A big hello

[Ed1]

Yeah, It's a bit overbearing, I'd say. Warn us of what?

Awesome. I am all about the fact of the Spirit Bloweth Where It Will

It's rhetorical Kerry. It's like saying "back off." Thanks. Everybody here knows that unless you are an admin, there is no consequence that some other poster can impose on somebody.

[Ed1]

How many handles does this make now? Six? Kinda weird, man.

- Doc

Doc, this is the one I am living with now. This is no longer a puppet. Thanks.

[Ed1]

I am as independent of a thinker as I am precisely because I am not a lemming and not in lockstep with Midgley and DCP, and feel utter contempt for Scott Gordon. I have absolute especial disdain and contempt for John Gee and his work and believe that John Gee is among the worst of individuals on the planet, who has done more to damage the standing of the Book of Abraham than any critic ever has. They are not my "brothers" in any sense of the word, notwithstanding their perceived loyalty to the Brethren. The Mopologists exist as they do for self aggrandizement, and for the building up of their power of their establishment, and for their own egos, not necessarily for the building up of Zion, as I see it. Otherwise they would care about evidence, and treat it more carefully and with more integrity, which they don't. Every interaction they have with me always ends up to be some extreme negative experience, and they always attempt to do boundary maintenance in the way they treat me, not to attempt to actually examine the evidence and arguments that I present, and not to include what I have produced in to the corpus of material available, but to "contain" me in a box on the outside, and make sure that I am ignored and forgotten, and to make sure that my materials are treated like they have leprosy.

Thanks for sharing this, Ed1. I'm curious, though: can you elaborate a bit on your "utter contempt" for Scott Gordon? I know that a lot of people see Gordon as this milquetoast, "nice guy" sort of figure, but I have always suspected that there was "a darkness" behind that persona. I'd be interested to get your take on him, if you don't mind.

Well, first and foremost, I am a nobody to them. But at the same time, I was enough to them that I needed to be kept on the outside strategically, but made to feel like everybody was all on the same team and all being included. So, it was a matter of how to keep this weirdo fool nincompoop on the outside, but to fool him into thinking that he is a part of them.

Scott Gordon in my experience is a person that treats me like he is nice to me, but he gaslights me and is passive aggressive, and stabs me behind the scenes, and has no intention of actually helping me or giving me any real information. And there is a lot going on behind the scenes there I'm sure where they have "contained" me as I say. He acts like he is my buddy in emails and says he is not ignoring me, but then all he does is not respond in substance to what I say, and so when he says he isn't ignoring me, its a lie. He won't give straight forward answers when I demand a simple explanation for why I am treated the way I am, so that I will just go away with an understanding of precisely what the problem is. But he won't do that. He keeps up the facade. And so, I have had to figure out why I am treated the way I am on my own, and put clues together from what I hear from others. And what it amounts to with him and those associated with him is that it is an organized effort to marginalize me and keep me on the outside, and ignore me until I lose the will to fight and just stop contacting them. They do it over and over to me, and never give me a clear explanation. And it has been infuriating, because at times, I have doubted my own conclusions and gone back and tried to contact them again, only to get the same gaslighting.

For a number of years, they had a "friend" assigned to me from FAIR Management, that was my "buddy." He acted like a friend for a long time until I realized that he was false, and that he had no loyalty to me at all, but to them only, and was never going to help me, and was only there to make me feel like they were doing things for me, but they would never do anything for me that mattered, until I finally gave up. They were always lying to me, and telling me that the sky is not blue, and that 1+1=3. I wasn't born yesterday, and I know that they were lying to me for boundary maintenance, but at the same time trying to spare my feelings to not tell me how it really was, and leaving it up to me to figure it out for myself.

To me, that kind of psychological mind trip is an evil thing, and I believe they will have to answer for it, because it did me damage. Now there is just the grudge that I'm trying to overcome and let go. The only thing that worked was to stop contacting them. That way, I am not investing energy in something that is not real.

And to be perfectly honest, Kerry/Philo, I believe still to this day that you know what they were doing to me. You knew that they meant to keep me on the outside and keep me contained and gaslight me. I know you were in the inside of that for a long time, and I believe you were a part of that decision. And I know that you people considered me a nobody that was never going to be a considered a real contributor to anything. Since you are no longer on their "team", it would be helpful for you to admit this is the case.

[Ed1]

Well, I for one applaud you for marching to the beat of your own drummer and not taking crap from apologist types. I don't know that I share your darkly negative view of them, but that is perhaps because I am not really close enough to them to care about what they think and do all that much. I agree with you when you say that John Gee has done a whole lot of damage, and I also agree that ego is a big driver in Mormon scholarship of different kinds. That said, I don't know about any of them being "among the worst of individuals on the planet." I save such descriptions for much bigger fish than these guys. At best I think John Gee is fundamentally misguided and has "lied for the Lord" an awful lot. Apologetics of the kind we often see are a kind of intellectual game that is not about truth and honesty so much as it is about paternally protecting the people from the loss of their testimonies by any means necessary. Often, it plain backfires.

I say keep up your work and ignore the Mopes. Anything you write will live on long after most of the swill produced in apologetics. In any case, you do what you do for the joy of doing it, no? What better reward is there than to take delight in doing your thing? Sharing insights with others along the way is gravy. I write a lot of stuff that people either don't read or will never connect with my in real life identity, but so what? I pursue ideas for the sheer joy of doing so. You are a creative person who writes a lot, so revel in it. Haters gonna hate, as they say. What is that to us, if we are enjoying our lives?

Yes, indeed, I do what I do for the joy of it. Thank you.
Yes, I agree that the paternal protection thing pretty much backfires. I am trying to influence people around me to get as deeply rooted as they can, but I also have to allow them to have their agency, and choose what path they need to be on. It took me a long time to accept that many people are not going to accept my way, and that I have to allow them to become what they will.

[Lem]

...Yes, I agree that the paternal protection thing pretty much backfires. I am trying to influence people around me to get as deeply rooted as they can, but I also have to allow them to have their agency, and choose what path they need to be on. It took me a long time to accept that many people are not going to accept my way, and that I have to allow them to become what they will.

I don't think "paternal protection" was being discussed, but yes, I agree, for the most part, except that you can't really "allow" people to live their lives. But I do like the idea of accepting people as they are.

[Moksha]

I do like the idea of accepting people as they are.

So whether Lem likes to open her egg on the big end, Dr. Peterson prefers his on the little end, Gemli likes his fried with hot sauce, and Jon-Luc Piccard prefers coffee and a croissant... wait, what are we talking about? Oh yeah, we must resist the Trumpian revolt on January 6th.

In the meantime, welcome back Ed. This community has less duplicity.

[Kishkumen]

I am trying to influence people around me to get as deeply rooted as they can, but I also have to allow them to have their agency, and choose what path they need to be on. It took me a long time to accept that many people are not going to accept my way, and that I have to allow them to become what they will.

It sounds to me like you have the right approach. My frustration for years was over how people could possibly be deeply rooted in a shallow planting box. I don't think it is possible. Once you get past a certain public discourse, it becomes much more difficult to find fellowship in a deeply rooted way because there is no institutional support for it. Everything seems to be structurally and perhaps deliberately kept at a very shallow level. The internet alleviates some of that frustration because we are allowed to discuss without the need to form the same kinds of social hierarchies. We can read what you write and deal with it on its own terms without the mediation of a committee. Now, obviously this particular place tends decidedly in the direction of non-belief, but I think it is still possible to get decent feedback here, if not agreement.

[Lem]

I do like the idea of accepting people as they are.

So whether Lem likes to open her egg on the big end, Dr. Peterson prefers his on the little end, Gemli likes his fried with hot sauce, and Jon-Luc Piccard prefers coffee and a croissant... wait, what are we talking about? Oh yeah, we must resist the Trumpian revolt on January 6th.

In the meantime, welcome back Ed. This community has less duplicity.

I am not a bigEndian believer and I suspect DCP will take great offense at being considered a littleEnder so let's just go with Eggs Benedict. It seems fitting!

[Res Ipsa]

Eggs Benedict. Yummm.

[Shulem]

Yeah, It's a bit overbearing, I'd say. Warn us of what?

Awesome. I am all about the fact of the Spirit Bloweth Where It Will

It's rhetorical Kerry. It's like saying "back off." Thanks. Everybody here knows that unless you are an admin, there is no consequence that some other poster can impose on somebody.

That's not exactly true. You don't have to have admin rights to impose consequences on other posters that one feels like punishing. There are ways to punish posters on this board -- believe me, I'm guilty of that! Ha ha ha ha!

There are all kinds of creative ways to stick it to people that piss you off. You just have to get creative and go for it. This place can get pretty damn mean at times. Other times it's pretty nice. It just all depends on what's happening.