New Mormonism is just like old Mormonism

[_Sanctorian]

One thing is clear over the past few days, new Mormonism (Or Makmonism as I think one poster coined) is hardly different than old Mormonism. Sure they want to distance themselves from foundational truth claims as they can see the writing on the wall that it's clearly man made fraud and indefensible, but they can't bleach the crap stain it left behind.

But aside from the obvious issues of its checkered past, this new Mormonism carries over something much more damaging to its members. The "we are right and you are wrong" rhetoric in trying to force society into accepting their worldview definition. Mormonism has always been a fringe religion looked at by society as only one rung above Scientology on the crazy ladder. No matter how hard Mak tries to tell everyone "these are the rules and this is the definition", society will always know Mormonism was started by a polygamist conman.

And so new Mormonism has the same challenges of old Mormonism. Society doesn't play by Mormonism's rules nor will it ever accept Mormonism's definition. Members will always have to take a defensive position we've witnessed the past couple of days.

Mormonism has always tried to tell everyone how to think, how to act, how to be, but, it will never own society and will always lose. So for Mak, LDSfaqs, DCP and anyone else that wants to force society to accept any version of Mormonism, I leave you the words of a true prophet by the name of Eddie Vedder:

I seen the home inside your head,...
All locked doors and unmade beds.
Open sores unattended
Let me say just once that

I have faced it,... A life wasted,...
I'm never going back again.

I escaped it,... A life wasted,...
I'm never going back again.

Having tasted,... A life wasted,...
I'm never going back again.

The world awaits just up the stairs
Leave the pain for someone else.

[Guest]

Well, I'm not sure who Mr. Mak is trying to convince. I wonder if he put in half the time and effort at work or with his peers and family that he spends here implementing his Nu-Mormonism how that would pan out for him? I kinda hopes he treads lightly in real life. He's on a good trajectory, and it'd be a shame if some old school types put him in the crosshairs.

- Doc

[_SteelHead]

Old Mormonism - obey and pay
New Mormonism - obey, pay, and ignore the man behind the curtain.

Any questions?

[_Quasimodo]

Well, I'm not sure who Mr. Mak is trying to convince. I wonder if he put in half the time and effort at work or with his peers and family that he spends here implementing his Nu-Mormonism how that would pan out for him? I kinda hopes he treads livhtly in real life. He's on a good trajectory, and it'd be a shame if some old school types put him in the crosshairs.

- Doc

He may have a good idea. He might want to find a better spokesperson for it.

[_Lloyd Dobler]

For all the progress new Mormonism supporters say the church has made..............well, I went on my mission in 1990 and I at least had a year or some space and time before I went on the mish. Now, 25 years later, boys get their mission calls while they are minors and under the social, emotional and economic control of their parents and bishop. 25 years later and all the church has done is tighten the screws. The church is a tbm people factory. Kids and youth all do the same thing, learn the same thing at the same ages pretty much until they are RMs and temple married kids with kids. This is the purpose of the Church. Mak may tell us that how we remember the sausage being made is not how it is made today.........but the Church is still making the same sausage. He's still stuck with the one true church doctrine, the exclusive truth doctrine, the mess that is the literal belief in a living prophet and a historical Book of Mormon. As long as those are in place, the Church is still making the same sausage. Honestly, as long as the programs and the supervision remain as they are, which is pretty much exactly as it was when I went through the people factory in the late 80s..........there really is no new Mormonism. The Mount Rushmore of New Mormonism (Mak, Givens, Bradley, Wortherspoon) et al. can talk as big a game as they want, they can dismiss guys like us as much as they want........it does not change the beliefs and programs that keep the the factory floor bumpin. After all, the most important thing the church needs from their members is to support the production of future temple married kids who will report to work at the chapel or whatever ward boundary they land in. Does Mak really think the Church is interested in producing independent minded members who are not that into the one true church paradigm? Does the great Mak (said with admiration) really think the church wants a bunch of mini Dan Wortherspoons (again, who is a kind and wonderful person) running around? What decade is that supposed to happen? 2045?

What does it matter if I think the prophet only speaks administratively for the Church when the reality is my kid is going to class learning that today's prophets and apostles literally represent God's one true church here on earth? What is the point if Adam MIller is the priest quorum adviser when he still has to teach the same crap out of the same manuals and get the boys to mission preparation when they are 16 and 17 and support/recommend them going on a mission when they are 18? All the kids wind up going down the same funnel anyway. Sure Mak and MIller are so smart that they can likely get their bishop on board with a little nuance and French philosophy or whatever but.............how is that supposed to play out for the kid? How is that drop in the jello belt bucket supposed to grow organically into this movement for new postmodern Mormonism?

Mak is the crap. I respect anybody that tries to make the stupid church better. I did, I tried to get local pilot programs going with my SP for a couple years. God forbid, youth programs based out of service instead of rah rah rah restoration! Didn't work.............and I just wanted kids to go out and help people. Personally, he could take the Mount Rushmore of new Mormonism boys into the church office building and in a year they could make the church way healthier, way better, way less toxic and soul crushing. But the Church won't let them do it. So what if they are not marching on temple square or doing podcasts. They are never going to get a seat at the table in any meaningful way...........are they?

[_Tobin]

Lloyd Dobler,

The LDS Church is not Mormonism. As maklelan rightly points out, they alone don't define what Mormonism really is. Now, they do represent and publish a version of Mormonism. And obviously that version of Mormonism isn't tenable. It really doesn't take much thought to realize why that is the case.

What you and others are calling New Mormonism isn't really all that new. Mormonism is based on some rather extraordinary claims. One of those is that man can speak with god-like beings. Now, if you believe that is possible (or have done it yourself), then you are Mormon. The version of Mormonism the LDS Church pushes is that only certain individuals may do so and that they speak for these god-like beings. However, I don't really think that is a true representation of Mormonism since we are all supposedly God's children and should equally be entitled to speak with such beings and learn the truth for ourselves.

[_Res Ipsa]

Old Mormonism - obey and pay
New Mormonism - obey, pay, and ignore the man behind the curtain.

Any questions?

Not from me. I think this thread illustrates what Mak has been talking about quite nicely.

[_lostindc]

Old Mormonism - obey and pay
New Mormonism - obey, pay, and ignore the man behind the curtain.

Any questions?

Not from me. I think this thread illustrates what Mak has been talking about quite nicely.

And that is...?

[_Doctor CamNC4Me]

Not from me. I think this thread illustrates what Mak has been talking about quite nicely.

Please provide specifics because I'm not sure what his New Mormonism entails, and his emic/etic gambit is kind of shifting when people try to pin him down.

- Doc

[_Res Ipsa]

Not from me. I think this thread illustrates what Mak has been talking about quite nicely.

Please provide specifics because I'm not sure what his New Mormonism entails, and his emic/etic gambit is kind of shifting when people try to pin him down.

- Doc

And that is...?

I'm not sure what you mean by "his New Mormonism." I haven't seen Mak promoting or creating or talking about a "New Mormonism." The only "New Mormonism" I've seen in these threads has been created and defined by non-LDS critics of Mormonism.

When I read back through what Mak has said in various threads over the last several days, I see an extended argument in the form of an objection to a process he sees in this forum (and elsewhere I'm sure). The process he objects to members of a group appropriating the authority to define what it is to be a member of an outgroup that the group is hostile toward and then defining the outgroup by reducing it to a set of simple characteristics for the purpose of ridiculing the outgroup members. Ironically, that is just what some non-LDS critics on this board have done with "New Mormonism." The critics created the group, which it labeled "New", defined what it meant, assigned it motives, declared it wasn't really "New," then reduced their own created and defined group down to "obey, pay, and ignore the man behind the curtain."

Stepping back and trying to look at the process from a little difference, the notion of letting critics define a "New Mormonism" makes about as much sense as letting LDSfaqs define "liberalism."

That's what I meant.