Meet the Mopologists
Posted: Wed Aug 20, 2008 4:43 am
The following was brought to me courtesy of one of my very best "informants":
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lEaK9s8qcgg
What you are about to see is a rather schlocky video filmed by Kerry "The Backyard Professor" Shirts. The scene is the recent FAIR conference, and your host is none other than Shirts himself, who is sort of like a goofy, avuncular, rather "backwoodsy" version of Captain Kangaroo.
Some highlights worth taking note of:
---At around 1:30 in, we get to meet Juliann Reynolds. I was once told, by a different "informant," that juliann bore a resemblance to "Pat" from the "It's Pat!" sketches on Saturday Night Live. Well, I don't know if I'd put it quite that way. Her eyes do have a rather squinty malice about them, however.
---The bulk of the conference attendees are seriously overweight. I have to wonder why this fact seemed to stand out to me so much. I would estimate that the average blood pressure of the attendees was 165/90. Did they pass out Lisinopril with the refreshments?
---At around 3:45, we get to meet Allen Wyatt. This, apparently, is the slug responsible for the "More Good Foundation," among many other atrocities. Seeing him, it's not hard to understand how and why the "SP Keyes Debacle" came into being. This time around, he is looking puffy and flush over his legal victory against S. Tanner.
---At around 6:00 minutes, "Uncle Kerry" interviews a "high school senior" who is evidently a paragon of LDS scholarship. This poor schlub goes on to note how he single handedly dismantled Charles Larson's scholarship. Of course, he doesn't cite any specific examples, but why should we care about that? And, oddly, for some inexplicable reason, as I watched this segment of the video, the word "Evergreen" kept popping into my mind.
Bottom line: I give this video 1/2 a star (out of four). The production values are pretty poor. Shirts, though he is an enthusiastic host, is also grating after about 30 seconds. The video is full of far too many self-congratulatory moments, with Shirts perpetually mugging for his own camera. Also: I wasn't quite sure why The Backyard Professor seemed to be composing the video as a kind of video "Postcard" for Bill Hamblin. In the end, the impression I am left with is that this is the Mopologetic equivalent of Girls Gone Wild. Instead of the titillation of scantily clad young women and alcohol, these Mopologists seem to get off on the "thrill" of dissing critics, praising themselves for nothing in particular, and holding up carbuncular and wild-eyed young men as avatars of scholarly acumen. A sorry and disappointing effort on the whole.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lEaK9s8qcgg
What you are about to see is a rather schlocky video filmed by Kerry "The Backyard Professor" Shirts. The scene is the recent FAIR conference, and your host is none other than Shirts himself, who is sort of like a goofy, avuncular, rather "backwoodsy" version of Captain Kangaroo.
Some highlights worth taking note of:
---At around 1:30 in, we get to meet Juliann Reynolds. I was once told, by a different "informant," that juliann bore a resemblance to "Pat" from the "It's Pat!" sketches on Saturday Night Live. Well, I don't know if I'd put it quite that way. Her eyes do have a rather squinty malice about them, however.
---The bulk of the conference attendees are seriously overweight. I have to wonder why this fact seemed to stand out to me so much. I would estimate that the average blood pressure of the attendees was 165/90. Did they pass out Lisinopril with the refreshments?
---At around 3:45, we get to meet Allen Wyatt. This, apparently, is the slug responsible for the "More Good Foundation," among many other atrocities. Seeing him, it's not hard to understand how and why the "SP Keyes Debacle" came into being. This time around, he is looking puffy and flush over his legal victory against S. Tanner.
---At around 6:00 minutes, "Uncle Kerry" interviews a "high school senior" who is evidently a paragon of LDS scholarship. This poor schlub goes on to note how he single handedly dismantled Charles Larson's scholarship. Of course, he doesn't cite any specific examples, but why should we care about that? And, oddly, for some inexplicable reason, as I watched this segment of the video, the word "Evergreen" kept popping into my mind.
Bottom line: I give this video 1/2 a star (out of four). The production values are pretty poor. Shirts, though he is an enthusiastic host, is also grating after about 30 seconds. The video is full of far too many self-congratulatory moments, with Shirts perpetually mugging for his own camera. Also: I wasn't quite sure why The Backyard Professor seemed to be composing the video as a kind of video "Postcard" for Bill Hamblin. In the end, the impression I am left with is that this is the Mopologetic equivalent of Girls Gone Wild. Instead of the titillation of scantily clad young women and alcohol, these Mopologists seem to get off on the "thrill" of dissing critics, praising themselves for nothing in particular, and holding up carbuncular and wild-eyed young men as avatars of scholarly acumen. A sorry and disappointing effort on the whole.