Interpreter Drops a Thanksgiving Bomb on Kofford Books

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Tom
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Re: Interpreter Drops a Thanksgiving Bomb on Kofford Books

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the_narrator wrote:
Mon Nov 28, 2022 6:26 pm
Tom wrote:
Mon Nov 28, 2022 5:26 pm
I'd be interested in seeing the paragraph as it was worded in the early draft (I assume you are referring to a draft earlier than the one posted last week on the Interpreter website).
Here is the original draft:
By way of disclaimer, I should mention that I have recently written a book entitled Freemasonry and the Origins of Latter-Day Saint Temple Ordinances, an expansion of a 2015 journal article I began to work on in the last half of 2021. When I began the process of writing my book and the present review earlier this year, Cheryl Bruno and Nicholas S. Literski kindly gave feedback on my book chapters and provided helpful perspectives and answers to questions I had along the way, including questions about the views presented in an advance review copy of Method Infinite kindly provided by Loyd Ericson on behalf of their publisher, Greg Kofford Books. They also...
I pointed out to him that this contradicted what he told me:
"To be clear: It wasn’t on my mind [to write his own book] when I asked for the book [reading copy], but sometime prior to my in-person conversation about it with Cheryl at MHA in early June [2022], I decided I needed to expand my 2015 essay into a book."
After being called out for hiding what he did, he asked for suggestions to the paragraph. This is what I sent him:
By way of disclaimer, I should mention that I have recently written a book entitled Freemasonry and the Origins of Latter-Day Saint Temple Ordinances, which I did not decide to write until after receiving an advance reading copy of Method Infinite that I had requested from the publisher for the purpose of writing a review for The Interpreter. Utilizing research for an expansion of a 2015 journal article I began to work on in the last half of 2021, I rushed together my own book instead of writing the review so that The Interpreter could intentionally publish it the same week as Method Infinite. When I began the process of writing my book and the present review earlier this year, Cheryl Bruno and Nicholas S. Literski kindly gave feedback on my book chapters and provided helpful perspectives and answers to questions I had along the way, including questions about the views presented in the advance review copy of Method Infinite. They also generously granted permission to publish quotations from their book and excerpts from their private communications with me, unaware that I and The Interpreter planned to release my book the same week as Method Infinite instead of the review. Earlier conversations with Joe Steve Swick III during the writing of the previous journal article were also very helpful and supportive. I am grateful for the resultant friendly dialogue with these three scholars throughout the writing process, despite some differences of opinion—which unfortunately, in the case of this lengthy review, lasted much longer than I had overoptimistically anticipated due to The Interpreter and I deciding to instead use that time and the review copy to publish our competing book. I appreciate not only the scholarship of these authors but also their examples of how dialogue on differences need not jeopardize mutual respect and collegiality.
Thank you. It seems odd that he did not change the first sentence in the paragraph: "By way of disclaimer, I should mention that I have recently written a book entitled Freemasonry and the Origins of Latter-Day Saint Temple Ordinances, an expansion of a 2015 journal article I began to work on in the last half of 2021." It contradicts his next sentence.
“But if you are told by your leader to do a thing, do it. None of your business whether it is right or wrong.” Heber C. Kimball, 8 Nov. 1857
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Re: Interpreter Drops a Thanksgiving Bomb on Kofford Books

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I think those are the suggestions the_narrator made, not Bradshaw's follow-up draft.
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Re: Interpreter Drops a Thanksgiving Bomb on Kofford Books

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the_narrator wrote:
Mon Nov 28, 2022 6:26 pm

I pointed out to him that this contradicted what he told me:
"To be clear: It wasn’t on my mind [to write his own book] when I asked for the book [reading copy], but sometime prior to my in-person conversation about it with Cheryl at MHA in early June [2022], I decided I needed to expand my 2015 essay into a book."
So, let me try to get this straight. After he received a reading copy of the book, he told you that he had not even planned to write a book of his own, but between receiving the advance copy and chatting with Cheryl at MHA in June 2022 he decided he really needed to expand his 2015 essay into a book.

How much time was there between him receiving the reading copy and the 2022 MHA? One month? Two months? Longer? Shorter?

By his own account, if this is accurate, he seems to be saying that reading that copy of Method Infinite was what prompted him to write his own book. Now, however, he wants to backdate his decision to sometime in 2021. I am partly just amazed that he voluntarily offered up the information he sent you in the quote above. He wants to walk it back, but isn't it too late? Is it true that he thought nothing about what this admission looks like?
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Re: Interpreter Drops a Thanksgiving Bomb on Kofford Books

Post by the_narrator »

Kishkumen wrote:
Mon Nov 28, 2022 10:20 pm
the_narrator wrote:
Mon Nov 28, 2022 6:26 pm

I pointed out to him that this contradicted what he told me:

So, let me try to get this straight. After he received a reading copy of the book, he told you that he had not even planned to write a book of his own, but between receiving the advance copy and chatting with Cheryl at MHA in June 2022 he decided he really needed to expand his 2015 essay into a book.

How much time was there between him receiving the reading copy and the 2022 MHA? One month? Two months? Longer? Shorter?
Bradshaw came by my office on March 25th to pick up the ARC. (He had been begging me for one so that he would have sufficient time to write the review, and he was the first person to receive one.) MHA was the first weekend in June, so that means he had the ARC for 2 months. His book was available a few days after Method Infinite in the second week of August, and Dan Peterson admitted that it was intentionally released the same week as MI.

His admission that he had not considered writing his own book came after I called him out for failing to disclose that he was working on his own book when he asked for the ARC.
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Re: Interpreter Drops a Thanksgiving Bomb on Kofford Books

Post by Tom »

Kishkumen wrote:
Mon Nov 28, 2022 10:14 pm
I think those are the suggestions the_narrator made, not Bradshaw's follow-up draft.
My point is that Bradshaw contradicted himself in the original draft and didn't address that contradiction in the pre-publication version posted on the Interpreter website:

Original draft:
By way of disclaimer, I should mention that I have recently written a book entitled Freemasonry and the Origins of Latter-Day Saint Temple Ordinances, an expansion of a 2015 journal article I began to work on in the last half of 2021. When I began the process of writing my book and the present review earlier this year, Cheryl Bruno and Nicholas S. Literski kindly gave feedback on my book chapters and provided helpful perspectives and answers to questions I had along the way, including questions about the views presented in an advance review copy of Method Infinite kindly provided by Loyd Ericson on behalf of their publisher, Greg Kofford Books. They also...
Pre-publication version posted on the Interpreter website:
By way of disclaimer, I should mention that I have recently written a book entitled Freemasonry and the Origins of Latter-Day Saint Temple Ordinances, an expansion of a 2015 journal article I began to work on in the last half of 2021. After receiving a copy of Method Infinite earlier this year that was kindly provided by Loyd Ericson on behalf of Greg Kofford Books, I decided that in addition to writing a detailed review of Method Infinite, it would be relatively easy to turn my research on Freemasonry and the temple into a book—expecting that I would be able to finish both the book and the review before beginning a lengthy period of travel beginning at the end of July. Wanting to make sure that I represented both the subject matter and the views of the authors of Method Infinite accurately and fairly, I contacted Cheryl Bruno and Nicholas S. Literski and let them know about both efforts. During the initial writing of the book, they kindly gave significant feedback on the chapters and provided helpful perspectives and answers to questions I had along the way. They also...
Edit to fix colors.
Last edited by Tom on Thu Dec 01, 2022 7:25 pm, edited 1 time in total.
“But if you are told by your leader to do a thing, do it. None of your business whether it is right or wrong.” Heber C. Kimball, 8 Nov. 1857
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Re: Interpreter Drops a Thanksgiving Bomb on Kofford Books

Post by Kishkumen »

Good catch as always, Tom!
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Re: Interpreter Drops a Thanksgiving Bomb on Kofford Books

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I know this sounds and appears self serving, and I apologize, but I am sincerely grateful for Nick and Cheryl putting it down on record, live on my show of how it went down from their point of view. There is no guess work of what they had perceived and were thinking and doing in this fiasco with Bradshaw, and now Interpreter itself. It's the last 1/2 hour or so of the show. I asked them point blank, and they responded point blank.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zpp5pBb_ntk
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Re: Interpreter Drops a Thanksgiving Bomb on Kofford Books

Post by Kishkumen »

the_narrator wrote:
Mon Nov 28, 2022 10:40 pm
Bradshaw came by my office on March 25th to pick up the ARC. (He had been begging me for one so that he would have sufficient time to write the review, and he was the first person to receive one.) MHA was the first weekend in June, so that means he had the ARC for 2 months. His book was available a few days after Method Infinite in the second week of August, and Dan Peterson admitted that it was intentionally released the same week as MI.

His admission that he had not considered writing his own book came after I called him out for failing to disclose that he was working on his own book when he asked for the ARC.
I wish I could say that the assholish behavior of these guys didn’t get my goat, but it does. Apologetics seems to bring out the worst in people. Never would I consider doing something like this. Hell, I would be too embarrassed to behave in such a way. The lack of integrity shown in this entire scenario is absolutely stunning. And yet, we have seen similar capers from the apologists time and time again.

I mean, I can’t even imagine planning to time the release of a slapped-together book just to divert attention from what is, without a doubt, one of the more important works of Mormon history in recent memory. Everything about this looks crappy. LDS apologetics of this kind have been for so long the opposite of educational and informative. They consciously seek to stultify the entire conversation.
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Re: Interpreter Drops a Thanksgiving Bomb on Kofford Books

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Philo Sofee wrote:
Tue Nov 29, 2022 12:34 am
I know this sounds and appears self serving, and I apologize, but I am sincerely grateful for Nick and Cheryl putting it down on record, live on my show of how it went down from their point of view. There is no guess work of what they had perceived and were thinking and doing in this fiasco with Bradshaw, and now Interpreter itself. It's the last 1/2 hour or so of the show. I asked them point blank, and they responded point blank.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zpp5pBb_ntk
Thank you for posting the link, Philo. Your great show deserves all the attention it gets. In this case, giving Cheryl and Nick a platform to show exactly how poorly they were treated by these pricks is a public service.
“If they can get you asking the wrong questions, they don’t have to worry about the answers.”~Thomas Pynchon, Gravity’s Rainbow
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Re: Interpreter Drops a Thanksgiving Bomb on Kofford Books

Post by Informant »

Damn, Bradshaw. Just in time for the yearly “Mopologetics” awards. Textbook Oscar bait!
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