"'People don't like to talk about their fumarase babies for obvious reasons,' Wyler says. 'A lady comes in and helps her. 'He wanted to control his children and grandchildren through genetics. Shuvrajit Das Biswas. . Another of Ortells teachings: Adolf Hitler had the right idea about creating a master race, but didnt have the Lords help, so he failed. Fear began to overwhelm me, for the future, and for my own son. SALT LAKE CITY A local non-profit with ties to the polygamous Kingston group is facing multiple questions and accusations regarding its taxes. "By the late 1990s, Tarby and his team had discovered fumarase deficiency was occurring in the greatest concentration in the world among the fundamentalist Mormon polygamists of northern Arizona and southern Utah. And during a recent picnic to honor the birthday of patriarch John Ortell Kingston, Order families descended on a Salt Lake Valley park, where hundreds of children of all ages blanketed the parks green expanse. Ortell is credited with expanding The Orders business empire and making the family immensely wealthy. [Andrea] Moore-Emmett [author of 'God's Brothel: The Extortion of Sex for Salvation in Contemporary Mormon and Christian Fundamentalist Polygamy and the Stories of 18 Women Who Escaped'] contends that [in polygamy] incest, statutory rape, torture, physical abuse, forced marriages, and trafficking of girls is rampant. Elden also instituted the church law of one above the other, requiring members blind obedience to the churchs hierarchy of numbered men, with Elden being Brother Number One. The Kingston clan is also known as the Davis County Cooperative. A fourth to half of father-daughter and brother-sister offspring have mental or physical deficiencies. "'I knew I would have to marry my [half-] brother ever since I was 12,' says the woman. Another of the cults teachings was that soy can make you gay, an anti-government conspiracy theory popular in some right-wing circles. . She also had a child with a clubfoot, and I think probably half of her children had respiratory problems when they were babies, because they were so related.". 'Escaping Polygamy' is a docuseries on Lifetime which follows the work of three sisters, who were able to break free from the polygamous Kingston Clan, known as the Order. 'I've seen some children that can talk and communicate a little,' Wyler said. It's not really talked about; I don't think [people here] even research to see how related they are. ', "The ultimate goal of the breeding program, Wyler says, is to create the perfect race. "John and Charles' brother, Merlin Barnum Kingston, married and had children with four nieces and a half-sister, say ex-members, including one of his own daughters. . "Tarby says members of the community made it clear that neither choice was acceptable. Moore-Emmett suggests that the heavily Mormon Utah government is unduly tolerant of polygamy and reluctant to acknowledge the abuses of many polygamous families. They are quick to point out to reporters that they no longer practice polygamy and excommunicate members who continue to do so. "I remembered the studies conducted on my brother and I as children at the University of Utah . A 1999 Salt Lake Tribune article mapped the Kingstons incestuous family tree, quoting one of Ortells 65 kids, ex-Order member Connie Rugg as saying, My father experimented [with] inbreeding with his cattle and then he turned to his children.. Consequently, genetic diseases and mutations have inevitably sprouted in many polygamous groups having this belief. Rome became the mistress of the world, and introduced this order of monogamy wherever her sway was acknowledged. 'They don't believe anything written about Colorado City [by outsiders, even medical experts] carries much truth,' Tarby says. . The notoriety will just make them zoo specimens. The girl's father and mother, Susan Nelson (one of John Daniel's many wives) are half-sister and brother. Ron says the cults justification for its racism goes back to early Mormon teachings about a war in heaven between the forces of Satan and those of Jesus. Some would say that is because it takes generations for certain inbred recessive genetic traits to manifest. . We cannot afford to neglect the possibility our ancestors practiced a form of marriage that was unhealthy and debilitating to our children, to us, and to society. girl, born to John Ortell and Isabell Johnson, was not the product of an incestuous marriage. . . Daniels ultimatum: Stay in The Order, date no one, and have no contact with family. Current scientific knowledge indicates Grants lack of sons resulted from his own genetic defect, since only men carry the male Y chromosome to make a son. "Another of Rugg's full sisters, Andrea Johnson, died in 1992 of complications of pre-eclampsia, a condition of pregnancy that was not treated until after the young girl, swollen with toxic fluid, was rushed to the emergency unit at University Hospital. They have no movement. . "In 1996, the now 31-year-old Kingston mother of two slow-growing children sought explanations at Primary Children's Medical Center. Outwardly, she appeared to have no sex organs. And her ex-husband's parents, Merlin and Carolyn Kingston, were uncle and niece. . Paul would rather have the wealth and the money than the isolation and the conflict, he said. Below are further horrific details of the Kingston clan's "God-given genetic calamity, brought to you courtesy of Joseph Smith's Mormonism, as reported in the "Salt Lake Tribune" article, "When Incest Becomes a Religious Tenet": ". 'They are totally helpless,' he says. Early polygamy was rife with incestuous and eugenic ideas and practices as well. Is Jasper always unspirited and stony-broke when outvalue some Heisenberg very . http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bmhjgaB2Hi8. Kingston forebears were among those who suffered this fate. and councilmen.' That's still gross." Reading the ignorant responses of the polygs - particularly in the face of the evidence all around them - makes my blood boil. it is the only popular religion there,", -The Prophet Brigham Young, "Deseret News," 6 August 1862, "This law of monogamy, or the monogamic system, laid the foundation for prostitution and the evils and diseases of the most revolting nature and character under which modern Christendom groans, . From the previously-cited article, "Understanding Polygamy": "The polygamous Kingston family professes that their genealogy line traces back to Jesus Christ, and so they possess holy blood. Tucker recounted the clans version of the apocalypse, the End of the World War, a riff on a prophecy some ascribe to Joseph Smith, called The White Horse Prophecy. "Tarby believes the recessive gene was introduced by one of the community's polygamist founders. . . My great-grandfather, like scores of English immigrants eager to escape a life of poverty, . . All of the gay people would definitely be the first to go, he said. She's worked for lawyers who brought these cases to light and needed help with mormon terminology and ward politics workings. In a letter to the Intelligence Report responding to allegations made by former members, Kent Johnson, a spokesman for the Davis County Cooperative Society, claimed that The Orders foundational principles include the Golden Rule, and that the church rejects any form of racism or bigotry. "Genetic testing confirms that there is a high prevalence of various birth defects in polygamous populations. "While none of these can positively be linked to incest without DNA testing, geneticists say most of the conditions are exacerbated by incest. Asked about these legends, Kingston spokesman Kent Johnson, explained via email that on occasion Order families have asked to spread the ashes of a child lost before or after birth at the Holy Spot. They can't do anything by themselves. . The grave side funeral services will be at the grave side in Babyland at 4p.m.". For a man of God to be confined to one woman is small business. . Local Policing and Immigration Enforcement, Request for Legal Assistance Economic Justice. What were taught is to love our neighbor, that all people, all races no matter who they are deserve to be loved, he explained. Julie left the cult at age 19. The son of Pauls sister Rachel herself a daughter of Ortell and LaDonna Kingston Young was the only current member of the Kingston clan, out of the many contacted for this story, who consented to a live, on-the-record interview. "'This problem is going to get worse and worse and worse,' predicts . . 'They are functioning way below their chronological age.'. Nobody, from the police to [the governor], cares that these children are abused from conception to marriage.'. "Have you ever heard of the term The Turkey Baster?" "They were called the Second Warders and we were called the First Warders; we weren't supposed to hang out with kids from the Centennial group because they were wicked for having left," she says. . . . "Some fumarase deficiency children, he says, develop a small degree of motor skills over time: 'They don't remain infantile their entire life. Somehow LaDonnas curse was transferred to the Tuckers via Christy, Rons wife, because, Christys mom left The Order and married an Irishman, before leaving him and returning to the fold. . "In the FLDS community, marriages with cousins and other relatives are common, Bistline said. . His seven sons and two daughters by LaDonna Peterson, the second of his 13 wives, are reputed to be the inner circle that runs the cult. They maintain a secretive but powerful presence in Utah's Salt Lake Valley, and their estimated 7,500. . "Tarby says most of the children 'can say at least a word or two,' but that all of them 'have severe mental retardation' with IQs of less than 25. . the FLDS has the highest known rate of a rare genetic disorder called "fumarase deficiency" that causes severe birth defects. "An unknown number--but believed to be in the thousands--of Barlow/Jessop descendants carry the recessive gene that causes fumarase deficiency. "Of the Kingstons, Williams says: 'There is not much you can do about them. Certainly if MORmON Jesus had done this, we would hear all about it from the LDS as *proof* that God was doing his modern work via MORmONISM, but alas there is no such manifestation ! He also married a woman descended from polygamy. In order to maintain his familys superior bloodlines, Ortell married and had children with two of his half-sisters and two nieces. They steer clear of banks,. . Childbirth would be fraught with despair and guilt for me and for many family members. Consanguinity is a reason why families bear children of only one sex--all sons or all daughters. Mormons, however, take care to denounce the FLDS "polygs" as having absolutely no relation to their Latter Day Saints. ", ("Mormon Polygamy: Frequently Asked Questions," at: http://www.i4m.com/think/polygamy/polygamy_summary.htm). So when you see all of these diseases occurring in the children, it's possible some are the result of inbreeding.'. This is why those laws need to be enforced. His eldest died six years ago at 10 years old, he says, and another died in infancy, leaving behind two remaining brothers from a set of spontaneous identical triplets. Nearly all the Mormon founding families were relatives, so the first polygamists enjoyed relations to different degrees when the divine experiment began. Sisters married the same man in polygamous celestial weddings; brothers from one family married sisters from another (meaning their kids are double cousins). Lucky was the first to die in my generation. Young declined to comment when asked if he practices polygamy. . But [FLDS members] don't think of it as sexual predation. "Rather than polygamy being about religion, Moore-Emmett believes that many polygamous marriages are about sex and power. It is these discredited ideas that foster this genetic legacy. . This is a humane coping strategy devised to deal with a dilemma that devastated a woman taught from birth her only value was in the number of children she bore for the Kingdom of God. Certainly the British and French education systems make it clear quite early on (13-14 yrs old). . Young told Intelligence Report that his company has sold weapons, with the approval of the U.S. State Department, to governments in Europe and the Middle East, Saudi Arabia being one. . . . "Victims suffer a range of symptoms, including severe epileptic seizures, inability to walk or even sit upright, severe speech impediments, failure to grow at a normal rate, and tragic physical deformities. 'They have the authoritarian structure necessary to keep this from happening, but I don't think they have the advanced thinking,' Aleck says. They got married and contacted the . "Experts say the number of children afflicted in the FLDS community is expected to steadily increase as a result of decades of inbreeding between two of the polygamous sect's founding families--the Barlows and the Jessops. thus marking the first time news media reported this human and civil rights nightmare accurately since the 1850s. "Tarby and a team of doctors from Barrow Neurological Institute at St. Joseph's Hospital in Phoenix and the University of Arizona College of Medicine in Tucson began researching the disease and soon discovered that fumarase deficiency was occurring in at least two other families living in the same isolated community that practiced an unusual custom. Same family, second child, same period of life, a different fatal disease; was there a connection? . " The knowledge that one's children are likely to be born with conditions like this one does not prevent FLDS couples from becoming pregnant; instead, they see it as a responsibility and blessing to have many children. Although the official stance of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints is against polygamy, several of the women's stories reveal that LDS leaders dismiss the deviant sects and blame the women who come to them for help. 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