The thread about young people leaving made me wonder about this.

I doubt that I'd be out without the Net. I stayed till I was 40ish. I had about a 6 year process getting out, and it coincided with my use of the Net. I could have left in my 20's or 30's, but I wasn't on the net then.

Getting on the Net exposed me to more information, and to people that left. I remember at the very beginning reading a site like this one, and it may have been this one; I remember reading about a guy who left with his family, and he had been in the Bishopric.

He was such a well spoken guy, and I couldn't believe that he left. He was such a good guy, how could Satan have gotten a hold of him? That broke the barrier of "Bad people leave".

Of course other things were pivotal (Brodie's book etc.) But I Doubt that it would have happened without the Net. Or it would have taken a lot longer. Within 8 years of getting on the Net, I was out.

Would you be out right now without the Net?

It started with lingering questions after I read extensively on a mission. Mormon, pompous, boring, sanctimonious assholes helped. It was followed by boredom, weariness of guilt, and then finally reading Brode. I wish that the net had been around when I was in high school. I would have avoided the waste of time of the mission and the missed opportunities that a cultist has to avoid.

I would still be a morgbot if not for the internet. It all started when I stumbled onto a Shawn McCraney video on youtube, with a discussion about the magic rock and the hat and also a discussion about horney joe marrying other men's wives. At that point, I began to say WTF? WTF? WTF? OMG! OMG! OMG!

Yeah. I haven't been out since 1987.

I would probably still be in and miserable without the internet. With the internet, I realized I was not alone.

I've been out since the mid 70s. Still it's sure nice to have the net to know I made the right decision.

I would. I left at 18, in 1986. At that time, I didn't care if it was true, I just knew I needed to get out.

It wasn't till about 2001 when I stumbled on this site and I began to learn a whole lot about the problems with Mormonism. And even after all that time, I still felt a huge sense of relief to find others who had experienced the same thing. And, of course, finding out how rotten Mormonism is just reconfirmed my decision to leave.

But I certainly do wish the internet was available then. It would have eased the transition, for sure.

but I am SURE it would have been a lot more difficult without it.

My husband is someone who reads a lot about science and started introducing that to me in small doses after he stopped believing. He had his epiphany without this site, but got a lot of emotional support and additional information from it.

He shared some of that after I started having doubts and it really helped me trust my own feelings (specifically Simon Southerton's story).


***
Like my husband, I started having doubts of my own without this site, but they were more of the variety of thinking something was wrong with ME. I finally admitted to myself that I just didn't have a testimony and I just wasn't feeling mentally or spiritually fed at church and it wasn't working for me on an emotional level.

This site filled in the blanks for me: It provided the proof that EXPLAINED why I COULDN'T have a real testimony of the B of M, or the church itself. And basically the people here gave me tons of information and free therapy to help me work through my feelings. I was an emotional mess for 9 months when I left, and I think it would have been a lot longer without the support.

I think having people I could talk to about this was HUGE. Besides this site, I had only TWO other people in the world who I could talk about this stuff to. It's so isolating to be an unbeliever in a sea of Mormons.

I started questioning in the mid 80's after I read the D&C and Miracle of Forgiveness. I came to the conclusion none of it was true over the next few years without influence from the internet. But I didn't know you could actually resign until I saw it online, so without the internet, I'd be out but not resigned.

BTW last night I watched a video of Sandra Tanner explaining what happened when you sent a letter to have your name removed from the roles in the early 60's when she and Jerald resigned. The only way out was thru excommunication. Sheesh!

I started by reading "Leaving the Saints" and this got me questioning. I was also doing research with church books like D&C and POGP and BOA. I was honestly just looking to delve further into the doctrine, as I was a convert and grew up in a religious home where I was taught to research EVERYTHING.

It didn't take long before things started not adding up...so thats when I got on the net in 2004/2005 to figure out wtf was really going on.

I left in the early 80s. What a nightmare of a cult. They run you ragged and bleed you dry.

As a convert at 20, I was exhausted and began to lie when I had almost every night filled with some activity for TSCC and a TBM came up to me and asked me to do something on my only night off (Wednesday I believe) and I said, "NO, I'm busy that night", and the TBM just looked stunned but continued on autopilot and turned to the next victim and asked the same question. It was robotic and creepy. I knew then I had to get out. I walked out soon after that and never looked back. The internet just confirms my decision.

No one cares about YOU as a person, only what you can DO for the cult and how much you can GIVE to cult.

One: Information. I wouldn't have stumbled on the information I did that made me question without having googled Mormon Mother's Day quotes for a Primary Sharing time I was presenting the next Sunday. And I wouldn't have been able to double and triple check the information the way I needed to in order to justify such a massive life change. And I wouldn't have known where to look for the information as easily without the nice people who post help and advice online.

Two: Support. I really needed a site like this to talk out things, to realize I wasn't alone, to have people point out the obvious to me (seriously, I'm not good with the obvious). To confirm I wasn't crazy - Mormons were.

So no, I'd probably be where I was before. Overwhelmed, confused by how crazy everything seemed, not happy with my marriage because my DH isn't the typical Peter Priesthood I was told I wanted, trying to fit a round peg in a square hole, low grade depression. Even if I had figured it out, I wouldn't have had the support to leave because almost no one I know in real life is on my side and most of those who are are my Facebook non-LDS friends from high school, pre-BYU.

But I may not have resigned without the internet.

K

I think Brodies book set me on the path. I left in the early 90's and my access to the internet was very limited.
I did appreciate resources like alt.mormon which finally shredded any lingering doubts, but I doubt I would still be in TSCC, internet or no.

Sounds like another 10 years of the Net will really put a dent in membership, compared to a 10 year period prior to the Net.

One day I discovered RFM and within 30 minutes I was done for. And the church would have another $50k plus in tithing to help build the new mall.

Between RFM and NOM it was easy for me to get my questions answered. And it was easy to resign.

Got out on my own, no internet help. Turned to the internet "after" I was mentally and physically out. However, I was in my late 30's. I wish I had left after my mission, dangit.

Nope, the internet did it for me. Thank god for internet

I had planned to leave soon after a move, but couldn't be bothered. Ironically, its was the churches efforts to track me down that forced my hand.

The internet provided support during a difficult time. For me its not the history I had problems with as much as I was tired of misogyny. Now that I know about all the problems, I'd never go back.

I left before the Internet became what it was. But when I found RFM, the support was tremendously helpful.

Where's my prize?

It helped me, along with many books, to figure out what I wanted to do. I found reliable information that I didn't find anywhere else on the Internet. I found references I could confirm on my own also.

The Information Age is taking Mormonism like a storm.
Anyone who is unhappy about anything, questioning anythin, wants reliable "facts", has, at their fingertips, a quick remedy and easy "out".

I doubt the Internet has any negative impact on those religious believers that trust their spiritual witness aka testimony.
That kind of strong emotional attachment to the beliefs are not easily shattered by some information.

I never read a single work of "anti-mormon literature," in print or on the internet, when I left last year. I reasoned my way into atheism, and everything else fell like dominos. Discovering all of the historical proof that LD$, Inc. is a scam was just a bonus.

Yes.

I came to the conclusion that mormonism wasn't what it claimed to be long before anti-mormon lit came into my view.

Lots of comparative, out of the box learning. Since then, I've gotten an appreciation for how it came into existence, and how it's been spun to appear special.

by not fitting in, not being a very spiritual person, being too independent.

I had no idea in the late 50s that there were history or doctrinal issues, and the leadership under McKay was pretty benign.

JS, polygamy, who'd a thunk it?

I don't think I ever wanted it to be true so in that sense I was already out of the TSCC. The internet merely affirmed all my suspicions.

nope...

I'd still be active...

and miserable

The library had enough books to prove it false - I know because I checked them all out.

Probably if I did not have the internet, after watching the PBS show I would have gone to the library and read those books I had been sneering at. And I did anyway- read the web, go there and read books like One Nation Under Gods, Pomeroy Tuckers Rise and Progress, Linns History of Mormonism 1901, Ostlers Mormon America.

I got out long before the internet was even dreamed of, but I did learn how to resign from Kathy W's site. I might have figured it out on my own or not.However, with or without a formal resignation, I was out and did not consider myself a memeber.

Thanks to the nonsense I observed on my mission, I spent countless hours in the old SLC library in 1990 and 91 pouring over all the information I could get my hands on. The early Internet (94/95) finished me off!

Edit: I probably wouldn't have known how to resign without the internet, though. Actually I probably wouldn't have even known resigning was an option.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 12/23/2010 04:37PM by emadee.

I left because it is a cult, and many members are cultic, ie their brains are fried. But I still thought it was true. The fact that it is a con is a big bonus I discovered through the internet.

But I'm sure I would have tons of doubts that I would try to ignore. Things such as JS's polyandry and the lack of consistency in the church were things I had already heard about, but the internet helped bring those more to light.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 12/23/2010 04:48PM by Apatheist.

DNA Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Getting on the Net exposed me to more information,
> and to people that left. I remember at the very
> beginning reading a site like this one, and it may
> have been this one; I remember reading about a guy
> who left with his family, and he had been in the
> Bishopric.


Was that Simon Southerton from Australia? His story here made a big impression on me and my mother, but she died before she was entirely out.