Doctor CamNC4Me wrote:This is where I'm feeling you've given us conflicting information.
The two proposed dates undoubtedly conflict. When, first, I gave the earlier date, I expressed uncertainty about it. Now, having supplied a later date, I've explained why I think it much more likely to be accurate.
The major thing influencing me initially to place the conversation between 1982 and 1985 was that it occurred in California, and I was living in California at that time. But I now realize that it could not have occurred that early, but almost certainly happened during or after the summer of 1988. And, since I still visit California several times each year, it's not difficult to think of other times that it might have occurred. Moreover, since, for academic reasons explained above, I spent an exceptional amount of time in that particular area of California prior to mid-1990, it seems overwhelmingly likely that the conversation took place somewhere during or after the summer of 1988 but before the summer of 1990.
I'm feeling profoundly foolish for having bought into your pose of charity and fairness yesterday, but I've been open and frank with you. If you want to persist, along with Scratch, in regarding me as a liar, there's probably nothing that I can do about it, and, so, no real point in spending more time or effort on the matter.
Doctor CamNC4Me wrote:I understand your reticence,
I've scarcely been reticent!
Doctor CamNC4Me wrote:but if you'd be kind enough to explain why you would say that you never discussed Dr. Quinn's sexuality prior to his dismissal when you plainly said, as quoted by Dr. Scratch, that you did discuss his sexuality prior to his dismissal/excommunication/firing/however you would like to frame it.
I've explained this all above.
And, incidentally, the terms
dismissal, excommunication, and
firing refer to distinct events, and are very problematic. Your tendency to conflate them ("however you would like to frame it," you say, as if it's a matter of mere preference) obfuscates the situation, whether unintentionally or not.
Mike Quinn left the University in 1988. He was, to the best of my knowledge, neither "dismissed" nor "fired."
He was excommunicated several years later, in either 1992 or (I think more accurately but haven't checked) 1993.
I joined the University in 1985.
I do not believe that I had heard so much as a rumor of Mike Quinn's homosexuality by the time of his resignation from BYU in 1988.
Sometime between 1988 and his excommunication in 1992/1993, his sexual orientation was mentioned to me. (As I say above, I believe this happened prior to the summer of 1990.)
During the interval between 1988 and 1992/1993, Mike Quinn's homosexuality was, so far as I can tell, pretty much universally known among people involved with Mormon studies -- believers and unbelievers, members and non-members, liberals and conservatives. I was involved in no effort to spread this knowledge. I had no desire to do so. I had no particular status to do so, and no venue in which to do so. Did it come up occasionally during those years? Yes. A few times. But it wasn't a significant topic of conversation. Not in my circles, anyway. It was simply a fact.
I've been very forthcoming. I've supplied lots of details, as well as I can recollect them. I've been candid. If you want to persist in viewing me as dishonest, and as malicious, that's your prerogative.