Today on a site that sheds light on how bad the Mormon church is doing with growth and retention, I stumbled onto this peace that calls out Mormon Studies Review (the new FARMS Review) for fraud and imaginary history.

http://cumorah.com/Mormon_Studies_Review_The_Blind_Leading_the_Blind.pdf

Some interesting snippets:

"The brutal nineteenth century Belgian colonial exploitation and genocide in the Congo, which is blamed for up to ten million excess deaths – nearly twice as many as the Holocaust – and was brought to Western attention in 1899 by Joseph Conrad’s novel Heart of Darkness, would appear according to Mormon Studies Review and Mr. Decoo to be a figment of the imagination to be brushed away with hand-waving...The claims of Mr. Decoo as printed in MSR in denying nineteenth century Belgian colonialism
in the Congo and the associated atrocities are no less absurd than the claims of modern-day Holocaust deniers."

"Decoo failed to adhere to scholarly principles...instead inventing an imaginary history, alternative geology, putting words in our mouth which do not reflect the text..."

"To the extent that Mr. Decoo’s comments are presented as factual statements which have undergone processes of scholarly verification and reference checking which are required by reputable scholarly journals, when in fact they have not, this represents an act of fraud on the part of Mormon Studies Review and Ms. Inouye."

"We are astonished and gravely concerned by...MSR’s lack of any sense of integrity or responsibility to correct false statements it has printed, which any reputable journal would take pains to correct promptly and fully."

"Mormon Studies Review’s modus operandi of making false and irresponsible statements without fact and reference checking and then refusing to correct them even when presented with clear evidence regarding their errors, is more akin to a drive-by shooting or an act of vandalism than anything worthy of the designation of scholarship. The work represented in the piece edited by Ms. Inouye without fact checking and without competency in the subject matter is quite literally a matter of the blind leading the blind."

"We call for a full, independent investigation into the conduct of Ms. Inouye and Mormon Studies Review...MSR’s controversial reputation as a venue for polemics and insider opinion and not as a credible scholarly publication appears to be well-deserved, and seems unlikely to change anytime soon."


Of course this none of this is news to anyone here. The Morg does invent it's own imaginary history and alternative geology and does so routinely. It is satisfying to see them get called out for it by some of their own people though. rofl

The Mormons practice "drive-by" scholarship and historical vandalism. They've been doing all my life and more.

MSR does what mormonism excels at, taking Divine Right to ever new heights.