Why Now and Not Then?

This week we've listened to the hearings of General David Petraeus, we've looked for the signs of Beyonce's wedding, and we might just be wondering how much longer Katie Couric will remain with CBS News. But perhaps the second biggest story this week has been the mystery and horror that has come from the YFZ (Yearning for Zion) Ranch.

The compound lies just outside of Eldorado in Southwest Texas, and it is owned by the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. Members of the FLDS Church left their previous locations to escape increasing scrutiny from the media, anti-polygamy activists and law enforcement officials. It was in 2004 when William Benjamin Johnson, who was fined for hunting without a license, purchased the property, insisting later that the buildings that had been constructed were part of a corporate hunting retreat. The story was a lie, the buildings were part of the FLDS church's new compound. Now what's the problem? Well members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints no longer practice plural marriages or polygamy, this is where the formation of the Fundamentalists in the 1930's comes in. And now begins a story for Dateline.

A week ago a sixteen year old girl called authorities saying she was a victim of physical and sexual abuse, abuse she had received from her 50-year-old husband. The girl had a child with the man, with the child being born just eight months ago, and the girl feared she was pregnant again. As of April 8, as many as 533 women and children had been removed from the compound by authorities. 416 children (both boys and girls) have been placed in state custody because authorities believed they "had been abused or were at immediate risk of future abuse," a state spokesman said. But there is no knowledge of the whereabouts of the girl who called.

If you've seen the images of the women and children, you know they look very conservative. The women are forbidden to wear makeup, pants or any skirt above the knees or to cut their hair. Wearing homemade outfits, the women look as if they've walked out of the late 1800s. And the world they know is far from ours, though we're not entirely sure what they do know- but it's probably very minimal. For example, I heard the children were handed crayons and they had no idea what to do with them.

While watching this story unfold on the news, I heard one woman say it was the government going against religion. What religion allows men to take on more than one wife? Yes it's not unheard of, just watch Big Love, but this is more for the sick pleasure of the men. For the past couple of years the "officials" of the church have lowered the bar on when a man could take a girl for a wife. The permitted number being allowed has gone as low as 13. And speaking of the leaders of the group, the FLDS Church President Warren Jeffs was arrested in 2006 and is being held on rape charges. Hello! Wake up America, shouldn't something have been done two years ago? Shouldn't something have been done decades ago? And now we have women who have escaped compounds like this one coming forward with what darkness lay on the property. It's almost as if the word "escape" wasn't a good enough reason to have taken action years ago.

It would seem associating itself with the church helps to try and cast a positive outlook, but I look at the temple and it looks like an outpost for Hell- it's a sanctuary for pedophiles. And why is it that the authorities had to wait to make their move now when they have been well aware of what's been going on for several years, especially when they've supposedly had an officer on the inside?! If it wasn't for the caller how much longer would the suffering have gone on? So I guess my real question is why now and not then?