Tal Bachman wrote:You really are gone, aren't you, BC?
You’re convinced that Joseph Smith was a congenital liar; that he was deceiving and manipulating people throughout his entire mortal career – from duping local yokels into believing he could find buried treasure to enthralling his family with stories of ancient “Nephites” to concocting elaborate faux ancient “scripture” in order to convince gullible religionists of his status as a bona fide prophet.
In short, you would be hard pressed to identify a single sincere thing that Joseph Smith ever did. In your judgment, every step he took in life was calculated to serve shady ends – ends which invariably revolved around his insatiable appetites for pleasure, power, and wealth.
Am I on the mark here?
I wrote:I have yet to see any persuasive evidence that Joseph Smith ever consummated his eternal sealings to previously-married women.
To which you replied:… would it matter to you?
To which I respond:
No, not really. I suppose I have a soft spot in my heart for women like Etta Place and the men who love them.
It is as though there is a giant blur in the middle of all my comments where my actual point is, which you cannot see.
Why do you think that is, William?
I have noticed that you invariably end up saying the same kind of thing to your opponents in every debate in which you take part. Why do you think that is, Talmage?
Tal, the fact is that, unless you radically change your habits of discourse, you are the kind of person that will never be able to take part in the greater discussion on Mormonism that is occurring today in the world – whether on the MAD message board or within the pages of Sunstone and Dialogue. Simply put, you lack the necessary social graces.
Now, don’t misunderstand, I actually empathize with you to an extent. I also can tend to be a little uncouth; a little “rough around the edges” when it comes to the diplomatic arts. I’ve gotten much better in the past couple years, but I am still prone to the occasional “uncivilized” outburst. And if you want to be taken seriously in the ballroom of LDS-related discourse – especially if that ballroom contains people from both expanses of the belief spectrum – then you have to learn how to govern your passions and moderate your tendency towards exaggeration, hyperbole, and extremist pronouncements.
Let me attempt to illustrate my point: Dan Vogel, who is probably the most effective exmormon critic in current practice, was shouted down and shown the door over at RfM, whereas you and Steve Benson and others find an adoring and accepting audience for your vitriolic rants.
And yet the very thing that made you popular at RfM is the thing that disqualifies you from participating in the upper echelon discussions/debates that are occurring.
If you are satisfied taking the stance that believing Mormons are nothing but intellectually-challenged dupes clinging in near-desperation to the last vestiges of a thoroughly-discredited epistemological burlesque, and insist on dealing with them as though they are merely freak show caricatures worthy of nothing but mockery, then you will quickly find yourself forever banished to the fringes of the discussion.
I believe I understand you much better than you think. It is a small hinge upon which the door of faith swings, and I am quite cognizant of how a vantage point shift of only a few degrees can transform the entire vista before one’s eyes. But things are seldom as simplistic as you seem inclined to believe. You like to take your oversize crayons and draw bold pictures of a Joseph Smith who is an audacious and conscious deceiver and manipulator, and yet a careful examination of the available documentary evidence comes into conflict with that conclusion – something which Dan Vogel is honest enough to admit, hence his current proposition of the “pious fraud” theory, and its corollaries.
You are fond of disparaging someone like Dan Peterson with statements like:… I make Peterson look like even more of a dork that (sic) he already makes himself look like …
And you can certainly find many people on this particular message board who will laugh and applaud every time you say things like that. The problem is that, although they certainly don’t agree with his views, few critics would dismiss Daniel Peterson as casually and flippantly as you do. Why? Because they recognize that Dan is a formidable logician and debater with an incisive mind and a broad and nuanced intellect that has garnered widespread respect for him in both his specialized field of study and in his avocation as an LDS apologist.
If you truly desire to be taken seriously as a critic of Mormonism, then you will have to learn to respect your adversaries, otherwise you will, in short order, be consigned to the dustbin of long-forgotten apostates who weeped, wailed, and gnashed their teeth for a time, and then faded into obscurity.
.On the other hand, if you are really motivated to “help” the poor souls who are still wrapped in the tentacles of the monster Joseph Smith unleashed all those years ago, then you need to seriously consider the advice I have given you above
As far as participating on the MAD board is concerned, that is entirely up to you.
If you proved willing and able to employ the finesse of the critics I mentioned above, you would be more than welcome, I’m sure.
In fact, I’m certain your evident language skills, relative familiarity with the subject matter, strong opinions, and moderate prominence would also qualify you to receive “Pundit” status, which would enable you to participate in discussions that are limited to a more “select” group.
So, if you’d like to try your hand at humiliating the accomplished LDS apologists, you’re going to have to clean up your act to a considerable degree.
Wake up, Willie. Bring them over if you can't get the mods to stop freaking out over there. But just one question: would it even matter to you? Once your heroes make idiots of themselves by refusing to engage...or spontaneously reinventing Mormonism just to protect it from being falsified...what then? Does it matter? Do you change your mind? Or do you just keep repeating the same things over - and over - and over again? What, actually, is the point? Judging from my conversation with you, I could make perfectly sensible points which your heroes simply refuse to acknowledge or exaggerate in order to refute - just like you're doing here - and you'd probably be announcing, "Talmage got torpedoed!". Meanwhile, all that would have happened is that I'd been talking to people who weren't even listening...not even actually engaging with my points...and starry-eyed acolytes would be peeing their pants in excitement, never even noticing their heroes can't think clearly about Mormonism.
This paragraph clearly illustrates your most serious obstacle. You see, my friend, you aren’t going to ever convince any of your adversaries to acknowledge that you’re right! The sooner you abandon that fantasy
,You deny that Mormon belief ultimately rejects the constraints of logic and empiricism.
What I actually have done, in the course of my several posts, is to qualify the degree to which Mormon belief accepts the constraints of logic and empiricism.
This commits you to acknowledging that there must be falsifiability tests for Mormonism.
Within the context of my belief paradigm, there are such tests. But they’re probably not the same kinds of tests that you think effectively falsify LDS beliefs.
I have. Several times, in fact. Kate the Great (whom I unashamedly admire) and I have gone the rounds over my opinions vis-à-vis Emma Hale Smith.
Now, I must confess that part of me – a part that I repress to some extent – is empathetic towards Emma on account of the legitimate challenges she encountered in life. She dealt with everything pretty well, with the exception of prosperity. And I’m glad Joseph was willing to put up with her. I wouldn’t have. And since he’s the one who will have to go to hell to retrieve her, I can only say “better him than me.”
I doubt anyone’s going to bother with you. ;-)
Then again, who am I to judge? I’m probably a little harder on Emma – and you – than is warranted.
But not by much, I’m sure.
Well, I’d just be preachin’ to the choir over there, right?
Did I express enthusiasm? Or is that your eisegetical conclusion?
Not particularly. To quote, “I don’t care that much if you feel the need to look at the menu, just make sure you come home for dinner.”
Her sense of security and confidence is not related to these things. Is yours?
She has no such concerns. Are you, perhaps, projecting your own fears?
I rocked the socks off adoring fans in smoky clubs when I was LDS. But the appeal wore off by the end of that summer. I guess I just wasn't hungry enough for that particular kind of feast.
Is that how it was for you?
To whom or what is yours directed, my dear? Is it hard for thee to kick against the pricks?
Or do the anti-depressants ease that urge?
William Schryver wrote:Emma was a champion bitch and no one else would have her except Joseph.
Verbal flashing!
Regarding whether or not LDS are prudes – I have heard more than once that LDS men can be quite vulgar among themselves. My boyfriend was raised as a Mormon, and has shared some of the jokes they used to tell each other. :P I also remember on Z when I finally got FED UP with some of the lewd statements that some of the supposedly upright Mormon men couldn’t resist saying and protested it, calling it “verbal flashing”. Boy was I made fun of by the LDS for that. (although I suspect some must have supported me, I don’t quite recall)
Frankly, Pent grosses me out when he does this, and it's not the first time. I would think there would be more believers than cal telling him to censor himself. It is just GROSS. And I'm far from a prude, but I often am offended at his explicit comments. And did I mention it's gross? Maybe you guys don't have the same reaction, but it's creepy to me to read these sexualized comments from a "religious" man (it's creepy reading them from any man on the internet, but the religious component makes it creepier to me, like there's some dark side hidden from the real world going on there, being expressed in anonymity to strange women on the internet, a form of verbal flashing)
I'm sure I've said too much, and it'd be better to ignore him, but I'd rather read his string of censored swear words than read his graphic sexual comments.
In fact, now that I thought of the term "verbal flashing", I realize that's exactly what it is, and that's exactly why it creeps me out. You should think better of defending it by blaming it on serenity.
Just as a warning, Pent. The next time I, and other women, are verbally flashed by you on a thread I intend to file a complaint and include your other recent verbal flashings to demonstrate your pattern.
beastie wrote:
I wonder if this verbal flashing is indicative of some sense of entitlement and being the object of "desire" (not exactly sexual desire). LDS men grow up in an environment where, if they are active, they don't even have to be attractive or interesting to be seen as desirable by LDS women, because "marriage" to a "worthy priesthood holder" is so idealized. So they get on the internet and think that the women there actually want to hear their verbal flashing and would be flattered by it. Just speculation, who the heck knows what prompts it. But I've been on boards with LDS and nonLDS, and nonLDS men do not engage in this to the same degree as LDS do (and exLDS often demonstrate the same trait). And yeah, I do believe LOTS of LDS men are sexually frustrated - so maybe that sexual frustration, combined with obsessing about chastity (giving in once too often to porn on the net) combined with that old LDS entitlement just mixes up to make a toxic verbal flashing stew.
I go on record again saying: GROSS.
you sound just as incapable of rational conversation about Mormonism, and Smith's credibility in particular, as every other Mormon on this board, with a couple of exceptions.
… perhaps it is time to stop embarrassing yourself...
Is there some "debate" I'm trying to "get into" …?
All I know is that the MADness mods are doing an excellent imitation of people who provide cover, via banning and censoring, for buck-naked apologetic emperors; and since that seems to be what they're into, they can have it. And by the way, I was perfectly civil over there as far as I remember. Anyway - my invitation to you still stands: get me normal posting privileges and I'm fine to go over, if it means that much to you. You really think Runaway Dan will engage with me? I doubt it; but if he wants to, I sure don't mind.
As I said before, I'm happy to engage with anyone about Mormonism. Last time your hero came around, he sniped from the sidelines and then, as per usual, rather than "show the world how wrong the evil anti-Mormons are", announced some stupid excuse about why he wouldn't engage with me. I keep using the word "embarrassing", but that's what it is to me. I almost can't believe, even now, that dudes can act that way and not feel embarrassed.
If you are satisfied taking the stance that believing Mormons are nothing but intellectually-challenged dupes clinging in near-desperation to the last vestiges of a thoroughly-discredited epistemological burlesque, and insist on dealing with them as though they are merely freak show caricatures worthy of nothing but mockery, then you will quickly find yourself forever banished to the fringes of the discussion.
You know what I'd really like, William? I'd like some good evidence that Mormons AREN'T that. Where is it?
… it is, in fact, quite easy to come to believe that we have powers and attributes which we do not have.
Our vanity is such that flattery can make us believe almost anything about ourselves.
Many dozens of formerly devout Mormons have come to the conclusion that Mormonism is a fraud after we've chatted.
Go and reclaim this people, for they have all gone astray after an unknown God. And he said unto me: There is no God; yea, and he taught me that which I should say. And I have taught his words; and I taught them because they were pleasing unto the carnal mind; and I taught them, even until I had much success, insomuch that I verily believed that they were true; and for this cause I withstood the truth, even until I have brought this great curse upon me.
But I don't speak to you the way I do to people who seem really, truly sincere about their faith.
See, I don't really get that impression from you. I think you posture and pose and shout, but deep down, I think you're fighting a different sort of enemy, and it's one, I think, that doesn't really have anything to do with me.
When I think about giving someone the opportunity of knowing that whatever else the church is, it cannot be what it claims, I don't think about bought-and-paid-for apologists who would destroy every last Mormon doctrine in order to defend it. I think about normal, sane, decent, sincere, humble people who want the truth. Those are the people I like talking to …
If Mormonism were not what it claimed, how would you know?
It’s part of Bachman’s fundamentalist/dogmatic mindset, which once made him a wannabe Mormon suicide bomber and now makes him an anti-Mormon zealot, that he thinks there’s some clear, decisive test out there that will render an unambiguous black-and-white verdict.
I don’t feel any contempt for a man limited and constrained by his own logic to a very sad simplification.