Four of the Duggar sisters, who appeared on the former TLC show “19 Kids and Counting” have filed a lawsuit after the police reports that implied their brother Josh Duggar had sexually abused them were disseminated to the media. Jill Dillard, Jessa Seewald, Joy Duggar, and Jinger Duggar (the two older sisters are married and have changed their names) have filed a federal breach-of-privacy lawsuit against the city of Springdale and Washington County, Arkansas, as well as some officials involved in the investigation, and In Touch.

Stories about Josh’s abuse surfaced in 2015, but the abuse claims stem from 2006. The police reports were released as the result of a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request made in 2015 by In Touch. In Touch approached the city officials for the documents after an anonymous tipster came to its writers with claims about Josh Duggar. The sisters argue that when they talked to the investigators in 2006 they were told that the information would be kept confidential, and under Arkansas’ FOIA rules, interviews with minors cannot be disclosed.

Essentially the sisters argue that the FOIA request shouldn’t have been complied with on the officials’ part, or at the very least the documents should have been heavily redacted. The documents provided to In Touch were somewhat redacted–in that the names of the girls and Josh were blacked out, but they still contained the names of their parents. According to the lawsuit it was easy to determine who the victims were based on that information. The sisters are seeking unspecified compensatory and punitive damages. They have also released a statement, claiming that the filed the lawsuit to protect abuse victims in the future from breaches to their privacy

“19 Kids and Counting” was cancelled after the allegations about Josh Duggar, and his parents’ horrific choice to cover up the abuse. Duggar allegedly sexually abused five girls when he was a teenager–four were his sisters–by fondling them while they slept. After those revelations, sponsors began pulling out of the show, and it was cancelled by TLC. Additionally Josh Duggar, who was working at the time at the incredibly conservative Family Research Council, resigned from his job.

Anneliese Mahoney

Anneliese Mahoney is Managing Editor at Law Street and a Connecticut transplant to Washington D.C. She has a Bachelor’s degree in International Affairs from the George Washington University, and a passion for law, politics, and social issues. Contact Anneliese at amahoney@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Duggar Sisters Sue Tabloid and Police After Stories About their Brother’s Abuse appeared first on Law Street.

In 2006, the criminal justice system helped Josh Duggar’s family expunge his record of abuse and protected him from being exposed in media reports as someone who had “forcibly fondled” younger girls (a.k.a. molested children).

Every day–then, now–the criminal justice system targets people of color–especially women and trans people of color–for abuse and shootings (a.k.a. public executions for walking while Black or Latina).

And yet.

And yet we continue to use pictures of him in suits instead of finding pictures that try to reflect him negatively (see featured photo), like the mainstream media insists on doing with young people of color slaughtered by cops.

When Black young men are murdered by cops, they are cast as “thugs.” When a young white man is accused of child abuse, he retains his status as ‘poor cult victim.’

This serves both racist and misogynist ends: white perpetrators remain victims, and his misogyny is cast as an exception (caused by his cultish family).

The mainstream media likes to speculate on the “scandalous” aspects of how the family helped cover up the abuse; how the family, in fact, abused him through their extremism and his isolation from “mainstream culture”; but we don’t like to speculate on how Josh Duggar is not, in fact, an exception. Josh Duggar is the rule.

Duggar is an embodiment of rich white cis male non-dis/abled privilege, and while the control his family exerts over him is indeed frightening, their misogyny is not an exception.

The Duggars may be particularly explicit in the ways they preach and practice misogyny, but what pieces focusing on the cultish aspects of the Duggars that facilitated the abuse miss is that every person in this country–every. single. person.–is raised to hate women. The Duggars may be more explicit than most, but they are not alone: Josh Duggar’s apparent belief that women and girls exist for male pleasure is the same belief that we are all raised with.

It’s called rape culture, and it’s everywhere.

The fact that the Duggars isolated their children so much that they didn’t have a TV misses the point: all of us with TV, too, receive the same message–in a heteropatriarchal society like this one, women are disposable.

Because rape culture is not isolated to “cults.” It is everywhere.

Because women–especially women of color–are disproportionately targeted by the same criminal justice system that protected Duggar when the first police report was issued against him.

Because living in a heteropatriarchal society makes us much more vulnerable to debilitating mental health issues.

Because “strong women” in the mainstream media is still the only trope we’re allowed to hope for.

Because the kind of misogyny that the media ascribes to the cult of the Duggars is the same kind of misogyny that we are exposed to every single time we turn on the television, interact with men in the street, or are educated in a public school system that still focuses on “great” [read: genocidal] white men and does not teach consent as the golden rule in health classes (a.k.a. teach rape culture to all students).

Because we can condemn–or pity–Josh Duggar as much as we’d like.

But ultimately, we must recognize that his privileged positions and entitled, abusive actions are the rule, not the exception.

Jennifer Polish

Jennifer Polish is an English PhD student at the CUNY Graduate Center in NYC, where she studies non/human animals and the racialization of dis/ability in young adult literature. When she’s not yelling at the computer because Netflix is loading too slowly, she is editing her novel, doing activist-y things, running, or giving the computer a break and yelling at books instead. Contact Jennifer at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Josh Duggar is Not an Exception: On Rape Culture in the U.S. appeared first on Law Street.

UPDATE: October 25, 2014

Well, that was quick. As of today TLC has pulled the plug on its uber successful reality show “Here Comes Honey Boo Boo.” The announcement comes after weeks of speculation and reports asserting that Mama June, Honey Boo Boo’s mother, has been dating a convicted sex offender since splitting with her long-time partner Sugar Bear.

Here is the family’s response to the news, posted to their Facebook fan page earlier today:

According to Mama June in the video, she is not dating Mike McDaniel, who was convicted of aggravated child molestation in 2004.

“The statement of me dating a sex offender is totally untrue. Pumpkin (June’s daughter) has openly said that I’m not dating him … I would never, ever, ever, ever put my kids in danger.”

TLC, unsurprisingly, has been cautious when addressing this situation. “TLC has cancelled the series ‘Here Comes Honey Boo Boo’ and ended all activities around the series, effective immediately. Supporting the health and welfare of these remarkable children is our only priority. TLC is faithfully committed to the children’s ongoing comfort and well-being.”

No word yet from Sugar Bear on this controversy. It remains to be seen if the Shannon-Thompson family’s fans are as loyal as those of another major cable network’s reality family: the Robertsons of “Duck Dynasty” on A&E. A&E briefly barred the Robertson family patriarch from filming when he likened homosexuality to bestiality in a GQ interview. The whole family threatened to walk and many viewers revolted against the network, which later walked back the suspension.

Read our prior coverage on Mama June and Sugar Bear’s split, which kicked off speculation over the show’s future, here.

UPDATE October 25, 2014: Anna Shannon Cardwell, the oldest daughter of Mama June Shannon, reportedly was the eight-year-old child who McDaniel molested between 2002 – 2003. Cardwell defended her mother against reports that she was dating the man who spent ten years in jail for her molestation, until yesterday when she received more information about her mother’s relationship. Cardwell reportedly came forward with this information about her experience because of the nature of what she sees as her mother’s betrayal.

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Chelsey Goff (@cddg) is Chief People Officer at Law Street. She is a Granite State native who holds a Master of Public Policy in Urban Policy from the George Washington University in DC. She’s passionate about social justice issues, politics — especially those in First in the Nation New Hampshire — and all things Bravo. Contact Chelsey at cgoff@LawStreetMedia.com.

Featured image courtesy of [Daniel Horatio Agostini via Flickr]

Chelsey D. Goff

Chelsey D. Goff was formerly Chief People Officer at Law Street. She is a Granite State Native who holds a Master of Public Policy in Urban Policy from the George Washington University. She’s passionate about social justice issues, politics — especially those in First in the Nation New Hampshire — and all things Bravo. Contact Chelsey at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post TLC Cancels Honey Boo Boo, Possible Sex Offender Connection appeared first on Law Street.

It’s a sad, sad day for all you closet Honey Boo Boo fans out there. TMZ is reporting that Mama June caught Sugar Bear trolling dating sites for the last time. OK, to be fair, TMZ may be reporting it, but my mom is the one who reported it to me (and I’m sure she would want me to point out here that she is not actually a Honey Boo Boo fan, for the record):

To translate parent-text, ‘msnh’ = ‘many’ & ‘whoch’ = ‘which.’ Next up, WhenParentsText.com.

According to TMZ, David Michael Thompson — “Sugar Bear” on TLC’s reality hit Here Comes Honey Boo Boo — has made a habit of trolling various dating sites online, most recently as an “adventurer” looking for a “long term” relationship on PlentyOfFish.com. This of course poses a problem since Sugar Bear has been in a relationship with “Mama June” Shannon for nearly a decade. The couple, who started out as “shack ’em up mates” and exchanged vows at a committment ceremony earlier this year, have one daughter together, Alana “Honey Boo Boo” Thompson, and have been raising June’s three older daughters.

Courtesy of Giphy

Filming of the next season of Here Comes Honey Boo Boo is still underway, so we can expect some reference to these latest developments, if not footage from the fallout. The show has garnered shockingly huge ratings for the network, even beating the 2012 Republican National Convention in ratings. The family reportedly doesn’t use any of the money from their increasingly popular reality show, but rather lives off Sugar Bear’s income as a contractor. The family received up to $20,000 per episode in 2012, but the most recent figures put their per episode paycheck at $50,000 — all of which goes directly into trust funds for each of the daughters and one granddaughter for disbursement on their twenty-first birthdays. So, the division of assets probably won’t be as complicated as your run-of-the-mill reality star break up, but there will surely be no shortage of legal representation and publicity to go around.

I leave you with TLC’s video compilation of Mama June and Sugar Bear’s relationship as it played out on the show. #RIPShackEmUpMates

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Chelsey Goff (@cddg) is Chief People Officer at Law Street. She is a Granite State native who holds a Master of Public Policy in Urban Policy from the George Washington University in DC. She’s passionate about social justice issues, politics — especially those in First in the Nation New Hampshire — and all things Bravo. Contact Chelsey at cgoff@LawStreetMedia.com.

Featured image courtesy of [Lwp Kommunicacio via Flickr]

Chelsey D. Goff

Chelsey D. Goff was formerly Chief People Officer at Law Street. She is a Granite State Native who holds a Master of Public Policy in Urban Policy from the George Washington University. She’s passionate about social justice issues, politics — especially those in First in the Nation New Hampshire — and all things Bravo. Contact Chelsey at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Line Up the Lawyers: Honey Boo Boo’s Parents Are Splitting appeared first on Law Street.

The Learning Channel, or TLC, has made a name for itself in recent years for creating shows that showcase a variety of family arrangements. From the infamous “Jon & Kate plus Eight” to “Little People, Big World,” TLC stars are probably used to seeing themselves in headlines. But one of TLC’s shows, “Sister Wives,” is making headlines this week for a different reason–they were on the winning side of a lawsuit against Utah’s polygamy laws that was ruled on Friday.

“Sister Wives” stars consists of Kody Brown, his four wives, and their 17 children. They are Fundamentalist Mormons and members of a church called Apostolic United Brethren, a specific sect within the greater Latter Day Saints church. Most Mormons don’t practice polygamy now, but some do, and AUB is one of them. According to Principle Voices, a polygamy lobby and advocacy group, there are about 38,000 Mormons in the United States who practice, or at least believe in the practice of, polygamy.

“Sister Wives” began airing in 2010 and the fourth season started last summer. Brown is legally speaking only married to his first wife–Meri. The other three, Janelle, Christine, and Robyn are all married to Brown in a spiritual and religious, but not legal, sense. Since the show began, a bigamy investigation was opened by the state. The Browns have since fled from their home in Utah, to Las Vegas, NV. They were scared of persecution due to their polygamist family arrangement.

Until last Friday, Utah had some of the strictest anti-bigamy and anti-polygamy laws in the country. It was illegal to even claim you were married to multiple people, or to live with multiple partners. Most other states have made it so that it is illegal to obtain multiple marriage licenses, or try to obtain a marriage license to someone who is already married.

Under the former Utah definition, the living arrangement of the Browns would have been illegal. In Utah, it would have been classified as up to a third-degree felony, warranting a fine of up to $5000 or up to 5 years in prison. State attorneys have used the law to prosecute polygamous families successfully in the past.

The Browns brought the lawsuit against Utah about two years ago, claiming that their constitutional right to privacy was being violated by the Utah law, as well as their right of religious freedom. US District Court Judge Clark Waddoups agreed with the Browns in a 91-page ruling he released on Friday. The ruling struck down only the cohabitation portion of the Utah polygamy law, and rendered it similar to polygamy laws in most other states. Now, it is only illegal to attempt to legally marry someone, or attempt to seek a marriage license if you are already married. In his decision, Judge Waddoups pointed out that the law is “too broad because it bars consenting adults from living together and criminalizes their intimate sexual relationships”.

This is seen as a huge win for both fundamentalist Mormons, as well as privacy-rights advocates. Given the national debate about marriage rights, whether this will move in a wave of changes could be interesting. But my prediction is that it will not, and that Judge Waddoups’ ruling was just a move to catch up an antiquated law in a conservative state to the rest of the United States.

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Anneliese Mahoney (@AMahoney8672) is Lead Editor at Law Street and a Connecticut transplant to Washington D.C. She has a Bachelor’s degree in International Affairs from the George Washington University, and a passion for law, politics, and social issues. Contact Anneliese at amahoney@LawStreetMedia.com.

Featured image courtesy of [Kyle Pearce via Flickr]

Anneliese Mahoney

Anneliese Mahoney is Managing Editor at Law Street and a Connecticut transplant to Washington D.C. She has a Bachelor’s degree in International Affairs from the George Washington University, and a passion for law, politics, and social issues. Contact Anneliese at amahoney@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post “Sister Wives” Win Big Case appeared first on Law Street.