Can An "Educated" Person Have A Rational Thought?

While she noted that there have been several autobiographical accounts of former members of fundamentalist Mormon communities, Beaman says in her affidavit that assessing harm from that would be akin to extrapolating harms of monogamy by taking the accounts of people who have had abusive marriages.

It is nice to see that there are some educated people out there that can see beyond their diplomas.

Based in research done by Angela Campbell, a McGill law professor who testified earlier in the trial, and others, Beaman suggests that women in the fundamentalist Mormon communities have been wrongly stereotyped as having no choice or being brainwashed.

Brainwashing, she says, has “been largely discredited as a valid way to see those who belong to minority religious groups.”

Brainwashing, Neuro-Associative Conditioning, Linguistic Association, grooming, advertising, etc, are all closely related viable methods of conditioning people's thought patterns, though this does not mean that everyone who associates with a religion cannot think for themselves, nor does it suggest that those who do not belong to a particular religion, are not victims of the most simplistic of brainwashing.

Beaman, who also has a law degree, suggests that rather than stereotyping, society ought to assume that all members of minority religious groups “choose to be or remain involved in religious groups.”

“Such a position does not negate taking seriously allegations of abuse or underage marriage, for example, but assumes that the religiously committed have capacity as agents to make decisions.”

A main aspect of living in some religious groups is to live free from the abuses found in mainstream society. Yet there is always someone who deceives their way into a group in order to prey on others. It is not difficult to discern that those belonging to some minority groups would gladly help, and accept help, in curtailing abuse in all it's forms.

Not doing that, she says, means taking “a patriarchal position which treats religious minorities as being without the ability to make decisions. It assumes that we have the right to impose a particular worldview 'for their own good' on an assessment of their religious practices that is not based on empirical fact.”

Almost every abuser thinks that they have the right, or a justification, to harm their victims. Many abusers seek out like-minded individuals to validate their beliefs. Others quickly join to keep from being persecuted themselves. Soon a very large group of like-minded abusers have legalized control and power over those minorities who refuse to assimilate, minorities who want to live free from abuse and oppression.

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