Married at 12

[RR88]

Wonder if this is for real: marriedat12.blogspot.com/2011/05/what-makes-you-happy.html

link broken by admin

[Witsec7]

I could be wrong but I think she's the one whose 16 year old son was getting married.

[saraelise]

She still seems like she's in a cult tbh.

[teddybear]

Years ago I worked with a woman who was married and a mother at age 13. Her daughter was married and a mother at the same age. It was sad all the way around.

[Sola]

I could be wrong but I think she's the one whose 16 year old son was getting married.

Yes, that's her. She rails against her patriarchal upbringing, yet is propagating the abuse herself for the next generation.

[oddmountain]

My first post is going to be off-topic, but it can't be helped. Sola, I love your userpic! 1234 1234

[Sola]

My first post is going to be off-topic, but it can't be helped. Sola, I love your userpic! 1234 1234

It's that never ending drum beat.... .... ....

[MonkeyMomma]

She still seems like she's in a cult tbh.

Yeah, that's the vibe I get ...

[2xx1xy1JD]

I've also wondered if the blog is real or not.

She's not describing any community that I've ever heard of. She seems to be based in the US, not Israel, but I can't think of any place that meets her description. It doesn't even fit the pattern of strict, insular communities like Kiryas Yoel - they don't do hair coverings for unmarried girls, for example. Getting some details right but not others leads me to wonder if it's a troll, and if the break was to gather more information and a cover story. It also doesn't make any sense to me that someone would undergo extreme abuse and incest, but then be so gung-ho about submission for her daughters, even to their brothers, especially when it's not supported by anything in Judaism.

I hope my suspicion is right, because it would otherwise be a helluva sick story.

[FaustianSlip]

I glanced at that blog once, I think, but haven't read it since then. Could she be talking about that Lev Tahor community up in Canada? Though if she was really there, how would she be online in the first place? And while I've heard some pretty horrible stuff coming out of Lev Tahor, I don't recall marriage at twelve or thirteen being part of it (though maybe that just hasn't gotten out?). Based on what I'm reading here, I hope it's all fake. Ugh.

[2xx1xy1JD]

Oh shit. I just googled Lev Tahor. What is it with cults and the Laurentians?

http://aol.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/ ... ISHSECTATL

Ste. Agathe is indeed a rural/resort community in the Laurentian mountains, just about an hour north of Montreal. For years, it's been popular with the Jewish community and there are mainstream Hasidic groups that vacation up there, but this sounds like a fairly new cult compound. I wonder how they got into Canada - are they illegally overstaying as visitors? It would match the story about feeling out of place in their previous strict Hasidic community, but now finding a rabbi with similar views.

If this is true, and it's not a troll basing stuff on the Lev Tahor community, then she got out of one cult and into another.

[RR88]

Yes, that's her. She rails against her patriarchal upbringing, yet is propagating the abuse herself for the next generation.

I fully agree. Why does she require her daughters to submit to their brothers?

[Witsec7]

Maybe it's me, but she comes across as being very blase about her statutory rape wedding night? :think:

Doesn't she want some kind of justice or a better life for her kids?

I can't read the rest of her blog, It's infuriating.

As I was rereading her stuff last night she raised a point that her husband, who she is still with, was a victim and a perpetrator. I don't think a human can come out of this without a whole lot of therapy. Neither of them has had much counseling and now are in a new cult, and have continued to breed.

She's also been pretty silent since the birth of her twins, and I wonder if it isn't PPD or the oppression of the new cult.

[2xx1xy1JD]

I've been rereading the blog after reading what I could about Lev Tahor.

Sadly, I'm worried that the blog might be real after all. I found an article in Ha'aretz on the Lev Tahor community, and while it is an extreme community/cult, it also seems to attract people from a variety of Jewish backgrounds, from Hasidic to newly religious to "lost souls". There was a reference to a community member who described having a father who was a child molester.

Dina is clearly aware that the whole idea of wifely submission, and even more the idea of submission by sisters to brothers, isn't part of normative Judaism, even in its ultra-Orthodox forms. Other Orthodox bloggers told her that, and she herself makes it clear that her kids noticed that the dynamics at other Jewish homes was different from the dynamics in their home. I wonder if part of the appeal of Lev Tahor is that she feels more "normal" - even though her idea of what "normal" is comes from a very sick place.

Psychologically, she seems to have just scratched the surface in terms of therapy.

She readily acknowledges that she experienced horrible physical and sexual abuse, and can consider her father evil. On the other hand, she seems to really want to hold onto SOMETHING from her childhood and see it as good.

In her earliest entries, she acknowledges that she will never forgive her mother for standing by as she and her sisters were raped, but she still has this idealized view of her mother.

marriedat12.blogspot.ca/2011/03/childhood-concepts-of-modesty.html#comment-form

In this post, she shows that her mindset is still supportive of aspects of her upbringing.

marriedat12.blogspot.ca/2011_05_01_archive.html

But I was very aware that there was an outside world that looked at us as freaks. I think one thing my parents did right is teach me that the people judging us were really just jealous. And that by being proud of who I was I was being a "light unto the nations", showing people that there is another (in our view, better) way. More than anything the strong sense of a religious imperative (i.e. "G-d wants me to dress this way") definitely strengthened us against outside influences.

This quote blows my mind. Maybe she did feel special in some ways, and she's trying to hold on to the few good feelings that she had as a child - but it's hard to say that her parents did anything right. As an adult, intellectually, she must see that people outside her cult weren't "jealous". They were judging them as freaks - and if they had known the full extent of the horrors, they would have judged even more. They weren't being "a light unto the nations" at that point, but a disgusting pit of darkness and abuse. These words weren't a good aspect of a childhood that also included bad aspects of sexual abuse. Rather, they were part and parcel of a system of total abuse, designed to prevent her from openly rebelling and resisting repeated beatings and rapes.

A year ago, it seemed that she was on the brink - learning things in therapy and slowly recognizing just how wrong her upbringing was. Since then, there seems to be this backsliding. She won't consider Lev Tahor a cult, because it's not as bad as the cult in which she was raised, and she has a sentimental attachment to the aspects of her cult upbringing that didn't involve the actual physical and sexual abuse. Previously, she was opposed to making little girls wearing hair coverings, and now she's considering it.

I'm scared for her kids.

Edited to break the links.

[RR88]

Honestly, I consider her a bad person. She left a cult and is now part of another one, indoctrinating her kids.

[2xx1xy1JD]

Honestly, I consider her a bad person. She left a cult and is now part of another one, indoctrinating her kids.

I'm sure she loves her kids and is making an effort to figure out normal life, but objectively speaking, she's failing her children and teaching them a harmful lifestyle, putting them at high risk of abuse.

She also needs to be able to allow herself to get angry at her mother, not just her father, and see that her mother completely failed in her basic responsibilities toward her children. Hating the abuser, in some ways, is the easier part. Recognizing the evil of the enabler is harder, especially if she was also the main source of love or comfort during an abusive childhood.

[ladypuglover]

What fuckwittery is this reply?

LindaJun 7, 2011 06:52 AM

Dina never said she wanted her girls to feel less worthy than the boys--- that was never even implied. When I submit to my husband, my worth is not diminished in anyway. Your interpretation changed the vocabulary, and therefore the meaning, of Dina's post.

A crystal vase is used for one purpose, a hammer for another. A vase,fragile and beautiful, should not be used for hammering nails. Does that make it less worthy? On the contrary; it is very valuable indeed, and blessed is the man who is trusted to care for it.

A woman might not like to be compared to a fragile vase, because she is strong. That is fine for you. (my best vase is strong too) but certainly no one would argue it's worth just because it is reserved for that which it was made.

As for a send of 'entitlement' in the boys; I didn't see that either. Rather, the boys seem to be taught to care for the girls, protecting them. Again, you may not agree with this philosophy either, but let's not put words in Dina's mouth.

Blessings to you both- Dina and Kisarita.

I'm sorry but girls, daughters, and women are not fragile vases. If anything we are just a different colored hammer. :evil:

It also makes me think of when Monica from friends was called an empty vase by the boy-toy. Not cool then and not cool in this either.

[2xx1xy1JD]

What fuckwittery is this reply?

I'm sorry but girls, daughters, and women are not fragile vases. If anything we are just a different colored hammer. :evil:

It also makes me think of when Monica from friends was called an empty vase by the boy-toy. Not cool then and not cool in this either.

Vases are inanimate objects. They do not "defer" to anyone. Dina is specifically stating that she likes seeing her girls defer to their brothers, and the boys "not being afraid of their power". WTF is that supposed to mean? She's been challenged on this, and has never once come up with an explanation of WHY a girl should submit to her brother. It's crazy that she encourages this, when she was repeatedly raped by her brothers.

[RR88]

….Hence why I consider her a bad person.

[HijabiLady]

What fuckwittery is this reply?

I'm sorry but girls, daughters, and women are not fragile vases. If anything we are just a different colored hammer. :evil:

It also makes me think of when Monica from friends was called an empty vase by the boy-toy. Not cool then and not cool in this either.

I want to make the bolded statement into a bumper sticker!

[tinuviel]

Vases are inanimate objects. They do not "defer" to anyone. Dina is specifically stating that she likes seeing her girls defer to their brothers, and the boys "not being afraid of their power". WTF is that supposed to mean? She's been challenged on this, and has never once come up with an explanation of WHY a girl should submit to her brother. It's crazy that she encourages this, when she was repeatedly raped by her brothers.

I find this really strange too. I know she has a therapist, but from my armchair view it looks like she still hasn't processed the horrible things that happened to her. Men and boys had all the power. She managed to realize that rape is horrifically wrong, but didn't get around to seeing how fucked up that kind of power imbalance is.

[sassyNoz47]

my husbands brothers married girls 13 and 14.. i found it odd very but they alll seemed to think it was wonderful. both men were 10 to 12 yrs older then bride

[Mama Mia]

I haven't read her whole blog, but I wouldn't be surprised if she wanted to keep the super strict gender separations because she fears too much closeness or exposure will lead to sex play/ abuse. You would think she could see the danger in setting her daughters up to obey their brothers, but probably she hasn't come that far yet after leaving the abusive situation she was in. She can probably only see "protection" and "sheltering" as keeping her kids safe.

[chaotic life]

She was married at 12 and had seven children by 26. Her last was twins and she has nine children now. She hasn't even hit 30 yet. She hasn't grown and matured enough to know HOW to get angry or protect her children yet. Children who are sexually abused are stunted in their growth and maturity for YEARS after being assaulted.

She was raised to be a victim and was easy prey after leaving one cult to be sucked into another without therapy that deliberately de-programmed her and taught her healthy personal boundaries.

She's a prime example of generational abuse and exactly how culpable is a victim when they allow the next generation to be victimized.

It's sad. It's still something as mother she needed to find her strengthen fully when she got out and STOPPED repetitive beahviors that victimized her own children. Just as mothers who hold their daughters down for FGM are at fault for that assault, she is also at fault for the abuse and sexual assaults she is grooming her children for.

[bananacat]

my husbands brothers married girls 13 and 14.. i found it odd very but they alll seemed to think it was wonderful. both men were 10 to 12 yrs older then bride

We have a term for men like that: pedophiles. I know they're your brothers-in-law, but I see no reason to sugarcoat it. That is horrifying.