What Would You Do?

[_EAllusion]

I never took "gunfight" to imply evenly an matched battle. If anything, the term sticks in my mind as an unevenly matched battle due to images from Westerns where a few people are pinned down in a battle against a larger force. What an odd, odd complaint.

[_Some Schmo]

I'm noticing an interesting pattern with mak, which is that there is only one version of history worth acknowledging, and it's the one with which he's most comfortable.

I always find it kind of funny/sad when people are so confident in what they think history is because they happened to have read some things on it. When I think about the fact that we don't even know the truth about occurrences in our own time due to news media slant, it seems incredibly hubristic to think anyone's got a handle on exactly what happened 200 years ago.

Agreed upon, documented facts are one thing. Intentions and motivations are quite another. If people think they're doing anything other than speculating about what Joe Smith thought or what motivated him, they're living in a fantasy land.

[_Yoda]

I don't think that Joseph having a gun to protect himself, and perhaps protect his brother and friends who were imprisoned with him, makes him any less of a martyr.

What Schmo says about speculation is true. We don't know what was going through the prophet's mind at that moment. Nor will we, in this lifetime.

The fact remains that he was attacked and killed by a mob while he was in prison. Let's just say that the odds were stacked way against his likelihood of survival, and it's probable that he was aware of it.

[_RockSlider]

I don't think that Joseph having a gun to protect himself, and perhaps protect his brother and friends who were imprisoned with him, makes him any less of a martyr.
What Schmo says about speculation is true. We don't know what was going through the prophet's mind at that moment. Nor will we, in this lifetime.
The fact remains that he was attacked and killed by a mob while he was in prison. Let's just say that the odds were stacked way against his likelihood of survival, and it's probable that he was aware of it.

The martyr definition does not bother me. The more interesting question might be what develops so much anger in a group of people to a point they are willing to commit murder/wound several people.

I think we tend to want to also relate martyrdom to a worthy and/or good cause. I assume it’s fair to say Joseph Smith was a martyr for the cause of polygamy (it’s fair to say that is what he was killed over correct?). I suppose this is subjective subject (martyr or vigilante act caused by gross violation). I could see myself wanting and possibly doing the same if someone married my wife/daughter under the same circumstances, and I sure would not be calling it a martyrdom.

More “Free pass” doctrine if you ask me.

[_maklelan]

Maklelan, that's not entirely fair. We have a few versions of what happened that day but we don't really know 'exactly' what occurred surely? zz's is one interpretation perhaps overstated simply because the fact that Joseph had a gun and used it is often understated or even ignored by active Mormons, something which is just as dishonest surely?

I don't know any Mormons who don't know about that, but they would be rather naïve if they didn't. However, firing a few shots from behind a door to defend a room full of innocent people from a mob of almost 200 men with faces painted black does not constitute participation in a "gunfight" in the manner zz is implying. He is trying to color the situation away from the way it actually happened and toward a perspective that sees Smith as more complicit and willing a participant. It's shameful and dishonest, and that's not really open for debate, as far as the facts are concerned.

Martyr's don't tend to go out shooting... I don't mean that to be unkind to Joseph.
Mary

Joseph didn't go out shooting. Joseph had thrown the gun to the ground well before being shot. The mob shot an unarmed man several times with rifles and handguns, even after he was already dead.

[_maklelan]

I'm noticing an interesting pattern with mak, which is that there is only one version of history worth acknowledging, and it's the one with which he's most comfortable.

Or the accurate one. I know this history far better than you ever will, so stop wasting my time with your made up history.

I always find it kind of funny/sad when people are so confident in what they think history is because they happened to have read some things on it.

It's better than history that is simply made up.

When I think about the fact that we don't even know the truth about occurrences in our own time due to news media slant, it seems incredibly hubristic to think anyone's got a handle on exactly what happened 200 years ago.

And yet you've got a better grasp than me on what happened without ever having to crack a book? Are you seriously trying to assert that?

Agreed upon, documented facts are one thing. Intentions and motivations are quite another. If people think they're doing anything other than speculating about what Joe Smith thought or what motivated him, they're living in a fantasy land.

What a joke. You're more than happy to make absolute statements about the intentions and beliefs of everyone in Mormondom from Joseph Smith down to President Monson. You're a terrible liar, and yet you keep trying to do it. Here are some examples:

The mother lie of them all:

"I know the church is true."

Sometimes, I imagine (of course, this is pure speculation; I'm not stating it as fact, not trying to suggest I know this for sure, and am only basing it on my subjective experience with reading various apologists on this board - thought I better make that clear in case someone wanted "evidence") that it's got to be tough and frustrating for the apologists when the deck is so highly stacked against them. I suppose I'd probably get angry and start acting the way they do if I were fighting an impossible battle too, especially if I couldn't admit to myself that it was a lost cause.

At what point do they just say to themselves, "All this intellectual dishonesty isn't worth it any more" and stop making crazy arguments? I suspect their resistance is due to comfort, and perhaps to a greater extent, ego. Some people just can't admit to themselves they're wrong (even though it's part of learning and being human).

It's sad, really.

The fact is, sometimes people find themselves in situations (of their own making) where they're damned if they do and damned if they don't. When confronted with a dilemma, people choose what they think is the lesser of two evils. I imagine he knew he’d die soon no matter what he did. How long would he last as a fugitive? At least if he held on to the ruse, it might protect his family, church, and reputation.

If you don't think that holds water, that's up to you. Seems pretty obvious to me.

It's just so amusing to me the pretzel logic a religious person must employ to make all the wacky, illogical crap they believe work. It just goes to show that comfort is way more important to most people than the truth is (although I wonder how many people would be relieved and comforted if only they realized they didn't have to believe a bunch of intellectually dishonest rubbish).

I suspect the truth is that you’re a frightened, insecure little boy hiding in a misogynistic, deluded adult’s body, but I’ll resist declaring that as fact, despite the abundance of evidence favoring that conclusion.

You're a phenomenal hypocrite, dude. I don't know why you think I would ever take you seriously.

[_maklelan]

What Schmo says about speculation is true. We don't know what was going through the prophet's mind at that moment. Nor will we, in this lifetime.

No, we won't, but that doesn't mean that his uninformed and bigoted speculation is more logical than a far more educated conclusion.

[_maklelan]

I think we tend to want to also relate martyrdom to a worthy and/or good cause. I assume it’s fair to say Joseph Smith was a martyr for the cause of polygamy (it’s fair to say that is what he was killed over correct?).

Moreso fear of his political clout and his control of a growing Mormon population.

I suppose this is subjective subject (martyr or vigilante act caused by gross violation). I could see myself wanting and possibly doing the same if someone married my wife/daughter under the same circumstances, and I sure would not be calling it a martyrdom.

More “Free pass” doctrine if you ask me.

Do you think it's intentionally misleading to state simply that Joseph Smith "was killed in a gunfight"?

[_wenglund]

Would the critics here think it accurate to describe Mountain Meadows as a "gunfight"? How about Waco, Rubby Ridge, Valentine's Day Massacre, etc.?

I am just testing for consistency here.

Thanks, -Wade Englund-

[_maklelan]

Maklelan:

Would you prefer the term "gun battle?"

Don't patronize me Shades. I'd prefer an accurate statement. He randomly fired a few rounds off of a gun from behind a door to keep a charging mob of almost 200 men with their faces painted black from him and several innocent bystanders inside a jail cell. He threw the gun to the floor and was shot several times trying to escape out a window. He was then shot repeatedly after he was dead. One of the innocent bystanders was killed and others injured. Trying to denote something less than perfectly innocent self-defense is reprehensible no matter who it is. Don't pretend your vernacular is anything other than just that.