I posted a tongue-in-cheek "don't blame the morg" reply on this thread http://exmormon.org/phorum/read.php?2,187952,187952#msg-187952 a couple of weeks or so ago.

Timothy posted a rebuttal that I totally approve of. He called me an "apologist," which, if you know my posts, you know I'm not. But I enjoyed his post. I was hoping for someone to answer the position I was sarcastically parroting and he did (finally someone started spelling out what was wrong with that position).

In fact, my sarcastic "don't blame the morg" post was me channeling other voices on this board, voices that have pissed me off with their "leave the morg out of it" approach to our processing our anger, pain, and confusion, and, as Timothy rightly reminds us, our "recovery" (a most important word there) from a cult (if you don't think the church is a cult then I challenge you to pick up a copy of Steve Hassan's Combatting Cult Mind Control book, read it, and find yourself not being able to highlight or underline 75% or more of it as pertaining directly to the church's use of its doctrines and members).

On the one hand, how someone handles the spiritual rape conducted by the church is entirely their own affair. Others who mitigate the church's form of organizational abuse, or who normalize it as just another "tribe," are not helpful.

Maybe when one is ten or twenty years out of the morg, one can look serenely on and note that under the eyes of the cosmos, all this shall pass and we take offense and burn with anger only at our own peril. Fine. A lot of people come here though and they aren't at that place. They are in the trauma center, and something has caused that trauma, and to minimize that trauma is treacherous and practically in league with those who are the church's PR minions.

There is a taking sides in this life. We do live in a circumscribed, finite present, and we hurt and can be abused by organizations that only seek our affiliation to fill their own coffers and promote their own aims. Families are destroyed by the church. No one of any real experience of these matters (matters of disaffiliation) can deny that.

At best, the apologist position that says the morg is just another group like any other is playing the part of someone who is spiritually and psychologically so distant from the abusive organization that their advice is next to useless for those who are in the throes of spiritual pain and turmoil caused by the church. What's odd is that such people would even bother to post on a RECOVERY FROM MORMONISM site. Which does lead one to wonder about their motivations.

Acknowledging abuse is healthier than minimizing it (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/8800526).



Edited 3 time(s). Last edit at 05/25/2011 04:42PM by derrida.

Well, I'm not sure the term cult is used correctly and doubt it would hold up legally in court, so your whole post is just silly.

Perhaps addressing the content would be a better choice.

Better yet, read the Hassan book and then come back and discuss it within this context.

And my apologies, derrida, for assuming you're an apologist. Have to be honest in saying I haven't read too many if your posts. What more can I say?

Letting folks or organizations off the hook, particularly repeat offenders, tends to burn my fern and I don't have a problem saying so.

I haven't read Hassan's book, but the entire bottom shelf of my library is dedicated to books on cults and the occult. Mormonism is no stranger there.

I'm curious, lillium. Have you been involved in enough court cases to know when a given argument will or will not hold up? In my experience, a strong and compelling argument of any kind will always hold up, but what do I know?

For the record, I've been out of the cult for close to forty-years. I'm not "angry" with it and haven't been for many years. What pisses me off, however, is the fact that said cult continues to inflict harm on otherwise innocent and undeserving folks and doesn't give half a hunk of s**t.

In that respect, to sin by silence when one should protest makes cowards of us all.

In my estimation, its alright to be angry. As the OP notes, acknowledging abuse is healthier than minimizing it.

Indeed.

Timothy

+1

Surely, you aren't serious? The term "Cult" is not used correctly? It is every bit a cult and then some.

A system of worship that centers on a living leader who claims to have authority from god.

Be hard pressed to find a religion that doesn't fit the criteria.

This is the Gospel according to Timothy ... When it looks like it, smells like it and acts like it, you call it what it is.

Timothy



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 05/26/2011 12:35PM by Timothy.

There are a lot of terms that legally won't be recognized. But if legalism is our only source of meaning for words, then there are a lot of words, ideas, concepts, that we all rely on which would be thrown out of court. Scientology is famous for threatening lawsuits at the merest whiff of bad PR. And the LDS church has a comparatively large and active legal arm. If it walks like a duck, and quacks like a duck, has feathers like a duck....

Hell, the American Psychological Association (APA) won't even recognize the word "cult" because they are afraid of all the cults attacking them in the courts with their huge supplies of money. You don't have to be right to win in or out of court. You just need to have enough money to threaten people with the idea of legal action to make them afraid to speak or fight for the truth.

For example, I don't think one could legally get a court to recognize the idea of "mind control." But who would seriously suggest that mind control doesn't happen? And what's the relationship between mind control and the concept of a damaging cult?



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 05/25/2011 04:35PM by derrida.

Damn! I can't believe I didn't get at least a couple posters agreeing with me!

I approve of your rebuttal. ;-)

I got some agreeing with me on the original thread. This thread is young. Give them time.

I hate the mormon church. I will hate it as long as I live. I hate the people in it. They perpetuated what happened to me and looked the other way when it was exposed. They kept me down. They destroyed my self-esteem. They made living tough. I hope every one of those people rot in hell (damn there is no hell, but you get the gist.)

it absolutely reeks of "the church is perfect" arguments.

It's minimizing and downright abusive. I also question the motives of those who take this line when people start ranting about the church. Part of recovery should be recognizing the faults of tscc, it's pretty damn far from perfect. I wonder if they aren't attempting to deal with their own pain by minimizing others feelings? I dunno, it's annoying though.

Nobody on this forum would disagree that the church is culpable for a laundry list of intentional or unintentional damages done to each of us, but it's not 100% the church either.

We all have to acknowledge at some point in our recovery that we are not 100% innocent, even those of us born in the church. Unless we take responsibility for ourselves and our actions we can never fully recover.

I take responsibility for my own actions. I can't help what I was taught as a child, i can't take back the hundreds of fake testimonies I repeated in sunday school while my mom whispered in my ear, I can't undo the indoctrination and the cultural programming, but I can say today that I've learned from my mistakes and won't allow myself to fall into the same trap again.

If there are people on the board that want to blame the church 100% then that's just where they are in their recovery. No judgement. That just wouldn't work for me.

I agree kolobian, and I am open to a middle ground or at least a position that isn't black and white, because of course that's the sort of binary, polarized thinking the church teaches.

My problem is to have such a mitigating, minimizing position posted in such a steady stream on this board (why are there so many fans of the church on THIS board? Surely they can post about their magnanimous feelings about the church on apologist and pro-church sites rather than get in the faces of people who are suffering over and angry about the church); and then I start to wonder why the position is so unsatisfactory for me and why it angers me.

One answer is that I get the same shit from my TBM wife. She won't really discuss the church. She was mortally offended that I was reading a book on cult mind control. Nothing it does is wrong. It's just a group like any other. In fact, look at all the good the church does.

It's the same damn position!



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 05/25/2011 04:34PM by derrida.

It's like when you watch COPS and the lady that just got the sh*t beat out of her by her "loving husband" refuses to press charges. They minimize (often suppressing) the bad stuff and exaggerate the good stuff until they've morphed who their husband really is into a pseudo-clone version that suits their needs.

Adherents of western religions, especially x-ians subgroups like kolobianism are the worst at this kind of thing. I did it until I didn't anymore.

I can look back on the afterlife insurance policy sales trip and remember specific instances when I was faced with being honest with myself about the implications of church doctrine and placing the stuff on my zelph shelf (which is really just the equivalent of lying to myself) until one day the shelf broke and I examined everything honestly.

That's what I mean by taking responsibility for ourselves. We can all remember specific times where we knew we were lying to ourselves and chose to anyway because preserving our beliefs was more important than standing on our own.

kolobian Wrote:

> If there are people on the board that want to
> blame the church 100% then that's just where they
> are in their recovery. No judgement. That just
> wouldn't work for me.

That's it exactly. You have to go through the anger in order to get to the middle ground.

Like Timothy, I've been out a long time (25 years in June!), so I'm well past the personal anger part. These days, like Tim, I tend to get most worked up on other people's behalf. When I see decent people going through hell, it works my last nerve.

All I can ever really say, though, is to assure folks it does get better. That the anger is normal and is a healthy response to an unhealthy situation. Eventually, it does end. And when that happens, it's a relief as well.

So, I kind of understand this minimizing technique. In some instances, it's meant as reassurance that things get better. But all too often, it comes off as minimizing the person's negative experience and their feelings.

The fact that this minimizing is felt most acutely by newly minted ex-mos bothers me. These folks need time and support to get through the anger. Making them feel their experience is somehow wrong does not help achieve that end.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 05/25/2011 05:17PM by elee.

"The darkest places in hell are reserved for those who maintain their neutrality in times of moral crisis." -- Dante Alighieri (qtd. in Laura Schlessinger, Surviving a Shark Attack, pp. 19.)

Of course someone who believes in a "hell" would make a propagandistic statement like this. It's no different than Bruce Mckonkie condemning africans for "sitting on the fence" during the war in heaven.

Cliches don't impress me. Achieving balance should be something to be strived for. People with political agendas are the ones who attempt to unbalance others by encouraging them to stray left or right.

Being angry is a way of dealing with issues in order to achieve balance. Choosing to stay angry no matter what is way of self-indulging and, like I said, it's not for me. I let my anger run its course and do its job, then I left it in the dust.

And people who can do nothing but preach "balance" to people who are in pain are being mindless and are no different from the apologists who swoon over mormonism and all of its lies, distortions, and abuses.

It's a "cliche" to "move past" one's anger. Any fool knows that. But the bigger fool keeps harping on "balance" and harmony while an abusive organization steals families and distorts lives.

“Nobody on this forum would disagree that the church is culpable for a laundry list of intentional or unintentional damages done to each of us”

“If there are people on the board that want to blame the church 100% then that's just where they are in their recovery. No judgement.”

“Being angry is a way of dealing with issues in order to achieve balance.”

“I let my anger run its course and do its job”

If me saying I agree that people who have been injured by the church should "go ahead and be angry" and "let anger run its course" is somehow defending the cult I don't know what to tell you. Should I change my position and say they SHOULDN'T be angry and SHOULDN'T let anger run its course? Is that what you suggest? I think you might be confused.

I think anger is a natural response and is healthy. But if a person chooses to artificially prolong their anger, that's not healthy. Do you disagree?

kolobian Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------

> But if a person chooses to artificially
> prolong their anger, that's not healthy. Do you
> disagree?

How could anyone discern if a poster is choosing to artificially prolong their anger? I don't see how that is remotely possible. So, I tend to take people at face value and trust that the process will eventually work itself out.

Roxydog1312 said:

"I hate the mormon church. I will hate it as long as I live."

This is what I was referring to.

Hyperbolic? Sure. To state categorically that one will always hate what one hates now is typical bloviation. Because that's how it feels. Whether or not that pans out on the long run is difficult to judge.

Maybe that's just where they are in their recovery process.

I was pissed off when I first landed at RfM in 2000. But I have moved beyond that. Now. And I've seen the same process at work on many, many posters over the years.

It really does seem like a natural process....

For every strident "anti-mormon" on this site there are multiple people who have gone through that process and come out less angry on the other side. There is a definite pattern.

I really do agree with your earlier point of accepting that there are stages and we should simply accept people for wherever they are at that moment in the process.

Great discussion, by the way. Thanks!

Erin

"I think anger is a natural response and is healthy."J

Who doesn't?

"But if a person chooses to artificially prolong their anger, that's not healthy."

Platitude.


"Do you disagree?"

Trollish bait.

I totally agree with the OP.

And isn't it funny how threads like this attract the very apologetic replies that this thread is directly addressing?

Roll call! I don't think all the closet apologists have stopped in yet...

Believe it or not, I've just discovered how angry I am. Fortunately, it's the kind of anger that just wishes to make fun of everything Mormon. It's a kind of hilarious anger. But I have my moments of seething anger on behalf of myself and my TBM family members.

I prefer the term "abusive organization" which I think encompasses most of what people mean when they say "cult". The word "cult" just carries so much baggage.

An abusive relationship is an abusive relationship, whether it's with a person or an organization.

what they should be feeling.

It doesn't MATTER what anybody SAYS you SHOULD be feeling.

You gotta just get real with yourself and deal with the feelings you ACTUALLY have. If you can get to the root of those feelings and deal with the circumstances, attitudes and beliefs that gave rise to them, you can start to work through them and heal emotionally.

To me, anger is like physical pain . . . a signal that something is hurting you and needs to be fixed. Don't try to suppress that pain, without fixing the cause. Like physical wounds, anger sometimes takes time to heal, and sometimes there are permanent scars. Sure, it would be nice to heal completely, but sometimes, the wounds are deep and they take a very long time. It's not fair for someone (especially a stranger) to get irritated because someone ELSE isn't healing fast enough for them. They have no idea how much someone else hurts or how deep the wounds are.

One more thought about anger. It's not an acceptable emotion in Mormonism (unless it's directed from a leader to a subordinate). If someone does you wrong? Forgive them ASAP, no matter how serious the offense (or crime). And we all know that not to forgive is more serious than the original offense, no matter how horrible it was. (sarcasm alert!)

So these posts objecting to anger seem like a carryover from Mormonism to me. They want everyone to forgive and forget, and avoid any unpleasant but real emotions they might have.

It seems like holier than thou bragging to me. Like, I'm better than you because I'm not angry, and I have TONS of friends still in TSCC because I'm so much more tolerant and wise than you. I feel like the person that I see doing this the most is constantly massaging her own ego in a really condescending way.

I've also seen people try to excuse horrid quotes by apostles and prophets by saying it was part of the times they lived in. WTF? That is just what a church apologist would say. The whole point is these men don't claim to be regular men from their time, they claim to be prophets and speak for a god who doesn't change and is timeless and these derogatory statements they make about women, blacks, and homosexuals have left a strong legacy in that church because of what those men said and who they claim to be. And this legacy continues to hurt many people today. Stop minimizing.

I think this idea of "holier than thou" nails much of it rmw. I mean, what the hell does that matter to the rest of us who are in dire straits about the church?

What surprises me though is the constant stream, the continuous badminton with posts, that one finds from such folks (one or two in particular of course). It's often struck me as a kind of trolling. They make the board less useful to me (someone who yearns for his pre-conversion days of sheer indifference to the church) in good part I think because they create one more boring, apologetic--self-congratulatory?--space on the board, another portion of the board that is remarkably untherapeutic, unconstructive, and therefore useless and ignored (for me).

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 05/25/2011 08:15PM by kolobian.

+1...and lillium, it is easy to get info on how to tell if some organization (church) is a cult. Please look into it so you can educate yourself.