Anyone hear this one or a version of it before? I heard the above recently and in the past I heard a woman in testimony talk about how others had come and gone, but she had stayed faithful. She had seen how, for those that stayed, the church had "softened them," made them gentler.

To me this just seems, like much of the LDS church's internal consumption folklore, a way of spinning the necessity of people submitting so much of themselves and their time and energy to whatever the church asks. Few see or reveal the grumbling, the cogdis, the unhappiness, the difficult efforts at adjustment, that goes on privately.

Outside the LDS church, I have also heard countless reports from Exmos about the freedom and happiness they realized outside the church. True they aren't such suckers for missionary promises or ponzi schemes, but they get along with real friendships outside the membership.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 03/23/2012 11:46AM by derrida.

Really? Where are they hiding them?

I live on an island that has more than its fair share of retirees on it. My impression is that they get older, crankier, and meaner.

Magical thinking......no one gets softer kinder or humbler (is that a word) by staying in an organization that calls people who leave the organization "apostates" and "in satans grasp", or "suffering from a major sin".

There is nothing kind, soft, or humble about that behavior.

Narcissists within the organization find the church an excellent tool for "softening up" their victims. By telling the congregation that they should be soft, she was participating in the role of perpetrator.

Also the best way to soften a good steak for consumption is to beat it with that studded mallet.

Interesting to consider that one beats a *bad* steak to soften it up and make it usable. This fits the LDS church's view of human nature--that people are bad and sinful and good for nothing other than molding into church fodder, into being tools of the church, serving the institution.

What's so great about soft?

If it means tender--great. Kind hearted. Good.

But it could mean gushy. Not for me. I like strong, clear, concise and compassionate.

What if it means malleable? I think that-malleable- is the intended version of mormon softness and is nothing to be proud of.

Soft in the brain? Easy to manipulate? Easy to make proud of being obedient even when it goes against your own self. Now what cult leader wouldn't find that appealing about soft?

Soft. It isn't necessarily such a compliment.

Once again the church members choose to see the rest of the world as hard and cold. They fail to see the truth, that there are billions of lovely warm hearted decent people everywhere and the arrogance of looking at the world the way they do is disgusting.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 03/23/2012 01:27PM by blueorchid.

Two words: Mountain Meadows

And of course we can't forget that lovable old softie, Brigham Young.

Bruce R. McConkie

Boyd K. Packer

etc.

What the Church does is make people arrogant. It tells them THEY are right and ANYONE who disagrees is wrong.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 03/23/2012 03:35PM by baura.

That's true. How can members seriously see the church as some leavening agent, rounding people's rough edges, when they also recognize the hardness of Mormons like Packer and Young? And when the Mormon God is such an exacting figure, requiring so much of members who receive precious little mercy from the never satisfied LSD church and God.

I remember as a TBM feeling that the church leaders, local and at gen conf, were good men who only wanted to serve the Lord. They loved the members. And the members were trained to love them. Makes me sick to think of that now.

Of course most members do not think too hard about MMM and so discount its violence, even if they think of it at all.

More creepy Orwellian stuff. Enslavement is freedom. Sadness is happiness. And as far as "softening" people, I think it tends to make people mean and prickly.

The LDS church has always been at war with Eastasia, is what I think.

This is the subjective claptrap of the unlearned. An old lady notices that Mormons get softer over the years. These are people who have denied their individuality for many decades. Every last edge of their personalities has eroded away under a steady stream of indoctrination. They are as dumb as river rock, tumbled smooth in relentless currents.

Interesting and useful point Don. Is "dumb" the right place to take the analogy of the worn river rock though? the analogy fits the indoctrination process beautifully, but while the rock loses much distinctness, it does so while settling and finally fitting into the river bed, placed where the forces of water and the needs of its neighboring rocks, sand, and drift wood have needed it to be. But we know long time members of the LDS church who aren't stupid, yet they have always bowed to the power of the church. Hmmm. I think this can go somewhere other than instant dismissal of the "church softens you" idea. It's a bad idea for sure, but there is a subtlety to it.

I don't doubt that a wrinkled brain is sharper than one with a smooth surface. Better to be flinty and hard-edged than worn into submission like a...river rock.

I think your analogy of the river rock is brilliant. There are machines that tumble rocks as well and speed up the process like the mormon church. No matter what it looks like going in, it comes out the same as all the others. It is what they want. Sameness. Boring,boring sameness.

The thought of looking around and having everyone indistinguishable from anyone else is truly nightmarish. In this life apparently the goal is to strip you of your personality, and in the next you get stripped of your pigment.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 03/25/2012 01:56PM by blueorchid.

shudder...

Like prison does.


Ana

The tbm used a quote from the Dalai Lama asserting the same virtue of kindness, softness, gentleness. This was meant to give high spiritual authority to the Mormon position of being like a child, a lamb, an innocent.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 03/24/2012 06:35PM by derrida.

Everything in human emotional and mental nature is manifestations of things that should be balanced soundly, in order for both the individual and the group, and the society as a whole, to function healthy. For instance what you take in and give out is in a balance, sound or not. If you are made sensitive about your own inner self, feelings and thoughts, the result will be in many humans also to direct it outward to be critical to the absurd towards other people. In fact, it may (among other functions, socially) become a weapon to redirect your attention from your self-directed over-critical attention to others' perceived little small secrets and faults (as viewed and perceived). Personally, I think it takes unsound proportions in the mormon church setting.

Wonder what church they are talking about?

I know some non-Mormon women do it too, but really, what the hell is up with that?

I have probably heard that.

But I have definitely heard: "[My wife] is so nice. You don't find people that nice outside of the church." Probably getting at the same idea. [eyes roll]

There are a lot of nice people in the church, and it really does seem to work for some people.

But it doesn't change the fact that the only good reason to believe something is that it seems to you to be true.

There are nice people in every church and in every organization. Some of those people soften over time. I think experiences, maturity, and growing up cause more softening than specific organizations. I know some that have softened and I know others that have become more arrogant and gossipy in the church. I assume they would have done the same in other organizations.

No way. It encourages people to cultivate an image of softer, kinder and more humble. Scratch the surface and you never know what you'll find.