Mormon Apologist motives

[PrincessLeia]

This is my first post, so be gentle with me please.

I was a tbm until abut a month ago, and am now in the middle of a major faith crisis and trying to think with a non-Mormon brain. I couldn’t sleep last night because I was having a hard time wrapping my head around the idea that apologists deliberately misrepresent Information. I’m a 61 year old highly educated woman, who has spent decades studying church history. I nevertheless just sucked in everything the apologists wrote without question for decades. Now I’m examining their “scholarship” much more carefully. I don’t like what I’m seeing. Yet, it doesn’t make sense to me. I tend to believe, probably naïvely, that most people present an honest point of view, even when I don’t agree with it.

So, my question is - why? Why would apologists present inaccurate information? To me it’s a breech of personal integrity. I get that some apologists are not trained in the area they write about. However, I know some are highly trained. I just don’t get it. Their publications are not peer reviewed in the traditional sense, but they have to know that their errors are obvious to many. Do they just assume most people, like pre faith crisis me, will just suck it all in due to confirmation bias? Even so, how can they sleep at night? They may be getting paid by BYU or the Church, but still, how do they justify sloppy scholarship, to say the least, or perhaps outright deception?

Any thoughts would be appreciated?

[Rivendale]

It is tied in with correlation. The motives are meant to create a narrative that is faith affirming. Let me give you an example from church history regarding Levi Savage.

Levi Savage's story found here.

From the ensign Levi Savage, a subcaptain, was one who opposed the decision. But he said, “Seeing you are to go forward, I will go with you; … will suffer with you, and if necessary, will die with you.” The crafted narrative here Levi Savage married Ann Brummel Cooper in October 1858, a widow he had met in the Willie handcart company. Ann had two daughters from a previous marriage, Mary Ann and Adelaide. After marrying Ann, they moved to Lehi and earned money selling lumber to the U.S. soldiers at Camp Floyd. The family moved from Lehi to Kanab, Utah, in the early 1860’s and in 1865 moved to Toquerville, Utah. Savage later took Ann’s two daughters, Mary Ann and Adelaide, as plural wives. He married Adelaide 17 October 1868 and Mary Ann one week later on 24 October 1868. He had three children with Mary Ann: William, Riley, and Clara.

And what they leave out:

The "good part" they leave out about Levi Savage is he married a widowed women named Ann Brummell on 31 October 1858 who he crossed with who had two young daughters at the time aged 3 and 5. He "loved" his step daughters so much, he married them almost 10 years later only a week apart. Since they had to go to SLC, they did it on the same trip. Just think of how hard it was for him to control his sexual desires for 10 years of grooming. Levi married Adelaide Cooper on 17 October 1868 who was born on 26 November 1852, and Mary Ann Cooper on 24 October 1868 who was born on 22 Nov 1850. Apparently, Adelaide tried to escape, "The story goes that Adelaide climbed out the back of the wagon as they headed up the Black Ridge and started back to Toquerville. It seems she had taken a fancy to the bishop’s son, Tom Willis, who was a wild “hairum-scarum.” Mary Ann sat quietly in the wagon and didn’t say anything. We will never know how it might have worked out because Adelaide met Bishop Bringhurst traveling northward in his blacktop buggy. He persuaded Adelaide to get in and he took her back to Levi and Ann’s wagon. But don't worry, Mary delivered for Levi nine months later and gave birth to William Brummell Savage on August 17, 1869. So much for the didn't have sex thing.

[Moksha]

So, my question is - why? Why would apologists present inaccurate information?
Any thoughts would be appreciated?

Apologists are defending a fictional story the best way they know how with made-up answers. Why? Because it is fictional, real evidence does not exist so they have to stretch and twist whatever they come up with in a way that will bamboozle the average member. Apologists also are quite adept at denial and ad hominem arguments aimed at critics of the LDS religion.

Apologists would not accept the description that they lack personal integrity, since their actions are covered under the umbrella of the Lying for the Lord doctrine. They feel they are doing what their Church requires of them. Hope that helps.

[Doctor Scratch]

This is my first post, so be gentle with me please.

I was a tbm until abut a month ago, and am now in the middle of a major faith crisis and trying to think with a non-Mormon brain. I couldn’t sleep last night because I was having a hard time wrapping my head around the idea that apologists deliberately misrepresent Information. I’m a 61 year old highly educated woman, who has spent decades studying church history. I nevertheless just sucked in everything the apologists wrote without question for decades. Now I’m examining their “scholarship” much more carefully. I don’t like what I’m seeing. Yet, it doesn’t make sense to me. I tend to believe, probably naïvely, that most people present an honest point of view, even when I don’t agree with it.

So, my question is - why? Why would apologists present inaccurate information? To me it’s a breech of personal integrity. I get that some apologists are not trained in the area they write about. However, I know some are highly trained. I just don’t get it. Their publications are not peer reviewed in the traditional sense, but they have to know that their errors are obvious to many. Do they just assume most people, like pre faith crisis me, will just suck it all in due to confirmation bias? Even so, how can they sleep at night? They may be getting paid by BYU or the Church, but still, how do they justify sloppy scholarship, to say the least, or perhaps outright deception?

Any thoughts would be appreciated?

Hi, PrincessLeia--welcome to DiscussMormonism.com.

I think you're asking an important question, and I think that the answer is multifaceted, and dependent upon context and upon which apologist we're talking about. In some cases, I do think that the apologists present inaccurate information because they genuinely believe it. A prime example of this is the so-called "Limited Geography Theory" (LGT) which claims that the events described in the Book of Mormon literally took place in Latin America. I think that many of them really, truly believe that this happened, and, similarly, they believe that the Book of Mormon is "real" history--that the events really happened. Of course, they overlook or disregard counterexamples and that sort of thing--I guess you could probably chalk that up to confirmation bias.

In other instances, the apologists stretch the truth because they believe they were "called" to do so. This seems to be the case with Mopologists like John Gee, Daniel Peterson, and Louis Midgley--the latter of whom believes that his mortal life is a "probation," and that he's basically just biding his time until he dies. DCP, on the other hand, has (if I'm not mistaken) stated that he was basically "ordered" to defend the Church in his patriarchal blessing. Meanwhile, a lot of these guys were egged on by certain General Authorities--such as Neal A. Maxwell. I'm sure they wouldn't put it this way, but in a sense they think they're earning "brownie points" with the Church for engaging in these sometimes dishonest tactics.

Finally, sometimes the apologists lie out of desperation. I can give you three classic examples of this off the top of my head:

1) Daniel Peterson has lied repeatedly about getting paid to do apologetics. Back in the late 1990s, he was paid over $20,000 to serve as Chair of FARMS, and he has continuously lied about this because he apparently wants all the "gullible and naïve" TBMs to think that he's just doing this as a sort of "charitable" disciple of Christ. He also lies about it because he knows it makes him seem like a hypocrite, since he, Midgley, and the rest of the Mopologists have expended a lot of energy hurling insults at Christian ministries that are critical of Mormonism--claiming that they're just it for "priestcraft"-related reasons.

2) John Gee's "two inks" gambit. Someone might be able to supply you with a link to old threads on this topic, but in a nutshell, Gee tampered with photographic evidence of the Book of Abraham translation documents (the Kirtland Egyptian Papers) in order to make it seem like the scribes were writing things down at different times (and using two different shades of ink). The *actual* photos point towards the documents being *actual* translation documents, with no noticeable difference between the inks--meaning that Joseph Smith really did think that he was translating the papyri. Gee, rather dishonestly, was trying to make it seem like the Kirtland Egyptian Papers were created for a different purpose.

3) The Second Watson Letter. Back in the early 1990s (If I recall correctly), the Secretary for the First Presidency mailed a letter to an inquisitive midwestern bishop about the location of the Hill Cumorah--this letter, written on First Presidency letterhead, said that Cumorah was in *North America.* Now, the Mopologists have insisted for decades that Cumorah is actually in Latin America--per the LGT. But, this letter from the First Presidency Secretary (Michael Watson) threw water all over their theory. So, in an issue of the FARMS Review, the published what they claimed was a *second* letter from Michael Watson which disavowed the original claim--thus saving their theory. Well, it turns out that this second letter never existed--they had been lying about it all along. Instead, they apparently had a fax from someone named "Carla Ogden," which, in fact, was really just a cut-and-paste from the Encyclopedia of Mormonism--a bit of boilerplate, in other words.

So, at the end of the day, there are many reasons why the apologists aren't honest. *Some*times I do think they're acting in good faith, but on many other occasions, they have been extraordinarily dishonest and corrupt.

[drumdude]

Lying for the Lord. It’s the same idea as any other “noble lie.” It has been a fundamental building block of the Mormon religion since Joseph Smith, as pointed out by many scholars.

D. Michael Quinn called the use of deception by LDS church leaders, "theocratic ethics." (The Mormon Hierarchy: Origins of Power, p. 112) Dan Vogel in his excellent work, Joseph Smith: The Making of a Prophet, described Smith as a pious deceiver. Smith used deception if in his mind; it resulted in a good outcome. Smith believed he knew when God approved of lying. For example, Smith wrote that God commanded the prophet Abraham to lie to protect himself and his wife Sarah from harm (Abraham 2:23-25).

Smith believed God also approved of murder if it was for a good cause. He wrote in the Book of Mormon that Nephi was inspired by God (1 Nephi 4:6) to deceive and murder his uncle to obtain an Israelite history. In Missouri, Smith and his counselor Sidney Rigdon, threatened to kill Mormons who disagreed with Smith's commands (Quinn, The Mormon Hierarchy: Origins of Power, Chapter 3, "Theocratic Beginnings," pp. 79-103).

Deception came naturally to Smith. Before assuming his role as prophet, he operated confidence schemes. He guaranteed clients that he could see underground treasure using a magic stone in the bottom of his hat. Gullible "clients" paid him to locate treasures using this vision-in-the-hat method. (He never found anything.) Smith's arrest, trial and conviction in Bainbridge, NY for fraud in 1826 documented his activity. He was found guilty of glass looking. The modern term for Smith would be a con artist. (Dan Vogel, Joseph Smith: The Making of a Prophet, pp. 82-86).

Full article here, highly recommended.

http://www.mormonthink.com/lying.htm

[Dr Moore]

Feel for you, PrincessLeia. Discovering the pervasiveness of "lying for the Lord" among the Church's leadership and its front-line apologist-scholars was one of the most painful things in my life. It is still hard to unpack why so many well-intentioned people will "lie in good faith" because they believe that eventually, somehow, some way, their lies will be vindicated by a grander truth. Sadly, these guys have become very adept at institutionalized gaslighting, blaming truth-seekers who awaken to a higher state of consciousness and dare to be vocal about it, and - in the cases of a smaller number of apologists (such as those listed by Dr. Scratch above) - outright bullying and character assault on those deemed threatening to various faith-promoting narratives.

[Kishkumen]

Greetings, PL. Welcome to DiscussMormonism.com. Let me begin by sympathizing with you in what is a very difficult time. Your world is being thrown into uncertainty by the things you are reading about your faith tradition. From being a "TBM," you are now no longer sure about the truth of your religion. You have reason to distrust what the apologists have written in many cases, and you wonder what could possibly motivate them to write what they have.

Here is what I think about this issue after many years of interacting with apologists: most of them really firmly believe in the LDS Church. They assume that, in the end, their conviction will be rewarded with sure confirmation from God. In the meantime, they will provide the best arguments they have, even when they only have bad arguments, because the alternative of doing nothing while people leave the Church is unacceptable to them. They will generally not admit that their arguments are bad, even when they clearly are, because to do so would result in more defections from the LDS Church.

My recommendation to you would be to start thinking about the benefits of membership in the LDS Church in more practical terms. I say this not to discount any belief that you may have in the LDS Church's divine origins or leadership, but because it can help put some parts of a complicated issue in perspective. Ask yourself some questions such as the following: In what ways is my membership important to me? Do I rely on the community it provides? Is my family deeply involved and enjoying that involvement? Do my colleagues at work belong to the LDS Church and how would knowing about my doubts impact those relationships?

Apologists think about those things too. They see families broken up by a partner's or child's loss of faith. They see people lose employment over a loss of faith. They also witness other kinds of suffering resulting from a loss of faith. I am not saying that losing faith results inevitably in bad things. It can also be a time of positive transformation in a person's life (although apologists are unlikely to see that). Since apologists see the LDS Church as a good thing, and they see how destructive loss of faith is at times, they calculate that it is good for them to do whatever they can do to keep people happily LDS.

Of course, in some cases their motives may be less than pure. I think others on this thread have covered those well enough, so I will not go into them. I tend to think that people see themselves as motivated by only the best aims when they defend the faith, so to speak, but we cannot exclude the darker possibilities either. Ego is not to be excluded, for example.

Good luck in your exploration.

[BeNotDeceived]

Great post and question Princess. I have two thoughts of reason as to why... 1) many might be struggling with the information they are learning doing their apologetic mental gymnastics after delving into 'church' history (I use the term 'church' lightly as it is more of a gargantuan multi-hundred billion dollar tax-free real estate corporation more than anything, LOL) and trying to 'make it work' because they've had a belief system all their life or a 'paradigm' that they don't want to accept might not be what they thought it was. 2) they are somehow benefiting financially and so don't want to disrupt the gravy train and are willing to deceive in the name of money or their careers.

[PrincessLeia]

I am very grateful to everyone who responded to my post. Thank you for sharing your time and wisdom. You have given me some well thought out answers and helped me gain new perspectives. I also appreciate your welcoming attitude.

I’ve spent most of my free time today listening to Ken Clark’s ExMormon Conference Lecture on “Lying for the Lord.” Thank you for that recommendation DrumDude. I’ve found it very helpful.

I’ve gotten a bit philosophical as the day has ticked by. I’ve started to realize there is an irony to my situation. I have long believed many lies without question, even though the excellent training I have received in evaluating evidence should have kicked in much earlier in my life. Blatant acceptance, from people like me, has to be part of the food that keeps these lies alive. I cannot sit on my high judgmental horse and cry foul without accepting at least a measure of the blame.

Alas, I am continually amazed at the things I discover about myself.

Thank you again for your time and comments. I look forward to learning more from this forum.

[drumdude]

I think it's helpful to remember that all of the current leaders are part of a corrupted system. They probably aren't inherently evil or trying to do wrong. They were simply raised in the environment, and put into situations which led to their actions.

Even I was a part of that system, in a small way. I wasn't able to tell the 8 year olds in my class that the Noah's Ark story we were talking about that day was fictional. Instead I had to sheepishly say, "ask your parents."

I think realizing that we've all been complicit in propagating malicious systems gives you a better perspective, and lessens the hurt of being lied to. No one was trying to intentionally hurt you or mislead you, they were just acting the way they felt they had to within Mormonism.