Read the INK Q&A with Howard Blum and save 30% on American Lightning: Terror, Mystery, the Birth of Hollywood, and the Crime of the Century.
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Read the INK Q&A with Howard Blum and save 30% on American Lightning: Terror, Mystery, the Birth of Hollywood, and the Crime of the Century.
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opal, May 18, 2008
"Escape" is, in my opinion, one of the most important books in the last 50 years to reveal a core dynamic of U.S. society. I read it on a recommendation from a stranger, but could barely put it down. What Ms. Jessop's book, I believe unintentionally reveals, in her unpretentious, honest way, is that the FLDS is not an anomaly in our country. It is in fact a distillation of the patriarchal system which founded this country, and which, unlike the FLDS, has learned subtlety, but which has in no way lost its dominion.I am a woman born and raised in the united states, and with a career history in many jobs which were nontraditional for my gender, so the author's experiences within the cult of the FLDS were sadly quite familiar to me, though more raw, unsophisticated, and outwardly brutal than what I dealt with daily at work.
The reader of "Escape" comes to understand how an entire community of intelligent and caring humans can be taught to live in fear of the ways of outsiders, and so to never turn to them, no matter how terribly they may suffer at home. The author writes that The FLDS members were allowed almost no news from the outside world to broaden their understanding and she matter-of-factly weaves together the bizarre incidents of her life to illustrate the strength of the grip that a cult like the FLDS has on its members.
I reflected, on finishing "Escape," that I live in a country of intelligent humans whose ignorance and fear of the ways of other countries (our version of "outsiders") stops us from demanding what plenty of our allies have: free health care, free college, a decent welfare system for the least amongst us, and a government which provides, rather than invades. I highly recommend this book to anyone who wonders why we aren't out in the streets with our banners and our pitchforks yet.
The toxic combination of religion, gender oppression, isolation, lack of opportunities, and little information from the outside world is unflinchingly laid out for us to examine in Ms. Jessop's brave book. "Escape" is not a literary achievement. She was not a writer, and makes no attempts at clever phrases or flowery descriptions, but her book is a revelation not to be missed, of the predictably tragic outcome of any society in which people can not or will not stand up for their rights and think for themselves. I thank her for writing it.
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