Tumgik
#sexism in mormonism
newvegascowboy · 2 years
Text
i am fucking BEGGING people. To use critical thinking skills when it comes to Joshua Graham and mormonism. If I see any more cutesy uwu missionary Joshua posts. Mormonism isn't your pure sweet ~ unproblematic ~ religion. it's a cult. im going to start biting people.
402 notes · View notes
transannabeth · 11 months
Text
*
#the thing about rebooting twilight and trying to fix it#is that the flaws of the source material are so so so deep and go beyond just like#dont be racist this time md cut the imprinting imo#it would involve being more aware of the toxicity of bella and edwards relationship (they won’t do that)#and there’s elements of this story that are so so so so mormon because smeyer IS mormon#not only is Edward painfully controlling; all the cullens are in on it (see book 3)#there’s a strong underlying message of sexism even among the female vampires really where they only get power once a man turns them#every single aspect of the werewolves are racist#like that’s what I’m leaving that as because I don’t have the tag space or spoons#the werewolves in twilight ARE RACIST. smeyer made up stories and mythology and the depections#of the quileute tribe ARE RACIST from the very beginning#and the fact that jasper not only was a high ranking confederate#but also ILLEGALLY JOINED because he was too young? what the fuck#that’s the tip of the iceberg I wrote a whole final paper on twilight and ran out of page space to do the proper dissertation I wanted#even Charlie y’all love Charlie. he has a terrible moment#when Bella punches Jacob after he kisses her because she doesn’t want him to?#Charlie’s reaction made me pissed I can’t remember it exactly#I’m not saying you can’t read twilight#clearly I still talk about it because it’s interesting to me from a writing standpoint with how bad it is#but I don’t think this is one we should try to ‘make better’#and hot take we don’t need a reboot like barely a decade later#write an original vampire story. learn from twilights mistakes.#i do not think we need to be returning to this ip which is deeply broken and hurtful#yes much of the backlash against twilight was sexist#but there are also valid reasons to dislike and criticize twilight we cannot forget that#unless quileute people are quite literally writing the script#i can see no situation where they are treated with the respect and monetary compensation they deserve#and that is only addressing that singular issue#i don’t even know if a consultant from the quileute tribe would be enough#here’s your rant of the day
15 notes · View notes
midnight-in-eden · 1 year
Text
In case you forgot that Mormonism is literally a patriarchy with sexism baked into the doctrine and structure of the church:
Men in the Book of Mormon: narrators, protagonists, antagonists, many named characters with fleshed out personalities/stories/character arcs, leaders, prophets, patriarchs, warriors, politicians, missionaries, lawyers, literal God and the Son of God themselves
Women in the Book of Mormon: wives and mothers of the male narrators who can’t be bothered to even write down their names, not relevant to the story except as something for men to lose/steal/protect, a few named or unnamed women who are relevant for a few verses each (e.g. Abish or the maidservant), Heavenly Mother/female aspect of God not worth mentioning apparently
***
14-year-old boy in early Mormonism: allegedly visited by God and Jesus, a young prophet, beloved and respected by the entire damn church, has songs sung about him and books written about him and stained glass temple windows depicting him and statues and art and church-produced videos made about him and—
14-year-old girl in early Mormonism: illegally “married” to a 30+ year old “prophet” as one of many wives, told her marriage was the only way her family would receive eternal salvation, never mentioned in church bc her story makes ppl uncomfy, people get mad at u and call u anti if you bring her up
***
Men in the Mormon church: told they get the Actual Power Of God at age 11, deacons/teachers/priests in their teens, can still be sealed to multiple women, are the only exception to the “two adult leaders must be in the room with children” rule (for the purpose of bishops interviewing children about their sexual activity!!), hold the vast majority of leadership positions both locally and globally, the vast majority of Conference talks, always the ones to extend callings, “preside” over their families with “priesthood authority”, get to know their wife’s/wives’ secret temple names, can literally be called as a prophet or patriarch who speaks for God either to the whole church or to individuals, can receive revelation for whomever they are “stewards over”, told they can be a good father and husband and have a career
Women in the Mormon church: zero priesthood authority ever, no authority over any boy older than 11, a TINY fraction of leadership positions and NONE over adult men, a TINY fraction of Conference talks, are not in charge of extending callings even for leaders of the women’s organization, can only be sealed to one man, do not get to know their husband’s secret name, until recently had to covenant in the temple to obey their husband even if they weren’t fuckin married, used to be told they’d be priestesses to their husband instead of to God, can receive revelation for themselves and maybe their family as long as it doesn’t contradict their husband’s revelation, told their main role is wife/mother and education is “insurance if your husband can’t work anymore”
***
Nonbinary/trans/intersex/otherwise not-cis-men/women in all this: haha yeah those don’t exist ;) they’re just confused by Satan, God will sort ‘em out in the next life, don’t worry about it :)
10 notes · View notes
Text
"Considering there are only four named women in the Book of Mormon, how would you explain to someone not of our faith why the Book of Mormon has value to women?"
-A question asked by my teacher in my French class today
5 notes · View notes
haggishlyhagging · 8 months
Text
Not long after we settled in Virginia, which was—and at the time of this writing still is—a very, very unratified state, I began hearing about the Equal Rights Amendment. The place I heard about it was church, and everything I heard was bad.
This disturbed me. Not because I cared about the ERA—I didn't even know what it was for a long while—but because I found that hearing politics being discussed so much in our most sacred church services interfered with my feelings of reverence and worship. It was disorienting to me for sacrament meeting to change suddenly, right in the middle, from a religious meeting to a precinct meeting. And, too, I liked the name of the amendment. I couldn't help feeling uneasy that the church was opposing something with a name as beautiful as the Equal Rights Amendment.
At that time, the church was also resisting racial equality by continuing its refusal to allow black males entry to the priesthood. Hazel had told me with disgust how church members in Alexandria had fought tooth and nail against integration of Alexandria schools. I had been troubled for a very long time about the race issue, ever since I had known Karl at the University of Minnesota, but I had been quietly troubled, with firm faith that everything would work out as it should. But this was different. Women were the issue, and I was a woman. This time we were talking about me! Without knowing much about the ERA, I felt directly implicated and involved. And the church would not let me forget, but kept the issue before my eyes, forcing my attention back to it week after week.
I would like to have forgotten about it, frankly, because in being driven by the church's vehemence to study, and growing more and more positive about it the more I studied, I was also growing more and more miserable: guilty about not being able to agree with the Brethren (as we call the leaders of the church) and seriously perplexed about why they had taken another such obvious anti-human-rights stand. I had never been in any serious opposition to the church's policies or doctrines, and I wanted nothing more than to preserve that record to the end of my life. And to teach my children to do likewise.
But instead of lessening, the political excitement, talk, and activity in the church only intensified over the next year or so, until I was in serious emotional distress about the issue. So I was pleased when, in the spring of 1978, it was announced one night in church that after sacrament meeting the next Sunday evening, our stake president (roughly equivalent to a Catholic bishop) was coming to our ward to explain the church's opposition to the ERA. I didn't know this stake president—he was new—but I was impressed by his credentials. Not just that he was a local church authority, which always impressed me in those days, but that he had, some years before, been the Project Director of the Army's Jet Propulsion Laboratory for the manned exploration to the moon!
I was still so naive, I thought that meant something about his intellect.
So I rushed home and called Hazel and Ron, who were also suffering about the church's anti-ERA stance. "You people have to come out to my ward next Sunday night," I commanded. "The Project Director for the manned exploration to the moon is going to be there to explain why the church is against the Equal Rights Amendment. Finally we're going to hear something intelligent on the other side of this issue!"
That was before I knew that there wasn't anything intelligent on the other side.
The next Sunday night when the Project Director got up to speak, nine of us pro-ERA Mormons (in a group of twenty of thirty of the other kind) sat hoping that he would help us understand why our church, the Church of Jesus Christ, had taken what seemed to us such an un-Christlike stand. But he wasn't halfway through his first sentence before he had murdered that hope.
He had not, he informed us, prepared anything to say that night. And while he was on his way to the church, he had begun to get a little nervous about this ("I should think so!" I whispered to Rick). In the midst of his growing alarm, he suddenly remembered someone's telling him there was an article about the ERA in the latest Pageant magazine ("That woman's magazine," he called it, which did little to halt my plummeting estimation of the Army's Jet Propulsion Lab since Pageant, now deservedly defunct, was a C-grade Reader's Digest). So when a 7-11 store miraculously appeared on the horizon, he had dashed in, bought a Pageant and, while we were having our opening song and prayer, read that article. Now, he announced triumphantly, he was ready to talk to us about the ERA.
-Sonia Johnson, From Housewife to Heretic
1 note · View note
wasmormon · 1 year
Text
0 notes
teachanarchy · 1 year
Text
Watch "Religion in the New Nation | US History to 1865 | Study Hall" on YouTube
youtube
0 notes
the-mountain-flower · 2 years
Text
Growing up Christian (LDS), I kept hearing the story of Abraham being told to sacrifice his son, Isaac, as a test to see if he would obey God no matter what. This story never sat right with me, even as a kid. But, thanks to cultural norms, I never thought deeper into it.
I only recently became comfortable with questioning this kind of thing, and realized why I never liked that bit. Because it’s another way we’re taught to never question “why.”
Kids, like me, often question “why” (and as an autistic person that trait stuck with me). The most common answers are “because life isn’t fair,” “because I said so,” or some other bullsh*t.
I don’t quite know if I believe in God as of right now (religion is complicated for me and right now the least of my concerns), but if They’re real and as benevolent and They’re said to be, there’s no way this would happen the way most people tell it.
Would a God that benevolent really give Abraham a child so dearly wanted, only to tell him to sacrifice that child?! Would They subject Isaac to that kind of trauma, to experience almost being killed by his own father, because someone told him to? To know that his own father heard he had to kill him, and not even question it? What the hell kind of love is that, on God or Abraham‘s end??
And to be told it was all a test, because God needed to know Abraham would blindly follow Them no matter what? Even if it meant killing his own son?!?! Subjecting the kid to that horrid kind of PTSD??
I refuse to believe that a truly Benevolent God would demand such a thing. This is a loosely veiled way to get people to think questioning the reasons behind what authority tells you is wrong.
‘Black people weren’t allowed to hold the priesthood until a certain time. We don’t know why, but it’s all part of God’s plan.’ The same God who loves everyone? “Black and white, bond and free” like the Book of Mormon says? In a time of severe racism and a white supremacist culture?!
Women supposedly aren’t allowed to hold the priesthood because what? Every answer I’ve heard to that question is vague as hell, and gives no REAL answer. The worst ones being that their connection to the priesthood comes from their husbands, which is sexist, and homophobic and just plain wrong! (My friend’s mother, who is transgender, had to wait years before coming out even when she safely could just so she could baptize and bless her own children!)
I’ve been told in seminary class that if you disagree with something a church authority says, ‘it’s okay just don’t talk to anyone about it and let it be.’
And that’s just the tip of the iceberg, all under the guise that we should never ask: “Why?”
Well, how’s that working out for you people now? Because you’ve made so damn many lose their way because of your own prejudice and need for people to follow you blindly because you supposedly speak for God.
You’ve certainly lost me.
1 note · View note
aleatoryw · 11 months
Text
I don't wanna hear any "I hope the twilight series beats the harry potter series :)" bullshit, smeyer is almost certainly just as much of a transphobe as jkr who's simply better at keeping that information to herself. twilight also has unavoidable anti-indigenous racism in massive quantities, and a fair amount of sexism as well. no twilight renaissance no giving mormons your money. they can both lose.
129 notes · View notes
shebben · 2 months
Text
Tumblr media Tumblr media Tumblr media Tumblr media Tumblr media
Shrinkydink earrings :) there are two of each of these. I traced them tho so idk if it really counts as my own stuff.
I got my ears pierced in November and they’re still healing (I swear I’ve done everything right 😭). I’m very excited to be able to wear earrings. Tbh I’m glad my mom didn’t let me get my ears pierced when I was really young bc that would have been a giant hassle.
Also I had my first full cup of coffee today. We’ve been a coffee free household until a few months ago since drinking coffee is heavily frowned upon in Mormonism. My dad and sister really like it but I think it tastes like absolute ass. They say it’s an squires taste but boy idk how I’ll get used to it. I’m all jittery and nervous now so idk if I’ll have any positive affects from the coffee anyways.
My sister got a job interview at Deseret Industries and it seems like she’s gonna get it. I may want to apply there since they usually look for neurodivergent people to hire since they’re cool like that. And there’s a lady that works there who we know from church and she’s pretty nice. She still talks to my mom when she sees her in the grocery store so I guess she isn’t too bothered by how my mom is pretty upfront about sexism in the church. Idk if the lady knows we don’t go anymore tho lmao based on how chill she’s been I doubt that will upset her but idk.
Thank you for reading this. Have a good day.
Update:
Holy fuckijg shit I feel restless like in a bad way. I have to move around or it will feel really weird. It’s not the normal fidget it is almost uncontrollable. Bro this feeling is ass. I feel like there are bees in my legs lmao. I’m also having trouble breathing. Safe to say I’m never having coffee again. This is horrible. Idk how I’m gonna take a shower with my legs feeling sturdy but floppy at the same time. My sister says it makes her feel calm. I am jealous of her lol. I am not enjoying this experience.
Update 2:
The shower wasn’t bad at all and it didn’t take a million years to get in (or at least it didn’t feel like it). I washed my hair three times and my face in 20 minutes and usually it takes me 20 minutes to wash my hair twice. This is actually really nice. I am not a snail anymore, I’m a turtle. It still feels like there are bees in my legs and I’m still restless.
Bye
18 notes · View notes
drunktuesdays · 3 months
Text
Tumblr media
Final reckoning for my friend's book challenge she runs for our group chat. I didn't make blackout but I AM happy with how much i ended up reading. Self indulgently posting my list under the cut!!!!!
14. A book mentioned in another book - Three Men In A Boat, Jerome K. Jerome (recommended by @asimplequery) 23. A book that features a language you're not fluent in - Cemetery Boys, Aiden Thomas 29. A book from a genre you don't usually read -  I'm Glad My Mom Died, Jennette McCurdy 30. A book you last read at least ten years ago - Timequake, Kurt Vonnegut 34. A book that makes you smarter - On Writing, Stephen King 36. A book that makes you cry - The Dutch House, Ann Patchett 37. A book that you consider a page-turner - The Girl In The Tower, Katherine Arden 41. A book inspired by real events/ people - The Terror, Dan Simmons 43. A book that addresses sexism/ feminism - Bad Mormon, Heather Gay (lmao i should be shot for this) 49. A book concerning death - The Book of Night, Holly Black 55. A book with found family - Bet Me, Jennifer Crusie 60. A book set in summer - Reckless Girls, Rachel Hawkins 61. A book set in winter - Left Hand of Darkness, Ursula Le Guin (recommended by @vivathewilddog and i think this was my favorite book i read this year. did you know reading good authors is good?) 67. A book with an antihero - The Ninth House, Leah Bardugo 69. A book with a character who shares your name -  The Secret Book of Flora Lea, Patti Callahan Henry (recommended by @prairiedaun) 74. A book whose protag. is different from you in a significant way - Siren Queen, Nghi Vo 79. A book published under a pseudonym - The Cinderella Deal, Jennifer Crusie 85. A book with a one-word title - Pnin, Vladimir Nabokov (recommended by @eggtrolls) 89. A book that shares its title with a song - Never Let Me Go, Kazuo Ishiguro (recommended by @sarahcakes613 ) 90. A book with an ampersand in the title - Nettle & Bone, T. Kingfisher 91. A book with a number in the title - The First Fifteen Lives of Harry August, Catherine Webb 95. A book that uses three or fewer colors on the cover - Devil House, John Darnielle FREE SPACE Cold Sassy Tree, Olive Ann Burns
18 notes · View notes
mormonbooks · 1 month
Text
The Bishop's Wife Review
4/5 Stars!
This book was nothing like how I expected it to be and everything I needed and wanted it to be. I expected the kind of novel you could recommend to your mom for a bit of light reading on a Sunday afternoon. The Bishop's Wife. She's a mormon woman who is doing her best to take care of her ward.
I was pleasantly surprised at the moderately progressive tone the book took within the first few chapters (asking questions about the sexism in the church, the fear of judgement 'imperfect' families face, etc) but I soon realized that it there was much more. This novel is a deep commentary on Mormonism, digging into the deep and unpleasant parts, and asking difficult questions that most members like to avoid. It does it all through the eyes of a faithful middle-aged woman, who knows what she believes and uses her faith to bring justice to her community, even when she has to struggle against the church institution and her own husband to do it.
In my opinion, it's a great work of mormon feminism, that allows our culture to shine through in all it's glory and with all it's flaws. I would highly recommend this book to anyone, genuinely. The mystery is engaging, the community is loveable, the plot twists are gut wrenching. Truly a work of art. I'm excited to read more of Harrison's work
Breakdown under the cut
1. Well written - 5 Stars
Yes. The prose is beautiful. The plot is engaging. The mystery is complex and the new information always threw me. It was gut wrenching at times. It was comforting at others.
2. Fun level - 5 stars
It's a slow-paced story, with many moments that skip weeks or months where not much happens. But I enjoy stories like that. It gave breaks between the page-turning mystery solving moments.
3. Complex faith - 5 Stars
This is probably my favorite part of this book. The villains and the heroes are all mormons, and they all approach their faith and their religion in different ways. Linda obviously has more progressive views, and is enraged by the misogyny of many of the men in this story. Those men are not shown to be anamolys per se but they're also not shown to be the norm. Many women in the story have opportunities to voice their questions and doubts but it never makes them any less mormon. People exist all over the scale of mormonism and it feels like the most honest portrayal of our culture that I've read so far.
4. Homophobia scale - 3.5 Stars
It's not a major plot point, but it's mentioned that Linda's son Samuel joined the GSA at his school and she is proud of him for that. She also suspects that her other son might be gay, and worries about how that will affect his relationship with his father. I imagine this will be explored further in the series. It's refreshing that Linda is pro-LGBT but it also seems to treat the church's heteronormative stance quite naively and I'd love to see Harrison really dig into that topic in the future.
5. Mormon weird - 4 stars
Realistic Fiction, but definitely uniquely mormon. The characters in this book could not be swapped out with "generic christians." some of the problematic and dangerous beliefs are uniquely mormon, but so are the beautiful and comforting ones. There is a lot of discussion of the plan of salvation, that I appreciated. I also liked Linda's realistic approach to faith, and her honest moments of doubting, or referring to things as "legends" and "myths." Things don't have to be doctrine to be important in our culture
6. Diversity of characters - 2 stars
I don't think race is ever touched on in the novel, and they all live in Utah and have typical european-american names, so it's easy to assume they are all white. And despite being essentially a work of mormon feminism, a very small percentage of the speaking cast are women.
7. Other problematic stuff - 4.5 stars
I deeply enjoyed the novel as a snapshot of a mormon town, however that does mean that, despite her progressiveness, Linda has a realistic understanding of gender, as a middle-aged mormon woman. She has some beliefs and attitudes toward men that I found frustrating, although understandable.
Conclusion:
I gave this book 5 stars on goodreads but that was before I did my breakdown. I wish it had been more diverse, but I think Harrison explores race in the church in future novels. We'll see.
I LOVE Linda Wallheim. I LOVE the way Harrison talks about Mormon communities and Mormon faith and Mormon culture. I love how much this book made me feel. This is decidedly GOOD mormon rep, with all the determined faith mixed with struggles against flawed systems and truly terrible people. like. I cannot express how much I hate the villains in this book.
I can't wait to see Linda's next adventure.
12 notes · View notes
vavuska · 8 months
Text
Books similar to The Handmaid's Tale by Margaret Atwood:
The Grace Year by Kim Liggett and Extasia by Claire Legrand are both distopyas dense of religious fanatism and women's segregation, in which sexism and sexual prejudice are associated with various aspects of religion (e.g. belief, faith, and fundamentalism). This novel shows also how higher religious fundamentalism is associated with internalized misogyny and passive acceptance of traditional gender roles, and both hostile and benevolent sexism.
In The Grace Year the stereotype of a women as source of sin was laid down by the dominant religious authorities before the inception of widespread violence led by women against women, but after all the violence and blood, women learn the importance of sorority, female friendship and start to support and help each others.
The main source of conflicts are ribbons, which, in The Grace Year, are the sign of a women lifestage and the bride's ribbon is a valued price among most of the girls of the age of Tierney, the protagonist. The bride ribbons create a competition between girls to get bachelor’s attention, self-objectification, and humiliation toward each others. Although the competition eventually destroys most of them, this characteristic offers pleasure to those who survived their Grace Year. Tierney learns to survive on her own, learns that the religious values she was thought were wrong and learns also to appreciate her peer's friendship.
Extasia adds witchcraft and supernatural elements, but the main character (Amity) believes deeply in social conservatism—Amity has a preference for stability, conformity and the status quo— which is often a key trait of the religious experience, but also betrays deep feeling of self-hate.
In Extasia, the very patriarchal structures that decry witchcraft – the Puritan church in which the characters lives in and escapes from, the male headship to which the community so desperately cling, the insistence, in the face of repeated violence, on the sin of her mother – are the same structures that inevitably foreclose the options of the lead character, Amity.
To this two, I will mention also The Year Of The Witching by Alexis Henderson. In this novel, Immanuelle, a young woman living in a rigid, puritanical society, discovers dark powers within herself. This book is very similar to Extasia, but not such as good: Amity character is way more believable than Immanuelle and shows way more comprehension of the injustices committed in the name of the religion. The cult in Extasia contains more original elements and believing than the one in The Year Of The Witching, which seems more a copy-paste of mormon radical close-communities, including the elements of racial prejudice. Both Immanuelle and Amity live in the disdain of their own community because of the sins committed by their mother, which were both punished for their love affairs, but when Amity is a girl-of-action and actively search for mercy and witchcraft, Immanuelle is cursed - literally - by passivity and events occurs without her active consents, including the defection of the evil antagonist. Also, female friendship doesn't take place among the main themes and the book suffer a lot of the male love-interest help.
The Grace Year by Kim Liggett
Tumblr media
No one speaks of the grace year. It’s forbidden.
In Garner County, girls are told they have the power to lure grown men from their beds, to drive women mad with jealousy. They believe their very skin emits a powerful aphrodisiac, the potent essence of youth, of a girl on the edge of womanhood. That’s why they’re banished for their sixteenth year, to release their magic into the wild so they can return purified and ready for marriage. But not all of them will make it home alive.
Sixteen-year-old Tierney James dreams of a better life—a society that doesn’t pit friend against friend or woman against woman, but as her own grace year draws near, she quickly realizes that it’s not just the brutal elements they must fear. It’s not even the poachers in the woods, men who are waiting for a chance to grab one of the girls in order to make a fortune on the black market. Their greatest threat may very well be each other.
With sharp prose and gritty realism, The Grace Year examines the complex and sometimes twisted relationships between girls, the women they eventually become, and the difficult decisions they make in-between.
Extasia by Claire Legrand
Tumblr media
Her name is unimportant.
All you must know is that today she will become one of the four saints of Haven. The elders will mark her and place the red hood on her head. With her sisters, she will stand against the evil power that lives beneath the black mountain--an evil which has already killed nine of her village's men.
She will tell no one of the white-eyed beasts that follow her. Or the faceless gray women tall as houses. Or the girls she saw kissing in the elm grove.
Today she will be a saint of Haven. She will rid her family of her mother's shame at last and save her people from destruction. She is not afraid. Are you?
The Year Of The Witching by Alexis Henderson
Tumblr media
In the lands of Bethel, where the Prophet’s word is law, Immanuelle Moore’s very existence is blasphemy. Her mother’s union with an outsider of a different race cast her once-proud family into disgrace, so Immanuelle does her best to worship the Father, follow Holy Protocol, and lead a life of submission, devotion, and absolute conformity, like all the other women in the settlement. But a mishap lures her into the forbidden Darkwood surrounding Bethel, where the first prophet once chased and killed four powerful witches. Their spirits are still lurking there, and they bestow a gift on Immanuelle: the journal of her dead mother, who Immanuelle is shocked to learn once sought sanctuary in the wood. Fascinated by the secrets in the diary, Immanuelle finds herself struggling to understand how her mother could have consorted with the witches. But when she begins to learn grim truths about the Church and its history, she realizes the true threat to Bethel is its own darkness. And she starts to understand that if Bethel is to change, it must begin with her.
26 notes · View notes
unpackingexmo-blog · 10 months
Text
The Mormon church is an abusive cult. - No mandatory reporting of sexual abuse. - Members are taught to pay tithing money even if they can't feed their own children. - No disavowal of white supremacists like Brigham Young. Racism, sexism, and bigotry. - They teach people to ignore and suppress negative emotions rather than process them. - They threaten you with eternal damnation and loss of your eternal family if you don't comply. - Local bishops make you comply by threatening to take away your temple recommend.
65 notes · View notes
Text
One of the biggest things I am trying to deprogram from my time in the mormon church (other than the obvious racism sexism and lots of other bigotries I don't need to list out) is the need to control other people's behavior
Sunday school teachers would say that it isn't enough for just you to not swear, you have to teach all of your friends and family and classmates and anyone you interact with to not swear
And anyone who didn't keep the same standards as you was regarded as deviant and in need of correction
It took me a bit to realize this, but one of the reasons I was trying so hard to not let people around me break The Rules was obviously because I was told to teach people around me but also because in a way I didn't understand yet, I was jealous
I knew that I wasn't allowed to cry or be loud or act in any way like a small child in church, so when I saw people whose parents let them play with toys louder than usual or who left early I wished that could be me, but I knew I couldn't, so it made sense to me as a child that they shouldn't be able to, because that is not fair
But nothing in life is fair, not in a "suck it up and pull yourself up by your boot strap you snowflake" way but in a "fair is a concept meaning everyone gets the same thing but because people are diffrent they don't need the same thing" way
It is taking effort but I can see ways that I am getting better at un training brain to try to stop people from doing things I am not allowed to, because it doesn't matter, who cares. If nobody is being hurt it doesn't matter if someone does something strange in a public setting, because life is short and spending all of it trying to tug people into a box that won't let them wear a crop top, is not the way I want to spend mine
9 notes · View notes
cyeayt · 8 months
Text
Enough about kolob, enough about cain/Bigfoot, enough about secret languages and creepy occult shit that sure, might be believed in flds cults down in the south of the state but that aren’t that relevant to wider church culture. The only similar thing that should be talked about is polygamy, and not in a "oh those crazy mormons i bet they all still do it hardehar har" but in a way that reminds everyone that the founders of this religion were horrible men and the whole thing has been sexist from the very beginning,
lets talk about soaking, about repression, about feeling trapped and making what seems like the biggest decision of your life at eight years old, even when you all know its not really your choice. lets talk about how impossible it is to be rude, when rudeness is considered saying no to anyone or not talking to people who make you uncomfortable. lets talk about the racist and colonialist foundations of the church, how no one will say it but technically yes our children are taught that native americans are the descendants of the evil race who killed all of our heroes. lets talk about missions as a tool of colonization and power and how they're not only a way to beat down the young people who go on them to solidify the idea that the world hates them and only the church is safe, but also to assimilate and collect money from people all over the world. lets talk about all the shit that makes this religion a horrible oppressive environment to grow up in, the way that afab people are taught from like three years old that one day they will grow up to be mothers, and everything else that i cant type all of because its really just a whole horrible culture of fear and shame packed into beige carpeted walls and squeaky gym floors.
tldr, the stuff that makes Mormonism bad isnt that different than any other religion, its mostly sexism racism homophobia and transphobia, and of course the terror of polite manners and the implications thereof.
this post is actually supposed to be funny because me and my cousin couldn't stop cracking up about soaking, like, a couple on a dating app looking for a third but its not for a threesome its for soaking, cmon its hysterical. anyway,,,,
13 notes · View notes