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[_Droopy]

I could list a number of cases, but you have Google, you can find them yourself it isn't very hard. If you choose to be ignorant of the child abuse problem within the LDS Church that is your choice.

Then list them and stop stalling for time. You have come to the Celestial room with a thread topic and a polemical approach that is not appropriate for this forum (and so why the mods have allowed it to remain is a mystery to me).

Put up or shut up. Bring forth your facts and evidence or bow out.

[_Darth J]

You have come to the Celestial room with a thread topic and a polemical approach that is not appropriate for this forum (and so why the mods have allowed it to remain is a mystery to me).

Droopy, I wonder if you would be inclined to specify where the rules for the Celestial Forum prohibit "a polemical approach" (whatever that means)?

RULES FOR THE CELESTIAL FORUM:

1. Keep all communications "Rated G."
2. No personal attacks allowed whatsoever.
3. No disrespectful communications allowed. Address the ideas, not the person who posts them.
4. No swear words allowed. Not only does this mean to avoid the "F" and "S" words and any of their many variants, it also means to avoid lesser bad words such as "bitch," "piss," "ass," etc. Altering the spelling or substituting a symbol for a character does not give you a free pass to disregard this rule.
5. No specific temple content allowed.

[_Droopy]

You have come to the Celestial room with a thread topic and a polemical approach that is not appropriate for this forum (and so why the mods have allowed it to remain is a mystery to me).

Droopy, I wonder if you would be inclined to specify where the rules for the Celestial Forum prohibit "a polemical approach" (whatever that means)?

RULES FOR THE CELESTIAL FORUM:

1. Keep all communications "Rated G."
2. No personal attacks allowed whatsoever.
3. No disrespectful communications allowed. Address the ideas, not the person who posts them.
4. No swear words allowed. Not only does this mean to avoid the "F" and "S" words and any of their many variants, it also means to avoid lesser bad words such as "bitch," "piss," "ass," etc. Altering the spelling or substituting a symbol for a character does not give you a free pass to disregard this rule.
5. No specific temple content allowed.

Certainly.

The upper-crust forum for scholarly, polite, and respectful discussions only.

The OP and related posts are a wild, unsubstantiated, tabloid polemic unrelated to anything remotely scholarly or intellectually serious in nature. These kinds of posts are standard boilerplate here in the Terrestrial and Telestial rooms since forever.

The author of this body of special pleading and anecdotal calumny needs to put up or shut up, as I said. Provide some support for the assertions, engage in logical argument, or move to another room where this is unnecessary.

[_Darth J]

Certainly.

The upper-crust forum for scholarly, polite, and respectful discussions only.

That isn't a rule, Droopy. It is a general description. But anyway......

The OP and related posts are a wild, unsubstantiated, tabloid polemic unrelated to anything remotely scholarly or intellectually serious in nature.

You have not indicated any way in which he was impolite or disrespectful, unless you are demanding that the failure to affirm your cherished beliefs is per se impolite and/or disrespectful.

I take it you did not notice his citation to mainstream newspapers. Additionally, determining whether a claim is "unsubstantiated" is the purpose of argument and refutation. If, per your opinion, claims that are made but unsubstantiated cannot be posted in Celestial, then very, very little about the factual claims underpinning LDS faith-promoting narrative will be available for discussion here.

Additionally, even if something is "polemic," that does not mean that it not scholarly. The meaning of "polemic" does not exclude scholarship.

Polemic

1.
a controversial argument, as one against some opinion, doctrine, etc.
2.
a person who argues in opposition to another; controversialist.

Scholarly

1.
of, like, or befitting a scholar: scholarly habits.
2.
having the qualities of a scholar: a scholarly person.
3.
concerned with academic learning and research.

He is referring to court cases and reported instances alleging that reports of sex abuse are sometimes ignored by people acting in some capacity for the LDS Church. If you do not find his evidence convincing, or you do not think a prima facie case has been made, then that is also part of debate.

These kinds of posts are standard boilerplate here in the Terrestrial and Telestial rooms since forever.

"Standard boilerplate" is redundant, but the mere fact that you find something to be "polemic," or not faith-affirming, does not mean it is not polite, not respectful, or not scholarly.

The author of this body of special pleading

Where has he suggested that someone in a similar position should not be held to the same standard?

and anecdotal calumny

Regarding a subject that is by nature anecdotal.

needs to put up or shut up, as I said.

A claimed failure to meet one's burden of proof is not determinative of whether a topic is scholarly, but whether it is persuasive.

Unless we're going to stop talking about the Book of Mormon or the Book of Abraham up here, too. As in, put up or shut up regarding a reason to believe they are what they claim to be other than I interpreted my subjective feelings the way the Church says I should.

Provide some support for the assertions, engage in logical argument, or move to another room where this is unnecessary.

It looks a whole lot like you want this to be moved not because it is not a scholarly topic/argument at all, but because you believe it is an unsuccessful scholarly argument.

Would you also support, for example, Ldsfaqs' anecdotal thread about being banned from MD&D being moved out of Celestial?

What about Subgenius' hypocritical polemic about Buddhism? Should that be moved out of Celestial?

[Guest]

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[Guest]

Here's the problem with your Oprahfied witch hunt against the LDS church,, HDE.

Wrong. What we see is in some places Churches don't have the protection from reporting abuses in cases of "confessions" that the LDS Church and Catholicism have fought for, so in those places if leaders do not report abuse when they are told about it they are liable. The policy in Handbook 1 is to call the legal hotline if they have to report then they do if they don't have to report then they don't.

And you know this precisely how? How do you know who reports and who doesn't unless the case becomes public and questions are raised. If I was a Bishop and I reported such a case, how would you know about it?

Several problems are also apparent here. First is your tiny sample size, fifty or sixty cases in a Church with nearly six million American members (and many thousands of Bishops and tens of thousands of ecclesiastical leaders), which in no sense can be construed as indicative of a "problem" within the Church in some sense unique to it as an institution. That's right, your Montel Williamsesque sensationalism is not going to work here, HDE. Some of us can see right through it.

Secondly, your inclusion of Hugh Nibley here represents a big problem for at least some portion of the rest of those you mix together as "accused" and "convicted" in a very vague and imprecise manner. Nibley's case is widely understood (and clearly so) to have been the petty, self serving fabrication of a family member, and this calls into question the culpability of any number of other examples you produce, unless they have, indeed, been shown in a court of law to be legitimate.

You sound like you know what you're talking about, but, as is so often the case, upon closer inspection, we see the telltale signs of an intellectual shoddiness that bespeaks underlying agendas other than getting at the truth.

[_Droopy]

Prove or at least give some reason for the thread topic and substance being polemical and inappropriate. Then maybe you could actually deal with the questions laid out in this thread??

Thanks for asking:

Is "Forgive and Forget" the best advice to victims of sex abuse that come forward to Church leaders after years of suffering??

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bc0t3QtT8t0

What is the real reason that LDS Leaders don't want to report abuses to the proper authorities? Is it really out of reverence to "clergy penitent privilege or is it actually just to protect the Church from criticism?

Why is it that the advice to leaders and the Handbook of instructions is to call a hotline that is run by the legal services department rather than a hotline run by psychiatrists to assist the victims?

Why does the Church impose gagging orders attached to the million dollar payouts effectively buying the silence of victims and could it be considered as an example of further abusing the victims?

Why is the LDS Church so quick to forgive those that abuse and to place them in positions of trust while it is so hard on those who engage in consensual relationships or masturbation? Why is sexual abuse considered an example of apostasy in Catholicism but just a fact of life within their own religion?

Are there a number of beliefs that members have about their leaders and the authority structure particularly damaging, for example that there are no female leaders and so women are often misrepresented, the belief that leaders have some form of special spiritual discernment even though those promptings can place children in extremely dangerous situations and interviews where teenagers are alone with an adult and are encouraged to talk about deeply personal and sexual issues.

A veritable cornucopia of innuendo, psychological suggestion, statements that assume arguments/conditions that have not been so much as shown to be plausible, barely veiled ulterior agendas/interests (feminist ideological concerns, in this case, among others), assumption of guilt by nothing more than association with a charge (Nibley), and the promise of lurid scandal within the context of a yet to be plausibly demonstrated "problem" within the LDS church regarding sexual abuse.

All on the next Oprah...

[_Buffalo]

Droopy would make an excellent Catholic Cardinal.

[_harmony]

Lawsuits are not settled out of court or with silence orders in order to spare the church some bad publicity. Lawsuits are settled or with gag orders so that the money is protected.

Follow the money, folks. The church will do just about anything to keep the courts out of the bank accounts.