Posted by:
azsteve
(
)
Date: March 12, 2018 05:35AM
It may be a non-story today. But it just amazes me that in 1990, when the church actually abandoned these parts of their so-called eternal ceremony, that no one except Deborah Laake was talking about it publicly. And for those who didn't happen to read her book, they didn't hear it anywhere. I mean, you literally had a secret with at least hundreds of thousands of people in-on it, the secret had to do with death threats coming from a mainstream (at the time) church, and virtually nobody was talking about it. No one was on TV saying "they probably changed the ceremony because it creeps people out to have their church routinely issue threats of body mutilation/murder against them. Especially when the church is always talking about the sacredness of the human body".
To not talk publicly about those repulsive, offensive, soul-crushing practices is just amazing. The reason that it is amazing is that it actually worked. Hundreds of thousands of people who had received those threats were afraid to talk about it. So to stay safe, they kept their respective mouths shut, all hundreds of thousands of them. That is absolutely amazing. It actually worked. And the mormon church is not damaged much because of it, when they should have been publicly exposed, publicly shamed because of it, and to where pretty much every average member of the public today would shake their head and say "that's that church with the (or that used to have) death threats and body mutilation threats against those who took part in their temple ceremonies". Response "oh yeah, I saw that on TV. That was really creepy". But no, the mainstream media gave the mormmon church a free pass on that.
To this day, most mormon church members, not to mention virtually all of the general public, are ignorant about those mind-controlling, repulsive tactics that were routinely used on the church's most loyal members, even if 28 years ago. The average church member today would never believe that their church would ever be capable of doing what they actually did do. When I go to Disneyland and pay for an e-ticket ride, I want my moneys-worth it damn it, not psychological trauma or at best (something really bad that I am not allowed to talk about). I don't want the train to travel a few feet and everyone told to get off the train, 'and if you ever tell anyone about this day, we're going to cut your throat open and tear your innerds out'. When it's your church that does this, it's worse. Then, everyone goes out in to the amusement park, talking about what a wonderful ride that was, encouraging everyone else to try it too. Others go and take that ride and they too claim that it was wonderful, inspirational, and sacred. No one mentions the death threats or says that this ride made them feel sick. To this day, everyone keeps their respective mouths shut (hundreds of thousands of them, if not millions of them), and acts like there is nothing important to talk about. That's really messed up.
Meanwhile, the mormon church today enjoys prestige and influence in communities world-wide. People naively donate money to the church. The church receives huge on-going tax breaks because they qualify as a religion according to the IRS. These men who run the church have all been through that ceremony. They live in ivory towers, well taken care of, with millions of followers who praise them. A death threat on their own respective lives at least twenty-eight years ago is a small price to pay for the lavish lives they lead now. So they justify everything. The church is immune from ever needing to admit that their "sacred" ceremonies were wrong and psychologically harmful, and exploitive. People keep donating money to them. For the most part, the media leaves the church alone and gives them credit every time the church stages something that might boost the ratings. One hand washes the other, especially in cases where the church owns the media outlet.
Edited 6 time(s). Last edit at 03/12/2018 06:27AM by azsteve.