Polygamist abuse

By Michael J.W. Stickings

AP: "Nearly two-thirds of the families living at a polygamist group's ranch -- targeted in a high-profile raid last spring -- had children who were abused or neglected, Texas child welfare officials said in a report released Tuesday."

Surprise... surprise... surprise.

As I wrote when this story broke back in May: "[W]e all know -- do we not? -- that this sort of lifestyle, the polygamy of a totalitarian religious cult, is inherently abusive. Indeed, it would not exist without abuse. Abuse is what keeps it going, what enables and supports it."

In a liberal society, the state has every right to, and must, intervene and to prosecute the abusers. The abusers will cry religious freedom, but there should be no freedom to abuse.