Hi everybody. Just joined about ten minutes ago as of the time of this post, and I already have a question for anybody who wants to take a crack at it. Nice to meet you all, by the way! There was an experience I had a number of years ago in which a now former friend of mine came back from his mission. I actually went to visit him the night of his return. That night, and for quite a while afterwards, I noticed rather copious amounts of arrogance extruding from him. He talked like he now knew anything and everything about the world; how it all worked, and so forth.

It seemed as though he thought himself to have a lock on all knowledge about everything ever after coming back from his mission. On top of that, he then started to use Mormonism to judge the actions of everyone around him, myself included. He believed everything about Mormonism before his mission, more or less anyways. Yet upon returning, it was as if Mormonism had completely overtaken him in almost every aspect to the point of being grossly excessive.

I had heard about this experience from other friends with RM friends/family, so I believe this to not be an isolated incident. What is the cause of this, if anybody has any ideas? I had never before, or since, experienced such arrogance and/or downright haughtiness before from anybody, him especially. I would have thought his personality had been overtaken by something had I not seen him loosen back up to his old self after a while.

It is interesting that he has such a high opinion of himself and acts so arrogantly around others. If it weren't so infuriating, you could just look at him and very sadly say:

"I'm really sorry that you went through such a horrible experience. I can just imagine all the rejection and abuse that you went through both from the public as well as the people running the mission. You also got to see that the overwhelming majority of the world gets along just fine without Mormonism and all of its silly demands. Hopefully you'll get to a point where you actually recover from this. I'm sure it's like some sort of PTSD."

I'm sure it would piss him off to no end. But if you could do it with that perfect tone full of pity it would be priceless.

I don't think this is uncommon, but I wouldn't say it's the norm either...at least outside of Utah. I came home from my mission to LDS friends that had left the church, non-member friends that were almost done with college, and non-member extended family that thought I was wasting my time. I was sick and exhausted and just glad to be done. I felt like I had suffered through my Mormon rite of passage, and was more ashamed than proud. This was 20 years ago, but I remember very clearly my best friend asking if I was glad I had gone. I pretended like I was, but I really envied him.

I'd say 75% of the missionaries on my mission were just suffering through it. There were some annoying gung-ho missionaries, but I was fortunately never stuck with any of them. These guys were probably arrogant pricks upon returning home, but most missionaries just wanted to eat real food again, catch up with friends, catch up on movies, etc... They may have come off as arrogant at times when talking about their mission, their love for "the people", etc... around other mormons, but they're just playing the part...that's what they're supposed to do.

I don't know. The last 3 kids from my neighborhood weren't. One from Russia, one from Seattle and one from England. They all kind of went into hibernation. Watched TV or played video games most of the day. Their old friends had moved on, got married, etc. Kind of depressed.

You either sink or swim. That is the LDS Corp mentality. They isolate, intimidate and brainwash the missionary. They often turn reasonable, critical thinking youngsters into self-serving pricks. We had a lot of zone conferences about winners and losers. They highlighted, recognized and praised the group that made their goals. The rest of us [losers] were humiliated, rebuked and ordered to repent for not working hard enough. It sounds like this RM considers himself a "winner".

Some of this arrogance might wear off in time, but only in part. Many RMs wear their mission as a medal on their chest forever.

A part of it is probably the pure arrogance of youth as much as the arrogance of a mission. Do you remember being 21 or 22? I do. God, how I would love to be even half as smart as my friends and I all thought we were back then. I don't doubt that the returned missionary aura typically adds to this phenomenon, though in my case the mission field is where I came to a realization of the absurdity of the church, so I wasn't overly proud of what I had spent the two prior year doing. I was just a young man who was full of himself. The young jerk you describe is largely that as well, though he has the added drawback of thinking God is on his side.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 04/07/2017 06:30PM by scmd.

I worked for big company in Utah county for several years. I think in the room of 12 there was only 3 of us that weren't Mormons. Almost every day they would go into discussions about how they were blessed to be RM's. They were unqualified and arrogant. Guess who got the promotions? They would ask me if I had served a mission. I would always tell them I spent 6 years in the military defending their ass. Many times when I would be in a group setting,, some people would bring up the fact they had,," served".

Welcome.

Yep. They have special knowledge because they served a mission. That knowledge is that they are gonna get laid by an elite Mormon girl because she's looking for RMs.

:-)

It's not universal, but it is extremely common. Life has a way of humbling people though. Give your friend some time and maybe some space. If he's too insufferable, give him a break and check back in 2 or 3 years time. It's likely that he will still be TBM, but much less of an asshole. Or not. I think for most people though, this tends to be a phase that passes.

I too was a self-righteous asshole. The mission is weird. You get brainwashed into believing that you have the solution to all of life's problems. You've never really been out on your own and never had to seriously deal with the problems or contradictions of life, so such simplistic thinking comes much more easily. You're told that you have special authority, that you are an ordained representative of Hay-soos himself, and that you are selling the most valuable commodity that can be had. And yet at the same time you are berated and belittled for inevitably failing to obey to the upteen thousand mission rules, not working hard enough, not praying enough, not having enough faith, etc. The whole thing is a huge mindfuck.

After coming home, I tried to be nice, and generally speaking I wasn't overtly rude to people, but I was very judgmental and very prejudiced about people who didn't "meet my standards". But as I met more and more people from varied walks of life, I learned that they were good people, and as I became less and less convinced about the righteousness of my own path, I became a lot more open minded and a lot less of an asshole.

I still have to watch myself and examine my behaviors though. I am afraid that Mormon attitudes and a lifetime of Mormon thought patterns takes a long time to overcome. It is likely to be a battle that I fight for the rest of my life.



Edited 4 time(s). Last edit at 04/08/2017 04:48PM by Strength in the Loins.

Should wear off...but you know Mormonism is a strange paradigm. They create these delusions of grandeur for themselves, with grandiose titles and positions. Means squat outside of the cult, but to them - wow..they have something. Bunch of dumbasses.

Don't worry about it. They usually grow up and get over it.

Our one RM son was so incensed over the latest ruling (no ordinances for children of gay parents) that he and his wife have left the church. He now goes out for the occasional beer after work with his friends.

My brother has a naturally arrogant personality, and Mormonism/mission/priesthood badly encouraged him in it. He never learned to regard non-Mormons or people who make less than him as equals. He loves to put down other people.

Not every Mormon turns out this way, but for those who have a narcissistic streak, a mission where they get made the district leader or Assistant to the President encourages the very worst in them. Then they may never grow out of this pattern that got set in early adulthood.

My wife's nephew is an RM attending BYU and has a "job" teaching at the MTC. Everyone in her family takes every opportunity to tell us how smart he his and what a great young man he is, all because of his "service".

He posts the same crap on facebook you would expect from an active missionary.

Meanwhile, on my side of the family, my sister just marked another anniversary of my nephew's death from an IED in Afghanistan.

I can't swallow the old "their just kids". Sorry

The whole problem with the world is that the fools are so cock sure of thenselves And the wise are full of doubt.

Similar to Raiku--my older brother was arrogant by the time he was 12 so you can imagine what the mission did to him after he made it to AP. Year by year after the mission it got worse. Naturally he's very high up in the church now and get this--he often talks about how humble he is. Not kidding.

I came back and was in a complete daze. I only felt lost and untethered. Severe indoctrination leaves you with few life skills and as TBM as I was, I didn't fit in with the Mormons.

On the mission there were many arrogant missionaries all trying to "out-Mormon" each other. There were many like me who were just doing their duty. There were a lot who were playing and lazy and just going to movies. I would imagine they all were pretty much the same when they got home.

I had a friend (RM) of a relative approach me with the "I know everything" attitude. I cut him right off, "Is a 21 year old kid who has never had a job, wife, children or sex trying to explain life to me?" He said nothing and moved on.

Was he anything like this guy?

http://mylifebygogogoff.com/

Meant to post as a reply to the OP...



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 04/10/2017 10:05PM by Riverman.

I've known a few who were complete assholes with a holier than though countenance. I bet they thought they had fucking halos over their heads.

A guy in my Stake was a complete arrogant full of himself asshole before his mission. When he came back, oh boy was he even worse. Every story would start "on my mission..." and he'd always criticise teachers for slightly incorrect teachings or cause a stir in classes, and not in a good way. Loves himself and the sound of his own voice. Now married to someone equally full of herself and has his hair in a man bun. Looks and sounds absolutely ridiculous. I was once told him he's better than a damn sleeping pill, he didn't like that.

Also of note - he proposed to his now wife the morning of the Saturday session of Stake Conference. Loves to get attention from everyone, so by doing this and getting it straight on facebook, he and his equally attention seeking wife couldn't wait to be stars of the show all weekend. Even had the Stake President get them to stand for a round of applause during saturday evening session. I was nearly sick.

He sounds like Bishop -- or even Stake Presidency -- material for sure...

They're really, really strange when they first come back from a mission. I remember visiting a friend after she'd just returned home and she seemed like a completely different person.

Gratefully, usually, it wears off.

I knew someone who was a major asshole in high school, and his younger brother was just as bad as he was. Actually, the parents were just as arrogant as well, since their ancestors were from that Partridge family where biological sisters were in Joe Smith's harem of wives, and another member of that family was tarred and feathered with him.

I only knew the older brother for the last couple of years of high school, as we were in band together, but even then, I thought he was an arrogant asshole. My mom had both of them in her middle school English class, so that's how I heard about how arrogant the younger brother and parents were. I haven't heard anything about them, but I feel sorry for their mission companions and those who they harassed in the name of the cult. Chances are, they're just as arrogant because of their Mormon Royalty status, they probably thought they had the brightest halos on their heads.

44 years ago I was putting down spring fertilizer and the supplier was owned by a couple of TBM's who employed boys headed for missions and RM's as truck drivers. One holier than though asshole was a real jerk to deal with. A month later I was headed to a Montana cabin with my little brother and some pals who were throwing me a stag before my wedding. We partied and got shitfaced (we were all LDS guys and several were RM's) and when we crossed the border back into Alberta the next afternoon who is working as a Canada Customs officer?....Brother RM/Truck Driver/ Asshole! It was a Sunday and the jerk gave us the 3rd degree for going across to party instead of being in church. It was all I could do to stop from telling him to mind his own fucking business....but that would have landed me in handcuffs so I resisted the urge.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 04/13/2017 12:29AM by Lethbridge Reprobate.

The longer that I live the more proud I am of the fact that people did NOT think that I was an RM or recognize me as an RM after my absolutely miserable full time LDS mission. Including what his face Joe Christiansen who was president of the MTC when I went through the MTC.

Some years later, I was dating some brainless chick who decided that she was going to go on a mission. Along the way, she took a stake missionary preparation class that was taught on sundays afternoons by Joe Christiansen. One sunday my girlfriend and I decided that I would sit in on the class so I could be with her. (awwwwww, is not that sweet !!!!) After the class, Joe chatted it up with Jane, Joe wanted to know who I was so Jane introduced me. Joe quickly followed up by saying: "So, Smirkorama, have you ever thought about going on a mission??" I looked him right in the eye and said: "Yes, Yes, I have thought about it." I left it at that. Joe started up on how I should go on a mission. My girl friend has to interupt to inform Joe that I had ALREADY gone on a mission. JFTR the I was wearing the miserable magic MORmON underwear, but Joe completely missed that.

Too bad that I had not yet arrived at the point where I could have finished out my answer to Joe with what I was really contemplating about missions - that going appeared to be the biggest blunder of my life up to that point !!!! Well, other than its landslide effect in pushing me out of the filthy vile disgusting POS MORmON religion.

"Have you thought about going on a mission ????"

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joe_J._Christensen

Welcome on board.
I served in the California, LA mission 25 years ago. Some missionaries were arrogant on their mission, and not just the elders. A couple of sister missionaries had severe issues, too. The worst cases of arrogance for me were in the MTC. The young woman who was supposed to teach Gospel Doctrine spent her time instead berating everyone. Her ignorance of the gospel and scriptures was the flip side of her arrogance. She wanted to impress everyone with her calling and brought her family into the MTC, had them sit on the stage and when they took turns speaking, they, too, were arrogant. Imagine living in that family. I have met several people in the cult who suffer from this trait. They often made life miserable for everyone around them.

What awful people. But then this particular church seems to attract and retain this kind of personality.

I have worked all over the world, traveling extensively but for some reason don't feel the need to inform every single stranger I meet or even wear a ring proclaiming the fact.

I've lost count of the number of Morgbots who, within 2 minutes of meeting, loudly announce they "Served a Mission Yaknow".

Not sure whom exactly they're trying to impress. If I had wasted 2 years of my prime, God Bothering complete strangers trying to indoctrinate them into a cult.. All on my dime... I'm not sure I want that broadcast.