47: When Worldviews Go Haywire: Breivik, Jeffs, and the Religion/Mental Health Matrix

August 16, 2011
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The recent tragedy in Oslo and the Warren Jeffs trial provide two recent examples that remind us of the way various personality traits and/or mental issues coupled with isolation and the refusal to allow one’s own ideas to be challenged can lead to horrific acts of violence and depravity that the perpetrators claim to view as righteous. In this podcast, Mormon Matters host Dan Wotherspoon and panelists Joanna Brooks and Natasha Helfer Parker examine various angles into how distorted worldviews like these take hold, the influence of nature and nurture (including religious factors), as well as some of the things we might learn from such extreme visions about how to achieve balance in our own ways of seeing the world and our place within it.

We hope that after listening you’ll contribute to a great discussion in the comments section below!

47: When Worldviews Go Haywire: Breivik, Jeffs, and the Religion/Mental Health Matrix [ 1:08:55 ] Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

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  • http://latterdaymainstreet.com/ Chino_Blanco

    Listened to this on the way into work this morning.  Impressive as always.  I just wish there was a way to get some of the insights I heard to trickle down to where my people live.  You know, the LDS uncles who pull up their Arizona stakes and move their families and their gun collections to Idaho in preparation for some conflagration or other.  On some level, I wonder if securely middle-class Mormons these days understand just how other strata can be a lot less uncomfortable with the idea of death as an acceptable outcome, e.g., daughters encouraged to think dying beats other outcomes or dads who love their dead gay sons.  Living with these kinds of folks makes for interesting email forwards and prompts posts like Enough with the Emails from Mormon McVeigh Wannabes.        

  • Drew

     I really enjoyed this podcast.  I would have liked to have heard more about individuals and behaviors that fall within the accepted spectrum of believe but are still have unacceptable behavior.  What I mean is we all agree that Jeffs and Breivik are outliers who did horrible things.  But what about those use religion to treat others poorly.  It is too easy to look at Jeffs and Breivik’s behavior and write them off as crazy and yet it is somewhat common place to disown family members over religious beliefs, sexual orientation  or for getting pregnant out of wedlock.   Dan you are right that those with mental illness can use religion to do horrific things but so can the rest of us as well.

    • Dan Wotherspoon

      Thanks, Drew. Agree that many of us do a lot of hurtful things out of our worldviews even when they aren’t quite as extreme as Breivik and Jeffs. We definitely tried to make those points a few times–I’m thinking especially of a part or two when Natasha talks about aberrations versus extremes and definitely moves into ways we harm each other (one part in the middle of the cast, I think, and another toward the end), including mentioning the homosexuality issue that you raise above–but this is definitely something we could have hit harder. Thanks for raising attention to it here!

  • Kash

    Thanks for the podcast!  Well done and thanks Joanna for the background you researched.  That added a lot to the discussion.  Good for all of us to remember to reach out and be a part of a balanced community.  Or as Ice Cube says, “You better check yo self before you wreck yo self”

  • Mz.Liz

    Excellent job!  What a good conversation from some very bright people!

  • Colorado City-ite

    Truth, covenants, and ordinances enable us to overcome fear and face the future with faith!Russell M. Nelson April 2011 Conference”Teach of faith to keep all the commandments of God, knowing that they are given to bless His children and bring them joy.4 Warn them that they will encounter people who pick which commandments they will keep and ignore others that they choose to break. I call this the cafeteria approach to obedience. This practice of picking and choosing will not work. It will lead to misery. To prepare to meet God, one keeps all of His commandments. It takes faith to obey them, and keeping His commandments will strengthen that faith.”Do you really not want to keep all the commandments?Here is the link to the rest of the “Cafeteria Mormon” talk.  I thought it was somehow taken a little out of context.  http://lds.org/general-conference/2011/04/face-the-future-with-faith?lang=eng&query=cafeteriaThanks for a fine thought provoking pod-cast that really resonates with those of us that live  surrounded by  some pretty grandiose individuals with grandiose ideas on things; like the Lebaron’s, Warren Jeffs, and many other wanna be prophets one of which has solved the energy crisis single handedly and predicts his world domination. Not to mention a self proclaimed, smartest person in the world. Add to that all the Timothy McVeigh anarchists and the formula is rich where you enter a zone on earth where there is never a dull moment.You’ve now set the stage for:When Worldviews Go Haywire
    No one falls prey to “Eutychus Disease” while attending Fast and Testimony Meetings in our ward.Never a dull moment living at Short Creek and the surrounding area.I have some grandiose ideas of mine own. I am the Ward Mission leader,   Teaching kinda sorta LDS and those that don’t have a clue about Christ and helping them recognize the God within each person that we teach and how to apply that knowledge is about as big as it gets.  Keep up the good work Dan and panel.

  • Colorado City-ite

    Dan,

    I don’t know why my comment got all mucked up.  Does it have anything to do with using Safari as a browser?  It wasn’t that way when I submitted it.

    • Dan Wotherspoon

      Thanks for your comments! Very interesting perspectives. Church where you are does indeed seem like it would be quite the adventure!

      The formatting of your post looks fine to me (and I’m viewing through Safari), but I can’t say I know how you were planning it. No clue on why it might muck up and if Safari is a reason. If you want to write me separately to tell me how you want it to appear, I can probably make it happen by working in the administrator area.
      Best,
      Dan

  • Jacob M

    I also feel like the “cafeteria mormon” stuff has been taken wrongly by both sides of the “liberal vs. conservative ” dichotomy in the church. In context I felt it meant that we can’t pick and choose which commandments we are willing to live. However, I do recognize that many have taken this to mean that any who have unorthodox ideas are these “dirty cafeteria mormons” who must be shunned, and I think that is a horrible wresting of the apostolic counsel. But besides this the episode was great as usual.

  • http://apronappeal.com/ Apron Appeal

    Natash, I really appreciate your articulation on holding our church and leaders responsible for the messages they deliver through General Conference and other such addresses where they prepare messages for the lowest common denominator but in reality that is not who is hearing it and then the intended message gets misinterpreted and misunderstood.