Dan Peterson breaks Church Rules in pursuit of Mopologetics

[_Darth J]

Is that within the scope of a bishop's job presiding over his ward?

Where can I confirm that it is part of a bishop's job to undertake his own anonymous investigation of such a claim, rather than reporting it to the Church?

Liz, if a bishop is entitled to access confidential member records to investigate anyone who claims to be a bishop, irrespective of any priesthood authority over that person, how is the bishop not entitled to investigate any member of the Church anywhere? And exactly why would the LDS Church impose its own standard of confidentiality, and impose a legal, revocable license agreement for access to that data, if it is perfectly fine for LDS bishops to be de facto ecclesiastical vigilantes?

As a side note, as much as I appreciate your Freudian slip, Everybody Wang Chung was making a mockery of Daniel Peterson, not "the Church." You have made it very clear that the distinction is very unclear for you, but I wanted to point it out nonetheless.

I'm not sure you are sincere in your questions or if you are just hassling Liz, but I'm going to try again.

NO confidential records were accessed. Member records are not what Dan's friend viewed. He viewed a directory of presently serving Bishops which is only accessible to Bishops. Member records cannot be viewed by other Bishops--EWC or those four men were not in danger of anyone looking at their confidential church membership records.


Any Bishop who is concerned about a person who may be lying publicly on message boards, claiming to be a Bishop, but acting in a way that would be inappropriate for a Bishop and possibly misleading people, would be within his rights to check it out. He owes it to the church to look out for its well-being.


Now Darth, I've explained it clearly so if you keep going on about private confidential membership records being accessed by Dan's friend, I'm going to assume you aren't really interested in the truth and your just trying to fan flames against Dan.

Good, for you, Anonymous Coward! Meanwhile, here is what this bishop was bound by when the LDS Church gave him access to that database, which is only accessible to bishops:

You may view, download, and print material from this site only for your personal, noncommercial use directly related to your work for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (whether as a volunteer, as part of a Church calling, or as a paid employee of an affiliated legal entity).

Tell me where I can verify that according to the LDS Church---not you, the Church---the bishop of a ward is responsible for policing everyone, everywhere who claims to be a bishop and/or acts in a way that the bishop feels is inconsistent with proper LDS behavior.

[_Mayan Elephant]

Feel free to lead the way there at MDDB MrKnowitsome, we, who are banned from there would love to follow the results.

yes. i too am banned and I have exceeded the 10 pages of views that they so generously allow someone who is not logged in. what a joke. they are certainly not ashamed of their fragileness over there. in fact, they flaunt it.

[_Darth J]

Ah, ah ah! I love to count Liz's stories, ah, ah, ah!

5. In the meantime, though, Everybody Wang Chung continues to post comments on the message board that seem radically incongruous with being a faithful member of the Church, let alone a currently-serving bishop. Many of them are extremely insulting toward Peterson. He is also reputed to have sent some extraordinarily abusive and crude emails to one or two people who are friendly to Peterson. Some of his posts actually trade on his alleged status as a currently serving bishop: On several occasions, for example, he declares Peterson worthy of Church disciplinary action. On others, he publicly apologizes to the world on behalf of the Church for Peterson’s evil deeds, viciousness, and dishonesty.

6. Watching these things, and hearing about them, Peterson reflects upon those who toured Israel with him in April/May 2012. He and his wife conclude that such behavior plausibly fits nobody on the tour, and that Everybody Wang Chung’s claim to have accompanied them to Israel must be a lie.

.........

Based on the circumstances that Dan listed above, I think that his friend felt justified in looking at the database, and felt it fell under the guidelines of Church use. After all, Dan is a member of the Church, a former bishop, a BYU Professor, and a volunteer apologist.

viewtopic.php?f=1&t=28812&start=42

"To satisfy Peterson's idle curiosity!"

One! One story, ah, ah, ah!

there was sufficient cause for Dan to feel threatened. After all, Dan and his wife had both spent significant time with the folks on that tour. If Everybody Wang Chung, as a serving bishop, was actually in a position to stalk Dan, or significantly have the upper-hand in knowing quite a bit more about him than Dan knows about Everybody Wang Chung, then yes, I can see where Dan's bishop friend would feel that falls under the guise of Church business. viewtopic.php?f=1&t=28812&start=42

"Because Peterson and his wife felt personally threatened!"

Two! Two stories, ah, ah, ah!

As a bishop, if Dan's friend was made aware that a member if the Church had been misrepresenting himself as a bishop on a public forum, and in so doing was making a mockery of that sacred office, that bishop may have very well felt justified in looking up some information in a database he has full rights to access to look into this. viewtopic.php?f=1&t=28800&start=483

"Because lying about being a bishop defiles the sacred office of Peterson's bishop friend, which takes it for granted that Everybody Wang Chung was lying, which negates the reason to see if he was lying!"

Three! Three stories, ah, ah, ah!

No, because I am not a bishop, and I am not "apologizing on behalf of the Church" for various things in a public forum.

I have never, in my comments on this board, claimed that I was representing the Church in any way. viewtopic.php?f=1&t=28800&start=504

"Because someone was claiming to speak on behalf of the LDS Church!"

Four! Four stories, ah, ah, ah!

When a bishop is called, he is permitted to use his judgment as to what dies and does not constitute Church business. viewtopic.php?f=1&t=28800&start=525

"Because bishops can do whatever they want!"

Five! Five stories, ah, ah, ah!

Oh, dear. It seems that your reading comprehension is slipping. I said that bishops were allowed to use Church records to report conduct of other bishops. viewtopic.php?f=1&t=28800&start=525

"Because bishops have jurisdiction over each other, which assumes Everybody Wang Chung really is a bishop, which negates the reason of checking to see if he really is a bishop!"

Six! Six stories, ah, ah, ah!

[_Darth J]

Any Bishop who is concerned about a person who may be lying publicly on message boards, claiming to be a Bishop, but acting in a way that would be inappropriate for a Bishop and possibly misleading people, would be within his rights to check it out. He owes it to the church to look out for its well-being.

For our viewers at home:

Alter Idem, who is one of those anonymous internet cowards Daniel Peterson has warned us about, makes the above assertion. Bishops in the LDS Church only have ecclesiastical jurisdiction over their own wards. For all Alter Idem knows, Everybody Wang Chung not only might not be a bishop, he might not even be a member of the LDS Church. And Alter Idem proudly proclaims that an LDS bishop who has no ecclesiastical authority over this person is entitled to do detective work to smoke him out, for the good of the Church. That is, you don't need church authority over someone, nor to even know for certain who that person is, to have a duty to the Church to smoke that person out if you don't approve of his or her online behavior.

By this reasoning, any member of the LDS Church is perfectly justified in trying to track down anyone, anywhere.

I would like to pause for a moment to stress most vehemently that we're not a cult!

[_Kishkumen]

I can't get over the persistent question Daniel's defenders have posed about our relative feelings of moral outrage concerning Everybody Wang Chung's alleged "lies" and Daniel Peterson's self-professed detective work using his bishop friend's access to Church records to smoke out the identity of Everybody Wang Chung. "Why," they ask, "don't you feel as angry with Everybody Wang Chung for lying to you?"

Let me try to help out these good folks who have posed this question.

Everybody Wang Chung case:
Anonynous poster I don't know from Adam claims to be a bishop, says snarky things, and baits DCP. He tells us that he is going on a tour of the Holy Land with DCP and he will report on it to us. Never, that I recall, did he say that he was going to torture DCP or make fun of him. After the tour is over, Everybody Wang Chung does not follow through on his promise to report.

So, how does Everybody Wang Chung's failure to report on his trip affect my life one iota?

Daniel Peterson:
BYU professor, leading LDS apologist, and former bishop Daniel Peterson tells us that he has used confidential Church records with restricted access through his bishop friend to smoke out the identity of an anonymous MDB poster.

How do DCP's actions affect me?

DCP's actions have implications for every person who posts anonymously and disagrees significantly with the LDS apologists of Daniel's circle. We know that these apologists collect intelligence on people and use it to conduct online battle with them. Cross the apologists and they will threaten you with your in real life information. We know that some apologists in this circle have contacted employers and school administrators in attempts to interfere with critics' employment or education. They have also written or published lengthy smears on critics of their brand of apologetics.

Conclusion:
This is my view of why the outrage against Everybody Wang Chung is minimal--("Hey, that guy may have punked me, but I don't know for sure!")--versus our concern that DCP has coaxed a bishop friend into violating the terms of agreement to investigate an MDB poster--("Hey that guy is a leading apologist who publishes unkind things on people that lots of his fans gobble up; if he knows who I am one of his friends might contact my employer or bishop. He may even write about me on his patheos blog! Worst of all, if he does this, what other abuses routinely happen that could impact me, my family, and my friends!")

[_Bazooka]

Alter,

What is your view on the potential breach of trust between the tour company/leaders and their customers?
What I mean is, putting Everybody Wang Chung to one side for a moment, do the customers on that tour realise that they have had their Church records checked by someone who has no ecclesiastical authority or jurisdiction over them, simply because they happened to be on that tour and might be people who post things on a message board?

I see no problem with 'breach of trust' between the tour co. and their customers. There is no understanding that a person signed up to go on a tour won't be 'checked on' in some way by those involved in the tour.

You're joking, right?

[_beastie]

one person's tattletale is another's whistleblower.

I don't expect you to understand but, impersonating Bishops isn't something to laugh off.

This reminds me of something I thought about on another thread recently:


viewtopic.php?p=696175#p696175

On this thread, I referred to Jonathan Haidt, and linked to his website wherein he gives a summary of some of his ideas. I'll requote it here:

So here's my definition of morality, which gives each side a chance to make its case:

Moral systems are interlocking sets of values, practices, institutions, and evolved psychological mechanisms that work together to suppress or regulate selfishness and make social life possible.

In my research I have found that there are two common ways that cultures suppress and regulate selfishness, two visions of what society is and how it ought to work. I'll call them the contractual approach and the beehive approach.

The contractual approach takes the individual as the fundamental unit of value. The fundamental problem of social life is that individuals often hurt each other, and so we create implicit social contracts and explicit laws to foster a fair, free, and safe society in which individuals can pursue their interests and develop themselves and their relationships as they choose.

Morality is about happiness and suffering (as Harris says, and as John Stuart Mill said before him), and so contractualists are endlessly trying to fine-tune laws, reinvent institutions, and extend new rights as circumstances change in order to maximize happiness and minimize suffering. To build a contractual morality, all you need are the two individualizing foundations: harm/care, and fairness/reciprocity. The other three foundations, and any religion that builds on them, run afoul of the prime directive: let people make their own choices, as long as they harm nobody else.

The beehive approach, in contrast, takes the group and its territory as fundamental sources of value. Individual bees are born and die by the thousands, but the hive lives for a long time, and each individual has a role to play in fostering its success.The two fundamental problems of social life are attacks from outside and subversion from within. Either one can lead to the death of the hive, so all must pull together, do their duty, and be willing to make sacrifices for the group. Bees don't have to learn how to behave in this way but human children do, and this is why cultural conservatives are so heavily focused on what happens in schools, families, and the media.

Conservatives generally have a more pessimistic view of human nature than do liberals. They are more likely to believe that if you stand back and give kids space to grow as they please, they'll grow into shallow, self-centered, undisciplined pleasure seekers. Cultural conservatives work hard to cultivate moral virtues based on the three binding foundations: ingroup/loyalty, authority/respect, and purity/sanctity, as well as on the universally employed foundations of harm/care and fairness/reciprocity. The beehive ideal is not a world of maximum freedom, it is a world of order and tradition in which people are united by a shared moral code that is effectively enforced, which enables people to trust each other to play their interdependent roles. It is a world of very high social capital and low anomie.

http://www.edge.org/3rd_culture/haidt07 ... index.html

Mormonism is very much based on the beehive approach. (wonderful that Brigham was insightful enough to recognize that) The rights of the individual to privacy, to retain anonymity when criticizing a powerful institution, are just less significant than maintaining the purity of the hive.

You say I won't understand it, and I don't - at least not with my heart. At my heart I'm part of the contractual mindset, so the invasion of privacy that the LDS church so regularly engages in feels improper to me, and, at times, even immoral. But I understand that people who are of the beehive mindset have a totally different view.

[_beastie]

Daniel Peterson:
BYU professor, leading LDS apologist, and former bishop Daniel Peterson tells us that he has used confidential Church records with restricted access through his bishop friend to smoke out the identity of an anonymous MDB poster.

How do DCP's actions affect me?

DCP's actions have implications for every person who posts anonymously and disagrees significantly with the LDS apologists of Daniel's circle. We know that these apologists collect intelligence on people and use it to conduct online battle with them. Cross the apologists and they will threaten you with your in real life information. We know that some apologists in this circle have contacted employers and school administrators in attempts to interfere with critics' employment or education. They have also written or published lengthy smears on critics of their brand of apologetics.

Conclusion:
This is my view of why the outrage against Everybody Wang Chung is minimal--("Hey, that guy may have punked me, but I don't know for sure!")--versus our concern that DCP has coaxed a bishop friend into violating the terms of agreement to investigate an MDB poster--("Hey that guy is a leading apologist who publishes unkind things on people that lots of his fans gobble up; if he knows who I am one of his friends might contact my employer or bishop. He may even write about me on his patheos blog! Worst of all, if he does this, what other abuses routinely happen that could impact me, my family, and my friends!")

QFT

This is one of the most persistent themes in interactions between believing Mormons and exmormons. There is so often the threat of revelation lurking behind the scenes, or sometimes quite openly asserted. The problem with this is that the Mormon church has so successfully created a meme about evil apostates, that to even be revealed as someone with serious doubts and criticisms can create real and serious threats to family relations, social relations, and even employment at times. LDS just do not seem to see a problem with this. (see: beehive)

[_beastie]

And, by the way, if this was all a troll on the part of Wang, it's the most successful troll ever. DCP took the bait hook, line, and sinker. Indeed, some of us think he sank quite low.

[_Ceeboo]

Hey beastie!

LDS just do not seem to see a problem with this.

I can't imagine that this is true!

But..........maybe?


Peace,
Ceeboo