now 19-year-old — she’s 19 years old.

And Laurie Allen, a former polygamist wife, who escaped from a polygamist sect at the age of 16. She is also a documentary filmmaker. “Banking on Heaven: Polygamy in the Heartland of the American West,” is the title of her film.

Let’s first go to Mike Watkiss, who is in St. George, Utah.

Mike, boy, what a day. It sounds like it was very, very dramatic. Fill us in. What happened?

MIKE WATKISS, REPORTER, KTVK: Well, you said it, Ted. Gut wrenching, heartbreaking, very dramatic day here in the St. George courtroom. This young woman has so much pressure on her shoulders.

A lot of people think that Warren Jeffs ought to really face charges of crimes against humanity for the many lives he would has affected, and many people would argue, ruined.

But it really all boils down to these few charges — rape as an accomplice — and this one star witness. We finally got to see her today. You can’t show her face on television. But her testimony was indeed emotional, chronicling the events that led up to her marriage, at 14 years of age to a 19-year-old young man who is her first cousin. A guy she apparently did not like, who apparently bullied her throughout her young life when they were kids together.

She was placed into this marriage, allegedly by Warren Jeffs, and told to go home and to submit to your husband. This young man allegedly raped her, then, repeatedly. Those are the charges that Mr. Jeffs now faces.

ROWLANDS: Sarah Hammon was also in the court for the dramatic testimony today.
Sarah, how was it for you, given what you have been through, to see this young woman on the stand
?
SARAH HAMMON, VICTIM: Ted, at one point I just teared up. It ripped my heart out to listen to what this young woman went through. And it just broke my heart.

ROWLANDS: Let’s listen to another clip from today’s testimony. This one — in this clip the girl talks at how she went to Warren Jeffs and his father at one point and tried to keep this marriage from happening. Take a listen.

(BEGIN AUDIO FEED)
UNIDENTIFIED VICTIM: And I just said, I don’t think that this is right for me because I just feel like that I need to have some time to grow up. And I said, and I — I’m not willing to marry my cousin. He asked me if I was praying about it. I said, yes, I am. And everything is telling me not to do this. Every part of my soul and heart is telling me that that this isn’t right for me.
(END AUDIO FEED)

ROWLANDS: Mike Watkiss, Warren Jeffs is not accused of raping this young woman. Let’s clear it up — just to make sure everybody’s clear. He is accused of exactly what? What was his role in this?

WATKISS: Basically, they’re alleging here in the state of Utah that Mr. Jeffs, being the only person in that culture, who can put together marriages, is the man who, in fact, put these two young people together, the 14-year-old girl and her 19-year-old first cousin, and then told them to go home and basically have her submit to this man.

So Warren Jeffs is an accessory in the state’s theory to this — the raping of this young woman. Again, they allege that this young man then took her home and did just that, and raped her on multiple occasions.
FLDS

[[The Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is a sect of Mormonism. Mormonism in turn is a cult of Christianity.]]



And the thing that I think is important for people to understand is this is not an isolated charge. This is not an isolated claim that this young woman is making. We’ve been telling these stories for the better part of a decade in reference to Mr. Jeffs. She’s one of many young women, who have gotten out of there — run either after they’ve been married or before they get married — tell very similar stories.
So a very powerful day of testimony from this young woman. But again, she’s not the only person who has experienced what she’s talking about.

ROWLANDS: Fawn Broadbent, you experienced, first hand, what was talked about to some degree. At what point did you decide I have to get out of here?

FAWN BROADBENT, VICTIM: I was at the age of 14 years old when my father came to me and told me he was going to have me put in the Joy Book to be married. And it freaked me out. I didn’t want to be married. And he asked me, point blank, if I wanted to be a single life or a plural wife. And I told him I wanted to be a single wife. And he was — he told me how disappointed he was in me, and the prophet would be in me. And it just freaked me out so I did everything I could not to get married.

ROWLANDS: How much power does Warren Jeffs have, or did he have, when you were there? You lived in Colorado City or Hilldale?

BROADBENT: I lived in Colorado City, Arizona. The power that he has — if he tells someone to jump off a bridge, they will do it. That’s how much power he did have, and still has, over the people down there. They’re all he knows.

ROWLANDS: Lori Ellen, you also escaped, I guess, for lack of a better term. Tell us what you had to do to get out of the life you were in and, I guess, the only life that you knew?

LAURIE ALLEN, VICTIM: Well, I was — I was kidnapped at the age of 8 and kept for eight years, basically as a child slave. And I never finished the fourth grade.
And you know, the sad thing is that this is happening to a lot of people. I mean, my case might have been extreme compared to some. And this young lady who testified today, her case is, you know, sad, as all get out. But the thing is it’s happening all over the place. I mean, these people are doing this all the time. And for one person to step up is very courageous.

But, you know, the American people need to understand that this is not uncommon. It’s like Mike says, this is going on all the time. And it needs to be cleaned up.

ROWLANDS: Well, then why has it taken so long for this case to have come to fruition? And why are we only talking about it now?

ALLEN: Well, I think that, if you look at polygamy in general, you’ve got it in Utah, Arizona, Nevada, Colorado, and Texas, the state of our president. These are republican states, these are red states.

I think these people are being protected by corrupt politicians who don’t want to do their job, aren’t enforcing the law. They’re giving these people free handouts. They’re not even making these women give the names of their father of their children. They’re all on the dole. And I think that it’s just another big scandal.
I mean, here we’ve got the Yearning for Zion Ranch going up in Texas, and this is our president’s state. He’s talking about the axis of evil in the Middle East. Well, what about the evil that’s going on right in America and nobody’s doing anything about it?

ROWLANDS: All right. A dramatic day. We’re going to have more about not only what happened in court today, but more about the FLDS Church, more on the spellbinding testimony from today.

As we go to break, let’s listen to another exert from today’s testimony, heartbreaking testimony, in the Utah courtroom.
(BEGIN AUDIO FEED)

UNIDENTIFIED VICTIM: This entire time that I was there, I was crying and I just — I honestly just wanted to die because I was so scared. Excuse me. Sorry. This is very hard for me to relate. It’s not easy. It’s very painful. This was the darkest time in my entire life, one of the most painful things I’ve ever been through. And I’ve always just tried to forget it and put it out of my mind.
(END AUDIO FEED)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN AUDIO FEED) UNIDENTIFIED VICTIM: He told me how easy it was to molest people because they wait for opportunities. And they watch for moments. And they get used to people’s habits. And they work around it pretty much.

UNIDENTIFIED VICTIM: And then you grow up also going to bed every night and laying awake for hours waiting to hear the footsteps coming down the hall.
That’s a clip from “Banking on Heaven: Polygamy in the Heartland of the American West,” Lorie Allen’s documentary.

Mike Watkiss in the courtroom today. How far did this go, this testimony, in terms of really giving people an inside track? Unlike yourself, who has been covering this extensively? But for others, an inside look at this life that has been going on for literally 100 years.

WATKISS: Yes, I think it was a breathtaking example for people who have are sort of uninformed or ill educated on this.

This young woman sort of condensed it all, Ted. Talked about this — this lifestyle, where she was basically pulled out of school, only got through the ninth grade, minimal education, no contact with the outside world, no meaningful alternatives ever presented to her at any point in her life. Her only role, from the moment of her birth, what she was told, was to be an obedient daughter of Zion and to be a mother of Zion, and produce offspring as soon as the prophets told her to take a man.

And so I think we got a real clear picture of what the life is like for the young women in that culture. Of course, there’s a myriad of other issues. The young men who are basically used as slave labor until they’re adolescence, and then tossed out of the community because you just can’t have an equal split of men and women.

The grown men, who fall out of favor of Warren Jeffs and have their families taken away. But she really condensed it all.

America, if they’re going to take a focus on this, they need to focus on real crimes, not on people’s beliefs. I think that’s right. And the bottom line is this is where the rubber meets the road. These are the victims of crime, young women, no alternatives, forced into these marriages and then, in essence, raped by their husbands.

ROWLANDS: Sarah, you said that you were brought to tears at one point listening to this testimony. How many girls went through, and are going through, what you went through and what this young woman who courageously testified today to — how many girls would you say are out there? And is this really, as has been alluded to on the panel, something that has not only been happening for years, but is still occurring?

HAMMON: Yes. I would echo what mike and Laurie both said. That young woman today, she represents thousands of women, at least a couple of thousand women out there who are going through this right now — today.

 

[cloudy]

Yay! Let's condemn the entire religion because of the actions of a few!

Let's jump on the hate bandwagon!

It's all the style, you know.

(I'm so fucking tired of people who believe that they're superior just because they happen to be pale, and believe that a carpenter became a zombie after three days in a grave.)

hey....if some of y'all can down muslims, I can sure as hell down Christians

 

[Pure]

Footnote:

A fact to consider regarding the Equal Rights Amendment of 1972

"SECTION 1. Equality of rights under the law shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of sex.
"SEC. 2. The Congress shall have the power to enforce, by appropriate legislation, the provisions of this article.

**This did NOT pass in the required number of states, during the 1970s because of opposition from Christians and Christian churches in these states:

NOT RATIFIED: UT, AZ, ARK, MISS, AL, GA, VA.

RATIFIED THEN RESCINDED: ID, SD,NE, KE, TENN

Passed in one house only: NV, OK, MO, IL, NC, SC, LA, FLA

The Republican Party withdrew its early support.
___

**List from Wikipedia.

 

[Misty_Morning]

(I'm so fucking tired of people who believe that they're superior just because they happen to be pale, and believe that a carpenter became a zombie after three days in a grave.)

hey....if some of y'all can down muslims, I can sure as hell down Christians

You're my hero.

 

[3113]

I'm so fucking tired of people who believe that they're superior just because they happen to be pale, and believe that a carpenter became a zombie after three days in a grave.

Cool. That means that when he returns again, an everyone rises from their graves, we'll have the Zombie Apocalypse!

Puts a whole new spin on Night of the Living Dead, doesn't it?

 

[CharleyH]

A fact to consider regarding the Equal Rights Amendment of 1972

"SECTION 1. Equality of rights under the law shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of sex.
"SEC. 2. The Congress shall have the power to enforce, by appropriate legislation, the provisions of this article.

**This did NOT pass in the required number of states, during the 1970s because of opposition from Christians and Christian churches in these states:

NOT RATIFIED: UT, AZ, ARK, MISS, AL, GA, VA.

RATIFIED THEN RESCINDED: ID, SD,NE, KE, TENN

Passed in one house only: NV, OK, MO, IL, NC, SC, LA, FLA

The Republican Party withdrew its early support.
___

**List from Wikipedia.

I suppose I am odd, but I've never understood why under a supposed "Judeo-Christian" society with one god, we have ever had to fight for rights - all of us - male or female, black, native, white, muslim, christian, jew, or even politically communist or democratic. Religion and politics make no sense to me - they are all the same - everything about them - yet we argue little idiosyncracies.

 

[SweetPrettyAss]

Yay! Let's condemn the entire religion because of the actions of a few!

Let's jump on the hate bandwagon!

It's all the style, you know.

(I'm so fucking tired of people who believe that they're superior just because they happen to be pale, and believe that a carpenter became a zombie after three days in a grave.)

hey....if some of y'all can down muslims, I can sure as hell down Christians

Actually, the group being described is an extreme division of the more mainstream LDS church. In all honesty, I would call the LDS church a sect rather than a cult since they have so many members. Women in the church are pressured to marry early and have many children. Girls are taught from birth that their primary goal in life is to be good wives and mothers.

 

[cloudy]

Actually, the group being described is an extreme division of the more mainstream LDS church. In all honesty, I would call the LDS church a sect rather than a cult since they have so many members. Women in the church are pressured to marry early and have many children. Girls are taught from birth that their primary goal in life is to be good wives and mothers.

Not necessarily...depends on who's raising them.

My sister belongs to the LDS, and all of her daughters have gone to college, have good careers, besides raising families.

That's another generalization I'm thoroughly sick of.

 

[Pure]

i believe we're talking about a ultraconservative minority of [all] Xtians, but a sizeable one, say 20-30 percent.** the LDS is perhaps the same [as the whole, and also have that minority]. i'm sure they[LDS] have their 'modern', equal rights persons, just like the methodists.

the LDS, iirc, still does not allow women ministers. this Xtian position is not exactly consistent with gender equality, but is found in the Southern Baptists and Catholics as well.

i believe that Paul said that as Christ is the head of the Church, man is the head of woman.

---
Being concentrated in the "Red" states, this 'moral majority' [as it calls itself] is, politically, a *very* powerful group, led by persons such Dobson, Falwell, Robertson, and mega-ministers like Mr. Haggard (all males, incidentally).

 

[Misty_Morning]

i believe that Paul said that as Christ is the head of the Church, man is the head of woman.

Puh-lease, give me a fuckin' break.

Women played a vital and equal role in the very early christian society. Paul was one of the first of many who saught to undo that.

 

[cloudy]

Puh-lease, give me a fuckin' break.

Women played a vital and equal role in the very early christian society. Paul was one of the first of many who saught to undo that.

Indeed he did...that's exactly what Pure is pointing out.

 

[Pure]

Misty Women played a vital and equal role in the very early christian society. Paul was one of the first of many who saught to undo that

P: Very early indeed. Perhaps 30-40 AD??

Paul was active 35-60 AD, and evangelized and wrote in that period. About 10 of 27 books of the NT are his epistles. Leaving aside the 12, none of whom wrote anything, Paul is often said to be the first Xtian. Paul appears less than wholly enthusiastic about marriage (and not at all about sex), and thought, esp. for men, those with a 'gift' (of ministry) like his, do best to remain single. This is taken up as the official position of the Catholic Church. (Of course married men are said to be the heads of the family, exercizing loving direction and proper correction of the wife and children.)

We may say that [proposals for] the theory and practice of gender inequality is a pervasive theme of the NT and dominant theme of the OT, and became more or less 'official' doctrine in the first 100 years of Xtianity, remaining so with the 'official' advent of Protestantism in Luther and Calvin.

 

[SweetPrettyAss]

Quote:
Originally Posted by SweetPrettyAss
Actually, the group being described is an extreme division of the more mainstream LDS church. In all honesty, I would call the LDS church a sect rather than a cult since they have so many members. Women in the church are pressured to marry early and have many children. Girls are taught from birth that their primary goal in life is to be good wives and mothers.

Not necessarily...depends on who's raising them.

My sister belongs to the LDS, and all of her daughters have gone to college, have good careers, besides raising families.

That's another generalization I'm thoroughly sick of.

That is true, of course. Not all LDS women buy into that doctrine, but those few that I have known do. Maybe I should have said "Many girls".

 

[JamesSD]

Guys like Warren Jeffs are the reason I don't believe in outright banning the death penalty.

 

[R. Richard]

The mainstream LDS church seems to be an OK operation. They have some uptight views, but the do send young members on missions to help others. [I follow sports and a lot of the BYU athletes are a couple of years older than usual, because of the missions.]

The polygamist splinter groups are illegal. However, no one wants to mess with them for a few reasons.

1) Young girls are forced into arranged marriages with [usually] older men.
2) Young boys are abandoned by the polygamists, because there are too many males to allow each boy to grow up and get married.
3) Almost the entire polygamist community lives on welfare.
4) The polygamist communities generally do not let children get much in the way of schooling.
5) If someone investigated the mess, the investigators would be expected to do something about the problems.

About an equal number of boys and girls are born. Since they are polygamists, the "inner circle" gets to have multiple wives. The only way that most of the inner circle can get multiple wives is for the leaders to assign them wives. The left over boys are then abandoned. Both girls and boys are being abused. At least the girls can get welfare, the boys cannot.

Now, let's look at the inner circle of males. They are basically people without much schooling and have few skills. They cannot realistically support several wives. Thus, the entire operation floats on welfare and child abandonment. Oh yeah, the new children born will be denied any sort of learning, because they would bail out if they knew how things really worked.

The entire operation holds together because it is a religion and you can't punish someone because of their religion.

I live in the western US. I talked with some people about ending the problem. I used to collect money for The Man. I am an expert in the area. What is needed is for a realtively few, highly trained money collectors to go into the communities and put the polygamist men to work. [The process is short, almost foolproof and very painful for the "customer." The customer will do almost anything to prevent another visit by the money collector. Almost anything includes holding down multiple jobs per customer that at least provide some reasonable amount of money to the wives and children.] Once the polygamist men are hard at work, the existing laws requiring education of children can be put to work to get the children into schools. The guys who collect what's owed then "work with the teachers" to make sure that the children learn something useful, instead of memorize poetry and history dates. Since most of the women are on welfare, the women can also go to school. In a fairly short amount of time, the problem could be solved.

UNFORTUNATELY, then some politician would have to explain why the problem occurred in the first place.

 

[JamesSD]

The entire operation holds together because it is a religion and you can't punish someone because of their religion.

This isn't necessarily true. I can't practice human sacrifice, even if I claim it's my religion.

Larger society already bears the burden of the abandonded young men, and also shells out those fraudelent welfare dollars. If my memory is correct, welfare fraud is usually where they go after the leaders of the sects for. And you certainly can punish someone for welfare fraud.

 

[Pure]

On the issue of 'religious freedom'. Yes it's hauled out by scientologists an the Ultra fringe of LDS. But existing US court decisions have VERY grudgingly admitted ANY exceptions to criminal law (peyote comes to mind, as an exception).
Hence rape is rape; fraud is fraud. Religion is NOT going to get you off.

THAT said, we know that in the US and Canada all kinds of abuses have happened because the government defers to Xtians (not suprising, since it's made up on them!). City and state govs overlooked sexual abuse in the Catholic and Anglican churches (schools, etc) as part of a 'gentleman's agreement.'

I want to be clear that I'm NOT, in this thread, simply looking at the extreme and corrupt Mr. Jeffs. That's too easy.

I propose that one can see the same problem in a smaller way regarding wife abuse, and its apparent sanction [in the form of a 'blind eye'] in various conservative Xtian and Jewish groups, including rather mainstream ones. You will NOT, for instance, in Southern Baptist literature on family see a lot about wife abuse, child abuse, incest, etc *among the faithful Southern Baptists.* The central affirmation is of patriarchal authority (held to be benevolent, if sometimes strict).

 

[R. Richard]

This isn't necessarily true. I can't practice human sacrifice, even if I claim it's my religion.

You can practice human sacrifice. However, you may not.

Larger society already bears the burden of the abandonded young men, and also shells out those fraudelent welfare dollars. If my memory is correct, welfare fraud is usually where they go after the leaders of the sects for. And you certainly can punish someone for welfare fraud.

Of course society in general already bears the burden of the abandoned young men. [I could show you my tax bill, but I won't.] The government can't really go after the leaders of the polygamous cults/sects for welfare fraud. The women are the ones who apply for the welfare. In gneeral, the women are entitled to the welfare. The one stumbling block is that there must not be a man living in the house. Of course there is not a man living in the house when welfare comes to check, he is living with another wife.

Let me just add that the scumbags in the communities where the polygamists live fail and refuse to enforce the laws against plural marriage. [This last is predictable, since the scumbags are also polygamists.]

 

[R. Richard]

On the issue of 'religious freedom'. Yes it's hauled out by scientologists an the Ultra fringe of LDS. But existing US court decisions have VERY grudgingly admitted ANY exceptions to criminal law (peyote comes to mind, as an exception).
Hence rape is rape; fraud is fraud. Religion is NOT going to get you off.

I have already pointed out that the scumbags will not enforce the laws against statutory rape, rape and conspiracy, or wlefare fraud. The scumbags in the polygamist areas are part and parcel of the law violation.

THAT said, we know that in the US and Canada all kinds of abuses have happened because the government defers to Xtians (not suprising, since it's made up on them!). City and state govs overlooked sexual abuse in the Catholic and Anglican churches (schools, etc) as part of a 'gentleman's agreement.'

The city and/or state governments do not enforce the law. Enforcement of the law is the resposibility of the scumbags. Admittedly, the city and state governments did direct the scumbags to avoid enforcing the law. [In some cases, torture was used. Yes, said governments threatened the scimbags with doughnut deprivation!] Even the local governments where I live are prosecuting Catholic priests who abused children. I am proud to say that no Anglican church personnel in my area have even been acused of sexual abuse, nor even citable offenses, such as traffic violations.

I propose that one can see the same problem in a smaller way regarding wife abuse, and its apparent sanction [in the form of a 'blind eye'] in various conservative Xtian and Jewish groups, including rather mainstream ones. You will NOT, for instance, in Southern Baptist literature on family see a lot about wife abuse, child abuse, incest, etc *among the faithful Southern Baptists.* The central affirmation is of patriarchal authority (held to be benevolent, if sometimes strict).

I suspect that you will search very hard to find a religion that dwells on wife abuse and/or child abuse. I will note that you have omitted racial discrimination, which was a big problem among Southern Baptists not so many years ago. [However, in general, it is not a really big problem now. I lived in the South for a bit and I would estimate that pehaps 20% to 30% of the women I saw in the supermarket had mixed race children.

 

[R. Richard]

I notice that the issues of wife abuse and child abuse are brought up frequently in this thread and that is well and good.

I also notice that no one, other than myself, has brought up the issue of denial of education/learning. Is it that you admit that, in general, US education is a waste of time and overt fraud?

 

[Pure]

I'd suggest looking at the broader picture of 'education deprivation.' In my Catholic inlaws' family, the eldest sister was discouraged from university studies. Teens is 'high poverty' areas, esp. girls, are encourage to drop from school; some poor Latino/Chicano areas being among the examples.

The Xtianity of those involved is surely *one* factor among several--poverty being a primary one (but poor boys tend to stay in school longer than poor girls, iirc.) IOW, Jeff's idea of grooming girls to be wives and mothers is NOT exactly the wierd idea of a small, fringe xtian cult.

The NT refers to the rabbis of Jesus' time; arguably he was much like one. IOW "learning" is connected with "men." This persists in orthodox Judaism and mainline Catholicism, though perhaps to a lesser degree.

Now it is said that Jesus was a radical egalitarian who didn't mind the company of prostitutes (for reasons we won't go deeply into) and other social outcasts. Misty made a similar point. Maybe for couple decades, or even a couple hundred years, women had a better 'lot' in the Xtian cult. Paul mentions a couple of Xtian women of prominence, e.g., Prisca.

Certainly by the time of the councils, e.g., of Nicea, 325, it's clear the men are in charge. No one at the councils, to my knowledge, was a woman.

(no rr, i will not get into the state of the US school system in this thread.)

 

[SweetPrettyAss]

I'd suggest looking at the broader picture of 'education deprivation.' In my Catholic inlaws' family, the eldest sister was discouraged from university studies. Teens is 'high poverty' areas, esp. girls, are encourage to drop from school; some poor Latino/Chicano areas being among the examples.

The Xtianity of those involved is surely *one* factor among several--poverty being a primary one (but poor boys tend to stay in school longer than poor girls, iirc.) IOW, Jeff's idea of grooming girls to be wives and mothers is NOT exactly the wierd idea of a small, fringe xtian cult.

The NT refers to the rabbis of Jesus' time; arguably he was much like one. IOW "learning" is connected with "men." This persists in orthodox Judaism and mainline Catholicism, though perhaps to a lesser degree.

Now it is said that Jesus was a radical egalitarian who didn't mind the company of prostitutes (for reasons we won't go deeply into) and other social outcasts. Misty made a similar point. Maybe for couple decades, or even a couple hundred years, women had a better 'lot' in the Xtian cult. Paul mentions a couple of Xtian women of prominence, e.g., Prisca.

Certainly by the time of the councils, e.g., of Nicea, 325, it's clear the men are in charge. No one at the councils, to my knowledge, was a woman.

(no rr, i will not get into the state of the US school system in this thread.)

I was under the impression that this thread referred to gender equality NOW. What do events centuries ago have to do with it?

My experiences were that boys drop out of high school more often than girls. This was the individuals' choice and had nothing to do with religion. Sometimes it was related to poverty.

Jeff's ideas are extremely far out. Even now, girls are groomed to be wives and mothers, just as boys are groomed to be husbands and fathers. This is not exactly a secret. However, it is always understood that when this happens is the choice of the individual, and there is little religious pressure for either boys or girls to marry. There is some pressure for them, once married, to become parents.