New RFM Podcast--Mormon Racism Revival

[consiglieri]

Bill Reel and Jonathan Streeter joined me for a discussion of the recent controversy involving the publication of racist material in the new 2020 Come Follow Me Manual.

https://radiofreemormon.org/2020/01/rad ... m-revival/

A good time was had by all!

--RFM

[Hagoth]

I'm listening right now. I love the way you showed the writing between the lines by filling in the ellipses in the JFS statement. It shows that they know exactly what the real doctrine is and that redacting it that way is just a form of cover-up. He clearly taught that the curse still applies to everyone with dark skin who does not convert to Mormonism.

I keep seeing apologists saying that eventually all of the BoM people accepted or rejected the gospel variously regardless of skin color but, as you point out, the BoM clearly states that those who returned to the church became white again, like the goody- goody Nephites. Joseph Smith really underscores this with his tale of Zelph the White Lamanites.

Something new I learned from the podcast was that JFS also taught the Kimball doctrine that righteous Native Americans are turning white. I think he actually said that they could "pass" for whites. Yikes.

[RubinHighlander]

Yes, good job gents. It is very suspicious they did not reprint those manuals, especially from a church with that much money that is so concerned about its image. Either the old guys are just not paying attention or they purposely wanted to support the older generation's bigot dogma with the printed material with the option to give the younger ones their gas lighted digital version. I mean, after all the angst and bad press, it looks like they just keep screwing up.

[Palerider]

Mrs. Palerider and I listened to this while driving a distance yesterday. She was appalled at the amount of misrepresentation going on by leadership.

I think leadership have been doing this little dance for a long time. Trying to bury old doctrines so slowly that no one will notice.

When the question arose as to why they can't just come clean and get it over with my thought was that if they do that they immediately begin to undermine the position of the "brethren". Above all else this must be safeguarded.

If they are seen as men who are just like the rest of us, with no special powers, the gig is up. Turn out the lights on your way out. As Cromwell said about the king of England, "Does he not fornicate and deficate like the rest of us?"

And that scares LDS leadership to death. Therefore, retain power by all means necessary.

[Corsair]

If they are seen as men who are just like the rest of us, with no special powers, the gig is up. Turn out the lights on your way out. As Cromwell said about the king of England, "Does he not fornicate and deficate like the rest of us?"

If you are Lutheran, you can acknowledge the mistakes and anti-Semitism of Martin Luther. If you are a conservative Catholic you can dislike Francis much like the liberal Catholics were not fans of Benedict XVI. But I do not bad mouth Russell Nelson or Joseph Smith in front of believers. It's their hot button. Preserving the distinct, exclusive priesthood authority through Joseph Smith is paramount. The change in racial attitudes remains deeply problematic.

[Hagoth]

I think leadership have been doing this little dance for a long time. Trying to bury old doctrines so slowly that no one will notice.

You're right, and I agree with you that it's just another example of distracting from the transparency of the emperor's clothes. They're not just burying doctrines to make them go away. They are still doctrine. They're pushing them deeper into the fog to make them less likely to garner criticism from outside the bubble. Some members, when they hear rational arguments begin to wake up to the deeper problems.

The appearance of that information in the manual was not the error they claim. It was carefully crafted to reduce the impact of a genuinely racist document in a way that would allow members to interpret it either with its racist intent, or as saying the opposite of what it really says. The only error was in underestimating how easily some people would see through the smoke screen.

[jfro18]

The appearance of that information in the manual was not the error they claim. It was carefully crafted to reduce the impact of a genuinely racist document in a way that would allow members to interpret it either with its racist intent, or as saying the opposite of what it really says. The only error was in underestimating how easily some people would see through the smoke screen.

This is 100% it. When I read the initial article in the Trib and then looked at the printed manual text, the *first* thing I noticed is how the cut that Joseph F Smith quote up.

When I did a write-up about it last week that was really eye opening to see that even in the "error" version they were still being outright deceptive to cover the doctrine and how they taught it.

It's so much worse than the printed manual states... just imagine if they put that whole JFS quote in there... and that doesn't even include the other quotes from prophets, apostles, and, of course, the Book of Mormon and Abraham.

But hey - apparently "skin" doesn't mean "skin," so why are we even arguing this. It's us that got it wrong.

[Arcturus]

“I don’t know why we have prophets if they can’t tell us what the Book of Mormon means...”

My favorite line of the episode! Great work RFM and Bill.

[wtfluff]

Maybe LD$-Inc. has a mole in the correlation/manual writing dept. Maybe the mole sneaked in the Joe. Field. Smith "quote...* without the Q15-Bigots noticing.

Maybe the Q15-Bigots are so protected by their tone-deaf bubble, that they didn't think Joe's racist "quote..." mattered.

Or maybe it was completely intentional like RFM, Bill and Jonathan mentioned.

Hmmm...

[græy]

But hey - apparently "skin" doesn't mean "skin," so why are we even arguing this. It's us that got it wrong.

Isn't the whole purpose of the BoM to be plain and easy to understand? Isn't it supposed to fill in holes left by the bible by being straight forward and simple? Then why does nothing in the book actually mean what it says?

skin != skin
black != black
horse != horse
steal != steel
wheat != wheat
cattle != cattle
translate != translate
chariots != chariots
windows != windows
compass != compass

and on and on.

[Hagoth]

I think we need to update the Articles of Faith from:

We believe the Bible to be the word of God as far as it is translated correctly; we also believe the Book of Mormon to be the word of God.

to

We believe the Bible to be the word of God as far as it is translated correctly; we also believe the Book of Mormon to be the word of God as far as it is "translated" correctly.

[jfro18]

I think we need to update the Articles of Faith from:

We believe the Bible to be the word of God as far as it is translated correctly; we also believe the Book of Mormon to be the word of God.

to

We believe the Bible to be the word of God as far as it is translated correctly; we also believe the Book of Mormon to be the word of God as far as it is "translated" correctly.

Can I steal that for future use?

[Red Ryder]

I think we need to update the Articles of Faith from:

We believe the Bible to be the word of God as far as it is translated correctly; we also believe the Book of Mormon to be the word of God.

to

We believe the Bible to be the word of God as far as it is translated correctly; we also believe the Book of Mormon to be the word of God as far as it is "translated" correctly.

Can I steal that for future use?

That’s probably the simple way to say:

We believe the Bible to be the word of God as far as it is translated correctly; we also believe the Book of Mormon to be the word of God as far as it is "translated" and “interpreted” by the current prophet in order to diminish the past racism, errors, and offensive content taught as doctrine by former prophets who we no longer support, dress like, or agree with. In fact, we believe WE the current living prophets, the First Presidency and the Quorum of the 12 Apostles to be the word of God as far as we say such things and provide the ONLY way back to God through OURSELVES and strict obedience to US! Hell, if we are honest we believe that WE are Gods so bow down and worship us! Take a knee. Bow your head now, and say YES! One more time but slower. There it is. That will do!