Smirk had started an interesting thread on the topic "Hostile Mormon Men" so when that topic was closed, I thought I would continue that topic here.

I have never seen so much passive-aggressive behavior by adults as I saw in my year in TSSC!

From what I saw, actually having a mature discussion of differences as adults just does not exist in those people!

Instead, childish behaviors such as ignoring, snubbing, gossiping and lies and innuendo, are the norm...

Be glad that you never had to endure a gossip-fest called Ward Council. 90 minutes of passing judgement of others.

Rest assured that if you were once active but no longer attend you are discussed in that gossip fest. In my case I don't care at all, I'm happy to give them something to talk about. However I know other ex-Mo's who feel victimized to constantly be on the Ward Council agenda.

He didn't like callings and definitely didn't want to be in meetings. He told my mom that the men gossiped really bad and he hated having to listen. They talked about everyone in the ward.

The mormon power hierarchy rewards passive-aggressive behavior. With more power, and heaps of praise.

It shouldn't then be at all surprising that we see that behavior in so many mormon men.

ificouldhietokolob Wrote:
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> The mormon power hierarchy rewards
> passive-aggressive behavior.

I was raised to revere it. I constantly struggle with not being passive-aggressive. I often lose that battle.

Wow, I had heard of the "Ward Council Meeting" but I think only certain callings are allowed to go to that, right?

I hate to think what they might have said about me or any other attractive female who showed up without a man. They were probably hiding the single men to make sure none were contaminated by contact with a new convert.

They talk about everything and everybody. I think you weren't replying to me.

But my wife was a Primary Pres for 5 years. She never named names but told me it disturbed her the degree of divulged information. She is a believer and it bothered her.

Oh. No. Kidding!!

The queens of passive aggression are in my TBM family. They will put something out on Facebook that anyone who knows the family knows is a slam to other family members, sometimes just as nasty as you can get. And the next day they post some meme by Rusty or Henry or Dallin or someone else about being kind and speaking kind words or something else. You're just like "do you hear yourself???"

I think that is more hypocrisy than passive aggression. Using social media for their aggression probably qualifies.

Elder Berry,

This is amazing to me, grown men and women, right, sitting around just talking about members?

But this explains a lot, how everybody knew for instance, that I got a new job, even though I only told the Bishop...

Thanks for the insights...

Mel, in my experience, they know things about us that we don't know about ourselves--they make up and conjecture a lot of things. It's pretty easy to do when they have a fleeting thought, and they attribute it to the Holy Ghost testifying of truth.

I've been to many of these meetings. The worst ones I have ever witnessed are in Draper, Utah and Utah County. These people will dissect your life and crap on it, and you wouldn't even know if you weren't there. I've sat through these, listening and waiting for the bishops to have some balls and leadership, but it's such a normal part of the culture that they think that's what are supposed to do, and the bishop is joining in.

I can't imagine those were pleasant meetings to sit through. . .

It was horrible.

I still live in the area and see those people all the time and it disgusts me to think about how they treat their brothers and sisters.

so my story is all over the place.

As a single mother after my gay husband left (and we were well liked in the ward, or at least he was and so I was treated well, better than any other time as a mormon), I of course didn't go to church. I worked at home. I of course was extremely depressed. I was working 2 jobs. So the only time I went anywhere was to take my kids to school and pick them up. Well, I didn't go to church. I went to visit family and I went to movies, etc.

So my old boyfriend came back into my life and I was trying to lose some weight so I was walking A LOT. I had walked before that at the track, but nobody knew. So I was walking late one night and I happened to walk past the bishop. Guess who got talked about in bishopric meeting the next Sunday?

My VT, who was my friend, her husband was a clerk and he told her that they were talking about me coming out of being a hermit. She was furious. She told him that is why I walk at night so that the bishopric won't talk about me.

Now I flaunt my life. My neighbor is the bishop. The prior one before that was a good friend (who I resigned under and he told me he understood). The one before that lived 2 doors down. It is like WHAT???

But I live here with my gay husband. We are not divorced. My boyfriend comes over often and he lived here for 6 months. We go places on Sundays all the time. I used to bring home alcohol and make sure that the neighbors saw the brown bag. My son quit drinking, so I don't buy alcohol anymore. BUT I make sure they see me bring in sacks from stores on Sundays. My son smokes on the front porch. We give them plenty to gossip about now. I get a big kick out of it.

What you see is what you got from him and we were all like that. I used to feel guilty for not being less vocal about how I felt. I had bishops even call me on it--well neighbors who had been bishops. They expected me to "keep sweet."

I'm sure that is why my family never fit very well into mormonism and why MOST of us are out. We speak our minds. We don't play games. I was also unable to flirt. I hate being fake. I was once told by my boss' boss at Thiokol that I needed to smile more. My boss was furious. I mean I'm typing and I'm supposed to smile more. That would be hideous.

In my view, silent treatment, whispering, avoiding eye contact isn't so bad, in fact some people in the 'gangsta' culture get offended with eye contact. Or if a guy looks sissy or something. And if you look at the wrong person in the wrong way it can get messy.

Now in the upper middle class world of mormondom, these kinds of social interactions that the urban marginalized populations deal with, aren't prevalent or even an issue at all. Mormons interact on a the white collar, upper class behavior. Which is concealing emotions, speaking emotionless, self controlled, avoidance of 4 letter words. Brown nosing your enemies. White collar criminality.

The worst behavior is the litteral Passive Aggresive behavior which is letting everyone walk all over you and bottling up emotion and then at some point blowing up losing your temper and attacking someone. Or self destruction. Which anyone of any social class is capable of.

Yes, concealing emotions...I've heard it called the upper class mask, and the old news anchors such as Cronkite and Dan Rather were examples of that expressionlessness.

some people think that Tom Brokaw should have been given an award for being able to keep a straight face after watching Hinckley screw the pooch before millions of viewers on national network TV

cash to finance the 2002 Olympic bid bribery scandal -2 million $

supposed Cost of openly acknowledged "indirect" support pledged to facilitate "Utah's" Olympic effort -8 million $

other undisclosed costs of "Utah" buying the 2002 winter Olympics for itself -somewhere around a billion $

seeing a self proclaimed PR and Media genius go Freudian and screw the pooch on national network TV while attempting to promote the POS Book of MORmON Scam during the 2002 Olympics news coverage -PRICELESS!!!!



https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8wALvdgurB4

I think it was considered a part of being a good newscaster back in the old days. I used to watch Walter Cronkite intently for cracks in his façade. If I could see that his excitement was building, I knew that it was going to be a big news day.

The two words together are such a contradiction. There is nothing passive about aggression, just masked and secret.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 01/20/2019 06:58PM by mel.

This doesn't go here



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 01/20/2019 08:16PM by moremany.

It's part of a broader pattern. Mormonism teaches boys and girls how to act, with the authoritative style among the former and subordination among the latter. Both genders are taught that when dealing with superiors, you should behave deferentially. So people register their opposition through passive aggression.

It's a disaster. The odds of personality disorders are, I venture, substantially higher in Mormonism than in the overall population; and the number of people on the various "spectra" is higher still.

And both genders are harmed directly and indirectly. The direct damage is obvious. The indirectly effect less so, but if you harm a girl, a future mother, you harm her children--including her boys. If you hurt a boy, a future father, you likewise harm his children, male and female. The next generation therefore goes into marriage with less experience and preparation and then falls back on the church-inspired patterns of behavior when rearing their own kids.

Soon the juvenility, the passive aggression, the inability to interact calmly but directly, are perpetuated as part of the larger culture. In some families the ghosts of this upbringing will probably take generations to exorcise.

"their descendants even until the 4th generation"

The Oath of Vengeance blow back. More than 4 generations though. Many more.

Yes.

I suspect it goes back to polygamy, a time when men were rendered gods--and hence unable to be loving fathers--and women became chattels. Children were reared in unnatural states, always competing for the affection of the more powerful mothers and the father. The resulting emotional insecurity and habits of deference then fed into loyalty to the church. In other words, Mormonism stumbled into a system that served its interests.

That was the LDS legacy. It is the legacy. Leaving the church is probably the most important step towards freedom, but there are many more. And in the meantime, the habits of Mormon social behavior persist even among some ex-Mormons.

"Unto the third and fourth generation. . ."

Lot's Wife Wrote:
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> That was the LDS legacy. It is the legacy.
> Leaving the church is probably the most important
> step towards freedom, but there are many more.
> And in the meantime, the habits of Mormon social
> behavior persist even among some ex-Mormons.

I am one of these ex-Mormons. I testify how incredibly difficult it is to break out of this pattern. Somedays I wonder how much different I really am from the people and culture I come from.

I take solace in knowing I have to remind myself of my failings and try to recognize my patterned behaviors daily.

So true. Resigning from the cult was just one step, just one necessary change I had to make in my life, my behaviors, my personality traits, etc. It's been a lot of work, and I probably will always have a difficult time making genuine, emotion-filled friendships. I'm honest and loving ONLY with my children and certain family members. I do tend to be passive-aggressive with Mormons, like, it's "right back at ya".

The aggression has to be "passive", because some of my loved ones are trapped in the cult, and are easily alienated and offended, if they perceive that I'm being uncooperative and rebellious.

When you can't be yourself, sometimes your humor and happiness, as well as your anger and frustration, has to come out. Mormons always comment that I'm "always smiling and laughing." I think to myself, "How can you NOT laugh?"

The poster child for passive-aggression was my cheating Mormon husband. He enjoyed the sneaking around and lying and acting, probably more than he enjoyed the sex. He was so full of hate, that the sex was rough. He ran off with another woman, and later became addicted to cigarettes and alcohol.

I once asked a branch president to stop gossiping about me. He said if I didn't want him to say anything bad about me then he wouldn't say anything good either. He was dead serious.

That branch was the most toxic and dysfunctional of any ward or branch I had ever participated in. It was a wakeup call for me while my children were very young.

One of my friends from that branch, a NYC fireman who was a convert from Catholicism, told me that he knew Mormonism was either 100% true or 100% false based on how much the members persecuted each other. It was a hateful church that we went to. That was why I left when I did while my children were growing up.

Jews have Passover. We have passive aggression. See how much in common we have?

babyloncansuckit Wrote:
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> We have passive aggression.

I think it is called "General Conference" the Mormon Passover Aggression?

hahah, good ones!



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 01/18/2019 06:30PM by mel.

Something that bugs me equally is men who act all priesthood, but show no leadership at all in the home and then get all pouty and passive aggressive when their wife gets sick of the whiney bastard and takes the reins.

I just don't see why it is thought more honorable or pious to secretly get back at someone in an underhanded way than to openly and honestly talk about whatever it is you're pissed off about.

For instance, if I say that your hair looks good like that, then you make sure to shave it all off by the next time we meet, or, I say to let me know (whatever) and you make sure it happens without me knowing...

this is the kind of stuff that drove me crazy.

They’re not even trying to be underhanded. It’s just the way things are in Perpetual Junior High. Everyone is stuck in that mentality. There’s nothing to debate, you can go observe it firsthand. The “exmos” and “antis” aren’t making it up. Looking at it from the outside, it’s super weird.

When you’re in Junior High, Mormonism might make sense. When you’re an adult, if it still makes sense there’s something wrong with your thinking process. It’s been hijacked.

babyloncansuckit Wrote:
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> When you’re in Junior High, Mormonism might make
> sense.

Especially when adolescent adults are asking Junior High kids about jacking off.

Yes,

TSCC is built on speculation, tabulation, guesses, hoaxes, visions, feelings, dreams, wishes, FEARS, mistranslation... passing-the-buck, call dodging, over-booking, misreading, "ego-pampering". Hierarchy. Double-promising. Misleading. Double-crossing. Misreading. Uncaring. Shams. Burdens. Troubles.

ALL so the individual can feel free - not bound - guiltless?

LDS institutionally functions by Reactions, vs. Actions! Who is "inactive"? tscc. Plays the blame game. ALWAYS blame the individual. The thinker. The innocent.

I looked for real connection, as a kid, and didn't find it (in mormons). Looking again- as an adult- I found it didn't exist.

The lds are so busy looking busy that there isn't much life energy left for reality/ life.

M@t

M@t,

Your words:"TSCC is built on speculation, tabulation, guesses, hoaxes, visions, feelings, dreams, wishes, FEARS, mistranslation... passing-the-buck, call dodging, over-booking, misreading, "ego-pampering". Hierarchy. Double-promising. Misleading. Double-crossing. Misreading. Uncaring. Shams. Burdens. Troubles."

Wow, that's it exactly! I was always so afraid in the church. Afraid of criticism or what they were saying about me, of not doing something right, of everything.

You have it, for sure.

Thanks Mel-

I always found it stuffy
That's the way I left it too

I know this is an odd thing to say, but having learned the art of Passive-Aggression as a Mormon youth by proxy I now find it a valuable tool to draw on in difficult situations in business. I am also very well aware of when it is being employed by others and am able to dis-engage. Also reading the book "Co-Dependent No More" helped me immensely to stop certain learned behaviors, deal with passive aggressive people, and recognize it in myself, and I highly recommend it.

I have enjoyed your comments, mel, regarding your short time in the Mormons trenches. Your observations are keen. Makes me wonder how much you regret the experience versus how much you gained--since almost everything teaches us something.

Done & Done,

Thank you for your thoughts. I will get that book, thank you for the recommendation.

I struggled with the people more than the beliefs. I joined with the hope of belonging to a community more than seeking God and maybe that was a mistake. I met some people who seemed very nice.

But I also was the target of more mean, cruel, judgmental words than I had ever experienced--only a few people, but that those felt entitled to act that way, really shocked me.

I think I will need some distance to figure out whether it was a worthwhile experience and whether I learned or gained anything.

Thank you for asking.

Thanks for this thread, Mel. I, too, enjoy your posts. Yes, you are a quick learner.

The book "Co-dependent no more" is very helpful!

My TBM mother and TBM father of my children were passive-aggressive. I used to think of it as "hatred and jealousy disguised as love."

The passive-aggressive Mormon neighbors who are shunning me, hurt me feelings, at first, but now I understand their underlying resent of me. I'm one of those people who always land on their feet. I seem to always have "good luck". I'm too happy all the time, and they think I'm faking it. They don't know my childhood suffering, how very hard I have worked, and the long hours I've put in, the pain of a chronic incurable disease. Luck had nothing to do with it. It was my knowledge of other things, that Mormons don't teach, and that Mormons actually discourage, that got me through. I learned mostly from books--from "experts." I did not rely on a cult, that wanted to keep me "sweet" and in my place as a piece of chattel. The cult who promised to help me was actually my enemy.

Examples of these "worldly" principles are: unconditional love (Nelson is against it), appreciation, self-confidence and pride (Mormons consider pride to be evil); hope for a future based on personal achievement instead of random "blessings" granted or not-granted by the MorGod; control over my life (instead of blindly taking orders), accepting responsibility and blame and praise, instead of pushing it all onto "Satan" or "fate" or "the plan". There are many more examples.

Oh yes, I love books! You can learn quickly and efficiently, without being harmed, without wasting your life. If a book seems full of BS or is boring or insulting to your intelligence, you just recycle it, and move on.

I learned a great deal from the Mormons about manipulation, also, which has helped me to say "no" and to spot scams and con-artists a mile away. My children won't be manipulated, either.

Still--the abuse we suffered at the hands of the Mormons, when we were members, was NOT WORTH the few lessons we would have learned, anyway, in a more favorable environment. You don't have to live through something, in order to learn it. Our parents could have taught us these lessons, had they not been ignorant, brainwashed Mormons themselves. Plus, there are all those lies we learned, that we had to UN-learn, and all the bad habits, and all the hatred the Mormons tried to instill in us.
Sorry--there is nothing good that my children and I gained directly from the cult. We were used, robbed of our money, and abused.

So many ex-MOrmons express regret that they didn't leave the cult SOONER. I left, and took the kids with me, when my children were young enough to benefit. I would leave all over again, and go through all the harassment (bad experiences, but nothing compared to the ABUSE when we were nembers) all over again--even if I had only a few days left of my life. That euphoria of freedom and truth was priceless! It still is.