On May 29, 2008, the Texas Supreme Court affirmed the Appeals Court's May 22 Decision - which overturned the District Court's April 17-18 Decision - declaring that the 468 children of the Mormon-based sect, the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints (FLDS), had indeed been wrongly taken into State custody by Child Protective Services (CPS) following the April 3rd raid on the FLDS Yearning for Zion (YFZ) ranch. The Court ordered CPS to return custody of the children to their parents.
In Texas, the State's CPS department is identified as the Texas Department of Family and Protective Services (DFPS). Management oversight of that subsidiary agency is maintained by the Texas Health and Human Services Commission (HHSC). Appointed in 2003, Albert Hawkins is the HHSC's Executive Commissioner.
On June 3, 2008, USA Today published an opinion piece by Executive Commissioner Hawkins, titled, "Opposing View: We had good reason to act." The Executive Commissioner therein asserted his justifications as to why his department had taken their actions against the FLDS. Although still maintaining the belief that the CPS workers had acted appropriately, he conceded a respect for the Texas Supreme Court's Decision that the children be returned.
Notwithstanding his asserted justifications for the raid, there was quite more to that which the Executive Commissioner wrote. Among his many statements, it was the very first paragraph - indeed, the very first sentence in that first paragraph - which stood out most prominently.
Namely, Executive Commissioner Hawkins declared, "In the eyes of Texas Child Protective Services workers, the Yearning for Zion (YFZ) case is not about religion or polygamy. It's about sexual abuse of girls and grooming boys to become perpetrators. It's about parents who condoned underage 'marriages' and adults who never took a stand against the abuse taking place in their homes."
Therewith, the final "top dog" executive of the entire Texas CPS openly declared that the case had nothing to do with polygamy. The national polygamy rights movement for consenting adults had been saying exactly those points from the start, while equally decrying against the underage issues with the FLDS too.
National Polygamy Advocate, Mark Henkel, and the TruthBearer.org organization he founded, spent thousands of dollars, financed professionally-authored press release and op-ed articles, reached out to numerous media contacts, and conducted interviews while rejecting numerous salacious or falsely-framed media requests.
Undoubtedly, both honest and dishonest media were overwhelmingly informed of the real facts. The FLDS are far more of a "Mormon sect" than a "polygamist sect," and that rogue sect was never involved in the national polygamy rights movement anyway. Moreover, the national polygamy rights movement for consenting adults had always disavowed the FLDS, the sect's criminal leader Warren Jeffs, and underage marriage.
With all that great expense and effort by the established national pro-polygamy advocacy, the resulting media coverage exposed which media outlets are based on actual, honest journalism and which ones are dishonest manufactured-news media.
In contrast to honest media, the manufactured-news media knowingly committed libel by omission. Omitting the fact that the FLDS religion is actually only a "Mormon sect," reports inaccurately identified them as a "polygamist sect" instead. Such dishonest media also omitted the known facts that, nationally-speaking, pro-polygamists around the country utterly oppose underage marriage, do not commonly believe in Mormon paradigms, and are most typically apt to be the only polygamists in each family's town, city, or suburb.
Such dishonest media intentionally omitted the most relevant facts of all. Not only do the FLDS not represent polygamy, but the overall national polygamy rights movement for consenting adults has always disavowed the FLDS and underage marriage. And ultimately, the FLDS raid was never about polygamy anyway.
Failure to report those known facts typifies a false-journalism that would otherwise earn an "F" in journalism colleges. Instead of reporting those known facts, such manufactured-news media sensationalized unverified speculations - such as a would-be "bed" for FLDS men to allegedly have "temple sex" with 13 year old girls. By manufacturing such speculations about underage copulation possibilities rather than actually reporting the known facts of non-Mormon (and even some Mormon) consenting-adult pro-polygamists opposed to such crimes, such libel by omission reveals each manufactured-news media's dishonesty.
With the Texas Supreme Court ordering CPS to return the FLDS children to their families, honest media are now differentiated from dishonest ones. The manufactured-news media are now clearly outed for their intentionally dishonest libels. Absolutely, Executive Commissioner Hawkins proved it, declaring what consenting-adult pro-polygamy advocacy has repeatedly declared. The case had nothing to do with polygamy.
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Bibliographic URLs:
Texas Supreme Court Decision, 5/29/2008
http://www.supreme.courts.state.tx.us/historical/2008/may/080391.htm
Text of Texas Court of Appeals Decision, 5/22/2008
http://extras.mnginteractive.com/live/media/site297/2008/0522/20080522_114730_Mandamus%20Decision.pdf
Texas Health and Human Services
http://www.hhsc.state.tx.us/about_hhsc/index.html
Texas Department of Family and Protective Services
http://www.dfps.state.tx.us/
BIO of Executive Commissioner Hawkins
http://www.hhsc.state.tx.us/about_hhsc/AH_Bio.html
Op-ed by Executive Commissioner Hawkins 6/3/2008
http://blogs.usatoday.com/oped/2008/06/opposing-view-w.html
http://news.yahoo.com/s/usatoday/20080603/cm_usatoday/opposingviewwehadgoodreasontoact
Sample example of HONEST Media reporting on story
http://www.counterpunch.org/rosen04192008.html
The "bed" speculations
http://www.deseretnews.com/article/1,5143,695269096,00.html
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2008/04/09/national/main4002969.shtml?source=mostpop_story
http://transcripts.cnn.com/TRANSCRIPTS/0804/09/ng.01.html
Texas Court: Polygamy does NOT put Children in Danger
http://www.pro-polygamy.com/articles.php?news=0060
National Polygamy Rights Movement for Consenting Adults Disavows FLDS
http://www.prweb.com/releases/2008/4/prweb874544.htm
FLDS is far more "Mormon sect" than "Polygamist sect"
http://www.pro-polygamy.com/articles.php?news=0059
FLDS was Always Opposed by National Polygamy Movement - Quotes
http://www.pro-polygamy.com/articles.php?news=0058
Polygamy Movement Opposes Warren Jeffs
http://www.prweb.com/releases/2007/09/prweb552208.htm
Warren Jeffs was Always Opposed by National Polygamy Movement
http://www.pro-polygamy.com/articles.php?news=0056
Pro-Polygamy Advocacy
http://www.nationalpolygamyadvocate.com
http://www.truthbearer.org
[Reviewed for publication - Pro-Polygamy.com Review Board.]
