Russ,
If you want to make it a mission to liberate the
naive people of Colorado City from their oppressive lifestyle, I'm all
for it.
First, we would need to ignore extremists like lolacollins
that posted earlier, because this is a very skewed view of how it really
is. I'm an Arizona| Arizona | (air-i'-ZON-u') | The State of Arizona comprises the extreme south-western portion of the United States. It is bounded on the north by Utah, on the east by New Mexico, on the south by Mexico, and on the west by California and Nevada. |
native, and still live here (just outside of Phoenix). And
though I've never been to Colorado City, I have probably done my homework
on this a little more than a lot of people.
Back in the 1950s,
then Governor Howard Pyle had hired detectives to investigate Colorado
City (called Short Creek at the time). These detectives ultimately ordered
a raid that resulted in the arrest of many polygamist men. The problem
here is the media at this point is showing footage of broken families,
children seperate from their parents, etc., which generated so much negative
publicity for the governor that made it difficult for future administrations
to take any action.
So as it sits now, law enforcement will
not simply go into Colorado City without a complaint being filed, or unless
they are witness to a crime, any more than they will investigate the break-in
of your house without either them seeing it or you telling them about it.
Frivolous lawsuit attorneys won't go after it because there's no money
to be made. So the only ones left are people with good morals and ethics
that usually don't have the means to even begin something like this.
My
problem is not with polygamy as a concept. If a group of consenting adults
all want to get married to each other, and they're not hurting anyone,
then that's their business. The keywords here are "consenting" and "adults",
neither of which applies to Colorado City. Very young girls (not adults)
are coerced (not consenting) into a particular situation. This is where
the problem is, and it's what needs to be attacked.
Some people
are for allowing polygamist relationships, and some are against it; just
as some are for gay relationships, and others are against it. So trying
to get support to make a change based on that method alone is not going
to happen. Someone needs to propose a change based on the fact that child
abuse is occuring, because a vast majority of people (substantially more,
anyway) would support something like this. It might be good to go in there
with a team from children protective services and send a shockwave through
their community.
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