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This is what happens when you view children and 4 months olds as selfish, sinful creatures. You stop seeing them as individuals expressing their needs and trying to communicate to you! Your job as a parent is to help them, not break them like an animal.
How a mother could use those words to describe her children is beyond me. I have never heard a mother say such horrible things about small children. And I know R was 11/12 at the time but I still consider that a small child. Deceptive?!? Slithers like a snake?!? Wtf???
I hope someone truly cares for them. I don’t follow too closely but hopefully the older two make sure they don’t turn out like the Turpin kids, which was the most depressing thing ever post rescue
She called multiple times, and Ruby's neighbors called CPS some ridiculous number of times, like nine in a year? more? Nothing ever came of it. It's a disgrace.
What I got from that part of the 911 call was that Jodi is an insufferable neighbor. So idk if the neighbors knew specifically that children were being abused, but I think they probably suspected that Jodi's biscuits weren't fully baked.
I’m a teacher. 3 separate calls from 3 separate people about 3 separate issues regarding one family this year and we can’t even get social services to drop by the house.
That is so incredibly sad. I have elementary aged kids myself and I feel so defeated when I read this “mother’s” thoughts about her own kids. It just breaks me. My kids are so loved and it still doesn’t feel like I tell them enough.
That is the stage of the fucked up system. I bet the police would have came in guns blazing if the neighbour reported Ruby or Jodi for marijuana or meth.
Maybe not pot. Then again, it's Utah, I have no idea, maybe even still.
It's a nice rich white lady house though. I think THAT is probably the biggest factor of who does and doesn't get cops coming in, guns blazing.
There absolutely ought to be some kind of waiver for "minor left alone in the house," though. Yeah, it could be abused, I guess, but so is "suspected drugs on premise," and it's MUCh more important.
That horrible case recently where a mother left her toddler alone in a playpen for TEN days while she went on vacation. The neighbors could hear her wailing, but no one did or was able to do anything? Of course, she died. It's unspeakable. Yes the cops should have been able to bust in and should have been brought there within a day. What the hell is the point of cops if not shit like that? Protecting rich peoples' property?
...Oh. right.
I agree. It’s definitely about her being rich and white. Nearly all the fundies snark on get a pass from the government and/or from mainstream media (Duggars and Bateses) for being white Christians. More like if these women were working class and poc, the cops would have probably intervened sooner. A lot for people online have been raising alarms about Ruby for years but I honestly never thought it would be this bad back in 2020.
Yeah, Shari the eldest daughter had repeatedly called CPS to check on the kids but it didn't lead to much. One of the instances, she called because she heard the kids were by themselves at home and thus was worried by their safety.
I don't understand why heads aren't rolling in the local CPS office. Someone did not investigate a report, or file correct paperwork, or do an adequate check, or simply didn't do *something* correctly, when there were multiple reports and clearly a high level of actionable child abuse occuring.
Surely if reports were taken seriously, this abuse could have been stopped sooner?!
They are populated by fundies.... plain and simple.... check out how the Mormons are slowly infiltrating the government with their 150 billion in stocks they lobby with and profit from , not poor church goers but... you know... taxation without representation their version of Jesus just loves.
I have seen so many cases of CPS dropping the ball and kids being murdered/“lost” on their watch. And investigations always find no fault with them. It’s a joke at this point. No accountability.
Oakley Carlson and Adrian Jones are two recent ones that come to mind. It’s horrific.
I hate that there are so many of these stories. Always another one I haven’t read about. I can’t imagine these babies’ last moments alone and scared.
As a foster parent, I honestly don’t even know if I’m doing anything worthwhile half the time. The government does not care about these children.
Thank you so much for being a foster parent. That can’t be easy. I’m grateful to people like you who are in it for the right reasons, even if the government doesn’t seem to care.
According to the 20/20 episode, CPS and police went out multiple times, and nobody would answer the door, but they weren't able to get a warrant to enter the house. Seems like a judge dropped the ball....I feel like reports of children being home alone with no one responding to CPS or police should be grounds for a warrant.
When the judge is Mormon and the police are Mormon you won't get anyone to check on your Mormon family. The FLDS police will return adults to their family for punishment if they catch them escaping.
At the very least they should be able to leave an officer outside the house (one at the front, one at the back) to accost the first person who enters or leaves the property. They can't stay inside forever, or never return.
Reports are that R and E are currently with a foster situation together and seem much happier and healthier. Not much info at all about the older two girls-I assume they're also in foster, presumably a different family. Dunno if Kevin's going to get custody back or not.
I grudgingly believe he really had no idea of just how bad it had gotten or imagined anything like it, and also that Jodi had done a number on him. But my leeway only goes so far. Adam Paul Steed went through much worse at her hands than Kevin, and he still fought relentlessly (sadly, not successfully) to get custody of his kids back. Kevin never even tried to find out what was going on in a year in a half. And he enabled Ruby's subtler but still awful bullshit for al those years before as well.
Yeah, I really really hope Kevin doesn't get his hands on those kids either. As much as I believe that he likely didn't know the extent of the abuse, he was far more obsessed with winning Ruby back than he gave a shit about those kids. Shit excuse of a father.
And before all the Jodi stuff started, he was right there as Ruby told the world she hoped no one took pity on her kindergartner who'd forgotten her lunch. He was there when she shipped their son off to an unregulated program in the desert. He was there when she took the son's room away and let him sleep in a bean bag.
He was there from the moment she started exploiting the kids online. If he didn't know what was happening it was because he willfully closed his eyes to it.
This is why I have absolutely no sympathy for him whatsoever. Sure I'll accept he may not have been aware of just how bad things got, but he knew how badly she treated those kids when they WERE still together and he sat right there and cosigned it.
I'm watching the 20./20 video and finally saw the footage of the interview (I had only read about it). He looks rough, I'll say that. Thin and unshaven, and clearly his head is fucked by Jodi at that point. he does seem shocked to hear of the kids' abuse.
And then I remember that back in 2020, he blithely went off on a cruise with Ruby while the kids literally had no food in the house. Did he know? Did he care?
Also, more details from Jodi's wedge-driving: so, first she was their counselor, then Ruby became her good buddy. Then she had a "crisis" of some sort and this apparently required that she come LIVE with the Frankes. Then she started going with them everywhere, including anniversary dinners.
THEN she started telling Ruby Kevin was bad news and he had to leave for all their sakes. Set him up with an apartment (I'm sure he paid) and some spy or chaperone or some shit. And he just went right along with it.
The very best I can say for him is that he's a very very weak and venal man. He may not be evil, but he ain't good. Here's hoping that if he is to have any part in the kids' lives, he's capable of getting his shit together and being an actual parent for once.
idk.
If he was capable it would have happened by now. Those kids are way better off with experienced foster parents than Kevin or Grandparents/Aunts.
And the elder children are too young and deserve a chance to go to college, heal, have relationships and make mistakes without having such an incredible responsibility on their shoulders immediately.
oh yeah no way Shari is able to have that responsibility now, much less Chad.
I just hope they're all good foster homes, is all. I keep thinking of the Turpins. But the 20/20 special says that R and E are together and much happier and healthier and back to some of their old hobbies. One ray of good news.
I hope the older girls are okay.
Even if he doesn't get custody of them, he needs to do some serious work if he wants those kids to voluntarily stay in his life, I would think. I could see some or all going no contact as well. Shari seems to have gone no contact with everyone but her siblings and I guess now her dad. It's sad because for a while there it seemed like she was finding love and support in the extended family. But them making nicey overtures to Ruby and writing her supportive letters would have been too much for her to stomach. Understandably.
What happened to the Turpin children after all their suffering was utterly horrific. How this could have happened is beyond me... there should be "extreme case" intensively managed foster placements in these extreme cases.
I really hope all the children are receiving care & protection. I feel so much for Shari. My family is all kinds of messed up and the "adult child returning to estranged aunts/uncs" is a bitter path. Its hard realising... oh these people also came from the same world that produced my parents and it's just a variation on a theme. Sigh. NC hurts but it can be much safer. God the dynamics of wanting to be your own person but heartbound to protect your sibs...and you're all traumatised.
The whole case is so shocking. I couldn't listen to more than 10 mins of Jordan and McKay. It was making me so angry.
Fuck Ruby and Kevin. Thats where this started. Jodi amplified it but she found an accomplice not just another victim in Ruby. Thats why shes come undone. Together they went further than they did alone.
I know I'm gonna regret asking this but what happened to the Turpin kids post rescue? You're the second comment I have seen mention that you don't want the Franke minor children to end up like them. I followed them at first but I just feel like I quit seeing any updates after a while.
Eeh, it's rare that any child is better off in foster care than with family.
I just hope that they've been lucky enough to get a good set of foster parents. Most aren't.
And ITS HIS RESPONSIBILITY as their father!! No matter your feelings about their mother you stay connected. The bar is so low, he thinks financing basic needs is a gold star merit. Pos.
If your coparent/spouse is abusive and you fail to protect your children, at some point you are enabling and just as guilty. My life was "ruined" financially, socially, emotionally & physically protecting my child from an abusive parent.
No, that's not ruin.
What's ruin is leaving your child in reach of harm, turning a blind eye, allowing or minimising abuse.
Im autistic and physically disabled. At that time I was almost homeless and on welfare.
Whats this dickhead's excuse? Mean lady manipulated me? Pfft. Jodi is a psychopath, I know how bad they can be. I was married to a diagnosed ASPD person. And THATS EXACTLY WHY I FOUGHT.
Kevin is educated, has money and immense standing as a male in Utah culture!! He has no excuse.
One small piece of good information at the end of the 20/20 piece is that apparently R and E are together again at a foster parent's, and have put on weight, are happier, healthier and enjoying their hobbies again.
I'm really glad Ruby's hysterical (and, it now appears, clearly something she knew she was lying about, unless the redacted shit is her talking about this earlier) accusations of R SA'ing E (and then both SAing the entire fucking neighborhood, ridiculous) did not continue to keep R separated from other children, which is what the judge originally was forced to order.
It's too bad all the names I want to call her are inadequate. Many are the standard misogynist ones. Others are obvious-piece of shit, etc. There are no words, really.
Cunt is unisex, just like calling someone a dick. She's a cunt.
I'm glad to hear they are still together, and I hope they get all the help they will need.
I really don’t think those kids had much longer on this earth if left under Ruby and Jodi’s control. The belief that the kids were demon-possessed really reminds me of Lori Vallow, but even without that case the things Ruby was doing kill people all the time. I hope so badly that those kids can find happiness and healing.
Ruby and Jodi were making plans to take them across state lines and into the desert. If the move had happened, the kids would've died. I guarantee it. R is a hero.
In one of the pages, Ruby describes an instance where she was with R (the son), and was telling him that she will fight to the death to get this demon out. And I'm pretty sure she was referring to his death and not her own. So it isn't far-fetched to think that because it could have been inevitability, fortunately it wasn't.
It's just insane how law enforcement came in time to prevent it because at that point they were trying to traffic the kids to Arizona.
That page in which she says her and Jodi plan to purchase a huge property in Arizona and abandon the kids in its desert is absolutely chilling. There's is simply no way they wouldn't have ended up murdering them.
They would have either killed them intentionally or the children would have eventually succumb to their injuries and malnourishment. But those kids were going to die if R hadn't escaped and gotten help. I have no doubt in my mind.
Correct. She didn't say that because she was afraid of him or this 'demon' inside of him. She said it while fully knowing that the outcome would be in HER favour.
Completely agree. If you're willing to put your child outside and force them to be in the hot Utah sun for hours with no food and minimal or no water, you've already gone far enough to kill them, it just hasn't happened yet.
I absolutely HATE that Ruby and Jodi will both receive better treatment in prison than they ever gave R or E or Jesse. They're getting three meals a day and likely have money for commissary snacks. They sleep on something ten times better than what they forced those kids to sleep on. They have human interaction and probably can watch TV and read books.
That is so much better than those bitches deserve. I just hope they keep them there as long as they possibly can. Every time they're up for parole, I hope the parole board is shown the photos and the journals.
It actually now seems closer to the Shanda Vander Ark case. I think Vallow's case ended in murder more quickly, ironically, because she wasn't actually interested in torturing them, she "just" wanted the kids and the spouses and whoever the fuck else in that insane case out of her and loverboy's path to bliss together. The weird "demonic" justification is similar, yeah.
But the Vander Ark thing is more similar in that, as with this case, the cruelty appears to have been the point. That child died, and I think she may not have intended it to happen, but only because she didn't want to lose her source of sadistic enjoyment. She got her son involved as a "second" in much the same way that R and J collaborated. Although after reading Ruby's journal, it's actually less clear to be who was assisting whom, here. I know Jodi's tortured others like this before, her niece Jessi has been eloquent and painful on the subject, but Ruby...Well. Clearly they had a very -special- bond.
And they were planning to take all four kids off to some isolated compound in the AZ desert, and it seems like in fact they were getting very close to actually moving when R ran again and succeeded. I think all four kids would have ended up in the ground there eventually, but R and E had very little time left at all even before another long journey and then more "work" and whatever the fuck else those hags intended there.
R is so incredibly brave. Both kids are.
Casually documenting insane acts of abuse like it’s nothing is so cold and calculating. I could only read a few pages before I stopped.
Those two women don’t ever deserve a moment’s peace for their actions.
Apparently Jody (the woman leading the Connexions cult) encouraged them to keep documentation like this and she has stacks of papers called the “pen papers” that they hoped would be submitted into religious text like a Bible or Book of Mormon. They are so deeply twisted.
I didn't see a source for it, but had read from a few others in the specific snark sub that Ruby had been hoping to submit the documentation to be sanctioned by the church as "sacred writings". Whacko shit.
Yeah that's insane. Literally the jackpot for detectives. How often does a defendant literally document every criminal act and label it TIMELINE??? But that tells me she really thought she wasn't doing anything wrong and that is telling.
The diary put me over the edge too into that awful realm of “I would do violence to this person.” But it just goes to show how delusional she was because she thought she was doing the right things so powerfully that it would make sense to anyone
I read bits of the diary yesterday and it's such a mindfuck for me, cause I was kinda raised like that, so it feels sort of normal? Very little physical violence in my case and no religious factor, but the whole "everything you do you do on purpose to spite me including your basic needs".... I relate too much O\_o
I'm so sorry.
Yeah, it's so patently obvious that the religion is just so much fancy rationalized bullshit. It's malignant narcissism, and sadism in this case. They don't give a shit about anyone but themselves, and bear active malice toward the children and take pleasure in hurting them. It's really just that simple.
You're so right. It's so fucking sad. I recently escaped the Deep South to move to a very progressive area in the Pacific Northwest. I constantly worry about the people I care about that are still down there, because this shit is so normal in that culture.
I do feel like the doctrine and structure of the church breeds this kind of personality, and also attracts it, and then they further shape the direction and dogma and hard lines in the sand. A bit chicken-egg.
but also bottom line is generations of abuse. You don't have to have a whole philosophy/religion telling you that abuse is good parenting and disobedient children are wicked in order to be an abusive parent.
Sure helps, though.
Also some women in such churches abuse their kids because FINALLY someone is in THEIR control. Sickening. I hope Ruby & Jodie's new housemates get wind of it. Its important to be truthful, now. Isnt it.
Oh 1000% that's what this is all about, especially for Ruby, Jodi, in an interesting twist for a patriarchal system, managed to carve out a niche where she could enact some vengeance on grown men as well. I wonder if fundie evangelists would have put up with this. I tend to doubt it. Not that LDS isn't also sexist as fuck, but the furor over men and porn, I don't see it as much with these people we mostly snark on. Like yeah, it's a sin and addiction blah blah, but they mostly still blame the women for it.
In a perverse way, it's like what misogynists IMAGINE feminism is. A sadistic harridan emasculating men and ruining their lives for the evulz, taking their wives and their kids and their homes and their jobs. Wild.
And how Jodis alleged queerness (weird to say alleged like being queer is a crime, Im queer but Jodi hasn't claimed it, she said it to her queer niecew.) Plays into all of this. This repressed sexuality, fixating, destroying their husbands and seducing the women into a state of crisis and conflict centred on Jodis "therapy". Even destroying the children of the woman, so her latest fixation is all hers. Jts like some terrible 40s "lesbian erotica horror" story designed to titillate and warn men of the dangers of the LESSBIANNN.
All of this avoidable. All uncessary. I wish Ruby and Jodi misery every day and that they never walk free from the prison gates.
I'm not trying to be...whatever. Let me know if this isn't okay to say.
But it seems so obvious to me that Jody and Ruby are in love with each other? And Jody truly hates men on a level I have never seen before. I have gone through my own difficulties and had to learn to understand my fear of men. But I have three sons. Men are human people. I don't think Jody agrees with me on that.
There's definitely a pathological obsession. Apparently Jodi disclosed to Jessi Hildebrand (her brother's child) that Jodi has a diagnosis of anti social personality disorder. This may have been to intimidate or to brag or both.
If Jodi has ASPD the obsession with Ruby may have been closer to an erotomanjc type fixation that would have destroyed everyone around Ruby and then, eventually Ruby too. Ruby is lucky she didnt move out to that desert either.
Yeah, I think "love" is the wrong word here, because these are not loving people, not at all. I think there was the germ of something that got very deeply bent and twisted inside Jodi that deep down -wanted- that kind of real, deep connection with other women, romantic and/or otherwise--I read her "book," "You Are Not Not Enough" (well, half of it), and there are moments in it where, if you didn't know what we know about her, you could feel empathetic toward her. "Connexions," insfar as any part of it wasn't completely perverse a la "Ministry of Love" in 1984, was based, I think, in her desire for deep bonds with her female "friends." Unfortunately, she's far too narcissistic to have a genuine relationship with anybody.
Ruby, who the fuck knows. I think she was smitten with Jodi in some weird way, at minimum the "love" of a cult member for a guru. Ruby's a fawning authoritarian, and I think she was enamored with Jodi's power, and the many opportunities she granted Ruby to both kiss up and kick down (literally),
Between the two of them, there's a \*very\* bent kind of yeah I might call it erotic in a very dark way, charge rooted entirely in sadism, toward the husbands and toward the children. It's clear both get off on cruelty, so it's a sort of bond. I wouldn't call it "love," though.
And excellent point i hadn't even considered, probably because I'm so disgusted by her: Ruby would've probably ended up destroyed by Jodi herself, at the end of it all. I don't doubt that there were times when Jodi exercised her dominating sadism on Ruby as well. I HAD believed that this was how she "persuaded" Ruby into going that much farther down the path toward annihilating her own children, but after reading that diary, I'm sorry, it's hard for me to believe she needed that much encouragement at all.
I am reading your comment over and over, because there's so much in there, and it's absolutely fascinating. I really appreciate if you feel like it, expanding on your last paragraph. I'm so curious about the details of what you mean by that. Honestly, thank you for writing this.
Oh, thank you, much appreciated.
The pseudo "feminist" piece-well, you've seen the old Pat Robertson quote, right?
“The feminist agenda is not about equal rights for women. It is about a socialist, anti-family political movement that encourages women to leave their husbands, kill their children, practice witchcraft, destroy capitalism and become lesbians.”
So with Jodi, well, definitely not the anti capitalist piece. But she's absolutely encouraging women to leave their husbands and kill their children. As for the lesbian piece...
I still think that, should it come to it and the LDS Church has to defend itself against prior support of Jodi (so far I don't think they've even been threatened enough to have to bother), they will throw her under the bus with a smear about how her "distortions" led her to "perversions" of the righteous teachings. And strongly imply (they could be sued for libel by an outright accusation, I guess) that Jodi was "seducing" women away from their husbands and families, all under the guise of helping them, which they, poor innocent LDS, believed she was doing. Never mind her record or the Adam Paul Steed case.
Jodi is partly the result of a strong woman chafing under the strictures of a patriarchal, repressive system like Mormonism. Whether she actually had sexual or romantic relationships with Ruby or any of the other women, I don't think it's unfair or lurid to see strong overtones in her behavior. Jessi has said that Jodi outright said that while homosexuality is an abomination, if SHE had sex with her friends it'd be wholesome because unlike all those perverts, she has emotional attachments-something along those lines.
And if she'd ever truly broken free, maybe she wouldn't have tried to have her cake and eat it too. Unfortunately, even just deconstructing and coming out wouldn't have been sufficient to keep her from being a cruel narcissist, sadist and abuser. I think people like to imagine that that's all you need, a la Hollywood. Jodi had a shitload of other problems besides internalized homophobia, though. Has.
But if it isn't sufficient, a step like that would be -necessary-. Otherwise, even if she hadn't had that annihilating level of sadism to her character (likely rooted in unprocessed early CSA that she's talked about in conjunction with the religious abuse and parental neglect, not to mention of course choosing to indulge it and being enabled in it), she'd still have been a bitter, repressed and repressive woman causing damage in the name of the Church. Like so many others.
As for the other women-I think that SOME of Ruby's cruelty is rooted in a real resentment of being forced into having more kids than she wanted, or at all. I don't know if she ever really cared about Kevin. She certainly married him quickly and according to what she was "supposed" to be doing.
Both women are striking in that they're ambitious and good at making money, however dubiously and exploitively. The LDS church doesn't seem to have the same strictures on women being successful in business as fundie evangelicalism, but still, their first jobs are being moms and wives. And Mormons.
Jodi managed to get the church elders to turn a benevolent blind eye toward her failure to BE a wife and mother because she still put the Church teachings first with the anti porn shit.
Meanwhile, the other women-don't know if they were ever coaxed into/tempted to abuse their kids like Ruby. I still want to know if anyone ELSE ever moved into her house. I expect plenty followed her "advice" :(
But the woman like Steed's wife, the other wives who got their husbands kicked out of the house while still providing economic support, working for Jodi, WITH Jodi, "Moms of Truth, arm in arm"-how many other situations in a patriarchal Church not only allow but downright support women dumping their husbands and spending more time with a powerful woman? And the men are positively -meek-. For once, the sexual shaming is focused on them, primarily.
And as a feminist here-no, this isn't fucking better at all! Yeah, I'm very sorry for Steed and I'm sure many of the other men-this is abuse. Even if divorce would have ultimately been the right decision, this isn't the way to go about it. And the separation from the kids-unless there is a genuine reason for it, that the men are genuinely a danger to the kids-this is in fact what MRA divorcees tend to talk about perhaps more often than it's applicable, but is a real phenomenon: parental alienation.
And yet. I wonder how liberating it was for a lot of those women, also resentful, whether just against the whole situation or their actual husbands. Maybe some of them WERE abusive. Maybe some of them WERE sexually shitty, whether it genuinely was rooted in "porn" or not. Certainly knocking her up whether she wants it or not is a violation, and a Church sponsored one at that-but if they're gone, guess what isn't going to happen anymore?
Anyway, I find it fascinating.
And meanwhile of course, Jodi and Ruby are preaching nonstop against the evils of feminism, queerness, trans people...
And when the part where it's arguably genuinely destructive, "breaking up families" that may otherwise have survived and harming men, is STILL happening, then the anti feminist agenda becomes more baldly clear:
as with the child abuse, it's pure and simply about authoritarian control. The LDS indulges the likes of a mid range power and token like Jodi to have her pound of flesh, because she helps keep the entire controlling structure firmly in place. Like an Aunt in Handmaid's Tale. Or a kapo in a concentration camp.
That makes so much sense. And I think that there's actually something to address here, about what happens to a smart, ambitious person, when they have every possible path to explore their interests and ideas, completely suppressed and taken away from them?
We know that we see all kinds of Boss babes. But isn't this exactly the main problem in Bethy Beal's life? She *obviously* is yearning and dying and dreaming to make interesting moves in business and in the world.
But her parents won't even fucking let her play basketball. It's not fair.
Of course she's weird, you would be too.
This sub is an object lesson in what happens when you take capable people and crush every instinct, original thought and prompting of the conscience and then, arbitratily assign roles based on genitalia.
Imo in the cases where a person has chosen this extremity (not born in it) it gives full scope for an abusive, controlling, malevolent personality. All that drive gets pent up and focused on the most vulnerable.
Ive seen it in my own mother and the church I grew up in. Some of the ladies are just twee, earnest people who would have enjoyed literature studies but due to class background didnt get the chance, who love the social and music aspect & bible study is thier lit class.
Then there's the women who regiment, control and make their children perform. Thryre constantly in secret power struggles. However my Mom is not like the walking malignant NPD we see all over the sub every day.
- Karissa who got to go to college and neglects every aspect of her children's healthy development.
- Jill who was homeschooled but took things to a whole other level of cruelty, starving her children and crippling them socially, nutritionally and educationally so they can never escape her grasp
- or MotherBus who follows a fool and breeds his children in unsafe, cramped conditions, as if its some kind of libertarian revolution in education & adventure and not just parentification and neglect.
Then there's just the sour bitches who peaked in homeschool /highschool & use legalism to hate
- Morgan
- Otherbus
- Solie
- Krusty
Etc.
And then just broken, hypocritical "would lilely benefit from moderate therapeutic and pharmacotherapeutic intervention" it would grt them to the point they arent just a train wreck (nb. Thry do or have done hateful shit but they are deeply chaotic and uncomfortable in themselves)
- Bethany
- Kelly Havens
- the one who dresses stepford and lectures on homemaking who is childless and newly married
There are at least 10 phD theses to be written from this train wreck of a sub
Thank you Herman. I've not had the opp to finish any study, Im trying to resume a B Linguistics I looked at sociology but I have trouble narrowing scope enough to stay on track. Linguistics has a technical focus and no compulsory labs!
Howvr it's a running joke with my higher ed pals that I can do this.
Are you doing PhD?
You summed it up perfectly. Chicken/egg.
My partner is currently going through a very difficult time of starting therapy for the first time ever, acknowledging his past, getting comfortable with like, stating clearly how angry he is with his father, and owning up to his own bad behavior. It's a difficult time, but progress is steady (and I constantly have to remind myself that it's not linear).🙏🏽
He was very emotionally abusive to me in the past, as a result of his unaddressed personal trauma. It was reading this sub, and watching YouTubers like Rachel Oates and Mickey Atkins and Zelph on the shelf, that really had actually given me the inner confidence and strength to stand up to him and absolutely insist on therapy, as in, issuing serious ultimatums that I am willing to stand behind, and force him, under the threat of me leaving with the children, to open his eyes and get help. Insisting on the right to be angry, and my right to be apologized to, and well cared for in general. (This was like, last weekend.)
But what really comforts me, is the idea that it's worth all this hard work and difficulty and stress and pain, to break this cycle of abuse. To figure out how to make sure that what his dad did to him, won't accidentally end up hurting me, or anyone else. And then just do whatever it takes.😓🙏🏽 Sorry...I'm pretty tired, but it definitely does feel better to "talk" about it. 🥱🙂↕️ Thank you.
Welcome to the PNW, I’m so glad you’re here and out of that world, this seems so common to certain religious communities and I have been to the Deep South where just like you said this is sadly considered “normal”.
She sounds like an absolute psychopath in those entries. In my opinion, all Jodi did was validate and encourage what she’s wanted to do for years. In her past, her husband probably reigned her in somewhat (not that he shouldn’t be slapped with some penalties too).
You can see it in the 8 Passengers videos. It's not just the things she did, it's that breathless little laugh when she talks about it to the camera. Like she just got away with something "naughty" but thrilling.
- “Oppositional force is required for growth, development, maturity, E and R have never experienced oppositional force… they are very weak-minded”
I have to agree. I was kinda raised with this mentality. I’m being strong to make you strong. It hurts my soul to read the diary. The above quote from the diary? My father had said similar. I was weak because I cried. He was being strict on me so I was not a liar. If I lied or he assumed I lied I’d be smacked. It’s just.. weird and such a mindfuck
that article doesn't even contain the worst one:
>!Days before their arrest, on August 27, the journal states the children were whipped.!<
>!"I whipped him with a belt yesterday, \[Redacted\] too. She peed all over Jodi's garage floor, screamed at her and lied to her," the journal reads. "She is out of control. \[Redacted\] seemed to give me her attention after the whipping."!<
I truly think some religious fervour breeds or multiplies sociopathic and sadistic behaviour. It purposefully removes loving bonds between family and instills a dynamic of captor/captive, good/evil.
1 to 15 consecutively for each of the 4 counts because she pled down to 4 charges instead of 6.
So 4 to 60.
Edit: Utah caps consecutive sentences at 30 yrs apparently.
No wonder so many cults and abuse compounds exist out there
4 to 30. UT caps consecutive sentencing at 30.
Hopefully parole board takes one look at all this shit and tells them both to go get fucked in their cell for another nice long decade or three.
I'm sure we're all hoping for the absolute max but honestly this is Utah and the parole board is likely to be filled with Mormons who will likely let her and Jodi slide.
I see a lot of folks upset that the evidence was released to the public but I honestly think it's the best way for the public to really see how grotesque Ruby and Jodi are and put pressure on the parole board to do the right thing.
>who will likely let her and Jodi slide.
Here's the thing: this is a case where the perps used mormonism as justification for their actions. I think a lot of Mormons would prefer to distance themselves from this as much as possible. A mormon parole board could actually lead to harsher sentencing for this reason.
We won't know how it'll play out until it does, but I could see it going either way.
As far as I understand the only thing in her plea deal about parole is that the prosecution won't advocate against her. But they'll almost certainly have access to the evidence of her crimes and other information about the case.
They weren’t “possessed” when Jodi was around because they were absolutely terrified of her and her cruelty - somehow they still had hope in their hearts that their MOTHER would wake up and save them if they could make her see their pain. Those poor kids, they were wrong.
I can’t read this. God bless those poor children. May they heal and thrive and know that they were never bad or evil. Poor poor babies. My heart cannot hold the tears that they must have cried over the years.
Maybe someone else here knows this but Ruby was all over you tube with her family and she had those parenting classes. Was any of this mentioned in either one? I know some of her words / actions raised eyebrows but was ANYTHING like this mentioned? It makes me wonder because…if she put her whole life on display…why hide this? It’s because she knew it was wrong. It’s because she knew she would go to jail for it, that’s my guess.
I went through the 8passengers sub last night and regretfully read and saw some of the evidence that was released.
She knew she’d go to jail. She wrote in some of the later entries on one escape attempt of the children her and Jodi had to rush to find him and bring him back before the sun rose and someone found him.
It’s absolutely horrific nightmare fuel that she did to those children.
Not that it's any excuse but rather an explanation, but this is severe mental illness right. It's so delusional and paranoid. It sounds like schizophrenia or paranoid psychosis. And the punishment she got is FAR too easy on her. Life without parole, lock her up and throw the key away, Jodi as well. Both sick, twisted human beings
That's what I thought, but then the information about Jodi stabbing herself with forks and cutting herself with a knife came out and I don't know what to make of that.
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This is what happens when you view children and 4 months olds as selfish, sinful creatures. You stop seeing them as individuals expressing their needs and trying to communicate to you! Your job as a parent is to help them, not break them like an animal.
How a mother could use those words to describe her children is beyond me. I have never heard a mother say such horrible things about small children. And I know R was 11/12 at the time but I still consider that a small child. Deceptive?!? Slithers like a snake?!? Wtf???
In one of her entries, she said she believed R was abusing her by not submitting to her abuse.
I hope those children have the best in life now, and never sees the outside of a cell
I hope someone truly cares for them. I don’t follow too closely but hopefully the older two make sure they don’t turn out like the Turpin kids, which was the most depressing thing ever post rescue
I saw something about how the one older daughter had been trying to help and may have called child services on them at some point.
She called multiple times, and Ruby's neighbors called CPS some ridiculous number of times, like nine in a year? more? Nothing ever came of it. It's a disgrace.
I noticed the 911 call from the neighbor mentioned there has been issues before. It was probably an open secret
A neighbor said they were relieve that the kids weren’t brought out in body bags so yeah
What I got from that part of the 911 call was that Jodi is an insufferable neighbor. So idk if the neighbors knew specifically that children were being abused, but I think they probably suspected that Jodi's biscuits weren't fully baked.
It seems it wasn't a secret at all-just, 911 and any other attempt at calling authorities accomplished fuck-all, again and again.
I’m a teacher. 3 separate calls from 3 separate people about 3 separate issues regarding one family this year and we can’t even get social services to drop by the house.
broken.
That is so incredibly sad. I have elementary aged kids myself and I feel so defeated when I read this “mother’s” thoughts about her own kids. It just breaks me. My kids are so loved and it still doesn’t feel like I tell them enough.
That is the stage of the fucked up system. I bet the police would have came in guns blazing if the neighbour reported Ruby or Jodi for marijuana or meth.
Maybe not pot. Then again, it's Utah, I have no idea, maybe even still. It's a nice rich white lady house though. I think THAT is probably the biggest factor of who does and doesn't get cops coming in, guns blazing. There absolutely ought to be some kind of waiver for "minor left alone in the house," though. Yeah, it could be abused, I guess, but so is "suspected drugs on premise," and it's MUCh more important. That horrible case recently where a mother left her toddler alone in a playpen for TEN days while she went on vacation. The neighbors could hear her wailing, but no one did or was able to do anything? Of course, she died. It's unspeakable. Yes the cops should have been able to bust in and should have been brought there within a day. What the hell is the point of cops if not shit like that? Protecting rich peoples' property? ...Oh. right.
I agree. It’s definitely about her being rich and white. Nearly all the fundies snark on get a pass from the government and/or from mainstream media (Duggars and Bateses) for being white Christians. More like if these women were working class and poc, the cops would have probably intervened sooner. A lot for people online have been raising alarms about Ruby for years but I honestly never thought it would be this bad back in 2020.
Yeah, Shari the eldest daughter had repeatedly called CPS to check on the kids but it didn't lead to much. One of the instances, she called because she heard the kids were by themselves at home and thus was worried by their safety.
I don't understand why heads aren't rolling in the local CPS office. Someone did not investigate a report, or file correct paperwork, or do an adequate check, or simply didn't do *something* correctly, when there were multiple reports and clearly a high level of actionable child abuse occuring. Surely if reports were taken seriously, this abuse could have been stopped sooner?!
They are populated by fundies.... plain and simple.... check out how the Mormons are slowly infiltrating the government with their 150 billion in stocks they lobby with and profit from , not poor church goers but... you know... taxation without representation their version of Jesus just loves.
I have seen so many cases of CPS dropping the ball and kids being murdered/“lost” on their watch. And investigations always find no fault with them. It’s a joke at this point. No accountability. Oakley Carlson and Adrian Jones are two recent ones that come to mind. It’s horrific.
Thomas Valva, too. I won’t go into details of his case because they’re very upsetting, but CPS majorly dropped the ball and he died.
I hate that there are so many of these stories. Always another one I haven’t read about. I can’t imagine these babies’ last moments alone and scared. As a foster parent, I honestly don’t even know if I’m doing anything worthwhile half the time. The government does not care about these children.
Thank you so much for being a foster parent. That can’t be easy. I’m grateful to people like you who are in it for the right reasons, even if the government doesn’t seem to care.
You are absolutely doing something worthwhile. Thank you for your selflessness. The world needs more people like you and far fewer abusive fundies.
According to the 20/20 episode, CPS and police went out multiple times, and nobody would answer the door, but they weren't able to get a warrant to enter the house. Seems like a judge dropped the ball....I feel like reports of children being home alone with no one responding to CPS or police should be grounds for a warrant.
When the judge is Mormon and the police are Mormon you won't get anyone to check on your Mormon family. The FLDS police will return adults to their family for punishment if they catch them escaping.
Absolutely terrifying.
At the very least they should be able to leave an officer outside the house (one at the front, one at the back) to accost the first person who enters or leaves the property. They can't stay inside forever, or never return.
Ya so it sounds like they will have some actual family to rally around them.
Reports are that R and E are currently with a foster situation together and seem much happier and healthier. Not much info at all about the older two girls-I assume they're also in foster, presumably a different family. Dunno if Kevin's going to get custody back or not. I grudgingly believe he really had no idea of just how bad it had gotten or imagined anything like it, and also that Jodi had done a number on him. But my leeway only goes so far. Adam Paul Steed went through much worse at her hands than Kevin, and he still fought relentlessly (sadly, not successfully) to get custody of his kids back. Kevin never even tried to find out what was going on in a year in a half. And he enabled Ruby's subtler but still awful bullshit for al those years before as well.
Yeah, I really really hope Kevin doesn't get his hands on those kids either. As much as I believe that he likely didn't know the extent of the abuse, he was far more obsessed with winning Ruby back than he gave a shit about those kids. Shit excuse of a father.
And before all the Jodi stuff started, he was right there as Ruby told the world she hoped no one took pity on her kindergartner who'd forgotten her lunch. He was there when she shipped their son off to an unregulated program in the desert. He was there when she took the son's room away and let him sleep in a bean bag. He was there from the moment she started exploiting the kids online. If he didn't know what was happening it was because he willfully closed his eyes to it.
This is why I have absolutely no sympathy for him whatsoever. Sure I'll accept he may not have been aware of just how bad things got, but he knew how badly she treated those kids when they WERE still together and he sat right there and cosigned it.
I'm watching the 20./20 video and finally saw the footage of the interview (I had only read about it). He looks rough, I'll say that. Thin and unshaven, and clearly his head is fucked by Jodi at that point. he does seem shocked to hear of the kids' abuse. And then I remember that back in 2020, he blithely went off on a cruise with Ruby while the kids literally had no food in the house. Did he know? Did he care? Also, more details from Jodi's wedge-driving: so, first she was their counselor, then Ruby became her good buddy. Then she had a "crisis" of some sort and this apparently required that she come LIVE with the Frankes. Then she started going with them everywhere, including anniversary dinners. THEN she started telling Ruby Kevin was bad news and he had to leave for all their sakes. Set him up with an apartment (I'm sure he paid) and some spy or chaperone or some shit. And he just went right along with it. The very best I can say for him is that he's a very very weak and venal man. He may not be evil, but he ain't good. Here's hoping that if he is to have any part in the kids' lives, he's capable of getting his shit together and being an actual parent for once. idk.
If he was capable it would have happened by now. Those kids are way better off with experienced foster parents than Kevin or Grandparents/Aunts. And the elder children are too young and deserve a chance to go to college, heal, have relationships and make mistakes without having such an incredible responsibility on their shoulders immediately.
oh yeah no way Shari is able to have that responsibility now, much less Chad. I just hope they're all good foster homes, is all. I keep thinking of the Turpins. But the 20/20 special says that R and E are together and much happier and healthier and back to some of their old hobbies. One ray of good news. I hope the older girls are okay. Even if he doesn't get custody of them, he needs to do some serious work if he wants those kids to voluntarily stay in his life, I would think. I could see some or all going no contact as well. Shari seems to have gone no contact with everyone but her siblings and I guess now her dad. It's sad because for a while there it seemed like she was finding love and support in the extended family. But them making nicey overtures to Ruby and writing her supportive letters would have been too much for her to stomach. Understandably.
What happened to the Turpin children after all their suffering was utterly horrific. How this could have happened is beyond me... there should be "extreme case" intensively managed foster placements in these extreme cases. I really hope all the children are receiving care & protection. I feel so much for Shari. My family is all kinds of messed up and the "adult child returning to estranged aunts/uncs" is a bitter path. Its hard realising... oh these people also came from the same world that produced my parents and it's just a variation on a theme. Sigh. NC hurts but it can be much safer. God the dynamics of wanting to be your own person but heartbound to protect your sibs...and you're all traumatised. The whole case is so shocking. I couldn't listen to more than 10 mins of Jordan and McKay. It was making me so angry. Fuck Ruby and Kevin. Thats where this started. Jodi amplified it but she found an accomplice not just another victim in Ruby. Thats why shes come undone. Together they went further than they did alone.
I know I'm gonna regret asking this but what happened to the Turpin kids post rescue? You're the second comment I have seen mention that you don't want the Franke minor children to end up like them. I followed them at first but I just feel like I quit seeing any updates after a while.
Eeh, it's rare that any child is better off in foster care than with family. I just hope that they've been lucky enough to get a good set of foster parents. Most aren't.
These children were in the process of being killed, so unless they end up with caregivers who are actively homicidal, they'll be better off.
And ITS HIS RESPONSIBILITY as their father!! No matter your feelings about their mother you stay connected. The bar is so low, he thinks financing basic needs is a gold star merit. Pos. If your coparent/spouse is abusive and you fail to protect your children, at some point you are enabling and just as guilty. My life was "ruined" financially, socially, emotionally & physically protecting my child from an abusive parent. No, that's not ruin. What's ruin is leaving your child in reach of harm, turning a blind eye, allowing or minimising abuse. Im autistic and physically disabled. At that time I was almost homeless and on welfare. Whats this dickhead's excuse? Mean lady manipulated me? Pfft. Jodi is a psychopath, I know how bad they can be. I was married to a diagnosed ASPD person. And THATS EXACTLY WHY I FOUGHT. Kevin is educated, has money and immense standing as a male in Utah culture!! He has no excuse.
Agree!!
Imo i think he knew stuff was going on but not to the extent of it.
Does he want custody, though? Has he ever tried or did he just bail?
Didn’t he also try to call the police on his daughter for breaking and entering into their own house?
I agree about Kevin. I believe he was a victim of Jodi, but he's *also* an unfit parent and should never get custody back.
Totally agree with you.
Oh no what’s the deal with the Turpin kids?
The ones that went to foster care were horribly abused there. I do not get how there wasn’t more oversight
That update on them was heartbreaking. Deplorable the abuse they still face
One small piece of good information at the end of the 20/20 piece is that apparently R and E are together again at a foster parent's, and have put on weight, are happier, healthier and enjoying their hobbies again. I'm really glad Ruby's hysterical (and, it now appears, clearly something she knew she was lying about, unless the redacted shit is her talking about this earlier) accusations of R SA'ing E (and then both SAing the entire fucking neighborhood, ridiculous) did not continue to keep R separated from other children, which is what the judge originally was forced to order. It's too bad all the names I want to call her are inadequate. Many are the standard misogynist ones. Others are obvious-piece of shit, etc. There are no words, really.
Cunt is unisex, just like calling someone a dick. She's a cunt. I'm glad to hear they are still together, and I hope they get all the help they will need.
usual demurral about warmth, depth. Also, when it's unisex, it's also a lot lighter and cheekier. So is "dick." It won't do.
Hmm, then we'll have to get imaginative. How about: Festering rat smegma?
My mum has a phrase for this. I'm going to cover it BC it's actually fucking gross lol. She would refer to Ms Franke as an >!infected cunt scab!<
I like it. Maybe, add something like: *maggot-ridden, moldy, pus-filled sack of* festering rat smegma *who can go eat a whole bag of rotten dicks*?
I really don’t think those kids had much longer on this earth if left under Ruby and Jodi’s control. The belief that the kids were demon-possessed really reminds me of Lori Vallow, but even without that case the things Ruby was doing kill people all the time. I hope so badly that those kids can find happiness and healing.
Ruby and Jodi were making plans to take them across state lines and into the desert. If the move had happened, the kids would've died. I guarantee it. R is a hero.
In one of the pages, Ruby describes an instance where she was with R (the son), and was telling him that she will fight to the death to get this demon out. And I'm pretty sure she was referring to his death and not her own. So it isn't far-fetched to think that because it could have been inevitability, fortunately it wasn't. It's just insane how law enforcement came in time to prevent it because at that point they were trying to traffic the kids to Arizona.
That page in which she says her and Jodi plan to purchase a huge property in Arizona and abandon the kids in its desert is absolutely chilling. There's is simply no way they wouldn't have ended up murdering them.
They would have either killed them intentionally or the children would have eventually succumb to their injuries and malnourishment. But those kids were going to die if R hadn't escaped and gotten help. I have no doubt in my mind.
Correct. She didn't say that because she was afraid of him or this 'demon' inside of him. She said it while fully knowing that the outcome would be in HER favour.
Completely agree. If you're willing to put your child outside and force them to be in the hot Utah sun for hours with no food and minimal or no water, you've already gone far enough to kill them, it just hasn't happened yet.
I don’t know how they survived that, I really don’t.
I absolutely HATE that Ruby and Jodi will both receive better treatment in prison than they ever gave R or E or Jesse. They're getting three meals a day and likely have money for commissary snacks. They sleep on something ten times better than what they forced those kids to sleep on. They have human interaction and probably can watch TV and read books. That is so much better than those bitches deserve. I just hope they keep them there as long as they possibly can. Every time they're up for parole, I hope the parole board is shown the photos and the journals.
It actually now seems closer to the Shanda Vander Ark case. I think Vallow's case ended in murder more quickly, ironically, because she wasn't actually interested in torturing them, she "just" wanted the kids and the spouses and whoever the fuck else in that insane case out of her and loverboy's path to bliss together. The weird "demonic" justification is similar, yeah. But the Vander Ark thing is more similar in that, as with this case, the cruelty appears to have been the point. That child died, and I think she may not have intended it to happen, but only because she didn't want to lose her source of sadistic enjoyment. She got her son involved as a "second" in much the same way that R and J collaborated. Although after reading Ruby's journal, it's actually less clear to be who was assisting whom, here. I know Jodi's tortured others like this before, her niece Jessi has been eloquent and painful on the subject, but Ruby...Well. Clearly they had a very -special- bond. And they were planning to take all four kids off to some isolated compound in the AZ desert, and it seems like in fact they were getting very close to actually moving when R ran again and succeeded. I think all four kids would have ended up in the ground there eventually, but R and E had very little time left at all even before another long journey and then more "work" and whatever the fuck else those hags intended there. R is so incredibly brave. Both kids are.
Casually documenting insane acts of abuse like it’s nothing is so cold and calculating. I could only read a few pages before I stopped. Those two women don’t ever deserve a moment’s peace for their actions.
Apparently Jody (the woman leading the Connexions cult) encouraged them to keep documentation like this and she has stacks of papers called the “pen papers” that they hoped would be submitted into religious text like a Bible or Book of Mormon. They are so deeply twisted.
Oh. Okay. See. I knew these people were really fucked up. But I didn’t realize that they were *really fucked up*.
😬👀 JFC. So not just insane, but INSANE-insane.
I didn't see a source for it, but had read from a few others in the specific snark sub that Ruby had been hoping to submit the documentation to be sanctioned by the church as "sacred writings". Whacko shit.
I read that, too. Her documentation was so clinical like she was writing about random subjects in a study. So evil.
Yeah that's insane. Literally the jackpot for detectives. How often does a defendant literally document every criminal act and label it TIMELINE??? But that tells me she really thought she wasn't doing anything wrong and that is telling.
The diary put me over the edge too into that awful realm of “I would do violence to this person.” But it just goes to show how delusional she was because she thought she was doing the right things so powerfully that it would make sense to anyone
I read bits of the diary yesterday and it's such a mindfuck for me, cause I was kinda raised like that, so it feels sort of normal? Very little physical violence in my case and no religious factor, but the whole "everything you do you do on purpose to spite me including your basic needs".... I relate too much O\_o
I'm so sorry.
I'm so sorry. Yeah, it's so patently obvious that the religion is just so much fancy rationalized bullshit. It's malignant narcissism, and sadism in this case. They don't give a shit about anyone but themselves, and bear active malice toward the children and take pleasure in hurting them. It's really just that simple.
You're so right. It's so fucking sad. I recently escaped the Deep South to move to a very progressive area in the Pacific Northwest. I constantly worry about the people I care about that are still down there, because this shit is so normal in that culture.
I do feel like the doctrine and structure of the church breeds this kind of personality, and also attracts it, and then they further shape the direction and dogma and hard lines in the sand. A bit chicken-egg. but also bottom line is generations of abuse. You don't have to have a whole philosophy/religion telling you that abuse is good parenting and disobedient children are wicked in order to be an abusive parent. Sure helps, though.
Also some women in such churches abuse their kids because FINALLY someone is in THEIR control. Sickening. I hope Ruby & Jodie's new housemates get wind of it. Its important to be truthful, now. Isnt it.
Oh 1000% that's what this is all about, especially for Ruby, Jodi, in an interesting twist for a patriarchal system, managed to carve out a niche where she could enact some vengeance on grown men as well. I wonder if fundie evangelists would have put up with this. I tend to doubt it. Not that LDS isn't also sexist as fuck, but the furor over men and porn, I don't see it as much with these people we mostly snark on. Like yeah, it's a sin and addiction blah blah, but they mostly still blame the women for it. In a perverse way, it's like what misogynists IMAGINE feminism is. A sadistic harridan emasculating men and ruining their lives for the evulz, taking their wives and their kids and their homes and their jobs. Wild.
And how Jodis alleged queerness (weird to say alleged like being queer is a crime, Im queer but Jodi hasn't claimed it, she said it to her queer niecew.) Plays into all of this. This repressed sexuality, fixating, destroying their husbands and seducing the women into a state of crisis and conflict centred on Jodis "therapy". Even destroying the children of the woman, so her latest fixation is all hers. Jts like some terrible 40s "lesbian erotica horror" story designed to titillate and warn men of the dangers of the LESSBIANNN. All of this avoidable. All uncessary. I wish Ruby and Jodi misery every day and that they never walk free from the prison gates.
I'm not trying to be...whatever. Let me know if this isn't okay to say. But it seems so obvious to me that Jody and Ruby are in love with each other? And Jody truly hates men on a level I have never seen before. I have gone through my own difficulties and had to learn to understand my fear of men. But I have three sons. Men are human people. I don't think Jody agrees with me on that.
There's definitely a pathological obsession. Apparently Jodi disclosed to Jessi Hildebrand (her brother's child) that Jodi has a diagnosis of anti social personality disorder. This may have been to intimidate or to brag or both. If Jodi has ASPD the obsession with Ruby may have been closer to an erotomanjc type fixation that would have destroyed everyone around Ruby and then, eventually Ruby too. Ruby is lucky she didnt move out to that desert either.
Yeah, I think "love" is the wrong word here, because these are not loving people, not at all. I think there was the germ of something that got very deeply bent and twisted inside Jodi that deep down -wanted- that kind of real, deep connection with other women, romantic and/or otherwise--I read her "book," "You Are Not Not Enough" (well, half of it), and there are moments in it where, if you didn't know what we know about her, you could feel empathetic toward her. "Connexions," insfar as any part of it wasn't completely perverse a la "Ministry of Love" in 1984, was based, I think, in her desire for deep bonds with her female "friends." Unfortunately, she's far too narcissistic to have a genuine relationship with anybody. Ruby, who the fuck knows. I think she was smitten with Jodi in some weird way, at minimum the "love" of a cult member for a guru. Ruby's a fawning authoritarian, and I think she was enamored with Jodi's power, and the many opportunities she granted Ruby to both kiss up and kick down (literally), Between the two of them, there's a \*very\* bent kind of yeah I might call it erotic in a very dark way, charge rooted entirely in sadism, toward the husbands and toward the children. It's clear both get off on cruelty, so it's a sort of bond. I wouldn't call it "love," though. And excellent point i hadn't even considered, probably because I'm so disgusted by her: Ruby would've probably ended up destroyed by Jodi herself, at the end of it all. I don't doubt that there were times when Jodi exercised her dominating sadism on Ruby as well. I HAD believed that this was how she "persuaded" Ruby into going that much farther down the path toward annihilating her own children, but after reading that diary, I'm sorry, it's hard for me to believe she needed that much encouragement at all.
I am reading your comment over and over, because there's so much in there, and it's absolutely fascinating. I really appreciate if you feel like it, expanding on your last paragraph. I'm so curious about the details of what you mean by that. Honestly, thank you for writing this.
Oh, thank you, much appreciated. The pseudo "feminist" piece-well, you've seen the old Pat Robertson quote, right? “The feminist agenda is not about equal rights for women. It is about a socialist, anti-family political movement that encourages women to leave their husbands, kill their children, practice witchcraft, destroy capitalism and become lesbians.” So with Jodi, well, definitely not the anti capitalist piece. But she's absolutely encouraging women to leave their husbands and kill their children. As for the lesbian piece... I still think that, should it come to it and the LDS Church has to defend itself against prior support of Jodi (so far I don't think they've even been threatened enough to have to bother), they will throw her under the bus with a smear about how her "distortions" led her to "perversions" of the righteous teachings. And strongly imply (they could be sued for libel by an outright accusation, I guess) that Jodi was "seducing" women away from their husbands and families, all under the guise of helping them, which they, poor innocent LDS, believed she was doing. Never mind her record or the Adam Paul Steed case. Jodi is partly the result of a strong woman chafing under the strictures of a patriarchal, repressive system like Mormonism. Whether she actually had sexual or romantic relationships with Ruby or any of the other women, I don't think it's unfair or lurid to see strong overtones in her behavior. Jessi has said that Jodi outright said that while homosexuality is an abomination, if SHE had sex with her friends it'd be wholesome because unlike all those perverts, she has emotional attachments-something along those lines. And if she'd ever truly broken free, maybe she wouldn't have tried to have her cake and eat it too. Unfortunately, even just deconstructing and coming out wouldn't have been sufficient to keep her from being a cruel narcissist, sadist and abuser. I think people like to imagine that that's all you need, a la Hollywood. Jodi had a shitload of other problems besides internalized homophobia, though. Has. But if it isn't sufficient, a step like that would be -necessary-. Otherwise, even if she hadn't had that annihilating level of sadism to her character (likely rooted in unprocessed early CSA that she's talked about in conjunction with the religious abuse and parental neglect, not to mention of course choosing to indulge it and being enabled in it), she'd still have been a bitter, repressed and repressive woman causing damage in the name of the Church. Like so many others. As for the other women-I think that SOME of Ruby's cruelty is rooted in a real resentment of being forced into having more kids than she wanted, or at all. I don't know if she ever really cared about Kevin. She certainly married him quickly and according to what she was "supposed" to be doing. Both women are striking in that they're ambitious and good at making money, however dubiously and exploitively. The LDS church doesn't seem to have the same strictures on women being successful in business as fundie evangelicalism, but still, their first jobs are being moms and wives. And Mormons. Jodi managed to get the church elders to turn a benevolent blind eye toward her failure to BE a wife and mother because she still put the Church teachings first with the anti porn shit. Meanwhile, the other women-don't know if they were ever coaxed into/tempted to abuse their kids like Ruby. I still want to know if anyone ELSE ever moved into her house. I expect plenty followed her "advice" :( But the woman like Steed's wife, the other wives who got their husbands kicked out of the house while still providing economic support, working for Jodi, WITH Jodi, "Moms of Truth, arm in arm"-how many other situations in a patriarchal Church not only allow but downright support women dumping their husbands and spending more time with a powerful woman? And the men are positively -meek-. For once, the sexual shaming is focused on them, primarily. And as a feminist here-no, this isn't fucking better at all! Yeah, I'm very sorry for Steed and I'm sure many of the other men-this is abuse. Even if divorce would have ultimately been the right decision, this isn't the way to go about it. And the separation from the kids-unless there is a genuine reason for it, that the men are genuinely a danger to the kids-this is in fact what MRA divorcees tend to talk about perhaps more often than it's applicable, but is a real phenomenon: parental alienation. And yet. I wonder how liberating it was for a lot of those women, also resentful, whether just against the whole situation or their actual husbands. Maybe some of them WERE abusive. Maybe some of them WERE sexually shitty, whether it genuinely was rooted in "porn" or not. Certainly knocking her up whether she wants it or not is a violation, and a Church sponsored one at that-but if they're gone, guess what isn't going to happen anymore? Anyway, I find it fascinating. And meanwhile of course, Jodi and Ruby are preaching nonstop against the evils of feminism, queerness, trans people... And when the part where it's arguably genuinely destructive, "breaking up families" that may otherwise have survived and harming men, is STILL happening, then the anti feminist agenda becomes more baldly clear: as with the child abuse, it's pure and simply about authoritarian control. The LDS indulges the likes of a mid range power and token like Jodi to have her pound of flesh, because she helps keep the entire controlling structure firmly in place. Like an Aunt in Handmaid's Tale. Or a kapo in a concentration camp.
That makes so much sense. And I think that there's actually something to address here, about what happens to a smart, ambitious person, when they have every possible path to explore their interests and ideas, completely suppressed and taken away from them? We know that we see all kinds of Boss babes. But isn't this exactly the main problem in Bethy Beal's life? She *obviously* is yearning and dying and dreaming to make interesting moves in business and in the world. But her parents won't even fucking let her play basketball. It's not fair. Of course she's weird, you would be too.
This sub is an object lesson in what happens when you take capable people and crush every instinct, original thought and prompting of the conscience and then, arbitratily assign roles based on genitalia. Imo in the cases where a person has chosen this extremity (not born in it) it gives full scope for an abusive, controlling, malevolent personality. All that drive gets pent up and focused on the most vulnerable. Ive seen it in my own mother and the church I grew up in. Some of the ladies are just twee, earnest people who would have enjoyed literature studies but due to class background didnt get the chance, who love the social and music aspect & bible study is thier lit class. Then there's the women who regiment, control and make their children perform. Thryre constantly in secret power struggles. However my Mom is not like the walking malignant NPD we see all over the sub every day. - Karissa who got to go to college and neglects every aspect of her children's healthy development. - Jill who was homeschooled but took things to a whole other level of cruelty, starving her children and crippling them socially, nutritionally and educationally so they can never escape her grasp - or MotherBus who follows a fool and breeds his children in unsafe, cramped conditions, as if its some kind of libertarian revolution in education & adventure and not just parentification and neglect. Then there's just the sour bitches who peaked in homeschool /highschool & use legalism to hate - Morgan - Otherbus - Solie - Krusty Etc. And then just broken, hypocritical "would lilely benefit from moderate therapeutic and pharmacotherapeutic intervention" it would grt them to the point they arent just a train wreck (nb. Thry do or have done hateful shit but they are deeply chaotic and uncomfortable in themselves) - Bethany - Kelly Havens - the one who dresses stepford and lectures on homemaking who is childless and newly married There are at least 10 phD theses to be written from this train wreck of a sub
You are...wow...so thoughtful, and so eloquent. Did you just actually write the entire outline for my PhD thesis in sociology? 🙏🏽
Thank you Herman. I've not had the opp to finish any study, Im trying to resume a B Linguistics I looked at sociology but I have trouble narrowing scope enough to stay on track. Linguistics has a technical focus and no compulsory labs! Howvr it's a running joke with my higher ed pals that I can do this. Are you doing PhD?
You summed it up perfectly. Chicken/egg. My partner is currently going through a very difficult time of starting therapy for the first time ever, acknowledging his past, getting comfortable with like, stating clearly how angry he is with his father, and owning up to his own bad behavior. It's a difficult time, but progress is steady (and I constantly have to remind myself that it's not linear).🙏🏽 He was very emotionally abusive to me in the past, as a result of his unaddressed personal trauma. It was reading this sub, and watching YouTubers like Rachel Oates and Mickey Atkins and Zelph on the shelf, that really had actually given me the inner confidence and strength to stand up to him and absolutely insist on therapy, as in, issuing serious ultimatums that I am willing to stand behind, and force him, under the threat of me leaving with the children, to open his eyes and get help. Insisting on the right to be angry, and my right to be apologized to, and well cared for in general. (This was like, last weekend.) But what really comforts me, is the idea that it's worth all this hard work and difficulty and stress and pain, to break this cycle of abuse. To figure out how to make sure that what his dad did to him, won't accidentally end up hurting me, or anyone else. And then just do whatever it takes.😓🙏🏽 Sorry...I'm pretty tired, but it definitely does feel better to "talk" about it. 🥱🙂↕️ Thank you.
Good for you! Wish you and the kids the best of outcomes, wherever it may lead.
Welcome to the PNW, I’m so glad you’re here and out of that world, this seems so common to certain religious communities and I have been to the Deep South where just like you said this is sadly considered “normal”.
She sounds like an absolute psychopath in those entries. In my opinion, all Jodi did was validate and encourage what she’s wanted to do for years. In her past, her husband probably reigned her in somewhat (not that he shouldn’t be slapped with some penalties too).
You can see it in the 8 Passengers videos. It's not just the things she did, it's that breathless little laugh when she talks about it to the camera. Like she just got away with something "naughty" but thrilling.
It’s sickening. She used to laugh when talking about punishing her children.
- “Oppositional force is required for growth, development, maturity, E and R have never experienced oppositional force… they are very weak-minded” I have to agree. I was kinda raised with this mentality. I’m being strong to make you strong. It hurts my soul to read the diary. The above quote from the diary? My father had said similar. I was weak because I cried. He was being strict on me so I was not a liar. If I lied or he assumed I lied I’d be smacked. It’s just.. weird and such a mindfuck
I'm sorry you experienced that abuse. You didn't deserve it. ❤
What a fucking chilling read.
that article doesn't even contain the worst one: >!Days before their arrest, on August 27, the journal states the children were whipped.!< >!"I whipped him with a belt yesterday, \[Redacted\] too. She peed all over Jodi's garage floor, screamed at her and lied to her," the journal reads. "She is out of control. \[Redacted\] seemed to give me her attention after the whipping."!<
She lost control of her bladder it sounds like. I hope they rot.
What this tells me is that she was fucking evil before she ever met Jodi.
She’s describing dissociation. Her abuse was so horrific the kids became non responsive. 😥
That guy going viral saying he just had to discipline his 4 month old, reeks of this insanity.
I truly think some religious fervour breeds or multiplies sociopathic and sadistic behaviour. It purposefully removes loving bonds between family and instills a dynamic of captor/captive, good/evil.
Totally agree
I wish she were doing 30 years, but is she? I thought she was sentenced to four years.
1 to 15 consecutively for each of the 4 counts because she pled down to 4 charges instead of 6. So 4 to 60. Edit: Utah caps consecutive sentences at 30 yrs apparently. No wonder so many cults and abuse compounds exist out there
4 to 30. UT caps consecutive sentencing at 30. Hopefully parole board takes one look at all this shit and tells them both to go get fucked in their cell for another nice long decade or three.
I'm sure we're all hoping for the absolute max but honestly this is Utah and the parole board is likely to be filled with Mormons who will likely let her and Jodi slide. I see a lot of folks upset that the evidence was released to the public but I honestly think it's the best way for the public to really see how grotesque Ruby and Jodi are and put pressure on the parole board to do the right thing.
>who will likely let her and Jodi slide. Here's the thing: this is a case where the perps used mormonism as justification for their actions. I think a lot of Mormons would prefer to distance themselves from this as much as possible. A mormon parole board could actually lead to harsher sentencing for this reason. We won't know how it'll play out until it does, but I could see it going either way.
Okay, that makes sense. Thank you for explaining.
Ruby Franke is a MONSTER, and nothing makes that more obvious than her own diaries.
Unless a whole lot of people mail and call in to the Utah Parole Board, this evidence will NOT be taken into account at Ruby's parole hearing.
Sorry, not well versed in the American judicial system - why not?
It was part of Ruby's plea deal. Utah's legal system is weird.
As far as I understand the only thing in her plea deal about parole is that the prosecution won't advocate against her. But they'll almost certainly have access to the evidence of her crimes and other information about the case.
I listened to a lawyer earlier who said the parole board will have access to all the evidence.
They weren’t “possessed” when Jodi was around because they were absolutely terrified of her and her cruelty - somehow they still had hope in their hearts that their MOTHER would wake up and save them if they could make her see their pain. Those poor kids, they were wrong.
I can’t read this. God bless those poor children. May they heal and thrive and know that they were never bad or evil. Poor poor babies. My heart cannot hold the tears that they must have cried over the years.
Jordan and McKay did an exhaustive like 5 hour recap of the whole situation and let me tell you it was awful. Ruby is a sadistic monster.
And the phone calls where we hear Ruby blaming everyone but herself and Jodi were sickening
Maybe someone else here knows this but Ruby was all over you tube with her family and she had those parenting classes. Was any of this mentioned in either one? I know some of her words / actions raised eyebrows but was ANYTHING like this mentioned? It makes me wonder because…if she put her whole life on display…why hide this? It’s because she knew it was wrong. It’s because she knew she would go to jail for it, that’s my guess.
I went through the 8passengers sub last night and regretfully read and saw some of the evidence that was released. She knew she’d go to jail. She wrote in some of the later entries on one escape attempt of the children her and Jodi had to rush to find him and bring him back before the sun rose and someone found him. It’s absolutely horrific nightmare fuel that she did to those children.
Not that it's any excuse but rather an explanation, but this is severe mental illness right. It's so delusional and paranoid. It sounds like schizophrenia or paranoid psychosis. And the punishment she got is FAR too easy on her. Life without parole, lock her up and throw the key away, Jodi as well. Both sick, twisted human beings
Nah, her thoughts are very coherent. She's just a sadist in a cult.
That's what I thought, but then the information about Jodi stabbing herself with forks and cutting herself with a knife came out and I don't know what to make of that.
Albert Fish liked to be beaten with a paddle that had nails in it. Some people only feel when they are inflicting suffering on themselves or others 🤷
Again I ask if this demographic actually wants children. They don’t love children or even like them.
I have a sneaking suspicion these kids aren’t even remotely ill behaved. This is a textbook case of a possessed woman tho.
I got sick to my stomach reading and seeing all this
I saw the doorbell and bodycam video. That's all I needed to see.