Newly released video shows the malnourished son of a parenting advice YouTuber approaching a neighbor for help on the morning that his mother and her business partner were arrested on child abuse charges.

The malnourished and badly bruised son of a parenting advice YouTuber politely asks a neighbor to take him to the nearest police station in newly released video from the day his mother and her business partner were arrested on child abuse charges in southern Utah.

The 12-year-old son of Ruby Franke, a mother of six who dispensed advice to millions via a popular YouTube channel, had escaped through a window and approached several nearby homes until someone answered the door, according to documents released Friday by the Washington County Attorney’s office.

Crime scene photos, body camera video and interrogation tapes were released a month after Franke and business partner Jodi Hildebrandt, a mental health counselor, were each sentenced to up to 30 years in prison. A police investigation determined religious extremism motivated the women to inflict horrific abuse on Franke’s children, Washington County Attorney Eric Clarke announced Friday.

“The women appeared to fully believe that the abuse they inflicted was necessary to teach the children how to properly repent for imagined ‘sins’ and to cast the evil spirits out of their bodies,” Clarke said.

  • Lvxferre@mander.xyz
    0·
    8 months ago

    I am highlighting that her disgusting and despicable behaviour is justified by the Bible, even if you dislike it (as a moral person should).

    You can justify a lot of immoral shit through the Bible simply because it’s self-contradictory - if excerpt A says “do it” and excerpt B says “don’t do it”, you simply pick one and try to justify the other in the light of the one that you picked!

    Historical context, textual context, versions, even which books should be canon… ultimately those are just the means that Christians use to fool themselves as justified in their actions, and to pretend that there’s no contradiction there. Not just on an individual level, but also in a church level, often forming new factions (oopsie “denominations”) based on which excerpt you should follow by the letter and which you should bullshit your way out of.

    That might reach specially hilarious levels with the Mor[m]ons, but note - what they’re doing is nothing but what other Christian groups have been already doing since the Ancient Age. Including picking which books to consider canon.