Mopologists Erupt Over "Nightline" Piece

[_Mister Scratch]

DCP began a thread over on the aptly named MADboard, as one of my "informants" notified me.

http://www.mormonapologetics.org/index. ... 40666&st=0

Apparently, someone other than KBYU, Church News, or some other LDS-controlled media outlet dared to say something about the Church, which, of course, means that whatever was said cannot possibly be good, balanced, or decent in any way whatsoever. Check out Droopy's apoplectic response:

This is simply de rigueur for the mainstream media. From the initial conflation of fundamentalist polygamist sects with the Church, to the claim that admittance of the general public to our Temples before dedication is rare (relatively speaking, yes, but it happens with each and every Temple), to the equally de rigueur concerns regarding Prop 8, the lack of serious research and context I expect from the mainstream media on virtually every issue of any substance was on prominent display in this piece.

For the present moment (as the chattering classes obsess over Prop dirol.gif, we have perhaps become the Jews of North America. I never thought I'd see the Church upstage the Protestant fundamentalists as the objects of the mainstream media's jaundiced crossed eyes.

Yikes! You can practically feel the flecks of spittle as they strike the screen.

Later, Joseph Antley sums his basic anger towards the piece:

And yes, what with the (in my opinion) rather unnecessary make it rain story, secret handshakes in the temple in order to get to heaven, and the repeated mention of the FLDS (which were not clarified to be an unaffiliated group until well into the interview), it wasn't that great of a PR piece.

(italics mine)

Aha! So *that's* it. Well, the Church ought to send out a memo to the AP and other journalistic outlets around the country: "Unless your handling of our Church functions as PR for us, then we will condemn you as being biased and jaundiced." Apparently, Mopologists such as Antley are uninterested in accurate, honest reportage. Only propaganda and agitprop will do.

In this next excerpt, LDSToronto engages in some mind-reading and guess work:

Not to mention the 'tone' in the voice of the reporter/narrator - kind of like a 'oh, come on, you don't expect us to believe this, do you?' tone. It was a heavily edited piece. Notice when Elder Ballard says that they don't talk about the nature of the signs/tokens: I've never once heard an apostle not finish that with 'because these things are sacred, not secret' or something like that, and I got the distinct impression that Elder Ballard said that, but it got edited out.

The piece, in my view, was edited to give the impression that ABC News was not fully believing what was said.

Huh? I'm not sure why editing out the silly and rather dishonest "sacred not secret" bit would have contributed to whatever mysterious "tone" Toronto seems to detect. Even more conspiratorial is Droopy, who digs himself in even deeper:

It was many years ago when I first, in doing some personal reading, discovered that 60 Minutes and other similar news magazine shows would routinely film perhaps 4 or 5 hours of interview footage and from this, edit the interview down to a roughly 10 minute segment. It was through this method, and incessant questioning on the same subject or point from various angles, that they could make someone say, in the actual televised interview, just about anything they wanted them to say, up to and including the appearance of saying things that were not meant at all or were the opposite of what was intended.

I haven't used our mainstream media here in the U.S. as a source of information on anything since about 1993, and I'm much the better for it.

The deep paranoia, conspiracy theories, guesswork, and so on are quite telling, in my opinion.

In closing, we need to return to DCP, who initiated this thread and did not bother to comment hardly at all until well into the 2nd page. What do you suppose he said, and, further, what do you think his motives were in starting the thread?

I thought the Nightline piece was mixed. Neither wonderful nor horrible. Okay. Which, on balance, is probably pretty good. As good as we can expect from the mainstream media, anyway.

Ah, okay. You cannot get your information from the mainstream media. In fact, as far as the Church is concerned, you cannot get any information from anyone other than the Mopologists or the Church itself. Everything else is tainted and "anti-Mormon," such as Craig Criddle and his fellow researchers.

In any event, as special "thank you" to the informant who alerted me to this thread.

[_Gadianton]

I do find the editing comments particularily entertaining. One comment lamented 8 minutes being cut out. How much gets cut out in Sunday School?

[_Seven]

I really don't understand the complaints and whining coming from MAD.
The piece was pretty mild and overall I thought it focused on many positive aspects of the church. The mainstream media never digs deep enough into any church issue to cause real harm.
If they actually did a little research and questioned the apostles on current sealing policy, the church misleading members on Joseph Smith's life & church history, Book of Abraham, Masonry, Patriarchy, polygamy in the afterlife, following the Prophet, racist pre existence teachings, section 132, etc. then I can see why apologists would be upset. The church gets off lucky that the media do not care enough to dig deeper.

The only comment that seemed a little harmful to the church came from Elder Ballard when he said "we know how to get things done" and something like "when the leaders give us direction, we follow it."

I think that's the issue that scares people about Mormons and will keep them in the spotlight over Prop 8.

[_harmony]

The only comment that seemed a little harmful to the church came from Elder Ballard when he said "we know how to get things done" and something like "when the leaders give us direction, we follow it."

I think that's the issue that scares people about Mormons and will keep them in the spotlight over Prop 8.

And will keep a Mormon out of the White House.

[_moksha]

Wonder if they felt better about the coverage of this same story by NPR?

[_Scottie]

And yet when the same type of report is done against the FLDS with the same tone, it's very well done and exposes them for the disgusting weirdos that they are!!

Same with Scientology.

[_Daniel Peterson]

I thought the Nightline piece was okay.

As I said.

[_Scottie]

In fairness, there are several TBM's who have said the piece was okay and that they didn't have a problem with it.

[_Henry Jacobs]

The story, was pretty darn friendly to the church. Not sure how anyone could say it was slanted negatively, unless all they are used to seeing is church generated materials about itself.

I'm sure there are thousands of churches that would line up to have 8 free minutes on ABC covering their beliefs. If the church hadn't invited this story it wouldn't have included two apostles. They used a temple opening to attract media and Ballard has been assigned the role of "defining ourselves", so he got the interview.

I wondered why two apostles had never been interviewed together until now. That seems unbelievable to me.

Ballard: "We know the voice of the lord".

What did he mean by this? Why wouldn't he be just a little more specific, and why didn't the reporter ask one of what would have been a number of really appropriate, inquisitive followup questions?

Ballard was more descriptive of revelation that even Hinkley, though. GBH described it to Larry King as "Impressions, like to build this building", as they sat in the conference center.

GBH was the building prophet, to be sure.

[Anonymous]

My favorite comment came from Droopy: (emphasis mine)

For the present moment (as the chattering classes obsess over Prop dirol.gif, we have perhaps become the Jews of North America. I never thought I'd see the Church upstage the Protestant fundamentalists as the objects of the mainstream media's jaundiced crossed eyes.

I've observed Mormons connecting any perceived persecution to the Jews my whole life. It validates their testimony somehow.

Didn't the Mountain Meadows Massacre end the lives of more innocent women and children than any persecution the LDS church has endured?
You never see journalists point this out when they cover 19th century persecution, nor do they explain the context of why members were driven to Utah.

I agree with some of the TBM's on MAD that it was shoddy journalism.
For example, the reporter stated polygamy became outlawed in the church in 1890. The church leaders only appeased the government with the manifesto and went back to performing plural marriages in secret. A quick search on google would have tipped them off that LDS.org is not the most honest source of information.

Then on the FLDS they stated "so called Fundamentalist Mormons" and stressed that they had no shared beliefs or connection to the LDS church.
Yeah, except for the Book of Mormon, Doctrine and Covenants, following the fundamental teachings of 19th century Prophets, performing ordinances in temples, wearing garments, etc... they share nooooooooo connection with LDS beliefs or practices.