Support NeoGAF

[xabre]

Tempest in Texas

ELDORADO, Texas -- This is a town of 1,951 residents, 13 churches, three restaurants, and a motel that fills with hunters during deer season. The town paper, the Eldorado Success, covers high school football, wedding anniversaries and city council meetings — typical small-town stories in what was once a typical west Texas town.

All that changed on March 24, 2004, when the biggest story to ever hit Eldorado debuted on the paper's front page: "Corporate Retreat or Prophet's Refuge?" the headline read. The Success sold 200 copies in a single day, causing a near-traffic jam outside the paper's office, says editor Randy Mankin.

The story Mankin broke concerned the true identity of Eldorado's new neighbors.

In November 2003, David Allen Steed had purchased a 1,691-acre ranch just outside of town, telling locals it would be used as a hunting retreat for business clients from Las Vegas.

But Mankin discovered that Steed was actually an agent for a breakaway Mormon sect known as the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints (FLDS) and based in an Arizona-Utah border community long known as Short Creek (encompassing the twin cities of Hildale, Utah, and Colorado City, Ariz.).

He began researching the FLDS, and what he would learn would astonish him: stories of "blood atonement," child brides, rabid racism, multiple wives, and a secretive, religious dictator.

The more he learned, the more apparent it became that the folks at the ranch had no interest in hunting at all.

The FLDS is a polygamous religious cult led by 48-year-old "prophet" Warren Jeffs, who teaches his followers (he claims an estimated 10,000) that blacks are the descendants of Cain, "cursed with a black skin" and selected by God to be "the servants of servants."

Since taking over leadership of the group when his father died in 2002, Jeffs has demanded absolute obedience from his followers and preached blood atonement, an early Mormon doctrine dictating the extrajudicial killings of certain sinners. (Modern Mormon officials have said that blood atonement was never actually carried out, but researchers have produced some evidence to the contrary.)

Jeffs says that the government is "wicked," as are outsiders and the mainstream Mormon Church (leaders prefer its full name, Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, or LDS), and that all will soon be stricken from the earth by God's hand.

An explosive situation appears to be developing.

Warren Jeffs' empire is, for the moment, headquartered in an area north of the Grand Canyon and south of Zion National Park known as the Arizona Strip, in the isolated community of Short Creek, where time has stood still in many ways since the polygamists moved there during the Great Depression. The FLDS split from the mainstream LDS after the church banned polygamy in 1890 under pressure from the federal government.

The FLDS further distanced itself from the LDS when the church reversed a longstanding position and began allowing blacks to become priests in 1978. Jeffs has described the day blacks were given the keys to heaven as a victory for the devil. He says the LDS "became the great and terrible church on the earth" and will be destroyed by God.

Despite longstanding laws forbidding polygamy, the group has been largely left alone since a disastrous 1953 raid on Short Creek by Arizona law enforcement became a public relations nightmare for then-Gov. Howard Pyle. The media told stories of families and children torn apart, and the public was outraged.

Short Creek is completely dominated by Jeffs. FLDS members control the city government, the police force, the schools, and every aspect of life.

"Obey the prophet when he speaks and you'll be blessed," Jeffs has said. "Disobey him and it's death."

In late 2004, Jeffs asked his disciples to stand if they would be willing to die for him. No one remained seated.

"He asked them would they die for him. Well, that's a veiled question," says Richard Holm, a former elder in the FLDS church who was excommunicated in 2003. "'Would you kill for me?' is the subtle question within that question."

In the two years since he became prophet, Jeffs has ordered all dogs shot; closed the town zoo; forbidden television, holidays, movies and music; banned laughter; forbidden swimming and water sports, and sent "God Squads" of young men to inspect residences and report any violations of his edicts.

Marriages are arranged and performed exclusively by Jeffs in order to keep his chosen people pure. "The devil is trying to get people to go out and marry and mix with the world," he preaches, "even different colored people. That is why we marry only who the prophet says."

Strangers ("gentiles") touring the town are met with glances ranging from hostile to fearful. Outsiders, residents have been told, are "wicked."

Everywhere visitors go in Short Creek, they are shadowed by an entourage of men SUV and pickups watching their every move, taking note of where they go and who they speak with — a silent intimidation of both the visitors and anyone who accommodates them.

Wow...just wow.

 

[Cerebral Palsy]

Yeah, what a bunch of fucking loonies. I live in Salt Lake, so I hear about these guys on the news every once in a while.

 

[DDayton]

You know, most Christian groups wouldn't consider this guy to be Christian, especially given the fact that he doesn't believe Jesus to be the same guy that most Christians believe Jesus to be.

Just an aside.

 

[Zaptruder]

Sounds like North Korea is invading America through the guise of 'christian fundamentalists'.

 

[explodet]

forbidden television, holidays, movies and music; banned laughter

If I didn't know better this would sound like a Care Bears episode.

 

[Rlan]

Sounds more like Robotnik on the old Adventures of Sonic the Hedgehog show.

 

[Cerebral Palsy]

Warren Jeffs

If I was as ugly as this man I would also join the FLDS church.

 

[xabre]

Looks can be decieving...he doesn't look like the fanatical religious dictator of a small town.

 

[D-X]

Sounds more like Robotnik on the old Adventures of Sonic the Hedgehog show.

Ok so it's not the one from that show

 

[Rlan]

More like:

 

[Hitokage]

These people aren't to be confused with the Robertsons and Falwells that "christian fundamentalists" usually refers to, and they don't get along too well with them either.

That being said, the mainstream Mormon Church DOES have its members swear to avoid loud laughter in the temple ritual.

 

[videogamer]

Warren Jeffs

If I was as ugly as this man I would also join the FLDS church.

That's like the same pic that xabre posted, but he looks much much worse in yours. Kind of like the Newsweek OJ cover.

 

[galeninjapan]

The FLDS further distanced itself from the LDS when the church reversed a longstanding position and began allowing blacks to become priests in 1978.

Is there even a black person that wants to join the Mormans?

 

[levious]

Is there even a black person that wants to join the Mormans?

Since mormons declared them to be human, they've been the fastest growing minority in the church.

 

[AstroLad]

I worked on a case against these folks last summer; it was really interesting learning about the community and its power structures, as well as winning.