DiscussMormonism.com

Hello fabulous people!

I would like to make a comment on the board today. We tend to conform to our social groups. Have ya noticed?

When I was attending U of U as a freshie (before getting accepted into BYU as a RM and before my mission), I took a required GE class called Intro to Sociology. The professor picked 7 volunteers from the huge class and I was one of them. We waited outside then entered the building one by one. I was the last to enter. Unbeknownst to me, the professor was telling everyone the details of the experiement while I stood outside. I was finally called up to the stage with the other six students, unaware that everyone's eyes were on me only.

The professor displayed photos 1 at a time of people on the screen and the 7 of us were to rate their beauty. 10 means most beautiful and 1 is least. The 6 other students consistently gave skewed answers - a beautiful supermodel got a mere 5 while a weathered old person with a bandaged head got a 9, etc. I never suspected everyone but me was in on the joke because I was put on the spot and my survival instincts kicked in. To survive, I had to reduce the pain of being noticed and stand out from the others. I gave answers that only varied slightly from the others but not enough to be very different.

It is really difficult to leave the church.

Have a WONDERFUL Wednesday,

Zee.

zeezrom wrote:It is really difficult to leave the church.

True dat.

I use to have the habit to conform because I didn't like confrontation. Now I usually just say what I think.

The other day for example my parents and grandpa started talking about weed and how bad it was. I took the other position and started talking about how we should legalize it. They probably think I'm a drugy that is going to OD on something now.

SOme say its much more difficult to stay in the Church and pretending. And in many cases its probably far more difficult to live in the Darfur region of Sudan then to leave the Church. Count your blessings young man, or old, whatever you are.

Oh, and I'm not suggesting we all should up and leave the church behind. I'm just saying it might be more comfortable for everyone to conform.

zeezrom wrote:Oh, and I'm not suggesting we all should up and leave the church behind. I'm just saying it might be more comfortable for everyone to conform.

Most likely. It's not exactly a ringing endorsement to say the church is better than Darfur.

Runtu wrote:
Most likely. It's not exactly a ringing endorsement to say the church is better than Darfur.

uuuhhh...Come on Runtu you're a smart egg. I didn't say this. I said, leaving the Church, though hard to some (keep in mind its really quite easy for many), isn't really all that hard when compared to the situations of others.

stemelbow wrote:uuuhhh...Come on Runtu you're a smart egg. I didn't say this. I said, leaving the Church, though hard to some (keep in mind its really quite easy for many), isn't really all that hard when compared to the situations of others.

I just thought it was an odd comparison. Leaving the church is easy only if you were never invested in it. For everyone else, it's pretty difficult to get out.

stemelbow wrote:
uuuhhh...Come on Runtu you're a smart egg. I didn't say this. I said, leaving the Church, though hard to some (keep in mind its really quite easy for many), isn't really all that hard when compared to the situations of others.

It's probably comparable to leaving Scientology or the Jehovah's Witnesses.

Runtu wrote:I just thought it was an odd comparison. Leaving the church is easy only if you were never invested in it. For everyone else, it's pretty difficult to get out.

Leaving, though difficult to some, isn't near as bad as some people have it. Just keep that in mind and count your many blessings.

Buffalo wrote:It's probably comparable to leaving Scientology or the Jehovah's Witnesses.

I suspect leaving Scientology is worse. As bad as it can be leaving Mormonism, the Scientologist use every weapon at their disposal to destroy their apostates.