Polygamists describe how to live in family with 27 wives and 145 children

July 28, 2016

By NATE CARLISLE 

The Salt Lake Tribune

 

The audience emitted a gasp when Edith Barlow told them she was a man's 13th wife.

Barlow was used to it.

"People say, 'Thirteenth? Are you freaking kidding me?' " said Barlow, 39.

Barlow's husband, Canadian polygamist Winston Blackmore has married 27 women in all. He has 145 children, according to some of them who sat beside Barlow on Thursday at the annual Sunstone Salt Lake Symposium.

Two of Blackmore's wives and three of his children on Thursday described the dynamics of a family bigger than some Utah towns. They also gave insights into Blackmore, whom Canadian authorities are prosecuting for polygamy, and who was once a bishop in the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints.

The Blackmores and other polygamous families live in a community called Bountiful within the town of Lister, British Columbia, near the border with Idaho. Eleven of Blackmore's wives have left the family over the years, though 16 remain.

Barlow is from Hildale, Utah, and was born into a family where her father had four wives. She said that as a teenager she did some "soul searching" to decide if she wanted to be a polygamist. She eventually decided to marry Blackmore.

"I'm not here to sugar coat anything," Barlow told the audience. "There were some dang hard days, and there still is."

Barlow said she is a "full-time working mother." The sister wives rely on each other for support — spiritual, emotional and logistical. They care for each other's children. Scheduling and personality conflicts arise, Barlow explained, creating a steady routine of addressing one issue as another arises.

But there is no matriarch, Barlow said. Blackmore has told his wives they are not to complain to him about the other wives, she said. They must work out their problems with each other.

"One day he said to me," Barlow said, pausing to sigh before continuing, " 'I can't imagine living with just one of you guys.'

"And I said, 'Right back at you, dude.' "

Barlow's younger sister Elise, 36, married Blackmore, too. But first, she became the second wife in another family. It didn't go well, she said.

Elise says the first wife was controlling, wanting to know where Elise was and making her turn in her money to the family. Elise said her days revolved around trying to please her sister wife, and she had no relationship with her husband and had no children of her own — and the first wife would not allow her to interact with her children.

"The hardest thing in all this was I couldn't love her children," Elise said. "Children are my life and I couldn't touch her children."

After three years, church leaders could see the marriage wasn't working. Elise said she was offered the chance to go to a new family. She chose to become Blackmore's 25th wife.

Shortly after joining the family, Elise said, she picked up a crying baby, then turned to see which mother would yell at her for doing so. Instead, a mother thanked her for helping.

Blackmore recognized how well she worked with children, Elise said, and encouraged her to go to college. She earned a bachelor's degree in education.

Elise will be married to Blackmore 15 years next month. They have five children.

"I had to get close to Christ and the Gospel laid out by Joseph Smith and that's what I want to teach my children," Elise said.

Plural marriages came to a halt for a time after The Split, when the Jeffs family evicted Blackmore from the church in 2002. Many of the Blackmore's parishioners opted to follow him to Canada.

But one of the Blackmore daughters, Hanna Blackmore, decided she wanted more than the monogamous marriages her sisters had. At age 19, she decided to marry a man who already had a wife. A third wife arrived later, Hanna said. The family now lives in Salt Lake County.

Hanna, 24, said she considers plural marriage to be as important as other Mormon principles.

"I don't think we can just get rid of a part of the Gospel just because we don't agree with it or it's too difficult," she told the audience.

Hanna describes polygamy as more heartache and more joy.

Two other Blackmore daughters described their relationships with their 143 other siblings and their 72 nieces and nephews.

"We never run out of people to love and people to love us," said 19-year-old Elsie Blackmore.

She is Blackmore's 37th child and the oldest unmarried child still living in his home. She is in charge of the community's relief society — volunteers of girls ages 13 to 19 who perform community projects.

"We are probably the only family that can have a bull elk killed, cleaned and eaten in under an hour," Elsie said.

Dollie Blackmore, 18, showed slides of some of her siblings and the nieces and nephews her age. The generations grow up together, she said, with both the mothers and the older siblings looking out for them.

Dollie said children see Blackmore most when they are young. They eat breakfast with him and he knows all their names. When a child wants time with Blackmore, all he or she has to do is ask and they can go with him to work or follow him for the day.

"He's there for us if we want him to be," Dollie said.

ncarlisle@sltrib.com

Twitter: @natecarlisle

http://www.sltrib.com/home/4165574-155/polygamists-describe-how-to-live-in?fullpage=1

 

Mormons aren't alone in feeling devastated when people leave

OPINION

Religion News Service

By Jana Riess  | July 26, 2016

 

In this guest post, author Jon Ogden draws from his new book When Mormons Doubt: A Way to Save Relationships and Seek a Quality Life, available today. (And only $4.99 on the Kindle.)

Jon says the book is for:

1.      Mormons who want to better understand a family member or friend whose beliefs have changed;

2.      Unorthodox or former Mormons who are looking for ways to talk about their transition with believing family members and friends; and

3.      People who are experiencing a Mormon faith crisis and wondering where to turn.

I have read part of the book and appreciate its warm, nonjudgmental tone, as well as his willingness to draw upon positive examples outside of the Mormon fold for models of how relationships can be preserved even when one person changes in religious belief. As he puts it, “internalizing stories from other communities helps us develop humility, empathy, and love.” — JKR

Jon Ogden

A guest post by Jon Ogden

A Catholic family in Utah adopted a baby boy.

The boy’s parents raised him inside the Catholic faith. The spiritual nature of his upbringing resonated strongly with him, and he aspired to the priesthood even as a boy.

Then he fell in love with a Mormon girl.

As their courtship progressed, he assumed he would easily convert her to Catholicism. At the same time, she assumed she would convert him to Mormonism.

As it turned out, she was right. When he was old enough to no longer require his parents’ consent, he was baptized as a Mormon. His family was devastated. It has been decades since his baptism, and his parents are stillhurt by his decision to convert from Catholicism to Mormonism.

This story, from a Mormon who lives in my stake, is universal. It’s the story told inFiddler on the Roof as Tevye, a Jewish man, watches in sorrow as his youngest daughter leaves his faith to marry a Christian. It’s the story told by Carolyn Jessop in her book Escape when, after fleeing with her eight kids from Warren Jeffs’ polygamist sect, she is pained to see her oldest daughter decide to return to polygamy.

There are millions of similar stories — some more extreme and heart wrenching, some less so. But they each have one thing in common. In every case, when people reject the traditions of their loved ones, their loved ones feel pain.

That’s the way it’s always been. Breaking from tradition is the world’s second-oldest tradition.

Unfortunately, there is a temptation to think that because your child or spouse (or even your parent) left your tradition, your life is a failure. You failed to keep someone you love in the fold. Maybe you blame yourself for not being faithful enough.

And yet everyone knows that leaving a tradition isn’t inherently bad. Somewhere in your ancestry someone broke from tradition to give you the traditions you enjoy today. And all sorts of people — Mormons especially — get excited when they see someone leave another tradition to join their own.

If we’re not careful, what we call truth is merely that which has been repeated often enough to make us feel comfortable.

This is why nearly everyone’s default worldview is the one we were born into.

The French writer Michel Montaigne noted this phenomenon as he visited different countries throughout Europe. People in each country seemed to believe without question that they had the truth and that their customs were the best in the world. Montaigne wrote, “There is always the perfect religion, there the perfect government, there the most exact and accomplished usage of all things.”

In other words, tradition blinds us with its comforts and familiarity. As the behavioral economist Daniel Kahneman once said, “Familiarity is not easily distinguished from truth.”

I sometimes ask myself what my life would be like if I’d been born in another country. If I’d been born in Afghanistan or Japan, would I still be Mormon? Likely not. Instead, I would probably be a Muslim or a Buddhist, respectively.

Or say that I was born in the same place (Utah), but 500 years before. In that case, I would have likely been raised as part of a Native American tribe, with their traditions and beliefs. As a child I would have claimed my conviction that those traditions were true.

Chances are, you would have done the same.

Knowing this should open up a wellspring of humility within us. Whenever someone disagrees with our beliefs, we should remember just how much our beliefs are a result of the context we were raised in. As we internalize this fact we can be filled with love even for those whose beliefs suddenly differ from our own.

Finally, we can also recognize that when our love for other people depends on their beliefs, our love by definition is conditional. What a tragedy it would be to let our religious convictions break apart the relationships that our happiness hinges upon right now. We can’t afford it. As Mark Twain said, “There isn’t time, so brief is life, for bickerings, apologies, heartburnings, callings to account. There is only time for loving, and but an instant, so to speak, for that.”

http://religionnews.com/2016/07/26/mormons-arent-alone-in-feeling-devastated-when-people-leave/

 

Manson Family: Where Are They Now?

Their terror brought a halt to the peace and love of the 1960s, but many members of the most infamous cult in American history live on

 

Rolling Stone

July 27, 2016

By Elisabeth Garber-Paul

 

Charles Manson, the psychopathic career criminal who inspired a murderous cult following and brought a grisly end to the utopian dreams of the 1960s, has spent the past 47 years locked up in California. Manson, born Charles Milles Maddox in 1934 to a 16-year-old mother, had already spent half his life in jail when he orchestrated one of the most infamous crimes of the 20th Century.

According to biographer Jeff Guinn, Manson had been a talented manipulator since grade school, convincing classmates – mostly girls – to attack people he didn't like. He managed to escape blame for their actions, and while he would sometimes turn violent himself, it was a 1947 theft that initially sent him into reform school. He was in and out of incarceration for the next 20 years for everything from pimping to false checks. 

When Manson was released from prison for the last time in 1967, he had learned to play guitar, and was intent on making his way as a musician. After a stint in San Francisco, where he witnessed first-hand the Summer of Love, Manson made his way down to Southern California, installing his budding "Family" in various temporary homes – including that of Beach Boy Dennis Wilson – before landing in the Spahn Ranch, an unused Western movie set.

It was while living there that Manson convinced his followers to help him start "Helter Skelter," a race-war that was foretold on a Beatles' White Album track, which would end in apocalypse and eventual Manson world domination. He sent them out to commit a series of crimes that culminated with the murders of Sharon Tate, the eight-month pregnant wife of director Roman Polanski, and four companions at her home on August 9th, 1969, and the killing of Leno and Rosemary LaBianca the following night.

Manson was arrested in October 1969 on unrelated charges, but hasn't been freed since. In 1971 he was convicted of first degree murder and sentenced to death, which was commuted to life in prison after California temporarily banned capital punishment in 1972. He's periodically spoken to the media – including to Rolling Stone in 1970 and 2013 – and has been denied parole 12 times, most recently in 2012. Currently 81years old, he's next up for parole in 2027. 

Leslie Van Houten

Leslie Van Houten, one of the youngest of the family, didn't meet Charles Manson until September 1968, less than a year before the murders took place. The two-time homecoming queen soon became one of his most devoted followers, and while she wasn't there for the Tate massacre, she participated the following night, stabbing Rosemary LaBianca in the back 14 times. Van Houten, 66, was up for parole this year, and asked to be freed, claiming that she had been emotionally troubled and under the influence of LSD at the time of the murders. 

Though she lost any real chance at public support when she giggled during her trial testimony in 1970, Van Houten has long been thought to have a good shot at getting out – attracting support from celebrities like filmmaker John Waters, who wrote a five-part plea for her release in 2011. Then, after her 21st parole hearing last spring, a California parole board recommended her release based on her model behavior over the course of her almost 50-year incarceration. But this month, after a petition from Sharon Tate's sister garnered 140,000 signatures, California Governor Jerry Brown denied Van Houten's release, calling her an "unacceptable risk to society." 

 

Bobby Beausoleil

Handsome and magnetic, Bobby Beausoleil had been drifting through California as a musician and actor when, in 1968, he appeared in a soft-core porn called The Ramrodder with Catherine "Gypsy" Share, a Manson follower, and soon met the cult leader himself. Before long he became one of his followers, living at the Spahn Ranch, the Manson family collective. In July 1969, he and two other followers went over to Family friend Gary Hinman's house, insisting that they owed him money for a bad batch of LSD. After holding him hostage for two days, Beausoleil stabbed him then smeared the words "Political Piggy" on the wall with his blood. Since his arrest in August 1969 – just days before the Tate and LaBianca murders – Beausoleil has become a member of the Aryan Brotherhood, fathered four children and continues to make music from prison. He was up for parole for the 17th time in February 2015, though it was postponed. 

 

Paul Watkins

Paul Watkins was a high school dropout when he met Charles Manson in the spring of 1968, and quickly became an integral part of the group – as a cute, young man, it was his job to find the teenage girls that Manson, then in his 30s, was too old to attract. He would search the highways and city streets for potential followers, once even falsely registering for high school to be "closer to the action," as prosecutor Vincent Bugliosi later described it. But unlike most of the people on this list, Watkins escaped the cult before the murders – and his 15 minutes in the spotlight would be for exposing the crimes, not committing them. Manson had openly shared his vision of "Helter Skelter," and Watkins could tell he was going to be recruited to help with the murders that would get the violence started. So in the spring of 1969, Watkins left the Spahn Ranch, relocating to the family's Death Valley hideout. The family eventually returned there after they committed the August 1969 murders, and were arrested en masse in October on unrelated charges. Watkins soon went to the police, and ended up testifying against the family during the trial, particularly about Helter Skelter. He went on to have a family and an entirely normal life before dying of leukemia in 1990. 

 

Mary Brunner

Mary Brunner was Manson's first follower, a relatively age-appropriate Wisconsin native who had moved west for a job at the UC Berkeley library. (Born in 1943, she was only nine years younger than the cult leader.) Brunner met Manson in 1967, and took him in. Soon she quit her job and they hit the road in a VW bus, going out to pick up the girls who would become the "family." She gave birth to their son, Valentine "Pooh Bear" Manson in April 1968 – according to legend, Charlie cut the umbilical chord with his teeth. That summer, the family moved into the Spahn Ranch, where Brunner continued to be a mothering figure for the entire group. But she managed to miss the massacres – Brunner was in jail for credit card fraud in early August, when the Tate and La Bianca murders took place – but she had been present for Gary Hinman's July killing, smothering him with a pillow after he was fatally stabbed by Charles "Tex" Watson. She testified against the family in exchange for immunity, but she soon felt badly about turning on them, and in 1971 was part of the group's plan to hijack a plane in order to free Manson and the other incarcerated members – a plan that was thwarted when police caught them stealing guns from a sporting goods store. Brunner spent six years in prison, and moved to the midwest after her 1977 release, where she changed her name and settled into obscurity. 

Susan Atkins

"Woman, I have no mercy for you." That's what Susan "Sadie" Atkins told Sharon Tate as she stabbed the pregnant 26-year-old actress in the stomach, one of six people she and the other family members killed during the early morning hours of August 9th, 1969. When their leader decided it had been too "messy" and sent them out again on August 10th – an expedition he joined to show them "how it was done" – Atkins went along. 

Though not even 20 when she met up with Manson, Atkins had already lived a wild life. Escaping an alcoholic father, the teenager escaped to San Francisco where she teamed up with two convicts for a robbery spree, spent a few months in an Oregon prison, and performed in a topless revue called "the Witches' Sabbath," put on by Church of Satan founder Anton LaVey. But the LSD and Manson's psychological power over her were a toxic combination; she was convicted of eight murders and sentenced to death, which was commuted to life in 1972 when the California Supreme Court briefly banned capital punishment. Her last, unsuccessful, parole hearing took place on September 2nd, 2009, less than a month before she succumbed to brain cancer. She was 61. 

 

Linda Kasabian

Linda Kasabian was the prosecution's key witness and eventually called Manson the "devil, not this wonderful man that I was led to believe." While she didn't participate in the murders, she did act as lookout on both nights – a vantage point that also allowed her to become the state's primary witness against the family. Kasabian was already a young mother when she first met Manson and the family on the Spahn Ranch on July 4th, 1969, only a month before the Tate and LaBianca murders. Though she quickly fell under his spell, she also quickly shook herself out of it: Only two days after the murders, she fled to New Mexico where she found her estranged husband, Robert. Kasabian eventually returned to L.A., where she testified against Manson in exchange for her own immunity – something that prosecutor Vincent Bugliosi has said was his idea. "She never asked for immunity from prosecution, but we gave it," he told The Guardian in 2009. "She stood in the witness box for 17 or 18 days and never broke down, despite the incredible pressure she was under. I doubt we would have convicted Manson without her." Kasabian moved to her mother's home in New Hampshire but was hounded by media, eventually moving west, where she was last found living in a trailer park in near poverty.

 

Clem Grogan

Though Steve "Clem" Grogan stayed in the car while Manson family members massacred Sharon Tate and her friends on August 9th, 1969, he did participate in the murder a few weeks later of Donald "Shorty" Shea. A Hollywood stuntman and Spahn Ranch hand, Shea was was killed and disremembered by the family that summer, but his body wasn't found until 1977. Grogan was one apparently of the dimmer members of the family, earning him the name "Scramblehead," and was allegedly the member that crashed Dennis Wilson's uninsured Ferrari while the group was staying with the Beach Boy. He'd linked up with Manson in 1967, making him one of his longest-time followers. Though he was first sentenced to death fro the murder of Shea, his sentence was later commuted to life in prison, when a judge decided he wasn't mentally capable of coordinating the crimes. Grogen was eventually freed in 1985, after helping authorities locate Shea's body on the Spahn Ranch grounds. 

 

Patricia Krenwinkel

Patricia Krenwinkel is probably best remembered for walking into the courtroom the morning of her sentencing, laughing alongside Susan Atkins and Leslie Van Houten. It was a disturbing scene, particularly in the case of Krenwinkel, who had chased down and killed Abigail Folger as she tried to escape the Tate home, then helped Tex Watson and Van Houten kill the La Biancas the following night. Since meeting – and quickly bedding – Manson in September 1967, she'd been a devoted member of the family, taking care of the children with a quiet intensity. But her involvement in the crimes would land her in jail for life. Despite having a record as a model prisoner, she was denied parole in 2011 and won't be eligible again until 2018. She is currently still incarcerated and, after Atkins' 2009 death, is the longest-serving female inmate in California. 

 

Charles "Tex" Watson

Charles "Tex" Watson came, as his name suggests, from Dallas. A former high school football star, he dropped out of the University of North Texas to and made his way to California, where he worked odd jobs and soon found Manson. He lived with the family at the Spahn Ranch, where he earned the name "Tex," but moved out at the end of the fall of 1968 to move in with a girlfriend. This didn't last, though, and he was back on the ranch by spring. That August, it was Watson who led the murders on August 9th and 10th, 1969. He knew he would be caught and fled back to Texas, where he fought extradition for nine months, which is why he didn't go on trial a with Manson and the girls. He was, however, eventually convicted of first-degree murder and received the death penalty, thought that was later commuted to life in prison. There, he has passed the time by founding Abounding Love Ministries, and working to make sure his story is accurately represented on Wikipedia. 

 

Lynette "Squeaky" Fromme

While she didn't participate in the Tate – La Bianca murders, Lynette "Squeaky" Fromme, a former child performer who was living in Venice Beach when she met Manson, was one of the most consistent presences outside the courthouse during the trials, supporting the family members by camping out there while they were on trial. But she got her own chance at court justice after her 1975 attempt on President Gerald Ford's life – which didn’t get past her pulling a gun on him during a public event. Fromme was sentenced to life in prison and, despite a brief 1987 escape, she was released in 2009. 

 

Bruce Davis

Bruce Davis came to the cult of Manson by way of Scientology, a new religion in which Manson himself had dabbled. Davis met the family when they were in Oregon in 1968, and proceeded to spend the next year or so in England working for the Scientologists before being kicked out for his drug use and heading back to California in April 1969. David became one of the most powerful people on Spahn Ranch, in charge of the fake IDs and stolen credit cards that allowed the cult to function. Davis wasn't present for the Tate or La Bianca murders; instead, his role seems to have been that of enforcer, and he was the muscle behind the Gary Hinman and Shorty Shea slayings that same summer. Davis was convicted of those murders in 1972 and was sentenced to life in prison. In the years since, he's been married, become a father, found Jesus and earned a PhD in philosophy, but was still denied parole by Governor Jerry Brown earlier this year, citing the "horror of the murders committed by the Manson family in 1969 and the fear they instilled in the public [that] will never be forgotten."

 

http://www.rollingstone.com/culture/pictures/manson-family-where-are-they-now-w430665

 

What kind of person joins a cult or joins a terror group?

The Conversation

July 27, 2016

1.      Shane Satterley

Research Assistant and PhD Candidate, Griffith University

There are some striking similarities between cults and terror groups. An all-encompassing ideology can, when exhibited by a group or individual, have destructive effects on society.

And when a cult or terror group generates such worldviews, untold destruction can ensue – especially in the latter case.

Mohamed Lahouaiej Bouhlel, who drove a truck into crowds on Nice’s Promenade des Anglais on Bastille Day, exemplifies how quickly ideology can be adopted. His experience of becoming radicalised – personal grievances, adoption of ideology, and contact with a recruiter – is not uncommon. Cult members have been known to become indoctrinated after just a few hours of conversation with recruiters.

Is there a difference between cults and terror groups?

The term cult, defined as a “new religious movement”, came into existence within the last century.

Most cults build upon or modify existing religious doctrine, yet how they express these beliefs varies from group to group. Many new religious movements inflict violence upon others and themselves.

Similarly, violence characterises contemporary terror groups, the most-publicised of which are Islamist and jihadist terror groups. These groups wish to impose a radical interpretation of Islam upon society; a jihadi uses violence to achieve this.

Islamism as an ideology, like many new religious movements, has been around for the last century. This is relevant in the West, as new religious movements are seen as arising from a decline in mainstream religions.

Some seminal theories attribute the creation of cults to Western modernisation. This is especially relevant to Islamist groups, as many object to modernisation and increasingly include a multitude of recent recruits born in the West.

So, in terms of rejection of modernisation and a digression from mainstream religion, the modern Islamist group fits the definition of a cult and exhibits similar sociological characteristics.

So, who are the recruits?

Research into cult recruits indicates several recurring factors. Among these, alienation, drug abuse, loneliness, sadness, rejection, the search for a replacement of parental authority, identity crises, a higher need for order, trauma, coming of age, the influence of a charismatic leader and conflict with law enforcement over radical politics are strong indicators.

Islamist recruitment is similarly attributed to alienation, identity crises, perceived injustices, discrimination, trauma, coming of age, alternative authority, the appeal of charismatic leaders, and Western foreign policy.

But perhaps the most important indicator in both groups is an all-encompassing ideology, particularly with regard to morality. Recruits are unwilling to acknowledge or unable to discern grey areas in morality and ethics. Once this threshold is crossed any number of behavioural outcomes are possible.

Bouhlel adopted Islamism quickly; he started visiting a mosque in April, grew his beard out a week before the attack and is said to have had recent indoctrination by an Algerian member of Islamic State (IS).

Bouhlel, a first-generation immigrant to France from Tunisia, had a strained and sometimes aggressive relationship with his parents, which resulted in early psychiatric treatments. He also reportedly had body image problems, a history of domestic violence, depression following a divorce, and may have been bisexual.

All of these factors could have pushed Bouhlel in a different direction, and many people with similar experiences do not become a jihadi. However, he adopted the all-encompassing ideology of Islamism and tragically resorted to violence.

But why don’t cults cause mayhem across the world in the same way IS and its recruits do?

First, cults tend to be more inward-looking; their identity crisis tends to be unique and not linked to a global ideology as seen with Islamists. Cults are more interested in changing and isolating themselves, whereas Islamists want to make drastic changes to society and will attempt to penetrate any given community.

Cults can cause much harm to themselves, their families and in some rare cases the rest of society. Jihadis, however, cause substantial harm to themselves, their families and society.

Reducing the appeal of radical ideologies

Due to recurring links between such indicators and recruitment to destructive groups, governments should enact programs and policies that help tackle these factors.

Counselling, drug rehabilitation, sex education, mentoring, community engagement and the mitigation of domestic violence may help prevent radicalisation.

In a free and open society, some people will undoubtedly adopt destructive beliefs and behavioural outcomes. However, many of the aforementioned psychological and environmental factors can be corrected or alleviated, reducing the risk of radicalisation.

Potential recruits often fall through the cracks of society and turn to the wrong people for solutions. Even if Islamism and cult ideologies died out tomorrow, problematic psychological and circumstantial factors create an environment conducive to radicalisation.

http://theconversation.com/what-kind-of-person-joins-a-cult-or-joins-a-terror-group-62969

 

Rabbi caught on video admitting rape, plotting murder with students

Years-old footage released of newly extradited Eliezer Berland shows him explaining how he forced a married woman into sex

 

BY TIMES OF ISRAEL STAFF 

July 27, 2016

 

A rabbi extradited from South Africa for sex offenses and arrested upon his arrival in Israel last week, after being on the run for three years, has been caught on camera admitting to raping one of his female followers.

“She was raped from start to finish,” Berland says in footage released by Channel 2 television on Tuesday night. “Afterwards she thought it was permissible… the first time I raped her.”

According to Channel 2, the incriminating recordings were made four years ago by two of Berland’s followers. They were told to burn all the tapes and other potentially incriminating material “in case the police do not cooperate.”

But some of the tapes survived, and were handed over to police Monday. In another tape, Berland can be heard instructing one of his followers to place a bomb under the bed of an unnamed person — to send them to heaven.

Berland was extradited to Israel last week to answer charges of molesting female followers, including a minor. He was also accused of involvement in an attack on the husband of one of those women who complained against him.

The 79-year-old Berland is a cult-like figure to his students and followers. He is credited by his followers with inspiring tens of thousands of Jews to adopt an Orthodox Jewish lifestyle. He is the founder of the Shuvu Bonim religious group, part of the Bratslav Hasidic sect.

In one video (in Hebrew) aired Tuesday, Berland appears to be discussing an issue of Jewish law whereby if a wife has an affair she becomes forbidden to remain married to her husband. However, if she is raped, however, this does not apply.

In the heavily edited video, Berland appears to contradict himself and claims that the woman, or perhaps another, is no longer married. “Afterwards she already asked me ‘What? What is happening here?’ I said to her ‘You are no longer married.'”

The video then shows Berland giving an entirely different justification for his actions. “She never did this voluntarily. She understood that she was like a divine messenger, to be the wife of the [rabbi],” Berland says, referring to himself in the third person.

In another video, Berland is seen speaking to a group of his followers in Hebrew. A student whispers something to him, to which Berland replies: “They placed the bomb for him? Who tried to do this?” He then entrusts one of his followers, Shlomi, to “go to Rishon Lezion and deal with those who placed the bomb.”

It is unclear to whom Berland is referring, or whether he was actually referring to a bomb. It is possible that he was using coded language for an entirely innocent activity.

A source close to Berland told the ultra-Orthodox website Hadrei Haredim in response that the video was edited by sources who wished to discredit Berland.

“Dozens of people attended this lesson, and it was recorded by followers of the rabbi and uploaded to YouTube. Those same people chose to cut the film, edit it and send it to the media during the rabbi’s trial. This is part of the well-oiled and prepared system that tries to harm the rabbi and his community.”

Berland was on the run from authorities from 2013 to 2016, eluding several Israeli attempts to extradite him. He moved between Zimbabwe, Switzerland, the Netherlands and South Africa, accompanied by a group of devout followers numbering around 40 families.

On Tuesday a http://www.timesofisrael.com/rabbi-caught-on-video-admitting-rape-plotting-murder-with-students/fternoon, Lod District Court upheld a police appeal against a decision by Rishon Lezion Magistrate’s Court to release Berland to house arrest. The rabbi was to remain in custody for another day for further questioning.

http://www.timesofisrael.com/rabbi-caught-on-video-admitting-rape-plotting-murder-with-students/

 

'Breakaway Amish' a first-person account of rogue Ohio sect

Author was one of Bergholz Beard Cutters in Amish community

 

The Blade

By TK Barger | BLADE RELIGION EDITOR

July 23, 2016

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In a new book, Johnny Mast tells an insider’s story of an unusual crime spree among the Amish.

He was one of the “Bergholz Beard Cutters,” a member of an Amish community in eastern Ohio that had been isolated from others because of the way Bergholz’s bishop, Samuel Mullet — the grandfather of Mr. Mast — controlled his people.

The Bergholz Amish were not welcome among their fellow Amish. “Those other communities considered Sam a rogue bishop doing his own thing,” Mr. Mast writes in his new book, Breakaway Amish: Growing Up with the Bergholz Beard Cutters.

In Bergholz, where his family had moved when he was 12, Mr. Mast wrote, “I was only an Amish kid working construction and selling horses on the side.” But he was a favorite of his grandfather, and he took part in some of the rogue actions that Mullet ordered. Mr. Mast had joined the church at age 17.

“I can’t help but think back on how Bergholz was when it first started,” Mr. Mast wrote, “how friendly everyone was and what a good place it was. Everyone joined in on everything. We were good neighbors to each other.”

Mullet changed that; Bergholz became a cult with him as the leader. Mullet does not fit the stereotype many have of the Amish, as deeply devoted Christians who live to honor their God. Instead, as Mr. Mast tells it, Mullet canceled all church services and banned reading the Bible: “The devil is twisting things around. He’s twisting the way people are reading the words and confusing people,” Mr. Mast quoted Mullet.

Mullet also sent men in the community who he accused of misbehaving — based in part on a demand that they write down all of their sins and give the list to him (alternatively, they could buy their way out of the writing by paying several thousand dollars) — to sleep in chicken coops or the stable, and Mullet secretly slept with with the men’s wives.

After that practice had become common, Mullet convinced his people, most of them family members, that cutting beards would be a sign of contrition; women would have their heads shaved. “By humbling ourselves and cutting our hair, we could be cleansed of our sins,” Mr. Mast recalled.

Among the Amish, an Anabaptist sect that largely keep to themselves, beards are expected.

Then, at Mullet’s direction, Bergholz people went outside their community to attack other Amish by cutting their beards. Mullet targeted people against whom he or favored people in Bergholz held grudges, including parents who had left Bergholz, and the law got involved.

Mr. Mast participated in some of the hair cutting, including of his father. But, he wrote with some remorse, he took the care to at least try to give decent haircuts and beard trims, and became the community barber.

Mullet and 15 others from Bergholz were prosecuted. Mr. Mast, at age 22 in September, 2012, testified for the prosecution under a grant of immunity. The defendants were convicted of all 87 counts and imprisoned. Mullet’s sentence was the longest, 15 years, and five women and one man got the shortest ones, only one year.

The community then worked to stay together and provide for the families with inmates.

Mr. Mast first went back to Bergholz, but he said Mullet continued to run the community from prison. Mr. Mast finally left — left Bergholz and the Amish faith.

Mr. Mast’s story, written with Shawn Smucker, is a fast and conversational read in which he recollects the events, framed around his testimony for the prosecution in the beard cutters’ trial, and describes how far out of the norm was his grandfather’s lust for power and manipulation of all in his community.

“A lot of people ask me the same question, especially about those days in particular,” Mr. Mast writes. “Why would a bunch of grown men allow another man to treat them that way? I can’t say for sure, but I think that for most of us, Bergholz was all we had. Every friend we had in the world lived there, every family member we cared about at the time. And Sam held the key to all of that.”

Breakaway Amish is published by Herald Press, an arm of the Mennonite Church. Mennonites are spiritual relatives of the Amish; some Mennonites practice ways similar to the Amish, such as not having cars or electricity and limiting children’s education, but most Mennonites live as members of contemporary society with modern ways and education.

 

Contact TK Barger @ tkbarger@theblade.com, 419-724-6278 or on Twitter @TK_Barger.

 

http://www.toledoblade.com/TK-Barger/2016/07/23/Breakaway-Amish-Growing-Up-with-the-Bergholz-Beard-Cutters-a-first-person-account-of-a-rogue-Ohio-sect-Bergholz-Beard-Cutters.html

 

 

Can Ipso apply in countries with strict press regulation- and with none?

The Guardian

Peter Preston

Sunday 24 July 2016

 

The Mail Online’s Tom Cruise revelations expose the knotty problem of regulating global digital news on a national basis

 

The problem Lord Justice Leveson couldn’t begin to solve is coming back to bite the press regulators he left behind. Simply, what happens when you’re dealing with a British newspaper’s online operation based in America, with American reporters writing about American celebrities for a largely American audience? Otherwise known, in this first headbanger of a case, as “Exclusive: inside the ‘bromance’ of Tom Cruise and Scientology founder David Miscavige”, a Mail Online special that Miscavige took to the Independent Press Standards Organisation and sort of won last week – except that Ipso then set up its own inquiry to try to address the more problematic issues involved.

The “bromance” itself isn’t particularly significant. It featured a series of interviews with former Scientologists saying Cruise had had special treatment at the church’s Gold Base headquarters. Miscavige pleaded inaccuracies under clause one (facts) and won.

Mail Online hadn’t given due weight to Miscavige’s denials and had failed to quote a Scientology spokesman’s responses. “It had also failed to provide a defence of the accuracy of the article, or its decision not to publish a correction.” Why not, pray? The Mail is a huge defender of Ipso. But no: “The story had been written to comply with American law and journalistic conventions, not the British Editors’ Code of Practice.” So the paper declined to defend its story.

The intractabilities are clear. US press law – on privacy, say – is hugely different from Britain’s rag-bag of restrictions. America’s first amendment runs wide and strong; Britain can barely raise a trickle. There are fundamental distinctions because press guidelines, where they exist, are designed to fit journalists’ behaviour into wider legal contexts. The differences cut both ways. Talk to a British website lawyer about the pitfalls of reporting US business in Delaware and you’ll see frown succeeding frown.

Until there’s a framework of international law covering digital news, there’ll be constant stumbles. But we could wait forever there. So how can UK rules of conduct be deemed to apply to newsgathering rights thousands of miles away? If the boot was on the other foot, if British publications were reckoned out of American – or Australian, Indian or Saudi – bounds, press freedom and defiance would go hand in hand.

There are certain caveats, to be sure. If the material shown is only posted on the Mail’s US website, that creates an (admittedly notional) declaration of intent. The Mail, as a warm upholder of Ipso, might voluntarily agree to observe its injunctions wherever they’re questioned round the globe.

But the basic divide between legal imperatives and voluntary code observance creates difficulties time after time. Why should we behave differently in a land where press regulation barely exists – or in one (Australia) where the rules are far more insistent? The problem, at root, doesn’t lie with journalism standards but with the clotted, chaotic nature of the world at large. Good luck to Ipso as it searches for solutions. But nobody, from Gold Base down or up, should expect a golden light to dawn.

https://www.theguardian.com/media/2016/jul/24/tom-cruise-mail-online-ipso-press-regulation