Re: Very brief comments on LDS/Mormons

[attila <attila@primenet.com>]

In <v03007808ae7af10d0afb@[207.167.93.63]>, on 10/04/96 
   at 09:03 AM, "Timothy C. May" <tcmay@got.net> said:

.Personally, I find Mormonism to be a good "survival meme."
.Self-preparedness, food storage, self-reliance, etc., are all counter to the
."I'll just let government take care of me" meme which is so common in the
.rest of society. I don't cotton to supernatural explanations of the world,
.though, so I've never been in involved in any religion (past age 11).
.
        dont worry, there has never been a book burning in Utah --even 
    when it was fashionable in the East for almost two centuries.  
    anyone who advocates book burning in Utah is not LDS.

        the LDS church does not disseminate a list of proscribed
    literature, and does not actually 'preach' anything other than
    what we consider 'acceptable' morality.  everyone has their own
    "free agency" and if they are practicing, certainly understand
    what those standards mean.  personally, I see nothing wrong with
    nudity, but R pictures have starting to approach what was X and
    is now NC-17 (under 16) --and NC-17 now includes almost what was
    XXX.

        the Church does not dictate, nor actually moralize --each 
    individual is left with their own responsibility and the impending
    review of their mortal life.

.I suppose I'm chagrinned that a thread I named, "Utah as a Religious Police
.State," has been followed by *so many* religious flames, pro- and con-
.Mormonism. (I use Mormonism as shorthand for LDS...sosumi.)
.
        tim, at the end (instead of here where it probably belongs) is
    some extended food for thought on how a corrupt Fed regulates
    thought and action --starting in the 1800s, proving that the party
    in power, even in a supposed democratic republic, still dictates
    what you will read, think, and practice.  the more I study (what is
    now --going on since I started school in 1945), the more cynical
    I become of human nature and the abuse men have permitted
    from whatever government extant.  

        if you think about it, the actions against the LDS in the 1800s
    is very little different than the power hungry, corrupt Feds of 
    today who are attacking the Bill of Rights as obsolete in the
    face of todays terrorism (is it so different from any before except
    it is faster and deadlier?).

        In our (LDS) terms I refer to the Feds as the Gadianton robbers
    who were the insidious 'mafia' which usurped government power 
    under the guise of 'law and order' in a period of the book of 
    Mormon...
 
        --or even the Pharisees (the temple money changers) of Jesus' 
    time. The same concept of the Pharasees is still practiced by the 
    Jewish faith today.   (another comment on today's pharisee's --a
    truly amazing eye opener, towards the end). 

.My point was not to attack Mormonism, esp. the religious beliefs.
.
        No, I sure it was not --but you may have been the only one! <g> 

.Personally,
.I think cults are useful in keeping people off the streets (better than
.police-enforced curfews). I was mainly challenging Attila's glowing opinion
.of how his community "enforces curfews big time." 
.
        Frankly, we do not wish curfews, and there never were curfews 
    before the immense immigration into the area, mostly from So. CA,
    over the last 15 years which changed St. George from the small 
    town of less than the 5,000 in 1970 when I left St. George, to the
    almost 30,000 when I came home within the last year.  

        I chose not to actually return to St. George, where a two lane
    main drag had been changed from a two lane, tree line "road" 
    to a glitzed 4 lanes plus center lane boulevard, instead moving
    North to the rural high desert  (we have no legislated curfew).

        St. George today is not Mormon dominated politics, but the
    bulk of the immigrants expected to find, and maintain, that small
    town innocence --which they have more or less done. 

        However, these people, Mormons (some good, some inactive) and
    non-Mormans alike, unfortunately brought with them the alien 
    cultural they were trying to escape: bored children without super-
    vision, a junk food way of life, dual-income families, and children
    feeling aliented and lost in a world they do not understand --not
    St. George, but the world itself and its television age.

        It was in this atmosphere the "non-homogenous" but somewhat
    like thinking apparently demanded the permanent curfew --there is 
    absolutely nothing to do by that time, and milling around what
    passes for a mall here (grocery store) was/is not considered
    acceptable.  Secondly, St. George seems to attract an influx of
    3-5,000 high school students at Spring break (it is very warm
    by that time, despite the 3,000 ft  alt)  

        --but why?  there is nothing here.  they wanted beer, but they
    could not legally buy beer, or rent a hotel room under 18 --does
    not make sense.  so they had a milling, loose crowd of "foreign"
    teenagers.  --just like Sonny Bono, as mayor of Palm Springs,
    found himself with every year: illegal drinking,  convertibles
    with even pre-pubescent girls standing naked on the trunk decks,
    etc.  --don't say "where? where? where!?!

        well, that prompted the curfew, but they found it also 
    maintained the semblance of peacful family oriented community
    among the lost and alienated families --so it is apparently here
    to stay.  other than the fact we are telling tparents who do not 
    wish to manage their children they must keep them home or take them
    somewhere, what does the law do? 

.Telling people when they
.can be on public streets and when they cannot is no different than telling
.them what they can read and what they cannot.
.
        that was my initial reaction -you wouldn't tell me that!  but 
    consider the right of society to legislate and  regulate in the 
    common good, despite both my and your abhorence of law in an of
    itself.  

        it is an effective means of forcing parents who do not seem to 
    care, or parents who wish to shift their responsibilities to social
    workers who are not available, they have a responsibility.  what
    happens to the violators --few are arrested, they are asked to go
    home. there is no great wild-west roundup of teenaged cattle! any
    who resist or commit minor vandalism are taken to the center --but,
 
        unlike every other city I have seen, they do not mix the 
    'miscreants' with the juvenile delinquents, repeat offenders, and 
    the teenagers who are obviously on their way to the dead end.

        what is the penalty?  call their parents for a ride home.  they
    are not fingerprinted and mugged, etc.  very few are required to
    even see a social worker.  consistent repeat offenders eventually
    enter the system --as they should.

.I still urge Attila to rethink his enthusiastic support of state-enforced
.curfews, or state-imposed bans on alcohol (not that I recall him supporting
.this particular law), etc.

        actually, the curfew laws are local laws, and I reluctantly
    decided to support curfew laws for minors after looking at the
    means and results --it does provide an early point of intercepting
    behavioral patterns with the *parent* being the judge and warder,
    and hopefully give those parents a wakeup call they need to guide
    their children as they are fast approaching adulthood where they
    are fully accountable.

        alcohol is available at any large grocery store; it has not been
    banned to any extent since prohibition, but not necessarily avail-
    able in rural areas.  

        in Salt Lake City and the more heavily populated north, there 
    are bars.  prior to about 15 years ago, you could brown bag your
    own hard liquor to a restaurant; today restaurants have full 
    permits.  In St. George there actually is a bar! --you do need to 
    *know* where to find it (I was told a few weeks ago the area, but 
    I could care less).

        I do not think you can prohibit anything from adults --drugs,
    prescription or recreational, included --no matter how destructive.
    all 18 of the US code provides is a 'illegalization' of a criminal
    class with enormous financial power --and, worse, a corrupt and
    lawless enforcement agency with an equally corrupt and evil class
    of attorneys to protect both the distributors and the corrupt 
    opponents  --modern, legal, efficient predatation on a class. 

        legalize drugs, etc. and the ATF, the DEA, and a host of allied
    agencies which cause billions of dollars per year and provide
    nothing in return will be totally unnecessary (except to snoop for
    paranoid Bubba...)  --even Bubba could enjoy his five lines a day
    and not be in defiance of our legal system!

        and think of the destruction of the narco-terrorist gangs;
    --there would be no money, power, or illicit prestige; no enormous
    slush funds to put Uzis in the hands of an 8 year old, or bribe 
    cops and politicians.  our urban decay and combat zones would be
    boring --some might find it necessary to even learn enough to be
    able to watch a robomachine do the work!  this is beginning to 
    sound like utopia.

        so why do we not legalize dope?  simple: George Bush's income
    stream would dry up along with the literally thousands of other
    supposedly law-abiding politicians who are on the gravy train!

        take away the illicit profits for Congress and we might even 
    an honest reformer or two in Washington.




        certainly we are justified in ranting against any abridgement of 
    our right to freely (and privately) communicate, freedom of 
    *peaceful* assembly, a truly free press --certainly not the New 
    World Order blinded press printing the official line dictated by
    political/economic Boss Tweeds of what is effectively an oligarchy 
    --they do not possess common principles sufficient to even be
    called 'national socialists' (fascists). 

        or, there is a government like Washington where they are trying
    to, and may anyway, implement President Hillary's "It takes a 
    Global Village" so the state can dictate everything and raise a new
    generation of robots in the mold of their revisionist history which
    we are now suffering by attrition....   

        If Bubba and the President are reelected with a Democratic 
    Congress, we will not recognize our once almost free country in
    the space of a few short years.  Bubba is a space cadet political
    wonder  -the front man, wandering in his drug induced sub-space;
    Hillary is a the intelligent, crafty, 60s idealist socialist 
    liberal --dedicated and determined to impose her order at whatever
    expense of liberty necessary.

        or, Hillary's social order which plays directly into the hands 
    of the NWO, the very rich, old family elitists.  first the cradle to
    the grave thought control welfare state; and entire amorphous
    classes of thoughtless drones  --then comes the changes for the
    survival of the human race: the total disenfranchisement of major
    components of the underclass, and the establishment of an effec-
    tively feudal structure with a serf labor pool.

        or, the disturbing trend of an almost exponentially increasing
    prisoner class who are being shifted to prisons run by defense
    contractors who are permitted to "employ" them at minimum wage;
    paying WH, FUTA, FICA, and all that good stuff; and taking all but
    chump change for their room and board.  Today that decuction
    does not cover their actual confinement, but we can obviously rest
    assured the defense contractors will take the burden off the tax-
    payers (at what cost human suffering) *and* make a profit! 
    
        in other words, encouraging the breakdown of the classic 
    American family actually benefits the NWO by providing a lawless
    element which can be imprisoned for profit, and reduce the birth
    rate simultaneously --what a benefit!

.I still urge Attila to rethink his enthusiastic support of state-enforced
.curfews, or state-imposed bans on alcohol (not that I recall him supporting
.this particular law), etc.


.This is the last thing I'll say on Mormonism. Whether some subset of settlers
.committed some set of crimes in Mountain Meadows is a footnote in
.history--who really cares about such anomalies? I care more about the
.present.

     
some historical thought on why lack of religious freedom:

        actually, when you look back in history, what was it that just just
    lit the fires in Washington which provoked the Feds to even
    legislate laws which contravened the whole concept of what the
    Constitution stands for --laws which literally dissolve the Church
    a legal entity, confiscated Church property in excess of $50,000
    [not that much by 1875], revoked woman's suffrage in Utah
    (Wyoming (which is heavily, though not predominantly Mormon,
    at that time enacted woman's suffrage first in the nation a few
    months before Utah), disenfranchised all officials of the Church,
    and any members practicing polygamy?

        other than the fact a number of territorial governors after
    the first one sent from Washington with Johnson's Army (trapped
    at Fort Bridger) who was gracious and therefore replaced by some
    pretty vicious and greedy slimeballs who transmitted messages to a
    very distant Washington of "rebellion" by armed and dangerous 
    outlaws, what was it?

        utah was a land no-one, including many of Brigham Young's
    followers wanted, but they had transformed a very inhospitable land
    into a virtual land of plenty. 

        even though Brigham Young was replaced as governor in 1858 by 
    the territorial governors from Washington, the Church was both
    monolithic and defensive --understandably.

The Pharisees are alive and well today:

            in my previous ward in California, the LDS chapel was "leased" 
    gratis, other than janitorial fees, (including totally rearranging our 
    own worship schedules to accommodate) to one Jewish temple's 
    overflow for the Rosh Hosana (sp?) and Yom Kipper holidays.

        their advance guard 'required' six hours to set up and I was
    still in our ward offices (member of the bishopric)  at the start...
    they litterally set up two rows of _money changing_ tables at the
    entrance (tables you must pass between); they had sold tickets of
    admission; and the seats in the chapel were sold like opera 
    tickets: priced according to location.  

        OK, that's their deal, I thought --so what?  but curiosity got
    the better of me, and I asked one of their people who appeared
    to be approachable about the seating --it was he who informed me
    of the price schedule --the front area seating was $10,000 per
    seat --anything moving into our multicultural hall (gym, etc.) which
    has acoustical 'curtains' between the chapel was still >$500!  I
    did not have the courage to ask what it cost to sit upon the dias!


.--Tim

."The government announcement is disastrous," said Jim Bidzos,.."We warned IBM
.that the National Security Agency would try to twist their technology." [NYT,
.1996-10-02]
.We got computers, we're tapping phone lines, I know that that ain't allowed.
.---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:----
.Timothy C. May              | Crypto Anarchy: encryption, digital money,
.tcmay@got.net  408-728-0152 | anonymous networks, digital pseudonyms, zero
.W.A.S.T.E.: Corralitos, CA  | knowledge, reputations, information markets,
.Higher Power: 2^1,257,787-1 | black markets, collapse of governments.
."National borders aren't even speed bumps on the information superhighway."





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