I would be interested to hear other people's views on this.

In the last couple of weeks I have been following the story of the removal and eventual placing into protective custody over 400 children that were taken from a religious sect in Eldorado, Texas.

Apparently they call themselves The Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints.

They are a group that broke off from the Mormon church after polygamy was banned.

They were holed up in a pretty much self contained ranch in Texas encompassing hundreds of acres.

Doesn't sound too bad so far if you leave out the children part does it.

It is okay that these people decided to live in a group by themselves, not interfering with anyone else, but, this is where the nasty bit comes in.

They were forcing young girls to marry and bear children to men who were many years their senior.

They were teaching the young men that this was acceptable and that they were meant to take many wives and procreate.

A young girl blew the whistle on this establishment when she called a crisis center saying that she was 16 yrs old and was forced to spiritually marry a 50 yr old man who already had other wives.

She says that she bore a baby at 15 and was subjected to sexual and physical abuse.

As of yet, they still haven't found this girl.

One of the things that I find interesting is that over 140 women left the ranch willingly.

The outside world was painted as a bad place where the girls would have to cut their hair, wear makeup and have sex with lots of different men.

In a religious sect that was obviously very strict I guess this acted as a deterrent to them leaving or running away.

As far as I can see, cut your hair or be raped repeatedly at age 12, hmmmm, I think I know which one I would pick.

I understand that if it is something that you have known since birth, then you are less reluctant to change it but what were their mothers thinking letting their children go through this.

Now these children are going to be placed into states homes and have to spend the rest of their lives recovering from this abuse.

Another member of the sect who lives near Lockney with his two wives and multiple children says that he thinks it is religious persecution.

Now please be aware that this in no way is condoned by the Church of Latter Day Saints. They do not believe in polygamy and certainly don't believe in the child abuse that this sect has metted out to the children that belonged to their group.

This group is a whole different ballgame.

So, what do you think?

Child abuse or Religious persecution.