Economics of Anti-Mormonism

[_KimberlyAnn]

I told no untruths. I simply informed the investigators about Joseph Smith's marriages to other men's wives and a few other true, historical tidbits, and viola! - they were no longer interested in Mormonism. You see, Coggins7, there's no need to spread lies about Mormonism. The truth is ugly enough.

Oh but you did, in your own way. You clearly failed to mention that the marriages to other men's wives of which you make so much hay were of a peculiar doctrinal nature that had no relation to sexual relations with them. You also probably failed to mention the complete lack of historical evidence that Joseph ever did, indeed, engage in any sexual relations with them (other than his legal plural wives, which, you might have mentioned, was a common practice among some very prominent Old Testament prophets). You may not have lied directly, but failing to explore the actual historical difficulties associated with proving the assumption of the worst about Joseph Smith as well as the doctrinal understandings of such practices, is still a form of intellectual dishonesty as any other. Unless it was simply done in abject ignorance, which, if true should make one shrink from cock sure pronouncements upon the doctrines and practices of others.

There was no doctrinal nature for Smith's marriages to other men's wives. God never spoke to Joseph Smith, not in the grove - not anywhere. There is absolutely no evidence supporting Smith's claims. None. Why would anyone assume Smith didn't sleep with all his plural wives? They were, in Joe's mind, his wives, after all. Most husbands have sex with their wives. Even the completely fabricated from thin air Section 132 of the D&C says men may have multiple wives to raise seed. Why else would Smith have bothered to marry other men's wives? He wanted to have sex with them. He wanted power and control, not only over the women, but over their husbands, too. He wanted to show them who was in control, to push his power to the limit. He was, in short, a megalomaniac. You may have a different opinion of Smith. That's fine. I shared my opinion with two families investigating Mormonism. They heard the missionaries opinions and they heard mine. They chose to believe me, much to their benefit.

Coggins7, where did I mention addiction in my post? I didn't. I certainly did not intend to detract from your recovery from Alcoholism. The fact that there is a recovery process to leaving Mormonism doesn't diminish your recovery at all. Are there different kinds and levels of recovery? Of course. I respect the difficulty of your recovery and had no intention of minimizing it. You will never see me mock your recovery or battle with alcoholism on this board or anywhere else for that matter. I think it's wrong of others to do so, too.

Here is what you wrote:

Seven extended family members have resigned and my whole immediate family, as well. I've gotten wonderful emails from people telling me how I helped them in their recovery from Mormonism and that their correspondence with me helped them make the decision to leave the church. It is also cathartic to share my personal experiences with others.

There's really no need to pretend that there isn't a well developed ideology within the active and public exmo world that consciously attempts to use 12 step terminology and concepts to conceptualize both their experience within Mormonism and their transition out of it, with all this entails and implies. Its disgusting, demeaning, intelligence insulting, and intellectually vacuous.

I don't know a thing about 12 step terminology. I only know from experience that it can be difficult coming out of a cult such as Mormonsim.

I was simply pointing out what Wade has consistently done on this board: Attribute any and all problems with Mormonism to the disaffected member instead of the organization itself. I'm not the only poster here who notices Wade's agenda.

Coggins, when I first posted on this board, Wade launched personal attacks my direction when I'd done no such thing to him. The post was about licked cupcakes for heaven's sake, and wasn't directed at him in the least. But he revealed his true colors on that thread. You're doing the same here. I have never been anything but polite to you, yet here you are launching personal attacks my direction. Thank you for showing me how you really are. And no, you're not excused for the ad hominem nature of your post just like Wade's not excused for his.

I've actually rarely seen Wade launch personal attacks against anybody, and even when he has, its been with restraint and decorum difficult for most of his opponents to muster.

You must have missed his attack on me. His attack really doesn't matter except that he consistently claims the moral high ground, asserting that he is trying to soften the dialogue between Mormons and ex-Mormons, when in fact, he isn't. He's a hypocrite.

Now, Wade has associated many problems people have with the Church to the people themselves, as have I for years. There is a reason for this, and its that in the vast majority of cases where the "reasons" for apostasy from the Gospel has come up, over almost a decade of discussion on the Internet with disaffected members, or ex-members, I've rarely seen anyone within this class of people willing to explore the possibility that, indeed, it is an unwillingness or inability to support and live in harmony with the standards, requirements, and disciplines expected of a Latter Day Saint that forms the crux of such apostasy. It is, indeed the case, that, as opposed to what you seem to think, I have almost never encountered ex-Mormons willing to consider personal character issues as a potential determinant of their relationship to the Church. Indeed, its almost always the Church that is the problem to most of these people, even though the doctrines and teachings of the Church; morality and sexual chastity, the importance of home and family, honesty, integrity, Christian service and charity, the eternal nature of family and friendship, the eternal nature of humankind, and our ability to become like Christ and partake of his nature and attributes, would seem, even if one, for whatever reason, couldn't accept them intellectually, to be hardly the kind of ideas that could create the kind of hostility, mocking disdain, and opposition I have encountered from exmos in print and on the Web for many years.

You do not know me or have any way to judge my personal character. The outright lies and disturbing racist, sexist, homophobic and un-Christian doctrine of Mormon theology is what merits disdain. I do not disdain Mormons individually. I want to free them from what I consider to be an abusive cult. Why should I not be as duty-bound to do what I feel is right as the Mormon missionaries are to do what they feel is right?

You may ignore the denunciation of you for your remark regarding "recovery" if you wish, if what I took it to mean was not your intention. That particular issue within exmo anti-Mormonism is a hot button one for me (Recovery From Mormonism etc.) and one for which I will show zero tolerance.

Gee, thanks for permission. You may apologize for your hasty and incorrect assumption and subsequent hateful and untrue personal remarks and then I may consider ignoring them.

I frankly don't think you have now, or have ever, understood, or attempted to understand the doctrines of the Church to a degree such that you have any real business turning others away from it. I don't really think you know what your doing, which, in a spiritual sense, is the best position for you to be in in the eyes of your creator.

You think wrong.

KA

[_aussieguy55]

The episode which I believe that is most damaging againts Smith is that of his interference with Zina Huntington and Lyn Jacobs. Here he claimed that God told him thatshe was to be his plural wife. Zina married Jacobs, had his children.When Smith was killed BY took Zina off Jacobs and had her sealed to him for life and Smith for eternity.Jacobs had to find a new wife and obviously lost his kids to be sealed along with their mother to Joseph Smith. All i can say she must have been a goodlooker. Also Coggins arguement that no sex was involved. Suppose Hinkley told Coggins that his wife was to be his for eternity, go find and be sealed with another woman. Meanwhile still stay with his wife, his children are sealed to Hinkley and he still supports her financially. What a lot of BS!

[_capt jack]

Coggins7 wrote:

You also probably failed to mention the complete lack of historical evidence that Joseph ever did, indeed, engage in any sexual relations with them (other than his legal plural wives...

Do you mind telling me, and everyone else, what a "legal plural wife" is? None of the women Joseph married, except Emma, were "legal". Polygamy was against the law in Illinois in the 1840s, hence his need to keep the whole thing secret.

But if you have evidence to the contrary, share it with the rest of us.

[_Coggins7]

T

here was no doctrinal nature for Smith's marriages to other men's wives.

You make this claim upon what basis? According to Joseph their was.


God never spoke to Joseph Smith, not in the grove - not anywhere.


You make this claim upon what basis? There is another problem here too, and that is that God has spoken to me and what he's told me is incongruent with your assertion.

There is absolutely no evidence supporting Smith's claims. None.

Clever. How could there be (or Smith's claims that Jesus was the divine Son of God, or that there will be a resurrection), as these claims are regarding metaphysical realities and abstract principles.

Why would anyone assume Smith didn't sleep with all his plural wives?

You can assume anything you like. That is not our task, however, when faced with Joseph's claims about who and what he was and who and what he represented. Assumption here won't cut the proverbial mustard.

I snipped the rest of the paragraph here because it was, in essence, an extended exercise in question begging. I understand that you do not accept the core claims of the Church as to its divine legitimacy. I, on the other hand, do. Your arguments on this wise rise or fall on their merits, but I don't accept your assumptions on the matter.

I don't know a thing about 12 step terminology. I only know from experience that it can be difficult coming out of a cult such as Mormonsim.

Good, I'm glad you weren't using my problems as a club as PP and some others have done here. Now here is where you get called on your sloppy use of language and poor educational background respecting some of your major presuppositions. In the first place, there are only two primary definitions of the term "cult" in the English lexicon, and both of them are relavent to the Church. A cult is, in the first instance, any religion or form of worship whatever, which makes the Roman Catholic Church, all of Protestantism, Buddhism, and Mormonism cults in this sense. In another, it is a minority religion with beliefs different than those of the cultural mainstream, and in this sense too, Mormonism is a cult.

In no other sense is the LDS Church a cult, which would imply features somehow similar to groups such as the the People's Temple, the cult of the Bagwan Shree Rashneesh, and some of the eclectic Eastern religious cults of the Sixties and early Seventies.

You must have missed his attack on me. His attack really doesn't matter except that he consistently claims the moral high ground, asserting that he is trying to soften the dialogue between Mormons and ex-Mormons, when in fact, he isn't. He's a hypocrite.

I may have missed it, but, regardless, maybe he does have the moral high ground. I don't think he's a hypocrite at all. What I've seen is that many people here take offense to being asked penetrating and dangerous questions that are threatening to the masks and defense mechanisms they've constructed to explain and justify their apostasy from the Church. Really Kimberly, if that wasn't true, they wouldn't be here posting at all, regardless of whether they had anything to do with the Church or not.

You do not know me or have any way to judge my personal character. The outright lies and disturbing racist, sexist, homophobic and un-Christian doctrine of Mormon theology is what merits disdain. I do not disdain Mormons individually. I want to free them from what I consider to be an abusive cult. Why should I not be as duty-bound to do what I feel is right as the Mormon missionaries are to do what they feel is right?

The outright lies and disturbing racist, sexist, homophobic and un-Christian doctrine of Mormon theology is what merits disdain.

The above, if not outright lies, merit inspection as the grossest misrepresentation of LDS belief and doctrine imaginable. I don't understand what you expect when you make bizarre claims of this nature about the Church and its teachings.

I frankly don't think you have now, or have ever, understood, or attempted to understand the doctrines of the Church to a degree such that you have any real business turning others away from it. I don't really think you know what your doing, which, in a spiritual sense, is the best position for you to be in in the eyes of your creator.

You think wrong.

That, at least, is one area in which my thinking is most certainly right on the money.

[Dr. Sunstoned]

The episode which I believe that is most damaging againts Smith is that of his interference with Zina Huntington and Lyn Jacobs. Here he claimed that God told him thatshe was to be his plural wife. Zina married Jacobs, had his children.When Smith was killed BY took Zina off Jacobs and had her sealed to him for life and Smith for eternity.Jacobs had to find a new wife and obviously lost his kids to be sealed along with their mother to Joseph Smith. All I can say she must have been a goodlooker. Also Coggins arguement that no sex was involved. Suppose Hinkley told Coggins that his wife was to be his for eternity, go find and be sealed with another woman. Meanwhile still stay with his wife, his children are sealed to Hinkley and he still supports her financially. What a lot of BS!

Show me the evidence that sex was involved in any of these relationships, in any cases other than wives who Smith married who were unmarried at the time. And even in these cases, where are the children and descendants of this man's harem? That's right, no evidence. Your assumption of the worst about Smith do not take the place of some direct historical evidence in the matter.

[_Coggins7]

Do you mind telling me, and everyone else, what a "legal plural wife" is? None of the women Joseph married, except Emma, were "legal". Polygamy was against the law in Illinois in the 1840s, hence his need to keep the whole thing secret.

But if you have evidence to the contrary, share it with the rest of us.

I make no pretense that practicing plural marriage in Illinois at the time was an act of civil disobedience, not at all unlike the civil rights activities of American Blacks under the leadership of Martin Luther King, Ralph Abernathy, and other leaders of the early civil rights movement. Take that for whatever you make of it. As to the rest of the United States generally, Polygamy wasn't declared illegal nationally until the Utah period. The "Boston Tea Party" has a long American tradition, stretching from the American Revolution, to Mormon plural marriage, to King, to Roy Moore.

This has, in any case, nothing to do with whether Smith actually slept with his polyandrous wives or many of the woman he had sealed to him simply to ensure their exaltation (we wouldn't do this today, as we understand that this can wait, provided a woman is otherwise worthy, until the next phase of existence).

[_capt jack]

Coggins:

You stated that Smith had "legal plural wives". That simply isn't true, you know it and I know it. Illinois did have an anti-bigamy statute dating from 1833 that Smith was in violation of. Nobody, at least not me, accused you of saying Smith's activity was civil disobedience.

But since you brought it up, the whole "civil disobedience" defense is a canard. Civil disobedience requires that good men and women break an unjust law and do it openly, "loudly" if you will, and dare the state to prosecute them for it. Think Rosa Parks; think Gandhi protesting the law against Indians making salt in India.

The whole point is to disturb the conscience of society to such an extent that the unjust law(s) are changed. It is impossible to do that if the lawbreaking is kept secret.

Smith would've been engaging in civil disobedience had he openly wed other women, lived with them as if they were his legal wives, and dared the Illinois authorities to come after him. He clearly didn't.

[_KimberlyAnn]

here was no doctrinal nature for Smith's marriages to other men's wives.

You make this claim upon what basis? According to Joseph their was.

Of course according to him there was! I believe he's an established liar.

God never spoke to Joseph Smith, not in the grove - not anywhere.

You make this claim upon what basis? There is another problem here too, and that is that God has spoken to me and what he's told me is incongruent with your assertion.

How do you know God spoke to you, Coggins7? God speaks to Muslims and tells them Mohammed is the one true prophet. My husband believes God spoke to him and told him Mormonism wasn't true and that Joseph Smith was a false prophet. To whom did God really speak? Maybe no one, Coggins.

Why would anyone assume Smith didn't sleep with all his plural wives?

You can assume anything you like. That is not our task, however, when faced with Joseph's claims about who and what he was and who and what he represented. Assumption here won't cut the proverbial mustard.

I snipped the rest of the paragraph here because it was, in essence, an extended exercise in question begging. I understand that you do not accept the core claims of the Church as to its divine legitimacy. I, on the other hand, do. Your arguments on this wise rise or fall on their merits, but I don't accept your assumptions on the matter.

Huh? I was asking why YOU were assuming Smith didn't sleep with other men's wives. Coggins, men having sex with their wives is standard practice. To believe they don't have sex with their wives is a wild assumption. Smith married other men's wives - and it wasn't to ensure their exaltation. Was Zina Huntington's husband not worthy to be sealed to her? Why did Joseph need to have another man's wife, Coggins? Would you give him yours? What Smith did to those women and their husbands was despicable.

I don't know a thing about 12 step terminology. I only know from experience that it can be difficult coming out of a cult such as Mormonsim.

Good, I'm glad you weren't using my problems as a club as PP and some others have done here. Now here is where you get called on your sloppy use of language and poor educational background respecting some of your major presuppositions. In the first place, there are only two primary definitions of the term "cult" in the English lexicon, and both of them are relavent to the Church. A cult is, in the first instance, any religion or form of worship whatever, which makes the Roman Catholic Church, all of Protestantism, Buddhism, and Mormonism cults in this sense. In another, it is a minority religion with beliefs different than those of the cultural mainstream, and in this sense too, Mormonism is a cult.

In no other sense is the LDS Church a cult, which would imply features somehow similar to groups such as the the People's Temple, the cult of the Bagwan Shree Rashneesh, and some of the eclectic Eastern religious cults of the Sixties and early Seventies.

You're not making any sense. You just showed that I used the term properly. The LDS church is a minority religion with beliefs different from those in the mainstream. Like the Jehovah's Witnesses or Scientology. I properly label those religions as cults, too.

You must have missed his attack on me. His attack really doesn't matter except that he consistently claims the moral high ground, asserting that he is trying to soften the dialogue between Mormons and ex-Mormons, when in fact, he isn't. He's a hypocrite.

I may have missed it, but, regardless, maybe he does have the moral high ground. I don't think he's a hypocrite at all. What I've seen is that many people here take offense to being asked penetrating and dangerous questions that are threatening to the masks and defense mechanisms they've constructed to explain and justify their apostasy from the Church. Really Kimberly, if that wasn't true, they wouldn't be here posting at all, regardless of whether they had anything to do with the Church or not.

Wade attacked me personally. It wasn't done through questioning. He's a hypocrite.

You do not know me or have any way to judge my personal character. The outright lies and disturbing racist, sexist, homophobic and un-Christian doctrine of Mormon theology is what merits disdain. I do not disdain Mormons individually. I want to free them from what I consider to be an abusive cult. Why should I not be as duty-bound to do what I feel is right as the Mormon missionaries are to do what they feel is right?

The outright lies and disturbing racist, sexist, homophobic and un-Christian doctrine of Mormon theology is what merits disdain.

The above, if not outright lies, merit inspection as the grossest misrepresentation of LDS belief and doctrine imaginable. I don't understand what you expect when you make bizarre claims of this nature about the Church and its teachings.

The Mormon church hides it's dirty history and does, in fact, lie to protect it's image, like it is doing with the MMM. The Mormon church still believes black skin is a curse from God and that homosexuality is a choice and a sin.

I frankly don't think you have now, or have ever, understood, or attempted to understand the doctrines of the Church to a degree such that you have any real business turning others away from it. I don't really think you know what your doing, which, in a spiritual sense, is the best position for you to be in in the eyes of your creator.

You think wrong.

That, at least, is one area in which my thinking is most certainly right on the money.

[/quote]

Think whatever makes you feel good, Coggins. It's apparent that's what you need to do.

[_Coggins7]

Of course according to him there was! I believe he's an established liar.

Evidence?

How do you know God spoke to you, Coggins7? God speaks to Muslims and tells them Mohammed is the one true prophet. My husband believes God spoke to him and told him Mormonism wasn't true and that Joseph Smith was a false prophet. To whom did God really speak? Maybe no one, Coggins.

All this really demonstrates is that you don't know who God has spoken to and who he hasn't, and have no basis for comparison from which to make any assertions upon the matter. Therefore, asking me how I know he's spoken to me simply begs the further question "how do you know he hasn't?". Your husband's "revelation" is clearly agreeable to your own prejudices and assumptions, while mine are not. So be it.

The Mormon church hides it's dirty history and does, in fact, lie to protect it's image, like it is doing with the MMM. The Mormon church still believes black skin is a curse from God and that homosexuality is a choice and a sin.

Its hight time you start doing you own homework Kimberly. As I said above, this is more evidence that you really don't have any interest in truth, per se, and not only regarding the Church but upon other issues as well. There is not a particle of historical evidence, and much to the contrary, that BY or the Church had anything to do with the MMM. This has been laid to rest for generations and is only kept alive by agenda driven demagogues like you who can't, or won't do your own serious thinking on the matter.

Many Church leaders did, for much of the Church's history, explain the Priesthood ban in relation to dark skin. But even here, you've misrepresented the idea since you've never really bothered researching or thinking hard about it. The entire doctrine of the Priesthood ban was one based upon lineage, not skin color. Skin color was theorized to be the mark, or sign (as was indeed the case among some Book of Mormon peoples) of the lineage through which no Priesthood could be held.

Looking back, this was clearly a theological explanation that had less to it than many members thought, and was influenced to a certain degree by cultural conditioning. As it was never official doctrine, and I was never required or bound to accept it, its change offered to members little in the way of a problem.

However, there are numerous lineages, including the Jews, white Caucasians, and others (the Lamanites for a period of time), who were denied Priesthood for ages because of disobedience or rebellion against God. Vast numbers of people have been denied it in this life, by being born in nations or in ages when it simply wasn't' available, and the Church has no explanation for this except that it has not been, for whatever reason, God's will that they had it in mortality. After the Apostasy, white Europeans lost any right to it for almost 2,000 years. God works in this way, through lineage, when dealing with his children. I suppose you accept that or you don't.

Further, there is not a shred of evidence in the brain sciences, or anywhere else, that homosexuality is anything other than a complex bio/psycho/social phenomena that cannot possibly be corralled into the reductionist box of genetic "cause", and therefore regurgitating feel-good left wing can't on the matter does not change the facts.

[_Chap]

Coggins:

you don't know who God has spoken to and who he hasn't, and have no basis for comparison from which to make any assertions upon the matter. Therefore, asking me how I know he's spoken to me simply begs the further question "how do you know he hasn't?".

Of course God has spoken to you Coggins. Of course. Anything you say Coggins .... don't let him get between us and the door ... Quick, now run!!!!!!