The stories are heartbreaking. You feel for the victims. It’s hard to imagine what they’ve been through. But at the same time, a 20/20 piece on Amish abuse from a few years back points to the generalizations that many journalists rely on to tell their story. The 20/20 folks lean heavily on cliches and misconceptions–from the ominous opening music, to the overplayed stories they trot…
Eli Stutzman, convicted murderer and father of ‘Little Boy Blue’, was an exile from the ultraconservative Swartzentruber Amish group. When you read words like ‘secretive’, ‘closed’, and ‘backward’ in the same sentence as ‘Amish’, the writer, rightly or wrongly, is often referring to this sect. Wayne County, Ohio, where Stutzman originated, has a high number of Swartzentruber members, with quite a few spilling over into…
Convicted murderer Eli Stutzman, formerly of the Amish of Wayne County, Ohio, has died. Stutzman gained notoriety after his nine-year old son’s body was found frozen in Nebraska in 1985. Stutzman was never convicted of murder in that case, only of lesser charges. He was also suspected in his wife’s mysterious death in a barn fire, as well as in two other deaths. Stutzman was…
Ohio looks to be cracking down on Amish-made foodstuffs, some of which are sold without following state rules on refrigeration and inspection. Could this spell the end of the legendary Amish baked goods stand? Some items are exempt–cookies and cakes, for example. But others fall under the regulations, such as those containing cream cheese or canned fruits and veggies. Is this a religious issue? One…
In The Riddle of Amish Culture, Donald Kraybill explains Amish ‘gangs’ in Lancaster county: By the age of ten, an Amish child will be able to name some of the groups—Bluebirds, Canaries, Pine Cones, Drifters, Shotguns, Rockys, and Quakers—and even describe some of their activities. Youth are free to join the gang of their choice…Parents worry about which groups their teens will join because they…
‘Amish’ sells. Whether it’s an overpriced bag of trail mix or a six-figure kitchen cabinet installation, people gravitate towards the implicit quality of anything with the Amish label. Exactly what does that label mean anyway? Does tobacco grown in the general vicinity of Amish country count as ‘Amish’? What about an RV produced at a factory with Amish workers? Does an Amish person actually have…
Most Amish look alike to the man on the street. In reality the group is surprisingly diverse. Though tied by a set of core beliefs, the Amish have no national governing body, no pope nor patriarch. The individual congregation, guided by its bishop, decides its own rules and customs. This decentralized approach, along with a widely varying tolerance for progressive ideas, creates many different ‘flavors’…