Some religious conservatives may be in a bit of a quandary when it comes to the police raid on the fundamentalist Mormon sect in Texas. On the one hand, they disapprove of forced marriage and rape of little girls, they certainly disapprove of polygamy, and they don't think too highly of Mormon religious doctrine. On the other hand, they do tend to approve of the patriarchal control of women which such sects are based on and they traditionally promote freedom of religion even when it means conflicting with secular, civil laws.

So, how should conservative Christians react to the Mormon sect's behavior and the police raid? Do they support the raid and taking the children away from the parents because it means protecting the children from sexual abuse and harmful religious practices? Or do conservative Christians instead defend the right of Mormons to practice their religion in private, even when it means forcing little girls to marry and have sexual intercourse at young ages?

Rod Dreher, the self-described "Crunchy Conservative," (via Pandagon) seems to want it both ways, but eventually seems to come down on the side of protecting child marriage and rape:

But what is abuse? Is it always clear? Under the law, there's no doubt at all that having sex with underage teenage girls is by definition a crime, whether or not you call her your "wife." In the state of Texas, a person under the age of 16 cannot consent to marriage. And obviously, polygamous marriages are not recognized as marriages. If teenage girls are being forced into polygamous marriages and into sexual relationships, the state has a responsibility to get in there and stop it. If no one will protect those minors, the state must.

But. I've been trying to think about this situation in light of the fact that the fundamentalist LDS cult (Tom Wolfe says the difference between a "cult" and a religion is political power) is unpopular, and I certainly find their beliefs and lifestyle repulsive. But this is a free country, and as such, I have to tolerate a certain amount of repulsiveness; my own religious freedom depends on it, and so do yours. But tolerance can only go so far. Where do we draw the line? How, in a pluralist culture that respects freedom of religion, do we know how and when to say that this or that religious sect's behavior is not only wrong, but is criminally intolerable?

After admitting that the girls being married can't actually consent, Rod Dreher really has to ask whether civil law should "tolerate" what is technically and legally child rape? Yes, he is. Rod Dreher really wonders whether the marriage and rape of children really should be legally accepted when it occurs under the aegis of a patriarchal religious organization. Somehow, I doubt that these questions would occur to him if the rape of little girls was going on in a secular context — it's only patriarchal religion which motivates him to "just giving child rape a chance."

As Amanda Marcotte points out:

By Rod’s argument, we should also be lenient on slavery (though it’s worth noting that the FDLS definition of wifehood is close to indistinguishable from slavery), infanticide, rule by kings, torture chambers for heretics, witch-burning—ah ****, what am I saying? All these injustices tend to fall on the shoulders of those who are not in his privileged shoes, so he’s probably see all of them as tolerable as long as you hid behind the “people of faith” label.

Is it just coincidence that Rod Dreher happens to be a member of the class upon which none of the injustices tolerated under the "people of faith" label will fall? Is it just a coincidence that he would never have to worry about losing equal rights or dignity that would be protected in secular contexts, but which might be undermined if a powerful religious majority deeded those rights or dignity contrary to their doctrine?

As if that weren't bad enough, Dreher has the temerity to suggest that tolerance of child rape might be required by tolerance of gay marriage:

I happen to think it's terrible to force a 14 year old to "marry" a 50 year old man who has five other "wives." I would put a stop to it. But shouldn't we at least ask ourselves on what ground we stand to criminalize the practice, when many of us are perfectly willing to extend marriage rights to same-sex couples. If there is no fixed definition of marriage, and if marriage is merely a contract establishing a legal relationship between consenting people, why is it wrong for the members of this community to establish their own rules governing marriage?

Remember, Rod Dreher acknowledges that the girls in question can't legally consent, and he doesn't appear to question whether the adult gays who want to marry can consent, yet despite that significant difference, he sincerely wonders if perhaps acceptance of gay marriage means that we lose the ability to legally and morally condemn child rape.

Oh, Dreher tries to justify this by saying that the lack of an ability to consent is merely legalistic, but he (deliberately?) ignores the fact that the girls in this cult cannot consent under any meaningful sense of the term. It's not simply that there's a legal denial that they can consent, even if they tried; in reality, these girls lack any option to consent or not consent — what they do is determined by their male guardians, from beginning to end.

But don't think for a minute that the only losers in this tragic affair are the FLDS cultists. All of us who are, or who can imagine ourselves as outsiders -- especially cultural and religious outsiders whose lives and beliefs run counter to the prevailing social order -- will have lost something.

Right now, the only people who have lost are those who want to raise daughters for the purpose of giving them over to life-long sexual and domestic slavery from a young age. Unless Rod Dreher has had thoughts in that direction, he hasn't lost a thing. The only way for him to try to argue that the loss for polygamous cults has any impact on him is to argue that there is some moral or legal similarity between being able to rape young girls and whatever it is he thinks is being threatened. What are the chances that such an argument would be successful?

In all his hand-wringing over what he imagines religious believers might be losing in America, do you suppose Rod Dreher has given any thought to what all the girls and women in these sects have lost? They lost their childhood. They lost the ability to choose their own sexual partners and mates. They lost the ability to be fully autonomous and free individuals who can make any significant choices about the direction of their lives.

Amanda Marcotte notes that Rod Dreher says he left the Catholic Church because of the sex abuse scandal with priests. It doesn't seem as though he seriously questioned whether there was a privacy or religious right for priests to fondle and molest little boys. It doesn't sound like he thought the prosecution of Catholic priests meant that religious believers around the nation "lost" something. Yet, the practice of polygamous sexual relationships with young girls does give him pause.

So, how are we supposed to avoid wondering why raping boys in the context of a church is horrible while raping girls in the context of a religious compound should even possibly be tolerated? If this is what it means for a conservative to be "crunchy," I think I'd prefer a soft and chewy conservative, if they are capable of acknowledging that religion isn't a justification for raping young girls.