Buffalo wrote:So, it's okay to have sex with minors in 1830s and 1840s, but it makes you a sexual predator in the 1970s? How does that work? Is your "presentism" bray just a way of identifying yourself as a moral relativist?
And don't try that children shtick with me. Joseph's wives testified in court to boffing the Lord's prophet, at the behest of the Church.
doesn't the fact that Joe didn't have children with his "wives" prove that he didn't really understand the purpose of polygamy? It seems like he managed to mess the whole thing up....either he was practicing polygamy to raise up a righteous seed or he was just a horny bastard who used his position to have adulterous sex with gullible women...the "where are the children" argument seems more damaging to joe than the critical claim that he was just cheating on his wife...
It is also incredibly naïve to think that the absence of children proves the absence of intercourse. Is anyone really dumb enough to think that every romp yields a pregnancy? Withdrawal, menstrual cycle, etc. Many ways to mitigate the change of pregnancy.
"I have more to boast of than ever any man had. I am the only man that has ever been able to keep a whole church together since the days of Adam. ... Neither Paul, John, Peter, nor Jesus ever did it. I boast that no man ever did such a work as I." - Joseph Smith, 1844
I disagree with Pahoran. Toronto's post about his loss of faith is not manipulative. It is disingenuous and obviously so. He says one thing is true knowing that it really isn't.
Abandoning your faith after committing to it in a temple marriage with a faithful wife is exactly like going gay (and holding Harvey Milk up as your moral hero, not that there is anything wrong with it). One day your wife says: "Have you switched teams?" Your wife is entitled to be something more than a beard, in the one case, or a false spiritual attainment, in the other.
Pahoran wrote: Contrary to your lies, I did not drive you out of the Church; you did that entirely yourself. Contrary to your lies, I did not weaken your faith; it is impossible for me to weaken something that does not exist. Contrary to your lies, I had no impact on your relationships with any of your LDS friends and/or relatives; I don't know any of them, and none of them know me. Your attempt to hang your apostasy on me is just a tired, shopworn anti-Mormon mind game.
You uttered the following slogan: "each time you tear down instead of building up."
Just this once, try to be honest: is there anything at all that I could have said that you would have construed as "building up" instead of "tearing down?"
Anything, that is, apart from affirming and encouraging your apostasy?
Regards, Pahoran
And how do you know any of that? Are you just hoping like hell, so you don't burn it it?
Parley P. Pratt wrote:We must lie to support brother Joseph, it is our duty to do so.
schreech wrote:doesn't the fact that Joe didn't have children with his "wives" prove that he didn't really understand the purpose of polygamy? It seems like he managed to mess the whole thing up....either he was practicing polygamy to raise up a righteous seed or he was just a horny bastard who used his position to have adulterous sex with gullible women...the "where are the children" argument seems more damaging to joe than the critical claim that he was just cheating on his wife...
You know, if there is anything that proves someone is not engaged in a good faith discussion, it is when they start constructing forks.
A fork is an argument that attempts to use opposing evidences to reach the same conclusion. It looks approximately like this:
If A then B; but, if ~A then B, too.
So when a high-school debater like schreeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeech smugly announces that the lack of children somehow "proves" that Joseph Smith "was just a horny [schreech]" then he is demonstrating that his supercilious bigotry bears no relationship to any actual evidence.
Actually the lack of children to plural wives, taken together with the large family Joseph fathered with Emma provides prima facie evidence that his actual sexual activity was not nearly as great as the jealous fantasies of filthy-minded swine would make it.
schreech wrote:doesn't the fact that Joe didn't have children with his "wives" prove that he didn't really understand the purpose of polygamy? It seems like he managed to mess the whole thing up....either he was practicing polygamy to raise up a righteous seed or he was just a horny bastard who used his position to have adulterous sex with gullible women...the "where are the children" argument seems more damaging to joe than the critical claim that he was just cheating on his wife...
You know, if there is anything that proves someone is not engaged in a good faith discussion, it is when they start constructing forks.
A fork is an argument that attempts to use opposing evidences to reach the same conclusion. It looks approximately like this:
If A then B; but, if ~A then B, too.
So when a high-school debater like schreeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeech smugly announces that the lack of children somehow "proves" that Joseph Smith "was just a horny [schreech]" then he is demonstrating that his supercilious bigotry bears no relationship to any actual evidence.
Actually the lack of children to plural wives, taken together with the large family Joseph fathered with Emma provides prima facie evidence that his actual sexual activity was not nearly as great as the jealous fantasies of filthy-minded swine would make it.
Regards, Pahoran
Most of Joseph's early wives were already married to other men, so the children would have been publicly assumed to have been sired by the legal husband.
Perhaps by the time Joseph abandoned that practice he had mastered the birth control methods that were around in his day.
Parley P. Pratt wrote:We must lie to support brother Joseph, it is our duty to do so.
Pahoran wrote: Contrary to your lies, I did not drive you out of the Church; you did that entirely yourself. Contrary to your lies, I did not weaken your faith; it is impossible for me to weaken something that does not exist. Contrary to your lies, I had no impact on your relationships with any of your LDS friends and/or relatives; I don't know any of them, and none of them know me. Your attempt to hang your apostasy on me is just a tired, shopworn anti-Mormon mind game.
You uttered the following slogan: "each time you tear down instead of building up."
Just this once, try to be honest: is there anything at all that I could have said that you would have construed as "building up" instead of "tearing down?"
Anything, that is, apart from affirming and encouraging your apostasy?
Regards, Pahoran
I have to agree. Pahoran didn't say anything to encourage your apostasy.
Now, had you suggested he helped lead you away from talking to dumb ass dick-wads, I'd have completely believed you. Pa-whorin' is the leading dumb ass dick-wad of them all, so that story is to be believed, for certain. But he's not exactly the pinnacle of moism, is he?
Come on, man!
God belief is for people who don't want to live life on the universe's terms.
Buffalo wrote:Most of Joseph's early wives were already married to other men, so the children would have been publicly assumed to have been sired by the legal husband.
CFR, please, that "Most of Joseph's early wives were already married to other men." Please note that, in normal English usage, "Most" means "more than half."
Note also that "early," given his death in 1844, would need to be before Nauvoo.
And while you are at it, please provide references to reliable sources that demonstrate that any of the known sealings were marriages in fact.
Buffalo wrote:Perhaps by the time Joseph abandoned that practice he had mastered the birth control methods that were around in his day.
Perhaps you haven't heard, but DNA testing of possible Joseph Smith descendants from plural wives has ruled him out.