So
claims Marleigh Meisner, spokesperson for the the Texas Department of
Family and Protective Services regarding the placement of more than 400 children into emergency state custody after removing them from a polygamous colony in Southwest Texas. On Friday, after a long and chaotic two days of hearings, the Judge presiding over the case signed an order validating this move.
Now the State of Texas has 400+ more children to place into a foster care system that most observers describe as already overburdened. One has to wonder if this move really is in the best interest of all these children.
For the uninitiated, this case presumably began with an anonymous phone call to State officials, allegedly made by a 16 year old girl, who claimed to be sexually assaulted and held against her will by her much older spiritual husband. Investigators have yet to publicly report that they've located this girl and few, if any, of the women brought out of the community match this description. Some now argue that the phone call was a prank, hoax, or purposeful lie used to justify the investigation. On that, I'd like to remain agnostic until more of the facts come forward. Once investigators entered the community (using a swat team to gain entry), they justified the remove of the children on the grounds that the
women were being socialized to accept being raped, while the boys were being socialized to become rapists. From my vantage point, this case (which is already a mess) highlights serious problems in the ways in which the United States exercises "child welfare".
I've spent much of the last two years carefully studying the sociology of Child Welfare Services. By way of preface, I am sympathetic to child protective workers. They have a difficult (and perhaps impossible) job, which they are expected to fulfill their duties with limited resources, high caseloads, and generally low respect from those they work with. They are asked to carryout law enforcement policies, without the authority of a full fledged law enforcement officer. They are asked to make split second decisions regarding the welfare of children in high stakes situation. One does not need to look hard to find examples in the news media where a child, known to CPS, died at the hands of an abuser where the department had an opportunity for removal. When this happens, the CPS system becomes the whipping boy (which is probably a poor analogy in this example) of the news media, politicians, and the general know-it-all public. The same is true, however, when CPS officials remove a child from a home prematurely... Their decisions are second, third, and fourth guessed by others (often by lawyers who are predisposed to emphasize due process). In the majority of these situations where there are no clear right and wrong courses of action, the CPS personnel will be held responsible for making a wrong decision where no right decision was obvious.
Having said all that, what I've read about this case gives me pause. The New York Times has a series of stories that are informative and the Salt Lake City Tribune's coverage is extensive (you can follow the links above). While the Texas CPS officials are claiming that they have evidence to support belief that all 400 of these children were in danger, I don't think those claims pass a smell test. Put differently, the investigators and officials may believe they have evidence, but their position is clearly shaped by religious bigotry, the nationwide moral panic concerning pedophilia, and the dynamics of minority threat.
The invasive investigation was trigged by an anonymous phone call suggesting that this sect's religious practices condone rape. Since the case broke, all kinds of outlandish things have been said in the media (particularly on NBC's Today show) about this group's exotic religious behaviors (ranging from symbolism of their dress and hair styles, to theological doctrine supporting rape).
Brooke Adams, a journalist with the Salt Lake City Tribune, has been covering these allegations and posting counter claims on her blog. I leave it to the readers to determine which set of claims are more believable. As I've read commentary on this case in the blogosphere, it's becoming increasingly clear that many people associate polygamy with rape... E.g., they're polygamists, therefore they must have been raping these girls (or were about to) and therefore these actions are acceptable. What little I've read about Polygamy (or Plural Life) suggests that, while the marriage of young women occurs, it's not that common. [I'm not an expert here, only reporting what I've read so far].
I have read nothing in the accumulated pool of news coverage to suggest that the investigators have evidence actual abuse. There are cryptic quotes in the papers referring to children in a certain age range who are pregnant (the age range being 14-17). A pregnant 14 year old may have been statutorily raped, but she may also have been impregnated by another minor. A reasonable reaction to this discovery, given the allegations of spiritual marriage of young girls to older men, would be to remove the pregnant girls into custody and question further. While this might even be objectionable, it would be responding in proportion to the evidence of abuse. Instead, they appear to be responding to the
potential threat of abuse, filtered through a culturally ignorant understanding of this religious group and fueled by the nationwide panic over pedophilia. To remove 400+ children, the majority of whom, I'm certain, manifest no indicators of abuse or neglect, because of some ideologically motivated belief that they are being socialized into a deviant life style, strikes me as beyond the pale of what should be tolerable in a pluralistic society.
Law enforcement generally, and Texas in particular, has a habit of ham handed interaction with minority religious groups. Sociologist
Nancy Ammerman provided a stinging
indictment of the Justice Department's handling of the
Branch Davidian siege of the mid 1990s. She suggests that had the authorities developed more cultural understanding of this group, they could have avoided the tragedy. Like that case, it appears that the actions of the State here are simply reinforcing group's persecution complex (which can hardly be called a complex when it's demonstrative!)
According to the series in the New York Times, the broader community in El Dorado Texas has viewed this sect with suspicion from the get go. In a 2004
article about the establishment of the YFZ compound, the local sheriff routinely watched their activities with suspicion and local residents went on record worrying that the new residents could quickly take over the community's government and politics. This is a clear example of minority threat. The existing community has been looking for a way to expel the threat and now they have one. Under these circumstances, benefits of the doubt are interpreted in a way that justifies further investigation and invasive state action.
Now that the children are in State custody, it becomes incredibly hard to reverse the process. Each will now be evaluated and officials will develop
family plans for reunification. I have no doubt that these plans will be intolerant of the family's religious beliefs. The 1st amendment is fine and dandy, until it runs into the teeth of a moral panic. Then such niceties as constitutional protections go out the window. I'll be watching to see what happens next, but am not optimistic that CPS will come out of this looking good.
