THE BORE
General => The Superdeep Borehole => Topic started by: Bebpo on June 21, 2016, 05:43:26 PM
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I have to admit I don't know much about Mormons. I mean I know the story from the Southpark guy's Book of Mormon, and I know growing up the whole door to door Mormon stuff, and I know everyone kind of acted like Mormons are a weird cult.
But I was reading the gaf thread the other day about how Utah is anti-trump, and people were talking about how Mormon's are really nice, friendly non-judging, religiously-tolerant people, and becoming more racially diverse with a growing 12% hispanic population and Trump being the anti of that makes Utah not want to vote for him and it's possible it could go democrat in November. But like, nice, friendly, religiously-tolerant and non-judging people who are growing more racially diverse, uh...sounds kind of nice? Like compared to your average American that seems a step up. So can someone explain why Mormons are bad? Or is SLC actually a really nice place full of good people?
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*waiting for Ronito to post*
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Meet some and make up your own mind.
All the baptists I know are really nice on the surface, too. Until you start talking about a vaguely-controversial subject you'd assume they were the most decent people you've ever met.
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That's very true.
Hence why I don't bring up my own philosophical and political leanings with the people I work with since most of them are conservative Christians that graduated from BJU.
So long as they think I'm one of them nothing bad will happen. :doge
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Politically, Mormons are the designated drivers of the GOP.
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That's very true.
Hence why I don't bring my own philosophical and political leanings with the people I work with since most of them are conservative Christians that graduated from BJU.
So long as they think I'm one of them nothing bad will happen. :doge
(http://i.imgur.com/Lk2Dgj8.jpg)
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They've been the lucky (by which I mean unlucky) recipient of extrajudicial and state violence throughout the years in America (e.g. their founder was murdered by a mob), so there's an understandable insularity to their community.
I personally wouldn't characterize it as a terribly tolerant faith, but in my experience they're at least polite.
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No prozelytizing faith is ever truly polite. :snob
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My family was nonreligious for at least the last two generations, but both of my paternal uncles converted to Mormonism. When I came to Japan, my first boss was a Mormon; he was active in supporting the missionary community here.
Mormons benefit from a tremendous amount of community culture, and seem to have their disaster preparedness together better than any other group I've seen.
That said, they don't seem to give two shits about anyone outside their group. The concepts of tolerance and kindness extend universally throughout their insular group, but have a hard time being extended to anyone outside. Extending kindness to those outside your tribe is the essence of Christianity.
My Mormon boss in Japan was paying for the missionaries' apartment by doubling his employees' rent on our company apartment. I have a list of other cases where he took advantage of us illegally and immorally to support his religious endeavors.
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Frontline/American experience has a great doc on Mormons.
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I've heard that Krakauer's Under the Banner of Heaven is also a pretty thorough book (I've barely started it).
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I grew up in a key town along the Mormon Trail so I got to grow up with a lot of Mormons.
I don't really have many negative impressions of them. They are nice but don't give much of a fuck about outsiders. They will be friendly to you but rest assured they'd rather be spending time with other Mormons.
I never really had an issue with the 10% tithe either. Once you get plugged into that community, it seems like that 10% is more than worth it, especially if you're poor. Not that I knew many poor Mormons, anytime there was a festival or celebration, they'd roll up in Escalades, Tahoes, F250s, etc.
Also the Mormon girls I grew up with in school were smoking hot. They were so hot that they were able to convince guys to convert to Mormonism. One guy converted to Mormonism and ran away with a girl to Utah and later British Columbia.
I'm sure Steve Contra and ronito have a lot to say on the subject so there's my two cents.
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So they're nice people within the mormon community, but kind of republican-ish to everyone else outside of their community? Hmmm....That story of raising the rents Chronovore posted is pretty fucked up.
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Mormonism is fairly simple.
It started with this guy Joseph Smith
(http://prophetjosephsmith.org/files/2012/10/joseph-smith-mormon.jpg)
Who came from a family that believed dark magic and sold his services as a treasure hunter and crystal gazer (which he was sued over because he wasn't that good at it)
Anyhoo he goes and prays about which church to join. And he has a vision
(http://www.lightplanet.com/mormons/basic/gospel/restoration/first_vision.jpg)
Where he saw God and Jesus (Or just God or just Jesus. It varies, Joseph told about 9 different versions of this throughout his life, which Mormons believe makes it much more believeable) and God told him all the other religions were wrong and he should start his own.
Fast forward a bit an Angel appears to Joseph and tell him that there's some golden plates hidden in a hill Cumorah, NY and that it contained the story about a people who did a transatlantic ocean journey in 600 BC to the Americas and they were the ancestors of native americans. Joseph retrieves the plates and no one is allowed to see them but him and he sets out to translate them using a rock. This rock specifically:
(http://static1.squarespace.com/static/55888da3e4b034e58f5c0dcd/t/55e1c66ae4b09e185962cf74/1440859755419/joseph-smith-brown-peep-stone.jpg)
(I'm not kidding)
So this becomes the book of mormon which details how there were these massive societies that settled in America (the promised land) and how Jesus came to America to visit after his death. Then these societies waged war with like 200k+ soldier armies until they killed each other off with swords and chariots (never mind there were no horses in the Americas at that point, or the wheel, let alone a chariot, nor was their steel or bronze).
Joseph goes onto set up fraudulent banks which get him kicked out of cities. He became a mason, after which he created a temple ceremony where you swear allegiance to the church and its prophets, has secret handshakes that are copies of the masonic rituals and you are sworn to wear underwear with masonic symbols on it. And they set out the plan of salvation which details the mormon path to salvation
(https://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/236x/a6/ce/63/a6ce633b73594dbb8ebf36e5c8badce4.jpg)
He also prophesied that the garden of eden was in Jackson County, Missouri. He also quietly institutes polygamy, marrying some wives as young as 14, sisters, and other men's wives around 38 wives in total. This, surprisingly, made people angry. A group of angry ex-mormons took a printing press in Nauvoo, IL and printed pamphlet called the "Nauvoo Expositor" that outed his polygamy. Joseph ordered a group of faithful to destroy the printing press. Which they did. That, surprisingly, angered the sheriff that was already pissed that Joseph was already a thorn in his side due to the accusations of fraud and theft and he had Joseph and a few others arrested. An angry mob broke into the jail with guns. Joseph (who some how had a gun) shot two or three men before being killed.
After him Brigham Young took the reigns and ramped up the polygamy and moved the church to Utah so they could practice polygamy in peace. He also taught that black people bore the curse of cain on them which they got because they didn't fight valiantly in the pre-existence and banned them from the priesthood and thereby the temple. This meant that blacks were denied exaltation. They could get to heaven if they were good enough, but the best they could hope for was to serve someone more worthy in heaven. Also this also meant that black families would also be separated in heaven. The book of mormon teaches that if you were slothful or evil you would have darker skin and if you were righteous your skin would get lighter.
Fast forward to 1978 the church finally decides that maybe blacks are equal and should have the priesthood after all (there are some conspiracy theories on this being because the feds were about to launch an investigation against the church to deny their tax-exempt status due to their racial discrimination). They lift the ban, although the prophet after the one that lifted the ban famously wrote about how the civil rights movement was a communist plot.
Now the church is very anti-LGBT, funding most of Prop 8 and now actively engaged in trying to outlaw gay marriage in Mexico.
overall, I agree that mormons are very nice people outwardly. But I'd be lying if I didn't find that niceness to be skin deep. When I said, "Hey this sorta seems like bunk" I proceeded to lose all but 1 or 2 mormon friends. The church is inherently set up on exclusion (you can't go to a mormon wedding even if you're a mormon, you have to be a mormon in good standing meaning you keep all the rules, sustain the leadership, and pay 10% of everything you make to the church). With rules like no coffee, no tea, no smoking, no tattoos, no drugs and certainly no sex (the sin next to murder) they are very family focused and clean cut.
I agree that Under the Banner of Heaven is a pretty good intro. It's sorta crazy because you're taught that the church isn't like that at all. And certainly the modern church isn't but the early church was exactly that. I mean Brigham Young taught about "blood atonement" which taught that the only repentance for someone who didn't believe in him was to have their blood spilled, essentially justifying murder.
People say that Mormons are really happy, but what I've come to learn in my transition out is that what is good about the church isn't unique but what is unique about the church isn't good. Too much shaming, manipulation, etc etc.
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The Mormons I knew were pretty nice, but I didn't know any really religious ones. I think that being a Mormon involved watching a lot of Everybody Loves Raymond.
However, considering how hard LDS church campaigned for Proposition 8 in California, I'm skeptical of the idea that they really preach tolerance, Trump's religious ban rhetoric is something that they have reason to be afraid of.
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Sounds like they're a mixed bag, like every other type of people.
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Never met any
I'm up for meeting some of these hot daughters tho
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I should add that the first art director I worked for was also Mormon, and was one of the most kickass dudes I've ever met. He didn't drink alcohol or caffeine, and he didn't smoke, but he also married a Catholic woman, so I don't think he was "in good standing."
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dum dum dum dum dum
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I've heard that Krakauer's Under the Banner of Heaven is also a pretty thorough book (I've barely started it).
As an ex Mormon that book was incredibly eye opening. I highly recommend it.
Sounds like they're a mixed bag, like every other type of people.
I think that's a safe thing to say. It likely also depends upon where they're from. Utah mormons are practically an entirely different religion to others throughout the US. And the church outside of the US is a lot more about things like community and family and less about things like keeping backwards ass rich white guys in charge.
The LDS church is weird in that they absolutely love to ret-con things as soon as it starts to affect their financial bottom line and most members don't question this even though the doctrine tells you to question it. (Of course the expected outcome is that you'll get the warm fuzzies and be okay with it)
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I will say, the lead singer in my favorite band (The Killers) is mormon so they get major props for that, at least.
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I seriously doubt Brandon Flowers is in particularly good standing.
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I seriously doubt Brandon Flowers is in particularly good standing.
Dude told Richard Dawkins to shut the fuck up. :lol
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The Killers? Eh, at least it's not Muse.
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Religions I can succinctly reject with one line :lawd
Mormons
"No thanks, you guys think black people are trash"
:whew
NOI
"No, you guys killed Malcolm X"
:pacspit
Ntards
"Didn't you buy a WiiFit board a decade ago"
:neogaf
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Noticed Scientology wasn't in there
(http://memesvault.com/wp-content/uploads/Laughing-Tom-Cruise-Gif-15.gif)
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Scientology isn't a religion. ;)
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Scientology isn't a religion. ;)
But Ntardery is???
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Scientology isn't a religion. ;)
That's official now in Germany, isn't it?
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Scientology isn't a religion. ;)
That's official now in Germany, isn't it?
Not quite, apparently
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scientology_status_by_country
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I seriously doubt Brandon Flowers is in particularly good standing.
Apparently the Neon Trees front man is/was a Gay Mormon: http://www.rollingstone.com/music/news/watch-neon-trees-tyler-glenn-slam-mormon-church-in-new-solo-video-20160429
which is a special kind of self loathing.
Honestly if you are:
1. Gay
2. A minority
3. A woman
There's almost no positive reason for you to join the LDS Church.
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Shower thought: Mormons are the Japanese of white people.
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Shower thought: Mormons are the Japanese of white people.
How so? Mormon weebs don't go to Utah wanting to pretend to be mormon. Also, they're not sexually perverse.
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thought this would be a riotous/bork thread tbh :doge
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Not really fair to talk about Cream, since he's ban-
Oh. MorMons
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I seriously doubt Brandon Flowers is in particularly good standing.
Dude told Richard Dawkins to shut the fuck up. :lol
Actually he didn't. What did happen which was fucked up for both Dawkins and Flowers is that the host decides to call Dawkins out while Flowers was still on stage before leaving to get ready to perform. Dawkins had no idea Flowers wouldn't even be "debating" him and Flowers had no idea he was going to get mauled by Dawkins.
It was pretty awkward and you can see Flowers about to explode before Dawkins realizes what was happening and apologized.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MMlgbfxt3qc
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Did anyone see that crowd shot loop of BYU students at a football game on reddit this morning? I can't find it again but that was some crazy shit
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Also, they're not sexually perverse.
He also prophesied that the garden of eden was in Jackson County, Missouri. He also quietly institutes polygamy, marrying some wives as young as 14, sisters, and other men's wives around 38 wives in total.
:ohyou
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Shower thought: Mormons are the Japanese of white people.
How so? Mormon weebs don't go to Utah wanting to pretend to be mormon. Also, they're not sexually perverse.
They share the same characteristics of others of their race, but just go that extra 10-15 percent in everything they pursue.
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(https://i.imgur.com/fPQBg4G.jpg)
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I had a friend at school who was a Mormon. Once asked him what he'd like for Xmas and he said he'd like me to go to church with him. I was like nah, how about some Pokemon instead guy?
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So lately, more and more news and proof about the mormon church willfully covering up for sexual predators keeps coming out. Last week they excommunicated a guy who simply asked that the church stop protecting sexual predators and grooming children for sexual abuse. Meanwhile any active mormons I know just don't talk about it, or look the other way at such stuff. I was telling a fellow exmo that it's not so much a question about if the church is true or not, the question is, is it evil or not?