14 Years - have delivered what?

[Equality]

In all seriousness, I'm asking for the, say, top 3 achievements that Interpreter has delivered (excluding volume as an achievement because it really isn't one).

It's also fun to ask TBMs something along the lines of "in your view, what are the top 3 prophecies or revelations that (e.g.,) Thomas S. Monson gave to the church and the world? They never really have an answer.

[I Have Questions]

In all seriousness, I'm asking for the, say, top 3 achievements that Interpreter has delivered (excluding volume as an achievement because it really isn't one).

It's also fun to ask TBMs something along the lines of "in your view, what are the top 3 prophecies or revelations that (e.g.,) Thomas S. Monson gave to the church and the world? They never really have an answer.

Exactly. Were anyone to attempt an answer to my question, the response would be an ambiguous "we've produced a lot of stuff" (which is pretty much all Kishkumen could muster on their behalf upthread).

[Gadianton]

but it would be really nice to have supportive friends of that kind. The possibility may feel a little more tangible to me because I was not that far from being in that club at one point in my life.

I found this post very interesting, Reverend. You were on the right track academically such that you may well have made it into the inner circle. It doesn't hurt that you're white and male also. I think we must be careful how we speak about "the club," however. Where was all that support for Dr. Morgan recently? Also, back on Z, I was struck by just how much the club leader interacted with people as a "one-way street" authoritarian style. I think there is only a partial truth here, very few apologists are so tightly knitted that they really are as supported as you say. A few seem to be, perhaps Bill and Will and Gee but I don't see any of the commenters on "the blog" as getting any favors. But there is a personality style that is fine being "ruled over" and treated like crap. Given your achievements and several factors even the time period in question, I think you could have been part of the inner circle, and that may have come with the kind of friendship you imagine, but I think you'd have been the exception not the rule.

And, I still don't think that "friendship" would have been for free. I think there would have been expectations for you to signal your loyalty to the group by stunts, public denouncements of enemies to the group, and backing up members even when they are obviously in the wrong.

There is a "gang" aspect perhaps to this kind of group and quite honestly, I don't think you would have lasted very long because I don't think you could ever have mustered the cruelty towards others that the course would eventually require.

[Marcus]

My parents separated in the late 1970s. They were the first couple in our branch to separate, but it happened in the midst of a rise in feminist sentiment in our area. In retrospect, I believe that my family was riding a wave that was happening all around us. I am not saying my parents were particularly happy or well suited for each other, but they were not so unhappy that you would assume that they were doomed to split...

A wave of feminism split up your parents?

[simon southerton]

Without the Interpreter's brilliant Bayesian analysis we couldn't possibly have known that:

the likelihood that the Book of Mormon is the result of guesswork is ... less than about one in a hundred billion, billion, billion, billion, billion, billion.