Question to Dehlin fans about "Rape in Mormon Culture"

[_Tator]

You could start with the excellent posts given in this thread by Res Ipsa, honorentheos, and Chap.

Actually I am in awe over several posts on this thread. Real keepers. They are valuable to me now but I really can't imagine how valuable this thread would have been worth to me 47 years ago when I was 18.

[_Res Ipsa]

The question is: is it moral to break the agreement without telling the other party? Your spouse may very will not want to stay in a marriage with you if you are having sex with another woman. The question is: when, if ever, is it moral to deprive her of that choice?

1. spouse depends on you, say he or she is in a wheelchair for example. Who else is going to take care of him or her?
2. when you have kids. Divorce is not good for your children.
3. You love your spouse. Having an affair doesn't mean you don't love your spouse, especially if you have needs like Dr. Darrel Ray argues.

1. Why not tell your spouse the truth and let her decide whether she needs you to care for her. You're not the only person in the world.
2. Why not tell your spouse the truth and let her be part of the decision as to whether the harm to the children is a sufficient reason to accept your change to the relationship?
3. Why not tell your spouse the truth? Why does the fact that you love her make lying to her more moral?

[_Lemmie]

Res Ipsa, on the other hand, gave some very good advice related to alcohol and casinos. Start there.

It's the same thing, he wrote, <snip>

I disagree, you and Res Ipsa are not saying the same thing.

Prior to your excerpt was this exchange between you and Res Ipsa:

There is at least one Casino that gives free alcohol, I read it on a news article. Some drunks ruin their life in just one night. It does feel Casinos do take advantage, especially if they give you more and more alcohol.

Think about it. If a Casino just gave away free drinks, why would anyone gamble there? Why not just go in and drink for free? I suspect either the article was factually wrong, factually incomplete, or you misunderstood. <snip>

That is NOT Res Ipsa saying the same thing as you. I feel like this exchange exemplifies part of the issue here. Your references are all over the place and are clearly not selected because you are familiar with them or because you have investigated the author's positions. Why not slow down a little and take in what you read?

[_Res Ipsa]

Actual, I think DT and I were closer to the same page than I thought on the comp issue. But for me, that issue is a distraction. I'm not really interested in trying to argue the morality of casinos.

[_Lemmie]

Actual, I think DT and I were closer to the same page than I thought on the comp issue. But for me, that issue is a distraction. I'm not really interested in trying to argue the morality of casinos.

Nor in watching the youtube video on the medical marijuana situation arguing that there are only two sides to an issue, I suspect.

My point was you are giving thoughtful responses that allow for the evaluation of unique aspects of a situation, as well as considering the motivations and considerations of all parties involved. Personally, I appreciated reading your legal take on a couple of the early issues, thank you for that!

My other hope was that DT might realize that just grabbing the top quotes off Amazon, Wiki and other casual sites is really not the way to approach making an argument. One needs to be at least somewhat familiar with the work of an author or at least their background and qualifications in order to trust in using excerpts of their comments in an argument such as this.

I don't get the sense, DT, that you are familiar with the references you are using.

[_DoubtingThomas]

1. Why not tell your spouse the truth and let her decide whether she needs you to care for her. You're not the only person in the world.
2. Why not tell your spouse the truth and let her be part of the decision as to whether the harm to the children is a sufficient reason to accept your change to the relationship?
3. Why not tell your spouse the truth? Why does the fact that you love her make lying to her more moral?

or let her religion or spiritual revelation decide for her? even for number 2?

I've read lots of stories where the death of a child has had the effect of bringing the parents close together.

Again I know dishonesty is not a good thing, but I don't see how responsible affairs are the worst thing in the world, especially if you need them. Abandoning your spouse is much worst, especially if your spouse and children need you.

[_Sanctorian]

Again I know dishonesty is not a good thing, but I don't see how responsible affairs are the worst thing in the world, especially if you need them. Abandoning your spouse is much worst, especially if your spouse and children need you.

An affair is a betrayal of the other persons trust in you. You say you love and respect the other person and they trust in that relationship. To have an affair is a symbol you don't really love that person as you say you do otherwise you wouldn't have an affair.

With that said, an affair can help you realize how much your spouse really means to you. The problem when you make that decision to have an affair, you lose control of how your spouse/girlfriend responds to you. If they accept you back, your relationship will be different for better or worse. If they don't accept you back, you are left with the ashes of the burned bridge.

[Guest]

1. Why not tell your spouse the truth and let her decide whether she needs you to care for her. You're not the only person in the world.
2. Why not tell your spouse the truth and let her be part of the decision as to whether the harm to the children is a sufficient reason to accept your change to the relationship?
3. Why not tell your spouse the truth? Why does the fact that you love her make lying to her more moral?

or let her religion or spiritual revelation decide for her? even for number 2?

To put it crudely, what's the difference between "spiritual revelation" deciding for her and your dick deciding you "need" to have an affair. If you can't trust a women enough to make fundamental decisions like "should I stay married to you," for God's sake don't marry her. To not trust your marriage partner to make those kinds of decisions demonstrates a profound disrespect for her. in my opinion, it will also kill any prospect of having a happy marriage.

I've read lots of stories where the death of a child has had the effect of bringing the parents close together.

Again I know dishonesty is not a good thing, but I don't see how responsible affairs are the worst thing in the world, especially if you need them. Abandoning your spouse is much worst, especially if your spouse and children need you.[/quote]

I've never taken the position that having an affair is the worst thing in the world. You know what's worse than having an affair? Holocausts. Beating a child. Rape. The question isn't: "Is having an affair the worst thing in the world?" The question is "Is having an affair a moral way to treat a fellow human being?"

I think Mormonism presents a cartoonish view of "sinners." They make it sound like a sinner gets up in the morning and says "You know what I really want to do today? Sin! I think I'll just turn my back on God and join up with Satan today. Mwa ha haaaa."

That's not how it works in real life. No one wakes up and thinks "I'm going to do evil today." They rationalize their way in to doing immoral things. They do it just like you are doing it here: I need to stick my penis in that vagina. I need to lie for the good of my children. That's how they do it. It's not that bad people do bad things. It's that good people talk themselves into doing bad things.

I mean, look at your latest post. Now you're talking about "responsible affairs." It's just like Congress labeling a tax cut for the wealthy as The All-American, Everybody Gets Some, Tax Relief Act. You're avoiding thinking through the hard questions by slapping a name on the conduct that makes it sound ok.

I've also never suggested abandoning one's spouse. It's you who keeps saying that. I'm asking the moral principle upon which you are deciding to take her right to decide away from her. And all I'm hearing sounds like: It's okay for me to think with my dick, but not okay for her to think with her church. It's okay for me to take my wife's right to decide away from her because she won't decide the way I want her to. Do you think your children need a father who decides it's okay to lie to get what he wants, regardless of what anyone else wants?

And this notion of "needing" to have an affair. That's really just self-rationalizing BS. I need to breathe, or I'll die. Tell me exactly what will happen if you don't get to put your penis in a vagina. Are you going to die? Are your testicles going to explode? Will you turn into a werewolf and eat your children? I think you'll find that the more honest word is "want." You may want it a whole lot. But it's still want. Having an affair is a want, not an irresistible compulsion.

[_Res Ipsa]

Again I know dishonesty is not a good thing, but I don't see how responsible affairs are the worst thing in the world, especially if you need them. Abandoning your spouse is much worst, especially if your spouse and children need you.

An affair is a betrayal of the other persons trust in you. You say you love and respect the other person and they trust in that relationship. To have an affair is a symbol you don't really love that person as you say you do otherwise you wouldn't have an affair.

With that said, an affair can help you realize how much your spouse really means to you. The problem when you make that decision to have an affair, you lose control of how your spouse/girlfriend responds to you. If they accept you back, your relationship will be different for better or worse. If they don't accept you back, you are left with the ashes of the burned bridge.

DT seems to be under the impression that affairs tend to stay secret. He doesn't think about being caught. He doesn't think about the negative impact on kids when they are caught up in the expected and natural emotional upheaval. I've known more than one family where the result of an affair was the kids growing up to despise the parent who cheated. But maybe that's all okay as long as you can get your rocks off.

[_Rosebud]

My sister shared one of her favorite movies, Blade Runner, with my 18-yo son. My son watched the Harison Ford + replicant sex scene and came to the conclusion that it was "rape-y." He wished he could help my sister, who is very vulnerable herself due to some things that happened to her growing up, understand why. My sister's interpretation of the scene was that the replicant just wanted to feel attractive and real and the Harison Ford character helped her by taking care of those needs.

I love that my son picked right up on how Ford's character took advantage of the replicant's situation from his place of greater power, etc. He saw what his aunt who is 2+ times his senior didn't recognize until we talked her through it and she was able to gain insight into the vulnerability of the female replicant and how that parallels with the way sexual harassment works in the real world.

I bring this up here because it's often forgotten that some partners, like the replicant who did drive off in the sunset with Ford at the end of the movie, aren't in relationships they chose from a place of empowerment in the first place. They may not want to be stuck in a marriage where the other person is just there because the other person believes they are "needed" regardless of honesty about outside relationships. Any sexual relationship based on a power differential, whether marriage is included or not, opens the less powerful partner up to exploitation.

If the less powerful partner doesn't know about sexual activity of the other partner outside of the marriage, that further diminishes her (in this case) power. Worse.

OTOH, after I tried to get away from my ex from the less powerful position and he used the power he held over me to force me to stay and agreed to let me be sexual outside of marriage because he didn't want to let go of the marriage, he only then used the fact that I refused to be faithful to him against me when I finally forced the divorce (seriously cost well over 100K for me to escape.... I don't even know at this point.)

Were the kids caught up in this? Absolutely.

But kids are smart. My 18-yo really gets what's "rape-y" and what isn't because he's witnessed how this all plays out in the real world. He gets that in the real world it's about a power differential. He gets that his own father was "rape-y" even inside the marriage through the methods of coercion he used to get me and keep me (Mormonism, temple, children, money, fear of exposure, etc.) and he has seen the way other Mormon men have used the women in his family from their different positions of power, etc.

His adolescence was very much about seeing men act like assholes and thinking about the women he loves. This was the environment in which he developed his identity and it can straight from Mormonism.

Now, at age 18, I couldn't be more proud of him. He has discerned. He knows the church is wrong and sexist, etc.

It occurred to me yesterday, as I was thinking through all this, that something else that helped him understand was me getting him out of the church before they gave him the priesthood. I'm glad he didn't spend his formative years weighing all this chaos while he also had people teaching him that he was one of a few elect who was given the true power of Christ with his father while his mother and sisters weren't. If he had spent much time pondering that and allowing himself to believe it at times, it's more likely he wouldn't have been able to figure this all out.

I think giving Mormon boys the priesthood during adolescence really hurts them developmentally. They get a false sense of worth, power, entitlement and, ultimately, ownership or potential future ownership of women. It snowballs into all sorts of problems later in life as indicated by this thread.

This isn't the adolescence I would have chosen for my son, but I don't think there could have been a more positive outcome. He has more wisdom than I could have dreamt of him gaining when he was 11 and I was trying to figure out how to get my kids out of the church and help save my son from going on a mission while their father still believed.

Anyway..... it's not black and white, telling the truth is a good idea but chances are that if you're in a relationship where this kind of stuff is coming up, there's a lot more that's wrong than honesty. And if you're Mormon, a lot of what's wrong may be related to the uses of gender, power, marriage and sex in Mormonism.

I tip my hat to all survivors.

And so proud of my good son who is now a man who really gets it, not who pretends to so he can look good publicly. I can't wait to see what kind of adult he becomes. His wife and girlfriends will be treated very well.