"The rumors prompted members and leaders to issue carefully worded denials that denounced spiritual wifery and polygamy but were silent about what Joseph Smith and others saw as divinely mandated “celestial” plural marriage.22 The statements emphasized that the Church practiced no marital law other than monogamy while implicitly leaving open the possibility that individuals, under direction of God’s living prophet, might do so.23"

BULLSHIT! BULLSHIT! BULLSHIT! BULLSHIT! BULLSHIT! BULLSHIT! BULLSHIT! BULLSHIT! BULLSHIT! BULLSHIT! BULLSHIT! BULLSHIT!

Let's check the sources:

"22.In the denials, “polygamy” was understood to mean the marriage of one man to more than one woman but without Church sanction."

Okay...didn't know I could just make up BULLSHIT and use it as a source!

"23.See, for example, “On Marriage,” Times and Seasons, Oct. 1, 1842, 939–40; and Wilford Woodruff journal, Nov. 25, 1843, Church History Library, Salt Lake City; Parley P. Pratt, “This Number Closes the First Volume of the ‘Prophet,’” The Prophet, May 24, 1845, 2. George A. Smith explained, “Any one who will read carefully the denials, as they are termed, of plurality of wives in connection with the circumstances will see clearly that they denounce adultery, fornication, brutal lust and the teaching of plurality of wives by those who were not commanded to do so” (George A. Smith letter to Joseph Smith III, Oct. 9, 1869, in Journal History of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, Oct. 9, 1869, Church History Library, Salt Lake City)."

BULLSHIT! BULLSHIT! BULLSHIT! BULLSHIT! BULLSHIT! BULLSHIT! BULLSHIT! BULLSHIT! BULLSHIT! BULLSHIT! BULLSHIT! BULLSHIT!

It's as though they want the whole scam to come to a crashing halt.

It looks that way, doesn't it! Maybe their greed has taken over their senses and they are trying to lighten the load on the "boat". Only the "chosen" are going to survive this "purge" with their testimony intact and they will divide the spoils...? Or something like that.
Wouldn't there be a hellacious class action suit from disaffected tithe payers though...?

It's important to note that 23 is George Albert's apologetics on Joseph's lying. Joseph III didn't believe that his father had practiced polygamy at all. To back up his belief, he cited Joe's many denials. Was the Utah church calling his father a liar? George then came up with his apologetic BULLSHIT.

So whose job is it to write the essay in response to the essay? Someone needs to refute this bullshit! But it all just makes me ill--who has the strongest stomach on exmo to clean this up!

If you go to lds.org and type in:
Joseph smith polygamy
You still can't find this essay!

Incredible!

Make sure you get screen caps before they disappear this POS

I started reading trying to give them the benefit of the doubt. It was over before the second paragraph. I wanted to debunk it, line by line.

But I just couldn't. I didn't have the time or stomach. It's lie after lie upon lie. Or it is the most spun essay I've ever read.

Emma knew about some, but not all of them. So that's OK. I guess they never read D&C 132. Or, they expect the audience never did.

I just. Wow.

The article is hilarious.

We liked polygamy and tried to fight, but decided the Lord wanted us to give up when the federal government and Supreme Court passed a law to dissolve LDS Inc. Take away the money and power.

Favorite Quote:

"Marriage between one man and one woman is God’s standard for marriage, unless He declares otherwise, which He did through His prophet, Joseph Smith."

God changed his omnipotent and all knowing position..... He couldn't maybe ... say ... intervene and use his magic power to save the day and keep the "One and Only True Church" on track so it can "Fill the Earth" and accomplish all the other trite phrases the profits spew. Speaking of spew, I just had coke come out my nose because I am still laughing so hard.

In 20 years when threatened with losing tax exempt status or some other issue related to LGBTs, Mormon Jesus will probably change his mind again.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 10/22/2014 06:32PM by perky.

Does it mention polyandry? What justification does it give for the adultery Joseph the fuckwit forced women into?

Here's how I see the "essays:"

Wah! Stop bringing up all the idiocy in our past, some of which we still believe, and stop calling us weird! Wah!

I'm serious.

I thought maybe I was right about Joe Smith, despite the interference I got from ignorant family. Now I know.

"When God commands a difficult task, He sometimes sends additional messengers to encourage His people to obey. Consistent with this pattern, Joseph told associates that an angel appeared to him three times between 1834 and 1842 and commanded him to proceed with plural marriage when he hesitated to move forward. During the third and final appearance, the angel came with a drawn sword, threatening Joseph with destruction unless he went forward and obeyed the commandment fully."

This is crazy. Right? Just crazy. God works this way? They want us to take this crap seriously? Wow, just wow LDS.org.

Haha! Because..It sounds so much better when you hear that an angel with a sword enforced it, right?

When I envision the fictional visitation of an angel, threatening destruction, I see in my imagination a scene like in the movie "Lifeforce"! No sword needed...

I read both essays and am still laughing my ass off!!

I would entitle the first one, "Man up fellows and SCREW those Girls!"

The second I would call "Time to zip up your flies now BOYS, and I will give you 14 years to change your ways, and then I will REALLY mean it"

OMH, what is this stupid church thinking of???

Keep in mind this was approved by the First Presidency and Twelve. It's increasingly evident that they know they are deliberately lying.

Yes I think so too that the first presidency knows that they are lying.

Yeah, they know for sure. Tom Perry and especially Dieter U. seem to actually be good men and I doubt they sleep well at night, aware of all the lying they are forced to do and the families like my own that have been ruined by these very lies.

Joe had multiple wives (or practiced adultery); he/tscc Denied it; Then, it was a commandment, Necessary for people to go to the CK.

SEVERAL church leaders Condemned monogamy....

contemporaneously, polyg was illegal (Illinois, Ohio).

then, 'the church moved west', where, it could be argued, Utah wasn't a part of the U.S. (at least at first).

then, the USSC ruled that anti-polyg laws were constitutional.

Manifesto I & II, where TSCC denied 'further' polyg marriages, however previous ones continue(d).

Wait: will they address past leaders' dissing monogamy? I DON'T THINK SO!

lather, rinse, repeat as to racism.



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 10/22/2014 10:55PM by GNPE.

Clearly, TSCC is paying attention to the dwindling numbers and, as one other poster said, listening to their PR consultants.

However, what floors me and, frankly, ticks me off the most is that with this essay, there's this attitude of releasing it and putting it out there but with this cavalier, "yeah, Joseph Smith practiced polygamy and polyandry, so what?" sort of attitude along with all of the BS religious reasons why. But they have withheld this information and flat out lied to members about this in the past. This is huge, and they're trying to just throw this crap out there like it's been out there all along, which is just sleazy and dishonest!

I like the comparison the other poster said about the church getting their s*&^ out there. Is this so they can absolve themselves and tell their members, "Look, it's out there. We've been open about the whole thing." to members? But this is going to come to a big freaking shock to a lot of people. Some, not all members, are going to be upset about this; others will be confused; and then others will try to once again rationalize in their minds how and why it's okay they change "the truth" for the umpteenth time in their lifetime.

This essay took so long to finish because it was really really hard to pile BS that high. And it shows.

Greg Dodge is going to need another staff member handling resignations.

The article also states that Mormon polygamy led to more children being born to righteous parents. Unless they mean to imply that polygamists were more righteous than monogamists (which they don't, because that would make it harder to downplay the importance of polygamy in Mormon doctrine), this assertion is demonstrably false. They used it in their first polygamy essay as well, to which I commented as follows:

"The relationship between polygamy and fertility is quite complex and varies under different circumstances. The polygyny-fertility hypothesis states that fertility in polygamous marriages is lower than in monogamous ones. This effect has been observed in many studies (Winking et al. 2013) and also applies to 19th century Mormons (Josephson 200
2, Moorad et al. 2011, cited in McKie 2011). Polygamy led to fewer children than probably would have been born in a monogamous society (Bean et al 1990, p. 136)."

Sources:

Bean, L.L., Mineau, G.P. & Anderton, D.L. (1990). Fertility Change on the American Frontier. Adaptation and Innovation. Berkeley, Californië: University of California Press.

Josephson, S.C. (2002). Does Polygyny Reduce Fertility? American Journal of Human Biology 14 (2), pp. 222–232.

McKie, R. (2011). Mormon Polygamists Shared the Flaws of the Fruitfly. The Observer, 27 februari 2011, p. 13.

Winking, J., Stieglitz, J., Kurten, J., Kaplan, H. & Gurven, M. (2013). Polygyny among the Tsimane of Bolivia: An Improved Method for Testing the Polygyny–Fertility Hypothesis. Proceedings of the Royal Society B 280:20123078.