The soul FARMS saves may not be...

[_Kishkumen]

Color this person unimpressed, to put it mildly:

Just honestly can't think of a less respectable occupation.

[_Kishkumen]

The law of unintended consequences continues to be proved by the evidence:

Without F.A.I.R. I may have kept my membership for many more years. So in a way, I'm thankful that by acknowledging the existence of problematic issues while simultaneously offering explanations that are rarely better than ridiculous, F.A.I.R. pushed me towards an earlier, delicious freedom.

[_Kishkumen]

The paper gets some lashing as well:

I mourn for the Deseret News. Once a fine news organization. Now a big ward newsletter.

[_Kishkumen]

Another (familiar) person who flew too close to the sun of Mopologia:

I'm another example of a FAIRite who lost his faith after engaging in apologetics. I seriously think I'd probably still be in the Church if I had never engaged in apologetics.

[_Chap]

Have I missed something?

Kishkumen has been asked twice where he is getting these quotes from, but he is not answering. From what I have seen of Kishkumen I do not doubt that these quotes are from real people, but where is he getting them from?

Is there some reason why he won't address this obvious question? Is he perhaps getting them from some list that would shut him out if he revealed he was re-posting? Or did he get them from Deseret News before the comments were removed? If the latter, why not say so?

[_Kishkumen]

The source remains undisclosed to protect the identities of the authors.

[_Chap]

The source remains undisclosed to protect the identities of the authors.

I thought it must be something like that. I notice that Google does not locate quotations from the messages you have cited.

May I ask whether you consider it likely that DCP would have seen these comments if you had not reposted them here? I hope you can answer that question without compromising security!

[_Kishkumen]

May I ask whether you consider it likely that DCP would have seen these comments if you had not reposted them here? I hope you can answer that question without compromising security!

I don't know to be honest. I imagine the FAIR folk who stalk the cyber-landscape looking to sniff out internal enemies have probably read them already.

So, maybe he has. I didn't post them for his benefit, however. I posted it to document the reactions of many individual LDS folks to both his published comments in the DN article, and apologetics in general.

It seems that a number of people consider themselves casualties of apologetic unkindness, and they recognize more of the same in Peterson's article.

[_beastie]

These comments do a good job demonstrating why DCP is such a controversial and often divisive poster on boards. He often seems bemused or confused about why he is such a target, and seems to imply that he is a target due solely to the flaws of his attackers - sometimes serious psychological flaws. But the truth is that he presents himself as a high-tier apologist who, at least in the past before he developed his creative manner of responding to critics without allowing them a response in return via his blog, was quite a voluminous poster. It is natural that sincere members who are struggling with issues look to him for a sort of interaction/response that will help them resolve these issues. But often DCP refuses to engage in the substance of these issues, and instead just refers them to his FARMS material - material that often leaves the questioner dissatisfied. Then he spends a lot of time sniping with his personal critics. This, in combination with the natural absence of truly satisfactory answers to some of these dilemmas, creates tension in those questioning members, and they get angry at him. Combine this with the tendency of online defenders of the faith to assume the worst about the motives of anyone who brings up troubling issues, and you have a mess on your hands.

[_Chap]

... [DCP's] creative manner of responding to critics without allowing them a response in return via his blog ...

Yes, I agree that his blog was a stroke of genius.

To make it even sweeter, when you look at his blog page there is no explicit indication that it is completely impossible to sign on to leave comments. The impression is therefore given that DCP's posts are so unanswerable that no critic dares to even attempt a response.

I see DCP has is moving his blog to a new site. I wonder if comments will be allowed there? Somehow I doubt it.