Stephen Smoot's Vendetta

[Doctor Scratch]

Nihil est nisi ultio....



Above: A pensive Stephen O. Smoot reflects on his future as a Mopologist.

On July 8th, a new entry appeared on the smear blog known as "Neville-Neville Land." The entry in question was entitled, "Jonathan Neville sinks to new lows of character assassination"--a title whose irony is, evidently, lost on "Peter Pan," the blog's proprietor, and a pseudonym which, at this point, is widely understood to be helmed by Stephen O. Smoot--the heir apparent of Mopologetics. "Neville-Neville Land" is a curious artifact of Mopologetics: one marvels at the sheer extent and obsessiveness of it. The blog began in February of 2019, and a new entry has been posted at least a couple of times per week since then, meaning that the total entries rivals the volume of "Sic et Non." We are talking hundreds of entries--all devoted to one purpose: taking down Jonathan Neville, one of the chief proponents of the so-called "Heartland Theory." It probably goes without saying that "Neville-Neville Land" is the most significant Mopologetic website since SHIELDS--at least, in terms of the way that it offers up a purified and focused version of what Mopologetics stands for.

We have to ask, though: Why does Smoot have such a beef with Jonathan Neville and the Heartlanders? To find out, we have to roll the clock back to 2018. Back then, there were a series of salvos between Smoot and the Heartlanders, such as this one, from Smoot's personal blog Ploni Almoni (which he effectively abandoned once "Neville-Neville Land" was launched):

The so-called Heartland model for the geography of the Book of Mormon is built on a foundation of fraud. Fraudulent artifacts, fraudulent science, fraudulent theology, and fraudulent history secured in place by racist ethno-nationalism are the four cornerstones of Heartlanderism.1 (By Heartlanderism I do not mean general belief in a North American setting for the events of the Book of Mormon, but specifically the movement started by Rod Meldrum.) The fraudulence of the history promoted by Heartlanderism is evident in how its proponents treat historical sources such as Oliver Cowdery’s letters published in the Messenger and Advocate in the years 1834–1835.

[SNIP!]

Heartlanders such as the monomaniacal Jonathan Neville have latched onto Letter VII as some kind of silver bullet that disproves the Mesoamerican model of the Book of Mormon. With an inquisitorial and self-righteous fanaticism, Neville has denounced, variously, Book of Mormon Central, FairMormon, the Neal A. Maxwell Institute, the Religious Education Department at BYU, the LDS Church History Department, LDS Seminaries and Institutes, and the Correlation Committee of the LDS Church (which, perhaps Neville is unaware, includes the First Presidency and the Quorum of the Twelve) as useful idiots at best or subversive fifth columnists at worst in spreading apostate views of the Book of Mormon that undermine faith, sow confusion and discord amongst the Saints, retard the Church’s growth, hinder the Church’s missionary efforts, and compromise confidence in Joseph Smith and other prophets. What, you may be wondering, is the shocking crime of these heretical culprits? Failure to pay unwavering obeisance to Letter VII—and thereby Heartlander geography—as the final arbiter in Book of Mormon geography debates.

This is, I think you'll agree, strong language. And it's worth noting that Smoot does not provide a single link to any of the places where Neville allegedly treats all those Church institutions and people as "useful idiots at best." Meanwhile, only a day later, the Heartlanders attempted to hold out an olive branch to Smoot:

Hi Steve. One of my readers suggested I respond to your post, so here I am. Thanks for paying a little attention to a point of view and some facts that don’t confirm your bias. But you’ve merely attacked a straw man of your own creation, as I point out here:
https://interpreterpeerreviews.blogspot ... r-vii.html.

Maybe now that this is off your chest we can engage in a serious, rational discussion of the actual facts and what I’ve actually written instead of your caricature. I’ve offered to participate in such a discussion and exchange for years now, but the M2C intellectuals have refused. Instead, they rely on obfuscation, censorship and disinformation to keep their readers ignorant of what the prophets have taught about Cumorah.

So, there is disagreement here. Nothing wrong with that, right? And he certainly isn't hurling the kind of brash accusations against Smoot that the younger Mopologist aimed his way. Neville continues:

Another way to state the fundamental question is, which bias do you seek to confirm? My bias is that the prophets teach the truth. Your bias is that, at least with respect to the New York Cumorah, the prophets are wrong. Then we each marshal facts and logical arguments to confirm our respective biases.

My second bias is I think most members of the Church, if fully informed, would choose the prophets over the scholars. That’s why I favor full disclosure and why I encourage people to read M2C literature to see for themselves what the M2C intellectuals teach. I link to BOMC all the time, but BOMC never links to contrary views. That’s not only intellectually dishonest, but it demonstrates the weakness of the M2C position.

It’s telling that in this very blog post, you didn’t cite a single article, book, or blog post of mine. Nor did you in your BOMC Kno-why. You don’t want your readers to know what I have actually written because it’s easier to attack your straw man. Judging by the comments here, your readers also prefer confirming their biases by reading your caricature instead of what I’ve actually written.

Quite a devastating response, and Neville highlights something that we've seen repeatedly with the Mopologists: they leave out source information deliberately so that they can spin-doctor the evidence in their favor. We saw this quite recently with one of DCP's pieces on the Strangeites, in fact. And to backtrack a bit, in the initial "Neville-Neville Land" post I mentioned, "Peter Pan" claims that Neville has "attacked Peterson dozens of times in writing" and he provides a link. Where does this link go, though? It leads you to a Google search:

site:moronisamerica.com ("daniel c peterson" OR "daniel peterson" OR "dan peterson")

I guess the idea is that you are either (a) supposed to take Smoot/Pan at his work, and that these links truly do lead you to Neville attacking DCP "dozens of times in writing," or (b) you are supposed to comb through each of the links one by one, looking for whether or not Neville actually does what "Peter Pan" claims he has been doing. But why should we trust him?

Back in that July 28, 2019 exchange with Neville on bookofmormonevidence.org, Smoot quickly flew into a rage:

Jonathan,

You have abundantly proven that you are not somebody who can have a rational argument in good faith with an “M2C intellectual.” You have, repeatedly, demonized and belittled and cast aspersion on anybody who doesn’t accept your dogmatic interpretation of early Mormon historical sources relevant to Book of Mormon geography. This isn’t just a matter of having differences of opinion. As your blog posts have more than demonstrated, you have a personal vendetta against the “citation cartel” (which is, in reality, peer reviewed academic scholarship, as opposed to your own brand of trashy Internet pseudo-scholarship) and anybody who is out of step with your narrow and uncompromising Heartland apologetics.

LOL! Is he serious when he claims that Interpreter and Book of Mormon Central materials are "peer reviewed academic scholarship"? And "trashy Internet pseudo-scholarship" is a nice turn of phrase. I'll have to borrow that one sometime. But Smoot's tirade continues:

I suspect I know why you are so personally angry and upset at “M2C intellectuals.” It must be very frustrating that your pseudo-scholarship which you’ve invested so much time and energy into is not making mainstream inroads in Mormon studies. It must be frustrating to be a laughingstock at the Church History Department and amongst BYU faculty. It must be frustrating that the best you can do is publish semi-coherent ramblings on obscure personal blogs or with no-name presses. But just know that it isn’t anything personal: it’s because both your Mormon history and your Book of Mormon geography are nonsense and you’re a deeply unpleasant person to interact with..

Now, now, Brother Smoot--there's no need to get personal, is there? Why not deal with Neville's ideas rather than attacking him personally? But it goes on further:

I am content with what I wrote in my post and in the KnoWhy, and I’ll allow readers to decide for themselves which explanation they find more persuasive. I will not, however, waste further time or attention on your shenanigans. Like I said, since you refuse to engage people who disagree with you in good faith, and since you’re a close-minded fanatic, it would be utterly pointless for me to engage you any further.

I will just say this one thing: for all of your self-righteous preening about how you accept the apostles and the prophets, and how “M2C intellectuals” are subversive apostates, it is breathtakingly hypocritical for you to lambast the Church History Department and BYU faculty and Seminaries & Institutes faculty for not kowtowing to your theories, since all of them are ultimately hired by the First Presidency and Quorum of the Twelve. It is astoundingly hypocritical for you to criticize the “Correlation Department” of the Church, which approves “M2C” artwork and videos and articles in Church publications, when, again, the First Presidency and the Twelve are a part of Correlation. It is monstrously hypocritical of you to accuse Saints of being “revisionist history” attempting to deceive people about Book of Mormon geography when Saints has been authorized, reviewed, and approved by the First Presidency and the Twelve.

So please, Jonathan, spare us all the self-righteous BS about how “M2C intellectuals” are trying to get people to disbelieve the prophets and apostles.

It is almost like we are seeing all those hate-fueled emails from the Mopologists anew--i.e., the dozens of messages from their "L-Skinny" list that are archived on SHIELDS. In response to this criticism, another Heartlander-friendly person emerges in the conversation:

Please share with me why it seems so many people deride Rod and Jonathan and say they are as you describe, “so-called Heartland model for the geography of the Book of Mormon is built on a foundation of fraud. Fraudulent artifacts, fraudulent science, fraudulent theology, and fraudulent history secured in place by racist ethno-nationalism are the four cornerstones of Heartlanderism.” I am especially troubled how you say they are racist for expressing their belief that this Unites States of America is an exceptional nation and we are under a covenant with God unlike any other nation in the world.

Nelson even provides a supportive quote from his namesake--current LDS Prophen Russell M. Nelson:

“The Book of Mormon reveals that Joseph, the son of Jacob who was once sold into Egypt, foresaw the Prophet Joseph Smith and his day and noted that there would be many similarities in their lives. Centuries later, the Prophet Joseph stated, “I feel like Joseph in Egypt.” The Book of Mormon reveals that the inheritance of Joseph, son of Israel, was not forgotten when land was distributed to the tribes of Israel, as promised in the Abrahamic covenant. Joseph’s inheritance was to be a land choice above all others. It was choice not because of beauty or wealth of natural resources, but choice because it was chosen to be the repository of sacred writings on golden plates from which the Book of Mormon would one day come. It was choice because it would eventually host the world headquarters of the restored Church of Jesus Christ in the latter days. And it was choice because it is a land of liberty for those who worship the Lord and keep His commandments.” The Book of Mormon: A Miraculous Miracle President Russell M. Nelson President of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles June 23, 2016

I guess the out here is that he doesn't say anything specific about the Book of Mormon *taking place* in North America? In any case, Smoot is rather predictably incensed by this:

My point is you (like other Heartlanders) are saying the geo-political entity the United States of America has a special covenant or destiny. I reject those claims as misunderstanding the prophecies in the Book of Mormon and the teachings of Joseph Smith and other prophets, who affirm the entire continent of America (North and South) is under the covenant of which you speak, not just the United States.

Hence my mentioning the racist ethno-nationalism of Heartlanderism, which mistakenly gives divine credence to the United States and its predominantly white leaders and population at the expense of the remnant of the house of Israel found scattered throughout Lehi’s seed in all of North and South America.

That’s just the start of my many problems with Heartlanderism.

Next, none other than Rod Meldrum joins the party:

Hi Steve,
Wow, I’m somewhat taken aback by the boldness in which you proclaim your views as established fact. I find it interesting to learn from you how the Heartland model was built, rather than my own personal experience.

From my experience, the Heartland model geography was built upon looking for an answer to the dna questions being thrust upon the church due to the complete lack of any genetic evidence in Mesoamerica for any Hebrew population(s). After finding mainstream journal articles stating that a new Haplotype (Haplogroup X) had been found among Native American populations, and the same markers being found in many Jewish populations including the Ashkenazi and Shepardic Jews, the Druze of Israel and others I felt that other members and scholars would like to know and pursue it. To my dismay, because the Native American populations having these markers weren’t found in Mesoamerica, but rather amongst the Algonquian populations to which the Lord through Joseph Smith send the first missionaries (see D&C 28, 30 and 32) I was attacked personally and my referenced main-stream peer-reviewed based research as well.

I'm struck by the difference in tone between Smoot and the Heartlanders. Even when confronted with what can only be called bristling rage and hostility, the Heartlanders maintain a polite and Christ-like tone. Interestingly, Rian Nelson floats a provocative idea:

I think it has become easy for Mesoamerican theorists and Hearlander theorists to simply speak on blogs and dismiss each other as frauds without having to debate each other one on one. I think it would be awesome for Steve and Jonathan to have such a debate so whoever comes can evaluate both sides. I think Jonathan could invite Rod Meldrum and Steve could invite whomever he would like. If Steve and Jonathan agree I would love to set that up. Please Steve and Jonathan email me at riannelson@aol.com and I will get both schedules and I think it would be fun. I assume both of you are faithful members of the Church and love challenges. Understand I am friends with Jonathan and I have never met Steve, but as I have said on this blog I believed the Mesoamerican theory for over 40 years and over the past few years have been intrigued with the Heartland theory and think it has merit. Even if we have the debate in front of only 5 or 6 of each of your friends, I would pay to see it happen. Why? Because I would love to see both of you go at it as two fellow saints who love the Book of Mormon. Im very serious. I will pay each of you $200 to make this happen. It would be very insightful if both of you would take the challenge and if not why not? The only thing I ask is that there will be no name calling and allow me to ask 3 or 4 questions of each of you. Please email me to let me know your schedule for the next two weeks and I will get a mutual time and place to make this happen. I am up late and would love to have your responses tonight if possible.

Smoot's response is both predictable and telling:

I respectfully decline your invitation.

Neville is free to write obsessive blog posts about me and other “M2C intellectuals” as long as he pleases. But I will not grant him any more credibility than he deserves by sharing a stage with him.

(As it is I only wrote this blog post because I had suffered his calumnies for long enough before I felt it necessary to go on the public record.)

Again, one has to ask: what "calumnies"? Smoot certainly doesn't provide any evidence of them here. And given the paucity of evidence provided elsewhere, you have to wonder if there is *any* real evidence at all, or if, instead, the Mopologists are simply reacting to a challenge to their pet theory.

So, that was July of 2018, and "Neville-Neville Land" launched in February of 2019, and Smoot has been hard at work on it ever since. In the most recent entry, "Peter Pan" makes a complaint:

But this is a new low, even for Neville: According to him, Daniel Peterson is a bad person because an anonymous person called an anti-Mormon podcast and complained that he was treated poorly by Peterson and Louis Midgley in the comments on one of Peterson’s blogs. The caller did not say what his question or concern was. He gave no specifics about what Peterson or Midgley supposedly said to him. He provided no information that would allow us to read the conversation and judge for ourselves if he was mistreated.

(emphasis in the original)

Actually, the caller *did* say: they said they objected to Peterson's "condescending" tone. But this is par for the course with the Mopologists: ignore what people actually say and twist the facts to suit your purposes.



A new era for Mopologetics? Or more of the same?


* * * * *

Some time ago, I wondered about the future of Mopologetics, and I asked who would be there to carry the torch once Daniel Peterson, Louis Midgley, John Gee, and the rest of the "old guard" had shuffled off their mortal coils, as it were. Today, it seems clear that "Neville-Neville Land" represents the center of all Mopologetics: it is a viciously obsessive, years-long attempt at character assassination that routinely gets cheerful approval from Dan Peterson at "Sic et Non." Though the Mopologists decried anonymous critics for years (and did again just recently, in response to observations about their apparent "Nazi obsession"), they have changed their tune and now give the nod of assent to Smoot's latest project. There was a period of time where it genuinely seemed like the rancor at the heart of Mopologetics was simmering down. Smoot and "Neville-Neville Land" show how wrong it was to think that things were changing for the better.

Mopologetics was always defined by hypersensitivity and bristling hatred, and "Neville-Neville Land" has these characteristics through-and-through. It truly is the modern-day version of SHIELDS--not serious in any real sense, but designed to hurt and to lash out at perceived enemies. It may be worth remembering that it was this same fundamental impulse that ultimately led to the unraveling of FARMS, and yet DCP and the rest of the Mopologists seem utterly clueless about the fact that they are repeating the same patterns of behavior. Peterson cheerfully eggs Smoot on, and the goal is an incredibly ugly one: they seem hell-bent on getting Neville and his compatriots excommunicated from the Church. Given that there is ample evidence that the Mopologists themselves *have* done a lot of harm in terms of driving people away from Christ's church, you'd think they'd tread more carefully--especially given the following that the Heartlanders seem to have. It may be that it is only a matter of time before this blows up in their faces.

But, as always, we will have to wait and see. With just a little over half the year gone, it will be interesting to see where Mopologetics leads us next.

[drumdude]

It’s quite hypocritical for them to whinge about this forum being malevolently obsessive when they do the exact same thing (even worse) to the heartlanders.

[Doctor Scratch]

Addendum:

On July 9th, following a lengthy descriptive passage in which he compares the Butchart Gardens in Victoria, BC to "the gardens beyond," Daniel Peterson posted a series of links to "Neville-Neville Land," and characterized the blog as "useful." How are they "useful," one wonders? Peterson elaborates:

I really, genuinely, do not understand Mr. Neville’s peculiar personal hostility toward me. I myself have written little or nothing about him, and, quite honestly, I could probably not pick him out of a crowd or a police line-up. (I think that I once met him very briefly at a public gathering. FAIR, perhaps.) I only began posting links here to the Neville-Neville Land blog after I found out that he had repeatedly taken direct aim at me. I continue posting such links because I regard such targeting (whether of me or, as he often does, of other Latter-day Saint writers and even, astonishingly, of Church leaders) as divisive and harmful to the Kingdom. He should stop it.

But "Peter Pan" should not? It's worth pointing out that Dr. Peterson provides zero evidence that Neville has indeed "taken direct aim" at him. The tidbit I mentioned above referred to a podcast that Neville linked to--in which *somebody else* called Peterson "condescending." Whatever the case may be, "Neville-Neville Land" is years' worth of posts all targeting Neville. Does Dr. Peterson really think this sort of thing is "divisive and harmful to the Kingdom"? Or does he only think that way under certain conditions?

Meanwhile, Smoot/Pan initially stated the following as the goals for the blog:

It is my contention that the Heartland movement in general—and Brother Neville’s writings in particular—are a case study in sloppy thinking, poor scholarship, and agenda-driven conclusions. It is also my contention that the popularity of the Heartland movement stems largely from its foundations in American nationalism and misguided patriotic fervor, along with appeals to conspiracy theories and pseudoscience.

As the entries on this blog will be based on new blog posts by Brother Neville (with special focus on his blog Moroni’s America), new material here may be posted sporadically.

Finally, I wish to clarify that I hold no animosity toward Jonathan Neville; I merely wish to demonstrate that his one-note zeal for his theories has caused him to embrace ideas and conclusions that are not warranted by evidence and clear thinking.

Clearly, that goal--i.e., debunking Neville's faith--was abandoned a long time ago. Once again, we've descended into the weird morass that is Mopologetics. Smoot has erected an enormous smear machine that spans *years* at this point, supposedly to tear down another Latter-day Saint's faith in the Heartland theory, and, by extension, to defend the LGT. But this eventually transformed into a full-blown hate parade to the point where DCP is now claiming that he supports the blog and finds it "useful" because Neville once supposedly "targeted him."

The divide between the Mopologists and the Heartlanders would seem to once again vindicate Dr. Shades's "Chapel/Internet Mormon" duality. The Mopologists are trying to tear down the Heartlanders' faith by claiming that they undermine the words of more contemporary prophets. Meanwhile, the Heartlanders are attacking the Mopologists by claiming that their ideas undermine Joseph Smith and the *older* prophets. The Mopologists claim that the Heartlanders are "sowing apostasy" because they're criticizing Church leaders; but the Mopologists have done this too, such as DCP publicly declaring the BY was teaching "false prophecy" on the matter of Adam-God.

I have seen the Heartlanders attempt to patch things up and shake hands. I haven't seen any such gesture from the Mopologists. They instead seem hell-bent on destroying Neville and his comrades.

[Dr Moore]

It's rather breathtaking just how much of the scientific corpus the Heartlanders tackle in the name of reconciling this basic proposition -- Joseph Smith's most fundamental proposition -- that all of the various scriptural accounts are literally true, including many literal historical representations made by Book of Mormon authors in their narrative. Such as, the flood, the tower of Babel, Adam & Eve, social & military technology in the Americas, DNA evidence, etc etc etc.

I mean, it's so much more than LGT vs Heartland. But for some reason, that one piece ends up being the pet objection? I don't get it. Joseph Smith literally dictated "revelations" from God about where, exactly, the Lamanites lived before and contemporaneously. It's not a mystery. Neville & Meldrum embrace it and what's the problem with that?

Now I do not side with the Heartlanders at all. I think their ideas are mostly nuts. They've done the equivalent of developing a novel, non-testable grand unified theory of fundamental physics in order to assert the truth of a fictional biology novel. It's bananas.

But here's the rub. Smoot et all can't just attack the bad science, because doing so would expose their own bad science. They're defending an equally fictional geology novel while attacking Neville for defending his biological fiction. So to speak. They're both on shaky ground. But at least, as you point out, Neville is nice about it.

Which is worse? Being wrong? Or being an asshole about it? Actually, the answer matters. I think, Doctor, herein we find the most irreducible theorem of Mopologetics -- a double negative is positive. If you are nice and wrong, you're wrong. If you're an asshole and wrong, 'tis all good.

[Gadianton]

Quite a picture of Lou Midgley you obtained from his younger, more spritely days, professor.

I think you must be right that Never-Never land is a startup with hopes of bringing the Old School back into play.

DCP's quote is quite revealing. "I only began posting links here to the Neville-Neville Land blog after I found out that he had repeatedly taken direct aim at me."

Is this how scholarship is supposed to work? If Never-Never land is a quality source of information, then why hasn't he been promoting it all along? His statement seems to reveal that he posted links to Neville-Neville Land in revenge, on the "first blood" philosophy. He seems to be saying that Neville-Neville land is a hatchet job, but that's what Neville gets for saying something he didn't like about him.

[consiglieri]

Am I the only one who sees in Stephen “Bukkake” Smoot’s earnest gaze a reflection of a young and budding Hugh Laurie?

[Rivendale]

Am I the only one who sees in Stephen “Bukkake” Smoot’s earnest gaze a reflection of a young and budding Hugh Laurie?

Bukkake is his middle name. That can't die and be washed away in the Annals of Mormon apologetics.

[Marcus]

Oliver Cowdery didn’t so much as even know Joseph Smith in 1827—the two men first met in April 1829—when these words he attributed to Moroni were spoken, let alone witness firsthand the recovery of the plates and the interview between the Prophet and the angel.

As a secondhand source publishing eight years after the event, Oliver was certainly embellishing details about the interview supplied to him by Joseph Smith. This would not be out of character for Oliver. Others have already noted his “florid romantic” language and his pedantic and flamboyant literary habits (as opposed to Joseph Smith’s own simple and straightforward authorial style) in these letters and elsewhere.15

“The rhetorical flourishes” in Oliver’s letters published in Messenger and Advocate “carried over into a way of describing events that put himself in the forefront. His feelings and thoughts are always on display, making the story more Oliver’s than Joseph’s.”16

Heartlanders want to selectively claim that some parts of Oliver’s letters are inspired (e.g., the location of the Hill Cumorah) while others are not (e.g., failure to mention the First Vision and embellishing the account of Moroni’s visit to Joseph Smith) for completely arbitrary and self-serving reasons.

They are free to do so if they desire, but they’re not accomplishing credible scholarship.

https://www.plonialmonimormon.com/2018/ ... ullet.html

Wow. isn't Smoot speaking here about one of the witnesses featured in Peterson's movie? The witness that is so overwhelmingly credible that his story about the plates must be believed? Smoot doesn't seem to think he's that reliable.

[Doctor CamNC4Me]

Am I the only one who sees in Stephen “Bukkake” Smoot’s earnest gaze a reflection of a young and budding Hugh Laurie?

Throw some glasses and stubble on a young Alan Turing and the two could be twinsies.



- Doc

[drumdude]

Stephen “The Rommelator” Smoot’s online handle ties in nicely with other LDS apologists Nazi fascination.