Mormons Rock!

[scottie]

Page 3, paragraph 4:

The result is an organization that resembles a sanctified multinational corporation—the General Electric of American religion, with global ambitions and an estimated net worth of $30 billion.

Wowzers.

[arizonaute]

sure the church makes lots of money

but they spend lots of money too : )

[falafel]

Page 3, paragraph 4:


Wowzers.

I wonder how much of that is tied up in physical assets like real property. I'll bet that's the majority. All of those meeting houses, stake centers, temples. The value of those will certainly add up.

[Commando]

[*] Awesome, of course, unless you are gay, or have gay family and friends.

I have a gay/transgender cousin. Does that mean I'm not awesome? Why do you hate gays?

[HuskyFreeNorthwest]

I would argue that it is the harmed party that gets primary consideration when it comes to defining hateful actions.

So if one were to consider you hateful or having their testimony harmed by your statements, you would not be able to argue against that claim?

[byu71]

My children have a 1/2 brother who is gay. He has brought his boyfriends to our Christmas parties. No one has hated him because he has. Both times the gay boyfriend played that exchange of goofy gifts thing.

Later, he was beaten up by each boyfriend. Why do gays hate gays?

[RobinFinderson]

So if one were to consider you hateful or having their testimony harmed by your statements, you would not be able to argue against that claim?

I think there are quite a few important differences. Here are a few:

In your scenario, someone who feels harmed by reading something I write can simply avoid reading my writing.

vs.

In the situation with gay couples in CA, where they had the right to marry, and then had that right stripped away from them, we are talking about lasting unavoidable harm.

In your scenario, the thing that I said that might have 'harmed' someone's testimony might have left other people's testimony untouched. In other words the damage could just as easily be the result of one person's fragile testimony, and not due to the persuasive power of my words.

vs.

In the Prop 8 situation, we are talking about the mean interpretation of millions of people. The bigger the sample size, and the more consistent the interpretation, the more likely that this is not the result of fragile individual feelings.

[Green Monstah]

Page 3, paragraph 4:


Wowzers.

I think that figure is on the low side, as crazy as that might sound.

[UtahDan]

Robin you have put it a bit more bluntly than I would have here, but your comments in this thread are excellent.

[cougjunkie]

Robin you have put it a bit more bluntly than I would have here, but your comments in this thread are excellent.

Yikes the fact that you agree with Robin in this thread shows how far you truly have fallen.

I like how you continue to justify the mistakes you have made in life.

If I vote no on a bill that will build a new road in Utah County and bring thousands of jobs and millions of dollars to the county does that mean I hate construction workers?

[UtahDan]

Yikes the fact that you agree with Robin in this thread shows how far you truly have fallen.

I like how you continue to justify the mistakes you have made in life.

If I vote no on a bill that will build a new road in Utah County and bring thousands of jobs and millions of dollars to the county does that mean I hate construction workers?

You're a credit to your faith CJ, never hide your light under a bushel.

[cougjunkie]

You're a credit to your faith CJ, never hide your light under a bushel.

I am just trying to give you another reason to justify your demise.

[pellegrino]

Yikes the fact that you agree with Robin in this thread shows how far you truly have fallen.

I like how you continue to justify the mistakes you have made in life.

If I vote no on a bill that will build a new road in Utah County and bring thousands of jobs and millions of dollars to the county does that mean I hate construction workers?

I agree with Robin, does that mean I have fallen too?

[cougjunkie]

I agree with Robin, does that mean I have fallen too?

No it just means you are not as smart as you think you are.

[RobinFinderson]

I would add one thing to this... the whole gay thing is the only serious problem I have with the church, and that is because I view it as an attack on people outside the faith whose life choices do not primarily impact people in the faith.

I have other quibbles with Mormonism, including their treatment of women in the church, the style of proselytizing, the corporate structure/culture, the marginalization of non-white cultural aspects in an increasingly diverse membership, and a bunch of others. But these things primarily affect members IN the church, so I chalk them up as the primary concerns of Mormons figuring out their own private Mormon destiny.

But the gay thing is a whole different matter, because of how it reaches out of the church and harms people who, for the most part, want nothing to do with the church. It is the one big thing that, IMO, deserves to be pilloried until the behavior is shamed out of existence.

Did the church actively campaign for laws to marginalize black people? Not that I know of. Did the defeat of the ERA strip women of their rights? Nope. In this way the church's activism against gay people is worse than its history with women and black people.