<![CDATA[Jezebel: Cults]]> http://cache.gawker.com/assets/base/img/thumbs140x140/jezebel.com.png <![CDATA[Jezebel: Cults]]> http://jezebel.com/tag/cults http://jezebel.com/tag/cults <![CDATA[ This Week We Loved Our Moms, Our Undies, Ourselves ]]> sadbear111607.jpg

  • We got to know virgin-hoarding cult leader Michael Travesser and his band of wack jobs.
  • We got some LOLs out of douchefessionals John Fitzgerald Page and Paul Janka.
  • We said goodbye to our own Jennifer, who is departing for greener Polo pastures. She will be missed!
  • This weekend, pour one out for all the white wine drinking, on-the-toilet phone talking, track suit wearing mommas out there. Happy Mothers Day, moms; we love you!
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Fri, 09 May 2008 18:20:00 EDT Jessica http://jezebel.com/index.php?op=postcommentfeed&postId=389101&view=rss&microfeed=true
<![CDATA[ Cult Leader's Son Tells Larry King About Dad's Affair With Ex-Wife ]]> Michael Travesser, formerly known as Wayne Bent, the cult leader accused of sexual molestation, sent his son, Jeff Bent to Larry King last night to do some damage control. King asked Jeff about the National Geographic documentary, Inside A Cult, during which Michael talks about boning Jeff's wife. Jeff claims that the couple were divorced by the time Michael and his wife consummated their "spiritual marriage," and besides, what they did wasn't sex as mere mortals know it. "They've been ordained by God...it was a spiritual experience illustrated by a physical act," Jeff tells King. Clip above.

Earlier: Teen Cult Member: "Michael Has Washed My Brain Of All My Own Corrupt Thoughts"
New Mexico Cult Leader Jailed For Child Molestation

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Fri, 09 May 2008 14:30:00 EDT Jessica http://jezebel.com/index.php?op=postcommentfeed&postId=388991&view=rss&microfeed=true
<![CDATA[ Teen Cult Member: "Michael Has Washed My Brain Of All My Own Corrupt Thoughts" ]]> Remember yesterday's post about Wayne Bent, aka Michael Travesser, the prophet of a cult called the Lord Our Righteousness Church who was arrested on charges of child molestation? Well last night, the National Geographic Channel aired a documentary about Travesser and the LORs, and lordy lordy, it was bonkers. This first clip shows Michael with "Healed," one of the minors he is accused of molesting. (Michael, who in cult lore is the son of God, said that God told him to lie naked with seven virgins.) Healed's parents no longer live on the cult's compound, and although her parents have begged her to leave, Healed insists on living with "God's son." Her crazed chuckle is enough to chill anyone with a pulse. After the jump, a second clip showing two other barely-legal LORs explaining the elation they felt at lying naked with Michael, doing "God's will".


Earlier: New Mexico Cult Leader Jailed For Child Molestation Related: Inside A Cult [National Geographic Channel]

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Thu, 08 May 2008 11:00:00 EDT Jessica http://jezebel.com/index.php?op=postcommentfeed&postId=388468&view=rss&microfeed=true
<![CDATA[ New Mexico Cult Leader Jailed For Child Molestation ]]> emmamichael5708.jpgMeet Wayne Bent, aka Michael Travesser aka the Messiah. The Charles Manson-looking yahoo is the prophet and leader of the Lord Our Righteousness Church, and he was arrested on Tuesday on three counts of criminal sexual contact of a minor and three counts of contributing to the delinquency of a minor at the church's compound in rural New Mexico. The three allegedly molested children were also taken from the ranch. (At left is Bent with his wife, Emma. He is 66. She looks about 20, tops.) The compound is a former ranch near the Arizona border, which Bent and his followers have dubbed Strong City. According to the Associated Press, "Wayne Bent has acknowledged having sex with followers - including his daughter-in-law - and lying naked with virgins. He said the virgins asked for sex, but he refused."

Bent is a former Seventh Day Adventist who founded the church in 1987, though most of the current members of the cult do not have roots in Adventism, reports CNN. Bent moved the whole operation to a remote corner of New Mexico in 2000, which was also the year, he says, that God informed him he was the Messiah. It gets better: Bent says on his church's website that the Clinton/Lewinsky scandal was the first harbinger of the apocalypse and also told his followers, around the same time, that the world was ending on October 31, 2007 (he also claims to have predicted 9/11).

clouds5708.jpgUm, but then it didn't! (Apparently, according to Bent, the apocalypse is a "process"!) Anyway, a former cult member, John Sayer, says he broke away from the church in late 2005, but only after Bent said he wanted to sleep with 7 virgins, two of whom were Sayer's 14 and 15-year-old daughters. "I just told him no. ... I'm not in agreement. I don't see it's right," Sayer tells the AP. (Sayer still allowed his daughters to "lay naked" with the prophet, though he insists that nothing sexual occurred.)

Interestingly, the National Geographic Channel is airing a documentary tonight about Bent and his Lord of Righteousness followers called Inside A Cult. NYT reviewer Neil Genzlinger says, watching the documentary "you might find yourself thinking, 'These people obviously didn't understand the power of the medium or how insane they would sound on film.' But think again: the cult is thoroughly media-savvy, maintaining an extensive Web site (strongcity.info) full of video and blogs." Reading the church's blog just shows how utterly brainwashed the followers of Bent are — so much so that the impact of the outside world just doesn't register. Sayer's younger daughter, posting on the cult's website under the name "Healed" is clearly one of the true believers. She wrote on the site late last year, "Michael DID NOT molest me, and my laying with him was not sexual in any way, either. Michael sacrificed himself and was willing to look like a pedophile so that I might be bonded inseparably to the Father in Heaven." Jesus Christ.

Church Leader Arrested On Sex Charges In Northeast N.M. [AP]
Sect's 'Messiah' Arrested On Sex Charges [CNN]
Strong City [Lord Our Righteousness Official Website]
Ex-follower: 'Messiah' Wanted To Bed 7 Virgins [AP via CNN]
New Mexico Compound's Enraptured Believers [NYT]

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Wed, 07 May 2008 09:30:00 EDT Jessica http://jezebel.com/index.php?op=postcommentfeed&postId=387971&view=rss&microfeed=true
<![CDATA[ Child Abuse Hearings On Texas Polygamist Sect Start Today ]]> FLDS41408.jpgChild custody hearings begin today in Texas for the 416 minors who were taken from the polygamist sect Fundamentalist Church of Latter Day Saints' compound near Eldorado. According to CNN, logistics will be decided upon today, like which cases take precedence, while the actual fates of the children will be determined on Thursday. As previously reported, over 100 mothers accompanied the children from the compound, also known as the Yearning For Zion Ranch, when they were taken by police over a week ago. Texas authorities were responding to a call from a 16-year-old who blew the whistle on YFZ child abuse, though that teen has yet to be located. The mothers and children have been living in a temporary shelter in San Angelo, Texas, and the FLDS moms are none too pleased at the treatment they've been receiving.

Three women claiming to be representing the group wrote a letter to Texas Governor Rick Perry, lamenting their plight. "You would be appalled," the FLDS mothers wrote. "Many of our children have become sick as a result of the conditions they have been placed in. Some have even had to be taken to the hospital. Our innocent children are continually being questioned on things they know nothing about. The physical examinations were horrifying to the children. The exposure to these conditions is traumatizing them."

The mothers have also been stripped of their cell phones, as Texas authorities fear that the custody case will be hampered by outside interference. If the treatment of the FLDS wives and children is anything like former sect member Carolyn Jessop claims it is, then the lack of cell phones is the least of these women's worries. Jessop was married to a man over 30 years her senior when she was 18, and though she had 8 children with her husband (who had five other wives), she lived in constant fear. "Some [women in the sect] had been beaten so badly they had suffered broken bones. Girls, some as young as 12 and 13, had been expected to have sex with much older men."

Mothers From Polygamous Sect Ask Texas For Help [CNN]
Sect Investigation Moving To Courtroom [AP]
Forced To Marry A 50-year-old With Six Wives When Just 18 ... One Woman's Harrowing Tale Of Escaping The Texas Polygamist Sect [Daily Mail]

Earlier: Authorities Take 400 More Kids From Polygamist Sect In Texas
Your Nagging Ancient Mormon Underage Sex Cult Questions, Answered At Last!
Polygamist Sect Raided On Charges Of Abuse Of Girls

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Mon, 14 Apr 2008 09:30:00 EDT Jessica http://jezebel.com/index.php?op=postcommentfeed&postId=379358&view=rss&microfeed=true
<![CDATA[ This Week We Hung Out With A Lot Of Child Molesters ]]> sadbear111607.jpg
  • We were so into the Fundamentalist Church of Latter Day Saints and their Yearning For Zion Ranch, where girls in their early teens get married off to gross molesty old men with multiple other wives, none of whom are allowed to wear red because that's Jesus' color.
  • Are those teens better, or worse off than the brave 8-year-old Yemeni girl name Nojoud Muhammed Nasser who was married off by her crazy homeless father, but has now successfully filed for divorce.
  • A study in contrasts: the marriage of Nojoud Muhammed Nasser versus the insane Southern belles of MTV's True Life who call themselves "old maids" at age 24.

  • OMG I almost forgot about that Australian father and daughter who fuck and have babies. Oh ew.
  • Can't some people just have a nice, normal wedding that doesn't involve incest, polygamy, statutory rape, fake boobs or Botox?
  • Mommablogger Dooce appears to be a fairly reasonable person whose wedding probably didn't involve any of those things.
  • Karl Lagerfeld hates Dooce's kid, though. Actually he hates all children. And also fat people!
  • You know who probably had kind of shitty moms? Those horrid teenage cheerleader bitches who beat the living hell out of their friend and may now face life in prison.
  • So make a bonfire out of Cosmo's "Sexy" issue, and rip off that bandanna you've been wearing. Let it all hang out this weekend!
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Fri, 11 Apr 2008 18:00:00 EDT Jessica http://jezebel.com/index.php?op=postcommentfeed&postId=378969&view=rss&microfeed=true
<![CDATA[ Polygamist Sect Raided On Charges Of Abuse Of Girls ]]> polygamy4708.jpgActing on a tip from a 16-year-old church member, Texas Child Protective Services arranged a raid on Friday at the compound of the polygamist sect The Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, 200 miles outside San Antonio. According to the AP, the teen caller said she was married and had a baby at age 15 with registered sex offender Dale Barlow, 50 — a clear violation of Texas law, as girls under 16 are not allowed to be wed, even with parental approval. The most recent reports state that Texas State troopers removed 219 people out of the compound —a former exotic game ranch, now called Yearning For Zion (YFZ) by the controversial church — but they've been as yet unable to locate the caller who notified child protective services in the first place.

CPS spokeswoman Marleigh Meisner tells the AP: "We're always concerned anytime we have a victim and we can't find that victim. I am confident this girl does indeed exist." Dale Barlow, who was convicted last year of conspiracy to commit sexual conduct with a minor, is reportedly in Arizona at the Fundamentalist Church's other compound near the Utah border, and claims that he doesn't know the girl accusing him. According to his probation officer Bill Loader, Barlow has given a DNA sample and is cooperating with investigators.

This isn't the first time the Fundamentalist Church of Latter Day Saints, a splinter Mormon faction that allows polygamy, has made news. Its controversial leader Warren Jeffs is currently in a Utah jail for arranging a marriage between a 14-year-old girl and her 19-year-old cousin, and the church has a reputation for exiling young men so that there can be a gender imbalance that allows for polygamy to be the norm.

The town nearest to the YFZ Ranch, a tiny burg named Eldorado, has been housing the displaced women and children for the past few days, not without suspicion and a little fear — perhaps they envision another Waco. According to the Dallas Morning News, locals think that law enforcement has been waiting since Jeffs' arrest to raid the compound. Randy Mankin, the editor of the Eldorado Success newspaper, told the Morning News, Child Protective Services "got the tip they've been waiting for, and I think they had the plan in place for how they were going to deal with it." The 200 or so women and children remain at a historic fort in nearby San Angelo for now, as officials are still trying to find the 16-year-old victim.

Troopers Probe Texas Polygamist Compound [AP]
137 Children Removed From Polygamist Ranch [CNN]
Man Accused Of Impregnating Teenager In Connection With Texas Polygamy Raid Says He Doesn't Know His Accuser [Salt Lake Tribune]
State Still Searching For Children At Polygamist Sect's Ranch [Dallas Morning News]

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Mon, 07 Apr 2008 09:30:00 EDT Jessica http://jezebel.com/index.php?op=postcommentfeed&postId=376693&view=rss&microfeed=true