Now, a year later, I still think that Elder Bednar was wrong. Facebook has and will permanently improve every aspect of our social lives. I wrote the following paper to illustrate why.

In the late hours of October 23, 2003, slowly getting drunk after being rejected by a girl, a Harvard undergraduate and computer programmer named Mark Zuckerberg was hit by a sudden cruel bout of inspiration. He was looking through a photographic directory (called a “facebook”) of his dormitory, and noted on his blog that some of the photos were so “horrendous,” that he was tempted “to put some of these faces next to pictures of farm animals and have people vote on which is more attractive.” Hours later, he had successfully created a website, abandoning the farm animals idea, but instead comparing Harvard students with each other using hacked photographs and information. Just a few hours later, and after 22,000 page views, Harvard officials had traced the source of the website and shut it down, citing privacy concerns. Now, with more than 1000 employees and over 400 million active users, according to Facebook Factsheet, Facebook.com carries underneath its stark blue banner a markedly different statement of purpose: “Facebook helps you connect and share with the people in your life.”

Many have voiced concerns over the use of online social networking tools, such as Elder Bednar of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles. He has called online presences “digital distractions, diversions, and detours” that could lead to difficulties in marriage, or a decrease in eternal, meaningful friendships. I can’t help but think that anyone who has a problem with Facebook merely doesn’t know enough about it.

If Facebook were a country, it would be the third-largest by population, just under China and India, and Facebook is now offered in 70 languages. Around 200 million users will log on to Facebook in any given day, and of these, 35 million will update their statuses. More than 3 billion photos are uploaded to Facebook each month. By October 2007, Time magazine’s Bill Tancer reported that, among 18- to 24-year-olds, social networking was the most-accessed type of web site on the Internet, outranking email, search engines, and pornography. In fact, Tancer quips that, statistically, it seems that when online social networking use goes up, pornography use goes down. What could appeal to young people more than the institutionalized voyeurism offered by online pornography? Perhaps Mark Zuckerberg said it best, quoted in Rolling Stone: “People are more voyeuristic than what I would have thought.”

But Facebook is not just a tool for prying into our friends’ lives. Facebook offers ingenious and simple solutions to many of the problems that plague our youth today. Previous to online social networking services, people had to make friends through personal, non-digital interaction. This was often painstaking, emotionally taxing, and slow. In order to learn another person’s interests and favorite activities, one had to have arduous conversations, feigning interest and engagement until the relevant information could be obtained. Human beings were needlessly confusing and multi-faceted. Facebook offers a better way. On each Facebook user’s page is an “Info” page. There, the user lists their personal characteristics, including interests and activities. Popular ones include “sports,” “music,” and “reading.” Mine says “songwriting.” I can easily go through my friends list and find other people interested in songwriting. Finding kindred spirits is easier and simpler thanks to Facebook.

Finding people with similar interests is one thing, discovering a person’s sexual orientation was even worse. It was socially demanding, and sometimes had to be done through roundabout means. This often led to embarrassment and offense. It required tip-toeing around the issue, carefully gauging a person’s affiliation through indirect personal queries. People went years without even declaring their orientation, deciding rather to personally cultivate and incubate those feelings for long periods of time. In the meantime, their casual acquaintances were left scratching their heads and wishing that the issue could be settled, so that judgment could no longer be withheld. However, on a person’s Facebook Info page, there is a section where he or she can publicly state whether they are interested in women, men, or both. Mine says “Interested in: women.”

Similarly, religious affiliation was once seen as a private dimension of one’s personality, and thus it was socially unacceptable to attain this information without grueling theological and philosophical discourse. It was not uncommon to have to hear a person’s entire life story and reasons for believing, in order to arrive at their religious affiliation. These traits were once very personal, carefully guarded, and sacred. Often, religion was left out of discussions altogether, for fear that one might be invited to a church service, Bar Mitzvah, or mosque, or that a controversial issue might be ignited in conversation. With Facebook, the process is streamlined, and the risk of controversial discourse is eliminated. Just check their Info box. Mine says “Latter-day Saint.”

Thus, important evaluations about a person’s character can be made with the click of your mouse. No longer must a person withhold appraisal until a clearer picture of their friend is obtained. It is now easier than ever to avoid the people you disagree with, and reduce complex social interactions.

In the past, people often found themselves longing for information about long-lost friends. Conversations about the past included references to characteristics and traits of their old friends, questions as to their whereabouts, and wishing that one could talk to them again, punctuated with sighing ruminations on how time flies. With online social networking, one can easily find out what these people had for breakfast this morning (and every morning). Each Facebook user has a white box on their front page that reads, “What’s on your mind?” One may type in their current whereabouts, opinion on the weather, or recent activities in what is called a “status update.” Below this box are the status updates of many of one’s closest friends. Some examples on my front page from my friends include, “meh,” “Babysitin [sic] my little nephews ,” “irritated…..,” and “oh life!!!” My own status says, “Does anyone want to come with my Arabic class to eat Mediterranean tonight?”

You might notice that these status updates seem simplistic and reductionist. This is by design. Many social interactions that existed previous to Facebook were seeped in over-stimulating meaning. Much time and effort were wasted by young people trying to understand and connect with each other. Young people’s hearts and minds caught fire as they participated in these exchanges. Should we really be over-stimulating our young people? Facebook offers a superior form of interaction through its “poke” function. Poke is a harmless, meaningless, effortless interaction, which undoubtedly leads to little misunderstanding, anger, friendship, or violence amongst our youth. On a person’s page, there is an option to poke them. Poke serves no function; Facebook merely informs that person that they have been poked. They then have the option to poke back.

Therefore, conflict is avoided through personal detachment. And when conflict cannot be avoided, it requires relatively little effort. Consider the following. In previous social interactions, confronting someone with a personal conflict or problem was a difficult task requiring great courage. One had to organize thoughts, plan a confrontation, and meet face-to-face with the object of their problem in order to work out a resolution. With online social networking, sending an angry email requires only the click of a button, and no face-to-face dialogue. People no longer need long nights of sleep to temper their emotions; one can now easily send a confrontational diatribe at 3 a.m., before rationality and a night’s sleep dull one’s emotions. And what if one receives an email like this from a friend? They are easily unfriended, or, in other words, removed from one’s friends list.

You see, before online social networking, “friend” was a poorly-defined term. Making friends required gaining the trust of others, sincerity and earnestness in one’s interactions, and perhaps several months of kindness before the title “friend” could be conferred upon another. Online social networking offers an instantaneous, digital, text-based solution to problem of friendship: redefinition and demarcation. Friends can be added through mutual interests, close proximity of location, or other friends. One could easily add or unfriend everyone from his or her high school. For instance, take Paul, the bassist from my last band, and friend-of-a-friend. Is Paul my friend, or isn’t he? It’s easy to tell: about four months ago he unfriended me.

This might have offended me, but I have 614 other friends. I can easily compare my prestige and popularity to other people on my friends list by contrasting the number of friends I have to the number of friends they have. Facebook’s statistics page says that the average person has 130 friends. Boy, am I glad I’m not that guy. However, embarrassingly, my wife has a significantly greater number than me: 943.

One might think that Facebook enhances friendships, relationships, and acquaintances. I would go one step further. Facebook replaces them with something even better: simple, streamlined friendship units. We are all now units on an interacting yet efficient grid. According to Facebook’s statistics page, the average unit spends almost an hour a day on Facebook. In this time, units read information on their friends’ walls, look through their activities, interests, and pictures, play games, join groups with others that have similar interests, and post links to other web pages. Units often check their Facebook pages several times during the day, and Facebook is now even offered on iPhones and other hand-held wireless devices, giving units the ability to check their Facebook pages everywhere they go, all day long, whether they are at church, class, or a friend’s wedding. There are more than 100 million mobile Facebook units, and according to Facebook Factsheet, they are statistically 50% more active on Facebook than non-mobile units. Perhaps one day, all people will carry Facebook with them, thus inextricably bonding us with our new virtual identities.

It should be plain now how Facebook transcended its cruel and dehumanizing beginnings in Mark Zuckerberg’s dorm room, and grew to be the most popular online social networking service. Elder Bednar is simply blind to the New Truth: Facebook is defining us, shaping us, and reducing us. May our now archaic system of human-to-human non-electronic social interactions stay where it belongs: the Stone Age.

“Priests are thus challenged to proclaim the Gospel by employing the latest generation of audiovisual resources — images, videos, animated features, blogs, Web sites — which, alongside traditional means, can open up broad new vistas for dialogue, evangelization and catechesis,” he said.

Apparently, the Pope is even on Facebook.  So, I had to check and see if Pres Monson is there too.  Well, there are some pages on him, but I don’t think he’s officially there.  Perhaps he is, but his 234 fans are quite a bit behind the Pope’s 87,429.

So, it looks like the Catholic  Church is ahead of the Mormons on Facebook, but the blog advice is more than 2 years behind us.  The Newsroom at LDS.org has Elder Ballard’s talk from Dec 15, 2007

Most of you already know that if you have access to the Internet you can start a blog in minutes and begin sharing what you know to be true.  You can download videos from Church and other appropriate sites, including Newsroom at LDS.org, and send them to your friends.  You can write to media sites on the Internet that report on the Church, and voice your views as to the accuracy of the reports.

Did you ever think you’d hear these octogenarians telling us to embrace Facebook and Blogs???  How much of an impact do you think blogs are having on them?

This problem is similar to the problem of freedom of speech.  Do you only allow freedom of speech until someone says something you don’t like?  Those with less dogmatic viewpoints are also less likely to condemn the sweeping pronouncements of others for the same reason they don’t make them.  They may be more self-critical and more reluctant to express their opinions when those opinions will affect others.

Here are a few examples of this problem (many of these are included in the book David O. McKay and the Rise of Modern Mormonism):

• Bruce R. McConkie’s Mormon Doctrine.  This was published without prior authorization from the FP under the most presumptuous title imaginable.  While Pres. McKay was highly incensed over it, requiring two apostles to research and find over 1000 errors in the book, no public correction was made other than to tell BRM that the book should not be republished.  BRM accepted the private correction, but repeatedly requested that the book be allowed to be republished.  Eventually, in his dotage, Pres. McKay gave a sufficiently cryptic response that BRM took it as license to republish.  Among the worst criticisms of the book:
  • It referred to the Roman Catholic church as the Church of the Devil, stating that this was what was meant by the Book of Mormon’s “harlot of the earth” reference.  It was so harsh that it caused RC Bishop Hunt, a friend to Pres. McKay, to come to Pres. McKay with tears in his eyes asking if this was what McKay thought of him.
  • It propounded the inaccurate “Cain” doctrine (borrowed from Protestantism) as justification of the Priesthood Ban.
  • It prohibited all caffeinated beverages from the Word of Wisdom (despite Pres. McKay’s own personal affinity for Coke).
  • And many many more . . .
• Ezra Taft Benson’s association with the John Birch Society.  As an apostle, Benson was staunchly anti-communist.  He quickly became enamored with the newly formed John Birch society and was repeatedly courted by founder Robert Welch to join the society and to use his apostolic influence to encourage other Mormons to join.  Pres. McKay refused to consent to both Benson’s membership and endorsement of the John Birch Society, but Benson persisted and even resorted to trickery to try to convince Pres. McKay to be featured on the cover of the monthly magazine of the society.  Again, no public disavowal of the organization or Benson’s tactics was ever made, and many members were led to believe that the church endorsed the John Birch Society.
• Joseph Fielding Smith’s Man, His Origin and Destiny.  The book states authoritatively (yet without authority) that evolution is false, a matter of Joseph Fielding Smith’s personal speculation.  David O. McKay specifically said he believed evolution was a true scientific principle; yet no corrective action was taken to diminish the book’s significance.
• Paul H. Dunn’s stories.  While not dogmatic, they are riddled with hyperbolic glurge that purports to “prove” the church is true, which can be faith demoting when individuals discover the stories are fictional.
• The Priesthood Ban.  This is a pretty basic one.  While David O. McKay was the first to acknowledge this was a policy (therefore “of man”) and not a doctrine (no originating revelation), there was no public repudiation of the rampant racist rhetoric of the time until much later when the ban had been removed, and the rhetoric had continued in justification.  In fact, this is a great example of a time when Bruce R. McConkie (much later) fell on the sword publicly, apologetically stating that the things they had said were all wrong.
• Spencer W. Kimball’s Miracle of Forgiveness.  This was written in 1969 and contains errors that are potentially harmful to those who read it if they are in a vulnerable emotional state or prone to take things far too seriously, such as:
  • It’s better to be killed than to be a rape victim.  This also implies that those who don’t die as a victim of a rape attempt were somehow willing participants, a particularly disturbing notion for both victims of rape and children of incest.
  • It states that wet dreams are sinful, implying that they are voluntary and not biological.
  • It has been criticized alternately as too harsh (by internal critics) and as un-Christian (by external critics) in diminishing the power of the atonement to redeem by focusing on human efforts.

In the above cases, the standing prophet was unwilling to make public correction, instead preferring to hope that the inaccurate information would die out on its own over time.  There was a desire not to reduce the influence of the General Authority who had erred in speculation through public correction.  The actual effect seems to have been that the tolerance and generosity of the standing prophets has caused these individuals’ voices to be the loudest of all, to the point that their doctrines and interpretations are mainstream or orthodox over the more tolerant religious views.

Is this the way of the world?  Do the loudest voices always win?  Are the loudest voices always the most harsh and dogmatic?  Was it always this way, or is this simply the current trend?  Or is this how we learn humility?  Is this a human condition that is just a natural byproduct of all organizations or a particularly Mormon trait?  Is this an example of those who act (those who prefer to take charge and define requirements for others) vs. those who are acted upon (those who prefer to “go with the flow,” or be passive & tolerant)?

Discuss.

I suppose alliances are a necessary evil if you want to get anything done.  Companies do it.  Countries do it.  Even individual people do it.  What are the dangers of these “strange bedfellows”?

• Association.  Having our views misunderstood or misconstrued by outsiders or even by our own members.  For example, do some members begin to think that we have a different or stronger stance on issues because our associates do?  Also, when an “ally” does something really stupid (many have), does that taint us by association?
• Motivation.  While our alliances might coincide, often our motives are quite different below the surface from those of our allies.  When those motives differ, our actions are likely to differ as well as our desired outcomes.  Isn’t it also likely that we might be used to achieve ends with which we disagree?
• Conflict of Interest.  Once an alliance is formed, it’s much harder to separate our interests where they naturally diverge.  There may be pressure by virtue of the relationship to allow our allies greater latitude for things we might otherwise have taken a stance against.

Clearly, there are some groups we have been leery to court as allies because the risk was too high:  the FLDS, staunch pro-life groups, the ERA (not sure that was really under consideration, but just wanted to see if you were paying attention), and the religious right.  But consider for a moment some of the alliances church members have formed.  Some of these are alliances the organization has sought out, and others are more “grass roots” alliances that members have formed, thinking their interests coincide:

• Prop 8 Allies. Many of these are the same guys who:
  • think we are a cult
  • want to “pray the gay away”
  • make some very hateful and inaccurate remarks about homosexuals
  • supported Huckabee to knock Romney out of the race for POTUS because Romney believed Satan and Jesus were brothers and apparently in each others’ fave five.  (Hey, I guess by that logic we also think Huck and Satan are brothers!)
• Focus on the Family.  This is James Dobson’s ministry to protect families.  But they ALSO support school sponsored prayer, corporal punishment, abortion intervention, and intelligent design.  Additionally, they are far more politically involved in their causes than we are, and many of their causes are ones on which we have no clear stance or don’t go as far as they do (see the aforementioned items:  we don’t have a stance on school sponsored prayer, we caution against actions like corporal punishment at least within the family, our abortion stance is softer than theirs, and we teach evolution at BYU).
• Feature Films for Family.  Enterprises like this take a nice idea (clean entertainment that is family friendly) as a starting point.  Often they lack the talent and resources to make it high quality or a good value.
• Clean Flicks.  This UT-based company that catered to the LDS crowd by removing objectionable movie content was more of a benevolently-viewed off-shoot, but they were certainly viewed as associated with Mormons.  Hollywood didn’t like being edited by do-gooders and sued them over it (frankly these people don’t like to be edited by anyone!  have you ever seen a Director’s Cut?); Clean Flicks discontinued.  Then the owner was implicated in an unsavory pornography scam in Utah County.  In our lovely deseret.
• Rush Limbaugh. Obviously, this alliance only applies to those Mormons who are also politically conservative Americans, but since that seems to be a very vocal majority, this association is relevant.  Limbaugh emcompasses basic political characteristics:  fat, loud hypocrisy.  Frankly, he’s not doing Republicans any favors either.  Maybe if the NRA cuts him from their Christmas card list, he’ll finally know he’s gone too far.
• Stockpiling WingNuts. There’s clearly a distinction between the reasonable counsel to be prepared for emergencies and layoffs by keeping a supply of food and money on hand and the wingnuts who are building a bunker in the backyard with a stockpile of weapons in case they have to kill and eat their neighbors.  There are some supposedly “like-minded” individuals out there wearing tin foil hats and selling 72 hour emergency kits to church members.
• “Obamanation” Armageddon Theorists. This is an unpleasant blend of political conservativism (fine in its own right) and Rapture-mongering (the idea that we can bring the second coming on despite the statements that say “no man knows the hour.”)  Can’t we disagree politically without resorting to religious fear-mongering?

So, what other strange bedfellows are out there?  How do we avoid “the appearance of evil” by associating with those who share a passing interest, but in reality have aims that are far different from our own?  Is this an inevitable problem, or are there ways to more clearly distance ourselves from allies whose agendas differ or even contradict ours on many points?

Discuss.

Interestingly enough, Tom Hanks was briefly identified as a Mormon (although he was not baptized) when his stepmother Winifred joined the church.  However, his father Amos was not interested in the Mormon church, and according to an unauthorized biography, Tom saw this as one reason they split up.  Tom stated later that he was no longer a Mormon, and he also believed his ex-stepmother had left Mormonism.  Tom made his way through several different religions over time as you can see here.

Speaking of his involvement in the show Big Love, Hanks said (with my parenthetical comments inserted):

The truth is this takes place in Utah (the truth is that it’s a fictional show), the truth is these people are some bizarre offshoot of the Mormon Church (the truth is these are fictional characters based loosely on some bizarre offshoots; but KUDOS for the “bizarre offshoot” remark), and the truth is a lot of Mormons gave a lot of money to the church to make Prop-8 happen (why do I picture someone making air quotes when they say “happen”?).  There are a lot of people who feel that is un-American and I am one of them.  I do not like to see any discrimination codified on any piece of paper, any of the 50 states in America, but here’s what happens now. A little bit of light can be shed and people can see who’s responsible (is he now talking about the Prop 8 maps that identified donors, essentially putting targets on their backs for gay activists?) and that can motivate the next go around of our self correcting constitution and hopefully we can move forward instead of backwards (I’m not even sure this sentence went forward instead of backwards). So lets have faith in not only the American (not Mormons who are UNAmerican for voting for Prop 8), but Californian constitutional process (so, have faith in Americans, but if they vote wrong, have faith in the constitutional process to correct that).

Then, Tom did a fairly nice reversal of his statement:

Last week, I labeled members of the Mormon church who supported California’s Proposition 8 as “un-American.” I believe Proposition 8 is counter to the promise of our Constitution; it is codified discrimination.  But everyone has a right to vote their conscience – nothing could be more American. To say members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints who contributed to Proposition 8 are “un-American” creates more division when the time calls for respectful disagreement.  No one should use “un- American” lightly or in haste.  I did.  I should not have. (I really like the terseness and directness of the last few statements.  Apologizers, watch and learn).

Obviously, the reversal of his statements (which was doubtless prompted by those who have a financial stake in his popularity) doesn’t necessarily mean he’s ready for a group hug.  So, what are Tom Hanks’ true feelings about Mormons?  Here’s a guess:

• He’s an activist for gay rights.  Like most of Hollywood, he’s an SSM activist and considers those not ready for SSM to be discriminatory.  It’s hard to blame him for his sheltered Hollywood existence, though.  When you spend most of your time around like-minded people, you develop group-think.  I’m sure we can all relate on some level.  In summary:  his feelings are pro-SSM, not anti-Mormon.
• He’s spiritual, not religious.  He saw his ex-stepmother as flaky (looking at his own religious history I say “physician, heal thyself”) and therefore attracted to Mormonism as a phase; he probably doesn’t take it very seriously as a religion (see:  Hollywood).
• He’s an artist.  We see Hollywood as a money machine; they see themselves as creative artists, holding a mirror up to the human experience.  Tom Hanks strives to make characters (even the polygamous Hendricksons) understandable, human, accurate, and relatable.  Showing the Mormon temple ceremony is not being done as payback (although he does resent Prop 8); it’s being done for accuracy and to render Barb Hendrickson more human.  And he is just an EP, not a writer for the show (that would be Dustin Lance Black, the gay ex-Mormon who gave the impassioned speech at the Oscars).

So, that’s my view.  I’m inclined to cut Hanks some slack.  Plus, I somewhat think there’s no such thing as bad press (even all that bad press out there).  Not many Mormons watch Big Love, but many do watch Tom Hanks.  I think his apology was adequate, and I don’t consider his work mean-spirited (although I hated the mullet he sported in DaVinci Code).  It’s a low bar, but high enough for me.  Discuss.

The onset of 2009 brings an opportunity for young people of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints to renew their commitment to their faith while participating in a program of instruction, song and dance that reviews the activities of 2008. The program also introduces their theme as Mormon youth for the new year: “Be thou an example of the believers” (1 Timothy 4:12)

Wow I had never seen such a sleek production done by the church some blogs have compared it too watching High School Musical. See you tube video here (please click high quality when you watch it).

Its a whole new media style and attitude I have never seen in our church.

Click here to see the News Press.Click here to Brand New Year Website – I found the videos pretty up beat and interesting. My English daughter who is out of young women’s found it cheesy-she thinks most American things are.  My wife thought it was a little too manufactured and OTT but she is English to.

What do you think?

Have any of the youth in your wards seen in it live or watched it ?

Did they enjoy it or not?

Jeff Lindsay [The Word of Wisdom] outlines principles of healthy living that go far beyond the scientific knowledge of the 1800s and much of this century…The 1833 dietary guidelines sound much like the recommended “food pyramid” produced by federally-funded research in the past decade.

For me and perhaps many of you it has been one of those solid concepts that when you feel rickety about some of the doctrine you can always count on the solid foundations of the word of wisdom.

What I never was taught though that before the word of wisdom there was the Temperance Movement.

Temperance Movement

In 1826 Marcus Morton had founded the American Temperance Society June, 1830, the Millenial Harbinger quoted in full, and with the hearty personal endorsement of Alexander Campbell, an article from the Philadelphia “Journal of Health,” The above in turn was quoting a widely circulated book, “The Simplicity of Health,” which article most strongly condemned the use of alcohol, tobacco, the eating intemperately of meats.

Fascinating Facts on the Word of Wisdom/ Temperance Movement (The last one being the most fascinating of them all)

The church today interprets hot drinks to mean tea and coffee, although there is evidence that in the early history of the church all hot drinks were forbidden.

Word of Wisdom is by Lester Bush (physician). He shows how, contrary to recent assertions, the Word of Wisdom was actually what “medical science” in the 1820s and 1830s preached. Bush claims that the Word of Wisdom would have been far more useful (and prophetic) to the 19th Century Mormons had it included instructions to use only clean water and to adequately dispose of waste. In fact, “hot drinks” and some alcoholic beverages may have saved the lives of many 19th Century Mormons had they drank them instead of the unsanitary water in Nauvoo, along the plains, and in Utah.

Although church leaders stress some portions of Joseph Smith’s Word of Wisdom, other portions are almost completely ignored. Mormon writer John J. Stewart observed: “The admonition to eat little meat is largely ignored, as are some other points of the revelation”

Temperance Societies were organized in great numbers during the early thirties, six thousand being formed in one year

The Temperance Society succeeded in eliminating a distillery in Kirtland on February 1, 1833, just twenty-seven days before the Latter-day Saint revelation counseling abstinence was announced, and that the distillery at Mentor, near Kirtland, was also closed at the same time (Brigham Young University Studies, Winter 1959, pp.39-40).

On October 6, 1830, the Kirtland Temperance Society was organized with two hundred thirty nine members. Among its members were listed a George Smith, several Morleys, a Wells, a Coe, and a Lyman. names all associated with the history of Mormonism

A few years before the Word of Wisdom, Robert Owen had abolished the use of ardent spirits in his community at New Harmony.

Whitney R. Cross points out that “the temperance movement … began much earlier… During the 1830′s it attained national scope. … Further, if alcohol was evil because it frustrated the Lord’s design for the human body, other drugs like tea, coffee, and tobacco must be equally wrong … Josiah Bissell…. had even before the 1831 revival ‘got beyond Temperance to the Cold Water Society—no tea, coffee or any other slops.’ ”

Joseph tested the saints to make sure their testimonies were of his religion and not of him as a personable leader. Amasa Lyman of the first Presidency related Joseph Smith trying the faith of the saints many times by his peculiarities. At one time he had preached a powerful sermon on the word of wisdom and immediately thereafter he rode through the streets of Nauvoo smoking a cigar. http://patriot.lib.byu.edu/cdm4/document.phpCISOROOT=/MTGM&CISOPTR=3327&CISOSHOW=3264

Questions

Do you have a problem with the temperance movement being, so to speak, the forefather to the word of wisdom?

If the Word of Wisdom was derived from the Temperance movement does that make it feel a little less inspired to you?

If the Word of Wisdom was derived from the Temperance Movement why don’t we show it in the manuals?

Can you still count on the solid foundations of the word of wisdom or does the Temperance Movement make it feel rickety?

Does it really matter where the word of wisdom came from – it’s a net positive if you live it?

http://ldslivingmagazine.com/articles/show/934

What are the hallmarks of a great novel?

• Plot.  There must be conflict.  There has to be a climax and a denouement.
• Character development.  Characters have to be full human beings, warts and all, with flaws and redeeming qualities.  Protagonists must change over the course of the novel.
• Themes.  A great novel will speak to the range of human experience through themes that transcend time and culture.
• Courage.  An author of a great novel has to be willing to speak unsavory truths, to look into the abyss, and to expose vulnerabilities (both his/her own and those of his/her subject).
• Novelty.  “There’s nothing new under the sun” as it says in Ecclesiastes, but a great novel has to feel fresh anyway.  It has to say something better than those who have said it before.

What prevents a novel from being great (aside from just bad writing)?

• Censorship.  The opposite of courage (in writing) is censorship, whether it is self-censorship or by others.  Having one eye on public relations creates a casualty of courage.  Without courage, topics like sexuality, violence, and even the topic of censorship itself can be omitted or glossed over.  This can result in a work that is toothless, gutless and crotchless.
• Superficiality.  Creating inauthentic or two-dimensional characters, or focusing solely on the characters or themes with weak plot development can result in a work that lacks depth.  Creating depth requires having depth; in some ways, Mormons spend our lives trying to avoid depth.  We know there is a “dark side” to humanity, and we stay as far away from it as we can.  Writers have to write about what they know, and if you don’t know the depths of your soul, it’s hard to write about that convincingly.

The ”great Mormon novel” has the added difficulty of subject matter.  If you are writing a Mormon novel (in the sense that Graham Greene wrote Catholic novels or Chaim Potok wrote Jewish novels), your novel will have Mormon themes.  If your novel is to have depth, it must cover the range of human experience, both the good and the bad.  And in so doing, there will likely be elements that are both loyal and disloyal to the church.  Those elements of disloyalty (even characters with internal conflict) can cause self-censorship as well as censorship (discouragement) by the group.

So, let’s talk about Twilight.  Twilight is an enormously popular book with a specific target audience.  It is a huge success by most measures.  I don’t think anyone would credibly argue it has a permanent place in the canon of literature, so it is not really up for consideration as “The Great Mormon Novel.”  But how Mormon is it?  This is a question being debated here.  A few opposing viewpoints that were shared (you can read the comments in their entirety in the link):

Andrew Oh-Willeke said:  “One way to read the story allegorically is that the Cullen’s (the good vampire family, if you weren’t paying attention) are the Mormons. They, given the free will to choose between right and wrong in this world have chosen virtue and abstinance despite temptation, in their diet, and in how they choose to love. . . There are also strong associations in the books between vampires and angels, mirroring the importance of angels in LDS scripture. The vampires are described as seraphic, and glimmer in the sun. They aren’t necessarily angels themselves, but are close to angels.  [I]t is a story full of LDS dog whistles.”

Mormon Soprano retorts:  “I submit to you that Meyer’s books are the antithesis of Mormon doctrine, and should be disturbing to any faithful active member. . . Just reading these books causes erotic thoughts and feelings because of what the characters are doing to and with each other. . .  Stephanie Meyer’s books are such a big hit with “the world” because they are titilating. . . The tragedy to me is that Meyer is continually referred to as “Mormon” and “LDS”, and her books have been given a free pass to sell at Deseret Book and Segull Book stores.  Please wake up out of your vampire trances my Twilight friends! There is nothing “lovely or praiseworthy or of good report” to be found in these books or movie. Faithful latter-day Saints need to send a message that lowered standards are never acceptable. My advice is to Stop buying these books, send a letter of complaint to LDS booksellers, and refuse to spend your money in support of this new movie!

These comments go to the heart of the difficulty for Mormon authors.  A Mormon’s work will be dissected for Mormon content and either praised or villified on that basis.  While Andrew’s argument states that the books are a Mormon allegory, Mormon Soprano finds the message in conflict with Mormon teachings.  So, what’s the answer?

Can LDS authors write books that contradict Mormon teachings?  Every Mormon author has to grapple with that question, and it is at heart a question of censorship, either by the group or by the author him/herself.  Authors who fear reprisal for their words, even their fictional words, will never write “The Great Mormon Novel.”

What is white-washing?  According to Encyclopedia Britannica:  to Whitewash is to gloss over or cover up vices, crimes, or to exonerate by means of a perfunctory investigation or through biased presentation of data.  Some examples of whitewashing given in Wikipedia are:

• propaganda proliferation
• implying a rosier version of events through selective inclusion
• biased editing of official materials to control information or public image

Obviously, covering up actual crimes goes further than covering up unsavory historical incidents.  I am not aware of any specific accusations of crime-based whitewashing directed at the church; actual crimes should be reported, investigated and punished.

OTOH, vices are human nature.  Everyone has vices and mistakes in their history.  Every organization has people with vices.  That’s a human problem.  Is it possible for people or organizations to be truly objective about themselves?  Do all religions white-wash?  I would suggest that most religions (and organizations of all types) do this to a great extent, with one possible exception:  the Hebrews.  The OT is full of crazy folks committing a multitude of sins (e.g. worshipping the golden calf, lying to one another right and left), yet still coming out as the chosen people.  Gotta love those guys.

Two types of white-washing come to my mind, and I think the second helps clarify understanding of the first (to an extent):

• Organizational.  Examples within the church might be only including favorable historical events, presenting events or doctrine with positive bias, or emphasis on public image through information control.  IMO, the church has a “party line” with a fairly robust apologetics movement on the side.
• Personal (Journaling).  This refers to individuals glossing over or omitting personal mistakes, focusing only on what is uplifting, finding a “moral” in every story or using personal experiences to teach a lesson to progeny.  Frankly, I’m not a big fan of this approach, although I understand the motives.

Why do people white-wash?

• To provide inspiration.  Napoleon said: “The role of the leader is to define reality and give hope.”  If your purpose in sharing the information is to edify and inspire your audience, you want to focus on what is uplifting and leads toward whatever your desired outcomes are.
• Due to confusion and ambiguity.  Whitewashing implies that the organization knows the full truth but opts for selective disclosure.  But when events are unclear or subject to multiple possible interpretations, it may be wiser to present a superficial account to avoid creating further confusion by presenting ambiguous and conflicting viewpoints.
• Personal bias.  We cannot be truly objective about ourselves.  Similarly, we cannot be unbiased about our religious faith.  We are always subjective, but even more so when the stakes are high and the topic is personal (such as our own life experiences or our religious faith).
• To hide a multitude of sins.  When journaling, how much personal information is too much?  One’s journal is not the Washington Post, after all–do the readers have a right to know everything?  To extend the analogy to a religious organization, what is the purpose of sharing the information?  To what end?  All churches that have ever had human beings as adherents have dirty laundry.  No one ever joined the Catholic church because of the “bad popes.”  Yet, the Catholic church does great good and is not defined solely by these errant individuals.
• Priorities and Purpose.  What is the purpose of communicating the information?  Who is the audience?  If the purpose is to edify and to promote Christ-like behavior, dwelling on the negatives or the mistakes of the past doesn’t seem constructive or expedient.

What’s the downside of whitewashing?

• Saying nothing whatsoever about unpleasant topics can create a sense of “the elephant in the room”–that there is something obvious not being discussed.  It can give undue weight to the undiscussed item.
• A superficial approach to investigation can provide misleading perceptions.
• It can lead to a black & white mindset that is just not realistic when dealing with human organizations or human beings for that matter.
• It can create feelings of inadequacy in individuals who realize their own imperfections but are only presented with images of perfection around them.
• Organizations and people can diminish their own critical thinking skills by “sniffing their own fragrance” or believing their own press.
• When knowledge is suppressed or withheld or not easily obtained, paranoia can result.  Individuals who seek and find unique knowledge that goes deeper than the superficial spin may conclude that only they know the “real truth,” may imagine conspiratorial cover-ups, or may feel disillusioned.
• Since no source is unbiased, negative information presented by opposing viewpoints is likely to be more damaging and even less objective.  The negative item may be taken out of context of the whole religion and evaluated independently or in conjunction with other negative events by individuals or groups at cross-purposes with the religion’s aims.

So, what do you think?  Does the church whitewash as an organization or is it just the efforts of well-meaning individuals to defend what they hold dear?  Do all organizations whitewash?  Is white-washing lying?  Is it inevitable?  Is it better or worse than the alternative?  What do you suggest as a better way to share negative information or confusing and ambiguous information?  Discuss.

An article in Newsweek this week poses these questions.  What is the real age of accountability?  Are age limits arbitrary?  The article compares two recent cases:  YFZ Ranch raid and Omar Khadr.

• Adults treated as children.  The article states that the actions of the Texas CPS were based on assumptions that didn’t hold up in court:  1) the original complaint call was a hoax, 2) the assumption of the TCPS was that the beliefs of the FLDS were inherently dangerous (the court failed to uphold this), and 3) the belief that the polygamous women were too young to consent (15 of 31 were legal adults, one as old as 27).  The court found that being ”sober, conservative, religious and married . . . doesn’t necessarily make them victims of abuse.”  A case of treating adults like children.
• Children treated like adults.  The article contrasts this with the case of Omar Khadr, a 21-year old Canadian facing a life sentence who has been held at Guantanamo Bay for six years.  At age 15, he was charged with throwing a grenade in a fire fight in Afghanistan, killing one U.S. Soldier.  His lawyers state that, as a child soldier, he should be protected and rehabilitated as a victim.  The judge in the case has overruled that argument and stated that he will be tried as an adult.

In this example, both cases have completely different outcomes.  Is this evidence that the courts are lenient on pacifists but harsh on warmongers (make love, not war)?  Or is this evidence of protecting our own (fanatical Americans) but not protecting others (fanatical Canadian citizen/Islamic terrorist)?

Both cases are examples of what average Americans might call adults brainwashing teens to accomplish their own religious ends.  Or you could argue they are both cases of young adults with fanatical devotion for a religious cause.

The term “brainwashing” is liberally applied these days and experts question whether religious brainwashing is even a reality.  The term originated in 1950 to explain why so many GIs defected in the Korean war after being POWs.  They were subjected to psychological torture such as sleep deprivation to systematically break down their feelings of autonomy and individuality.  Efforts to prove religious groups, cults or NRMs have conducted “brainwashing” or persuasive coersion have been largely fruitless at explaining the shift in fundamental beliefs for converts.  With children, there is no actual shift in belief since they are raised to believe this way.  So, beliefs we don’t like (Jihad and polygamy) are brainwashing, but beliefs we like “being a [insert political party of choice]” or “the American dream” are not brainwashing.

The term adult is also difficult to define.  Various societies consider the age of adulthood to be as low as 13 or as high as 21.  The majority would put that age between 15 and 18.  What are the characteristics of adults?  A list proposed on Wikipedia includes the following characteristics: 

Based on this list, I’m not sure I know any adults.  Maybe Ray.  In any case, each item on this list is more of a subjective continuum than a yes/no.

So, what do you think?  What is an adult and what is brainwashing?  Are polygamist teens and terrorist teens unable to make their own choices?  Are they 1) victims or 2) perpetrators or 3) adults responsible for their choices?  Were they brainwashed by their religions or have they made a choice?  How can we legitimately tell the difference?  At what age should people be held accountable and considered adults?  Do we overprotect those we see as victims while we underprotect those we see as victimizers?  Discuss.

Not a day goes by that I do not get some sort of email glurge from a relative.  Usually, the stories are designed to inspire patriotism, sentimentality for years gone by, or religious devotion.  As a missionary, I noted that several of the elders were prone to sharing Mormon glurge in talks, especially since the Spaniards had never heard these threadbare stories imported from the US.  This was well before the term “glurge” was coined (and before the internet was even a gleam in Al Gore’s eye).  You may have heard some glurge from the pulpit recently.

My favorite glurge-gone-bad story was in an area with a few faithful members, recently converted from Catholicism.  One of the elders was giving a talk on the Savior.  To illustrate his point, he spoke in the first person about his “brother” who had taught him everything and given so much for him.  When he got to the part of the “story” where “they took my older brother and crucified him,” the entire congregation, who were taking every word of his story literally, all quickly and in unison made the sign of the cross as murmurs of “Aye, Dios mio” rippled across the congregation.  To this day, if you mention that Elder’s name in that branch, people will say, “Did you hear what they did to his brother?  He was murdered, crucified just like Jesus, in cold blood.”

Is glurge good or the root of all evil?  Why do people feel compelled to glurge?  Here are some reasons I am a glurge-hater:

• It purports to be true, but it isn’t.  Can people not tell the difference?
• It is emotionally manipulative.
• Glurge sometimes conceals much darker meanings than the moral overtones suggest (according to Snopes anyway).  For example, a boy believes he will die if he agrees to a blood transfusion.  Where are the parents here?  Did they forget about him in their rush to save their other child?

While Mormons certainly do not corner the glurge market, religious glurge stories are often retold by different religious groups by changing some of the details.  Here are a few examples of glurge you may have heard:

• Teen befriends a new kid at school, unwittingly preventing his planned suicide.
• Child with ailing brother tries to buy a miracle at a pharmacy and meets the doctor who can help him live.
• Boy agrees to transfuse his ailing sister thinking the procedure will kill him.
• Child badly injured in an accident is comforted by “birdies,” his description of angels.  This story was originally recorded by Lloyd Glenn, who is LDS; however, the story has since been highjacked by other Christian sects who have taken out the elements related to temple service and made the “birdies” angels vs. departed souls waiting for temple work.  As a true story, it is not glurge, but as altered and retold, it qualifies.
• Paul H. Dunn’s story about a serviceman saved by the Book of Mormon in his pocket was a retold glurge from another denomination with a Bible in his pocket.  In both cases, the bullet came to rest on a meaningful scriptural passage.
• Patriarchal blessing to a Down’s Syndrome child who then temporarily has his handicap removed following the blessing.
• Japanese pilot converted because he was unable to bomb the Hawaii temple.
• Del Parson’s “red robe” portrait of Jesus was re-done several times based on eye-witness accounts or confirmed accurate by various leaders (or alternately a child whose parents were killed in a car accident).
• LDS Missionaries were miraculously saved from the 9/11 attacks on the WTC.

So, what do you think?  Is glurge inspiring and good?  Or is it soul-killing evil in inspirational story form?  And, have you heard any good (or bad) glurge lately?

The headline read:

‘Hillary Clinton’s a monster’: Obama aide blurts out attack in Scotsman interview

As the article explained:

In an unguarded moment during an interview with The Scotsman in London, Samantha Power, Mr Obama’s key foreign policy aide, let slip the camp’s true feelings about the former first lady.”

And thus ended Samantha Power’s advisory role for Barack Obama. But what is the real story here? If the news media was being candid with us, wouldn’t the headline have read:

Obama Campaign Does Not Like Their Competitors Because They, Um, Compete With Them

But of course there is no news worthy story in that headline at all. But isn’t this the real story? Perhaps one could argue that the real story is that someone from the Obama campaign publicly stated their private feelings – that we all knew they already had. I admit that would be newsworthy, so let’s redo the headline to read:

Obama Campaign States Publicly the Private Feelings That We All Know All Competing Candidates Have for Their Competitors

But this isn’t really right either. In reality Samantha Powers was just talking to the media about her book on Sergio Vieira de Mello. So this wasn’t the Obama campaign talking to the media, it was just Powers speaking for herself. The idea that she spoke for the campaign was something the media just made up (i.e. lied about) because I’m fairly certain Samantha Powers didn’t tell them “I speak on behalf of the Obama campaign with this next comment!” So let’s change the headline to the more truthful:

Samantha Powers, member of Obama Campaign, States Publicly the Private Feelings That We All Know All Competing Campaigns Have for Their Competitors

But you know what? This really isn’t the truth either. Powers in fact stated that her comment was off the record, so this was actually — in her mind at least — just a private conversation not meant for the public. The only reason it was published at all was because she made the mistake of stating it was off the record after the comment instead of before. As the news story explains:

WHEN is off the record actually off the record? When the rules are established in advance. … If a conversation is to be off the record, that agreement is usually thrashed out before the interview begins.

So if the media is to be honest and non-manipulative with us, the real headline should read:

Media Uses Legal Loophole to Allow Them to Publish a Private Comment that Explained the Private Feelings That We All Know All Competing Campaigns Have for Their Competitors: Aide Loses Job