thank you for the post,Trotafox.
after I saw your post, I watched it too. If I remember correctly, arranged marriages were for some who were 14 yrs old, becausethe age limit to get married in Georgia is 16. I could be wrong, so if anyone else watched it, jump in. And the reason for it was to not take the chance of having children born out of wedlock.
it was a very hard show to watch. the beatings some CHILDREN endured in front of the whole congregation must have been so terrible that I can't even imagine the pain. they were beat with belts or swithes till blood was drawn. and the members insisted that it was just discipline. it was downright cruelty to children. it made me sick to know that this still goes on.
on the other side of the coin, I did think that the state people who took the children away from their homes, used exessive force. there must have been a better way so as not to scare the crap out of all those kids. It's hard to draw a line, but the most important thing was the safety of the children, and that's why they removed them from the homes till it was all investigated.
thank you again for posting that the show was airing. I would have missed it otherwise.
peace,
somebody
editing t add this: did you catch the parents of the ex-member who was 16 when she recieved a beating so bad that she passed out? and the parents said that she was nothing but trouble since she was born ( or a very young child)? I'd e-mail her if I could. my heart broke for her. can you imagine how she felt watching the show tonight with her parents saying that? I think it was her mother who said that about her, and her dad agreed. what a crying shame.