So I wrote a long back story to this which I deemed unnecessary to the point I was trying to make. I've included it below if anyone is actually interested.

Here's the short version:
I once went out with a girl who was so in love with the church that she wouldn't even consider going on a single date with a guy without him being an RM. We talked for a long time about it one night while I was still a TBM.

As I think back to our conversation about how much love she has for the church I wondered this simple thought: Why didn't you go on a mission? If you love the church so much and you think your home absolutely needs an RM in it, why aren't you the RM? Why is it that girls get the pleasure of being so holier-than-thou choosy about the guys they date based on missions while they don't have the... we'll call it faith... to go themselves? All things equal the only person who should be able to say they only want an RM is an RM. These girls who discriminate have no idea what it's like to put life on hold for two years to go work 18 hour days at your own expense and get nothing out of it.

Let me add that I'm happily married to a nevermo. I was just thinking about these girls and how they 'require' someone who sacrificed to go on a mission while they were sitting at home.

Anyone else have that thought before?



Original story below

Once upon a time in a singles ward I had a MAJOR crush one of the fine sisters in the singles ward. I say sister both because of the Mormon custom of addressing others and because she was the sister of a good friend of mine in the ward.

I was an RM of about 2 years and she was a grad student. We'd known each other for many years being that I was friends with her brother and we actually hit it off well. We never could quite get our timing right as she dated a guy when I was single and I dated another girl while she was single.

Finally one fine October we were both single and we started to do what every apostle is afraid of - Hanging out without going on a traditional date! OMG!!!

We talked for quite some time about life, where we wanted ours to go and what the church meant to us. I was still very TBM at the time and was impressed by her fervor of church support. We went out once and it was apparent very quickly that we weren't as good a match as we thought we were. We were adult about it and remained friends.

As time went by we fell out of touch. She got married and I stopped being active followed by leaving completely. I had no shame of my new choice and one St. Patrick's day posted a picture of myself holding a green beer with some friends. She was the first to comment on it saying simply "hope it was good." Clearly that is a passive aggressive Mormon way of saying, "I hope it was good because it's sending you to HELL!"

I ignored the comment, but the next day, while obviously hung over, I went through her Facebook posts from the previous few months. She devoted 99% of her time to trying to push the church on her non-member friends. She had one blathering post about being so grateful for being married to a worthy RM and how all guys should go on missions. She has younger brothers so I'm sure it's partly directed at them.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 02/27/2014 04:20PM by mondaymorning.

"Why is it that girls get the pleasure of being so holier-than-thou choosy about the guys they date based on missions while they don't have the... we'll call it faith... to go themselves? "

This line of questioning screams, to me, "right here is a guy who internalized all the brainwashing but it has never occurred to him that the other gender is also being brainwashed."

Did you ever stop to think about the message drilled into YW's heads? Our sole, one and only, true purpose in life is to snag an RM and make babies with it. We don't get careers, we don't necessarily get love, we definitely don't get our needs met because women have no needs of course.

So first, there is no pleasure in having your one choice laid out for you, instead of evaluating all the possible choices and making it yourself. You make it sound like the men are are this downtrodden brainwashed horribly suppressed group but the women are all tourists in this cult. 'Cause subverting your hopes, your dreams, your talents, your aspirations to pump out babies for some overly entitled penishood holder, yeah that's a vacation. Like a walk on the beach.

It's not that they don't necessarily have the faith to go themselves. They are sitting on a ticking time bomb. They have to be married by 23 or so or else all the good ones will be snagged up by 19-year-olds. This is a race, man. Ain't no picnic. You've got to push up those boobies, and make up your face, and smile no matter what and keep sweet and snag yourself a man. OTHERWISE YOU HAVE NO PURPOSE IN LIFE. You are a worthless waste of skin and oxygen. You can't even get into heaven.

Besides everyone knows that the only women who go on missions are overweight, homely, and/or bossy/intelligent. [/sarcasm]

Finally, I'm not really sure why you are extrapolating the actions of this one turbo mormon chick to make the sweeping generalization that mormon women just don't have enough faith to go on their own missions. That just doesn't even make any sense, unless you think women are some sort of monolithic hive mind and we're all motivated by the same thing and act exactly the same way.

First, I'm talking specifically about the women who refused to even consider dating a guy without him being an RM. That is not a general sweeping group of women. That is a very specific type of woman.

And if your concern is a rush to get married then perhaps those same women I spoke of shouldn't be so picky as to only consider an RM.


It's the same line of thinking as woman who REFUSES to date a guy unless he is rich. They haven't made money for themselves but won't date anyone unless they have.

I remember being an RM in the YSA scene right after my mission. I remember more than a few church and fireside talks where they told the YW that dating a YM who had not served the Lard on a mission was beneath them. I don't think it is an entirely selfish act of the women. Just another product of TSCC brain washing and badmouthing anybody who doesn't follow every little TSCC rule with exactness. Church leaders taught these women to think that men who didn't serve missions were lazy, sinful, irresponsible, selfish heathens who were completely unworthy of them. This line of thinking probably got more than a few young men to go out and do the Morg's bidding for fear that no woman would ever want them if they didn't.

I am an RM so hopefully I can weigh in here. First of all, YW in the church are taught specifically that the effort a boy puts into serving the Lord is exactly the sort of effort he'll put into his family. If he isn't willing to sacrifice to go on a mission for GOD, sisters, he will never make sacrifices for you or your children. He'll be selfish and will take you for granted, like he takes God for granted. This was taught to us over and over again. It isn't like going for an RM is like going for a rich man - it's more like if you don't hold out for an RM, you'll end up with a self-centered loser and regret it. They aren't always trying to win a prize but to avoid a catastrophe.

Second, the fact you think an RM is a prize in women's minds shows how the church taught you to think of your RM status. You think that being an RM makes you like the rich guy - the prize. Not like you hit a minimum standard of acceptability. I'm not trying to be rude or anything by saying that but just to show you how pervasive their brain washing is without your even knowing it.

Third, if you were ever a girl at a Mormon dance you'd know a LOT of Mormon guys are just as bad with their "higher than/holier than thou" attitudes. Example - my first BYU dance I was a cute, slender brunette with big hazel eyes who dressed pretty nicely. I'd even been a runner up in our town's beauty pageant a mere 6 months earlier. Guys at the dance would walk past, slow down, look you up and down, head to toe and move on. They wanted a skinny blonde, dressed like a total Molly Mormon. They had a TYPE they'd been told over and over by their MP they were entitled to, based on how much service they'd given the Lord. It was very obvious and I wasn't the only girl disgusted by it. Now I'm not saying all guys were like this - in fact, I'd guess you weren't - but many of them were. They were looking for someone to cast in the roll of Hot Homemaker as much as the women were looking for a Handsome RM Prince. Mormonism messes with everyone.

I'm glad you ended up with someone who loved you for who you are. That doesn't happen so much in Mormon marriages where people are cast in a role rather than loved. And if it helps, some of the least Mormon guys are now, many years later, the ones I MOST regret having let go. Any woman who dumped you for shallow reasons may now be secretly regretting it and even if she isn't, the poor woman is still Mormon whereas you are a free man. Congrats on that too.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 02/27/2014 06:22PM by CA girl.

Thanks for your input CA but I think you've missed my point. I don't think an RM is a prize. That's exactly my point. They aren't any better or worse than any other guy there. The fact that certain women won't consider anyone besides an RM is a pedestal put there by someone other than the guy himself.

A good friend of mine from my old singles ward chose not to go on a mission. He simply didn't want to. He married a great but very TBM who didn't reserve judgment of him based on his mission status. Perfect example of the difference between the girls who called holier than thou and the girls who are not.

Trust me, I do not think being an rm is a prize. From my vantage point now it's a source of shame. I don't want people to know I was ever Mormon.

My point in all of this was if this girl I wrote about can be so high and mighty about the church and be in everybody's face about it, why didn't she go? She married at 25, more than enough time to go.

All I was trying to get across is its a bit unfair for someone to make that a criteria in choosing a dinner date. It is another fault of the church.

AND if I didn't do it the way they told me to, I might lose my family. BUT also, I was a very independent, free-thinking young woman who had an excellent job (the singles ward bishop told me not to tell the guys in the ward how much I earned). The mormon guys ran from me. I dated nonmormons--so nobody can say I wouldn't date a non-RM. The nonmormons were the only ones who seemed interested. AND I was considered HOT, too. The singles ward bishop was always telling me (I typed for him, so I knew him well) he couldn't figure out why I wasn't married yet.

I married someone gay. I think I did well considering what I read on here and what I see. I'm now with one of those nonmormons I dated at age 20 (I'm 56).

Actually, six months before the nonmormon came back into my life, I was sitting in my ex's ugly travel van with my son. We were discussing the guys I had "let go." I said to him, "An RM and a temple marriage at all costs and this is what I got!!" We got a good "laugh" out of that. THIS ATTITUDE was DRILLED into us. In reality, I would have been happy to just have a normal mormon guy ask me out.

I was going to say in another thread I read today that it really does go both ways--there are the picky unrealistic mormon girls and the picky unrealistic mormon guys.

My daughter is TBM and hates RMs. She actually has met one now who treats her like a queen, but he doesn't have a degree, only a GOOD JOB. He is actually an RM, but doesn't act like one. No other mormon girl wanted to date him because he didn't have a degree. (My daughter does have a degree and has a good job.)

LDS inc is abusing young girls by drilling into their heads that they are incomplete without a husband and children. LDS inc is abusing young boys by drilling into their head that they are incomplete without going on a mission.

LDS inc sets up oppressive expectations and rates teens as half a person unless they meet the expectations. Single young women aren't holier than thou they are victims.