Maksutov wrote:It's a very ugly part of the LDS culture, Reverend. I can remember when the Salt Lake City Police Department was working with the Wilkinson administration at BYU to identify Y students at the city's few gay bars. Then there were the spies on campus listening in on evil "liberal" professors. Eugene England confirmed to me in 1976 that this was still continuing under Oaks but lower key. There was also the case of Douglas Wallace, a quirky LDS dissident who dissented at General Conference and earned, not just a Church security detachment, but a SLCPD surveillance op that ended with the accidental crippling of an officer. All that within about a 10-15 year span of time. Who knows what has been going on the last 40 years? That's why these online fora are important, because these issues are rarely treated in the conventional press.
I recall an unfortunate event in my undergraduate years that I believe was the byproduct of this ingrained culture of spying on BYU campus.
One of my professors, who was, as I later learned, a troubled fellow, accused me of spying on him and reporting to the department chairman. I was devastated by the accusation. I had come to this fellow's office billowed aloft by unbridled excitement to tell one of my favorite professors that I would be doing what he had always encouraged us to do: visit Greece. His response was to tell me: "So that's what they paid you for spying on me all these years."
Man, was I ever crestfallen. No, truly devastated. This professor had so inspired me with his excitement for ancient Greece that I changed my major to Classics. Now he was accusing me of betraying him. But it had been my parents who, as a graduation present, paid my way to Greece. The memory of the unexpected and jarring confrontation still hurts to this day.
So, yes, this professor was a troubled person, and yet the way he acted out was consistent with the culture of spying that had long existed on campus, and continued to exist at the very time I was accused. Spies were planted in the classes of Prof. Cecilia Konchar Farr to gather dirt on her for her colleagues (and probably administrators).
As much as I enjoyed my time at BYU, its culture of spying and informing marred my experience and the experience of many other students.
"Petition wasn’t meant to start a witch hunt as I’ve said 6000 times." ~ Hanna Seariac, LDS apologist