What would it take for Joseph Smith to have been a fraud?

Post by **_Jersey Girl** » Fri Oct 12, 2007 12:57 am

beastie wrote:
You must show me how to prove a negative!

You're just avoiding the issue!!!

That was dealt with years ago! Why do you countermos persist in bringing it up?

Post by **_beastie** » Fri Oct 12, 2007 12:58 am

That was dealt with years ago! Why do you countermos persist in bringing it up?

Oh, please, not another atrocity tale!!

Post by **_Jersey Girl** » Fri Oct 12, 2007 1:02 am

beastie wrote:
That was dealt with years ago! Why do you countermos persist in bringing it up?

Oh, please, not another atrocity tale!!

Sociologists have an explanation for that!

(OMG, this means I can switch "sides" at a moments notice!)

Post by **_Yong Xi** » Fri Oct 12, 2007 1:03 am

It would help to have Smith's fraud play out amidst a climate of religious tension.

Post by **_Pokatator** » Fri Oct 12, 2007 1:03 am

Somehow when it comes to Joseph Smith I can't but help getting the feeling that he was continually amazed that his scam was so successful. The success of the scam made for more grandiose claims and behaviors. It fed his ego and his ego seemed to have no boundaries. This is why he could add polygamy and lies and etc. and etc. and the people well they weren't the brightest.

No different than the Branch Davidians or Jim Jones. There are followers for everyone if someone seeks them.

Post by **_Blixa** » Fri Oct 12, 2007 1:51 am

Pokatator wrote:Somehow when it comes to Joseph Smith I can't but help getting the feeling that he was continually amazed that his scam was so successful. The success of the scam made for more grandiose claims and behaviors. It fed his ego and his ego seemed to have no boundaries. This is why he could add polygamy and lies and etc. and etc.

I pretty much agree with this assessment, Pktator. I think he was a creative and ambitious man who was also vain---enough to lack crucial self pespective, thus the sense of his being continually amazed at himself and his success as you say.

Post by **_CaliforniaKid** » Fri Oct 12, 2007 2:40 am

beastie wrote:
That was dealt with years ago! Why do you countermos persist in bringing it up?

Oh, please, not another atrocity tale!!

Certain of my critics seem to think that my penchant for doughnut eating is less of an atrocity than my intellectually vacuous publications, which sadly are being broadcast all over the world by that laughingstock-of-a-publisher, Eerdmans. To these critics I say, people have been reading books published by Eerdmans for ninety-five years. Do you wish to argue that these people are all liars or insane? Or can you prove to me that you can't find treasure by putting my book into a hat?

Post by **_Runtu** » Fri Oct 12, 2007 1:19 pm

CaliforniaKid wrote:Certain of my critics seem to think that my penchant for doughnut eating is less of an atrocity than my intellectually vacuous publications, which sadly are being broadcast all over the world by that laughingstock-of-a-publisher, Eerdmans. To these critics I say, people have been reading books published by Eerdmans for ninety-five years. Do you wish to argue that these people are all liars or insane? Or can you prove to me that you can't find treasure by putting my book into a hat?

Absolutely brilliant, Chris.

Here's another one:

People can't stand me because I'm an outspoken LDS woman. I will not be silenced by the misogynists!!!! You all feel so sorry for poor Helen Kimball who was force-fed Krispy Kremes while strapped to a chair and forced to listen tapes of FROB. Yes, the poor victim you all make her out to be. It's awfully convenient that you forget about her later testimony that her doughnut/FROB sessions led to heavenly visions of angelic New Zealanders spreading the milk of human kindness. No, you all want to silence her and ever other woman's voice in the church. For shame.

Post by **_harmony** » Fri Oct 12, 2007 3:23 pm

Runtu wrote:Here's another one:

People can't stand me because I'm an outspoken LDS woman. I will not be silenced by the misogynists!!!! You all feel so sorry for poor Helen Kimball who was force-fed Krispy Kremes while strapped to a chair and forced to listen tapes of FROB. Yes, the poor victim you all make her out to be. It's awfully convenient that you forget about her later testimony that her doughnut/FROB sessions led to heavenly visions of angelic New Zealanders spreading the milk of human kindness. No, you all want to silence her and ever other woman's voice in the church. For shame.

I never understand why she insists that Helen didn't suffer from Stockholm Syndrome. It's like she's never heard of Patti Hearst.

Post by **_Runtu** » Fri Oct 12, 2007 3:33 pm

harmony wrote:I never understand why she insists that Helen didn't suffer from Stockholm Syndrome. It's like she's never heard of Patti Hearst.

I suggested in response that a person's attitude toward what happens to him or her in no way determines the rightness or wrongness of the act. I gave the example of my grandfather, who willingly gave tens of thousands of dollars to a fraudulent television ministry, to the point where he didn't have enough money for food or medicine. And more than one apologist suggested that in some strange way, my grandfather's actions were right. Bizarre. Either way, I wasn't talking about whether my grandpa did right but rather whether the hucksters who took his money did. In the same way, that Helen later defended polygamy does not in any way determine the rightness or intent of Joseph's actions.

I would think that self-evident. Apparently not.