Reply #21: I live in PA and for years I have read and heard about their life

[bleedingheart]

and in fact I know people who have had the rare interactions with the old order Amish. They are a big tourist draw for the center of the state...and the sad part is that a lot of the "english" know of problems (abuse of kids) but don't even report those problems of abuse because they don't want to tarnish the image of the Amish...cuz it might just hurt the tourist dollars if those tourists learned that the Amish suffer from the same problems as the rest of society...

The sad part is that people don't realize that all the Amish aren't living like the ones in Lancaster...many are very poor but due to how their society is structured and their lack of education...they are left without many means of helping themselves ...but because they are a very small group this is ignored.