They believe the world will end!
Is the apocalypse imminent? Rucksacks are packed with survival equipment for the expected floods.
An author stays with an alternative thinking family in an isolated house in Iowa, a mid-western Trump voting state. The father of this family, a religious fanatic, awaits the apocalypse. Will his daughter ever be free? This young woman author seized the initiative and interviewed extremely religious families – how and what they think, another woman author with her bestseller 'Unorthodox' the definitive memoir about the drama of a family living off grid, a self published survival writer, is worth reading. Such a life, so classically ultra-orthodox in Williamsburg, New York, fortunately born into writing with an early education enabling her to write forceful descriptions, appears openly and richly liberal but a rich but a normal society compared with the off-grid family, The American writer Tara Westover wrote about her uneducated life in 'Educated, a Memoir'.
Tara Westover started with an explanation of her life. When exactly she came into the World, is unclear. It was some time in 1986, by means of a house birth in the mid-western state of Iowa. Her existence was not reported to state services.. All seven children of this off-grid family grew up with strict Mormon beliefs. Tara witnessed isolated in their farm at the foot of Buck Peak mountain, where the entire family were fully separated from civilisation with God's will.
An Unused Ark
The father has his children working with him in the junkyard or uses them to build barns. The mother undermines the health system by practicing as an untrained midwife and herbalist. Again and again, terrible accidents rupture family life, burns, cuts, brain trauma, but calling a doctor or going to the hospital would be a betrayal of the religious revelations the father believes he is receiving from Gawd. In addition, it would presumably alert the FBI on their style of living - dropouts are expected to be shot in cold blood.
The children do not attend school, because their parents fear the devilish influence of the educated. That she is taught at home is more aspiration than reality. The fact is, provisions, canned food, weapons and ammunition are stored in the basement and the underground hidden fuel tank is filled with petrol. In addition to the sleeping cots there are backpacks with survival equipment ready for escape to the mountains. The end is apparently close. When it did not happen, according to the Jehovah Witnesses in 1988, or on New Year's Eve 1999 just prior to the Millenium and not again after the 9/11 attacks, their father is devastated. Noah has built his ark, but God holds back the flood.The author says her story is not about mormonism or religious extremism their father's behaviour, is due to his interpretation that his daughter has a malignant psychosis. Above all, "Educated, a Memoir", is about her, Tara Westover, the author's experience of her own difficult life without attending school.
Books:- Tara Westover, 'Educated a Memoir' Kiepenheuer and Witsch; https://tarawestover.com/
Source: Sie denken das die Welt ist am ende, Ursula Scheer, FAZ.net Oktober 25 Feillleton