It's justified in some such cases, and in some other cases wholly unrelated to Mormonism, and almost certainly even in some pro-Mormon writings.
But never is it justified when applied to fellow LDS. Right?
Not all authors who write books that are less than friendly to the Mormon faith are "disingenuous." Most, in fact, probably aren't.
But you and your hatchet-men know that it is good business to make all the critics anti-Mormons, and all the anti-Mormons disingenuous.
You've caricatured my position. You haven't represented it accurately.
Then you can prove it by naming a single LDS author who is justifiably called disingenuous. My point is that you reserve this for a select group of non-LDS, usually those who write pieces critical of issues related to the LDS faith.
Those interested in surveying the FARMS Review, and in deciding for themselves about its character, are welcome to do so. It's all on line:
Is this supposed to be news? People have judged for themselves, and the only ones left impressed with FARMS are fellow believers who love to get in on the anti-Mormon slam action. None of this crap could get published outside a Church owned printing press. Calling it scholarship is an insult to scholarship, and most non-LDS scholars who venture over there to take a peek, would agree.
I agree with the assertion that the title that Signature Books gave to the volume was a specimen of disingenuous advertising or marketing.
But you cannot make an argument as to why you believe this. Of course Grant Palmer was an insider. If he wasn't an insider then who could be called an insider? All former LDS members have inside knowledge that people outside the faith do not have. Calling it disnigenuous is just a quick way to poison the well.
And not their first, either. Amusingly, I was standing next to their booth at the annual joint meeting of the American Academy of Religion and the Society of Biblical Literature years ago when one of those staffing the booth complained to the other that their seemingly pro-Mormon titles (e.g., The Word of God, Brigham Young University: A House of Faith, Line upon Line: Essays upon Mormon Doctrine, Faithful History, and etc.), so contradictory to the books' actual contents but so helpful in marketing the books to unsuspecting Latter-day Saints, actually sent the wrong message to the non-LDS scholars wandering the meeting's vast academic book exhibit, who mistakenly viewed Signature's titles as Mormon-faith-affirming. We should, he said, really have two titles for each book, one for Mormons and one for non-believers.
Oh so you're real problem is with the liklihood that some unsuspecting LDS member might pick up one of these books and begin to read. Oh the horror! If their arguments are really so horrible, then you should welcome all LDS members to read these books as it should further strengthen their testimonies, right? But you know as well as I do that these books do in fact lure people out of the Church, because they aree willing to discuss all the problematic issues that the Church and FARMS likes to either ignore or sugarcoat. In any event, you have not explained why Palmer was disingenuous for calling himself an insider.
Curiously, you cited only a truncated version of the relevant passage about Grant Palmer. It comes from the relatively young but widely respected historian Mark Ashurst-McGee
Of course Dan, you're all widely respected. You never let us forget that. Funny how so many respected folks at BYU have to rely on the Church to publish their apologetics for them. You know none of this would ever pass peer review outside the Church. So as long as you guys keep hiding behind the Church to dress up your apologetics as "scholarship," all your gloating about being "widely respected" will continue to ring hollow.
Dr. Ashurst-McGee is making a rather different point than the one you attribute to him (and to me). Your truncation of the quote makes your claim more plausible, on the surface, than it actually is.
His argument is dumb, and it relies on a psychoanalysis of Palmer to figure out whether or not he is sincere. Like you just said, who can tell whether you are being sincere or not?
I mean this argument is not just dumb, it is REALLY dumb:
To what group is Palmer an "insider," and why does that perspective matter? The title apparently refers to his career as an instructor in the CES. But one may question whether Palmer's career as a gospel teacher furnishes him with more knowledge of "Mormon origins" than could be obtained by an "outsider." This is demonstrably not the case
This insults the intellgence of the masses and beats a straw man. Did Palmer claim it wasn't possible to obtain his level of knowledge while being an "outsider"? No. But your precious historian pounced on that straw man quickly. And the dumb argument continues:
Moreover, other "insiders" do not view things the way Palmer does. So what is really at work in the book's title? Essentially, it is a piece of disingenuous advertising. It intends to present Palmer as a seasoned gospel teacher who will shepherd those who wish to learn more about the origins of their faith.
Did Palmer ever claim that he belonged to a group of insiders who shared a united thought? No, but don't let that stop the "widely respected" historian from pouncing on that straw man. The last sentence there is a futile exercise is pop-psychoanalysis which is used to justify his attack on Palmer as disingenuous.
The point is that Grant Palmer isn't an insider at all, and that what he writes doesn't represent the views of actual insiders. Accordingly, calling his book "an insider's view," while an effective marketing ploy, is misleading.
Again this is a dumb argument that your historian didn't establish. All he did was beat upon two straw men. He didn't ever establish the point that Palmer wasn't an insider, he merely asserted it as if that conclusion followed from all the straw that went flying about. There is nothing misleading about calling yourself an insider when you've been in the Church as long as he has. The fact that he held positions as an educator in the Church is just extra gravy for his "marketing ploy." But there is certainly nothing inaccurate about it, and if it isn't inaccurate, it cannot be misleading, and if not misleading, it cannot be disingenuous. The fact that you guys leap to that illicit conclusion based on a fabrication of evidence says much more about you than it ever will Palmer.
Grant Palmer, Dr. Ashurst-McGee says, is not an "insider" in any sense relevant to the historiography of Mormon origins. He wasn't an eyewitness, obviously, and he had no record -- not just not a strong record, but literally no record at all -- of published scholarship on the topic.
Straw man #3. The hits just keep on coming huh? Palmer never claimed to have been a published insider, and publication is not a requirement for insider status and never has been. Where do you guys come up with this nonsense?
Nor has he ever presented papers on the subject at scholarly gatherings, Mormon or non-Mormon.
Straw man #4. He never claimed to have presented papers at any scholarly gatherings, nor would any of this preclude him from being rightfully called an insider.
He may well have been an insider with respect to teaching seminary and, briefly, institute classes for the Church Education System, or even to internal CES politics . . . but, when people want an "insider's" view of formative early-nineteenth-century Mormon history, that's probably not the kind of "insider" they're looking for.
An argument from probability about what you think other people will think. That seems to be the basis for your justification in the use of the term disingenuous.
And saying that he is an insider in the undeniable sense that he's one of several million members of the Church seems rather trivial and uninteresting. My home teaching companion, a former bishop and a physical therapist, is an "insider" in precisely that same sense, but I'll wager that he would never dream of publishing a book entitled "An Insider's View of Early Mormon History."
But if he decided to, it would be justified. As I said, all former LDS are insiders to knowledge otrhers outside the faith do not have. You focus on the "several million" Mormons and I'll point out the few hundred million Americans who aren't Mormons. By all reasonable standards, they would consider someone of Palmer's background, an insider.
This is where branding me as "disingenuous" is very helpful to your criticism; you can simply dismiss what I say and replace it with what you say about me. Quite handy, really.
Oh Dan, why would I ever do that when relying on your own words is more than sufficient to make my point?
What you say about me on this point wouldn't, however, stand up to an actual survey of my actual usage of the term.
Probably not, but as you said, you're the editor of the review so you sign off on all that it publishes. So you're credibility and reputation will forever be tied to all that you let slip through the peer review process.