American Theocracy
最近FLDSやウォーレン・ジェフスで検索してくる人が多いと思ったら、こういうことだった。
FLDSについては前に書いたエントリに付け加えることはあまりないが、Salonの記事が面白かった。
ラスベガス（ＣＮＮ） 一夫多妻制の推進者で、成人男性と未成年少女の結婚を仲介した疑いで、米連邦捜査局（ＦＢＩ）が行方を追っていた最重要指名手配者ウォレン・スティード・ジェフス容疑者（５０）が２８日午後９時頃、ネバダ州ラスベガス北方のハイウェーで逮捕され、変装用のかつらや携帯電話１５台、ノートパソコン４台、５万４０００ドル以上の現金などが押収された。
[...]ＦＢＩは今年５月、アルカイダ指導者オサマ・ビンラディン容疑者らとともに同容疑者を最重要指名手配者１０人のリストに加え、逮捕につながる有力情報の提供者に１０万米ドルの報奨金を用意していた。
そもそも疑問だったのは、なぜアメリカ国内で多妻婚を奉じるコミューンなんてものが可能なのかということだった。Salonの記事によると──
コロラドシティーはFLDSが築いた町で、１万人の住民のうち４分の３がFLDSのメンバー、残りの住民もその分派。ウォーレン・ジェフスは父親からFLDSを引き継ぐと一種の神権政治を敷き、市長、警察署長、教育長もその命令に従っていた──ということらしい。広すぎるな、アメリカは！
Colorado City's 10,000 residents make it the most populous town in the isolated wedge of chalky red desert north of the Grand Canyon and south of the Utah border. The town straddles the two states, materializing out of nowhere along a barren stretch of highway known as the Arizona Strip. Its seclusion is no accident: After polygamy was formally renounced by the Mormon Church in 1890, the town's early settlers sought out a remote site where they could take multiple wives far from public scrutiny. Residents call it the Crick, for the creek that meanders through the center of town, and kids commonly refer to themselves as Crickers. Three-fourths of the town's residents are members of the Fundamentalist Church of Latter-Day Saints; the other quarter belong to a sect called the Centennialists, which split off from the FLDS in the 1980s, insisting that the church be governed by its traditional committee of elders rather than submit to the dictates of the prophet.When Warren Jeffs inherited control of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints in 2000, following the death of his father, Rulon, the first thing he did was marry 30 of his father's youngest and prettiest wives. Then he set about tightening his reins on Colorado City, a town where the women dress like the cast of "Little House on the Prairie" and the civic leaders -- the mayor, the police chief, the superintendent of schools -- are all subject to the prophet's orders. Jeffs banned holiday celebrations, forbade followers from listening to music except for the droning spiritual chants that he himself records, and prohibited all forms of worldly entertainment, including sports -- bowling, football, even snowball fights. Colorado City was run like a theocracy, with Jeffs its ayatollah.
In order to keep tabs on his followers, Jeffs relied on the local police, who acted more like the Taliban's morality squad than keepers of the peace. The cops were essentially informants, loyal first to Jeffs and second to the state laws that they were sworn to uphold. They patrolled the community for violations of the prophet's moral code, reporting infractions to their supreme leader. They would pull kids over for alleged traffic violations, then take photographs if they found CDs or other worldly possessions, which they turned over to the Jeffs. Until last year, when government officials in Utah and Arizona began investigating charges of underage marriage and tax fraud, Colorado City was essentially allowed to thrive outside the law.
