What Is Utah Culture And What Is Church Culture?

[JDave]

There are other ways to do that. Two of the most common I've observed are these:

1. Subscribing to the Tribune while occasionally bad-mouthing the Deseret News (and not being in a position to make informed criticism of the Deseret News, since the basher never reads it anyway).

Even when I was in Utah I wasn't very conscious of the Deseret News growing up. Is the Deseret News itself a Utah Mormon thing? How widely distributed is it outside of Utah?

2. Being an ardent University of Utah fan to the point of being vocally hostile toward BYU.

I think it's funny how many LDS people outside of Utah want to send their kids to the "Church/LDS/Lord's University". With other options like BYU-I and BYU-H and Sothern Virginia U., this trend might decrease. I wish I could say the idea that allegiance to BYU is akin to allegiance to the LDS faith was a Utah Mormon thing, just because that would mean it was more limited in scope, but unfortunately I have seen that in many places. Of course now you have me wondering whether I am being vocally hostile toward BYU and thus exhibiting some rebellious spirit.

We have a minor rivarly in our ward over how many people graduated from BYU versus USU.

[Stone holm]

I would say that family farmers in Vermont tend to be communitarian, and an increasing number tend to be women. Are there really any family farmers left in Utah? I would expect they are a vanishing breed, I know they are pretty much gone in Indiana except for the Amish. All of the local merchants that served and supplied the family farmers are gone as well. The small towns that used to be semi self sufficient small towns are now just bedroom communities. As a result hardly anyone is self employed anymore. The clothes you wear are made in another country, the car you drive is likely made in another country. Welcome to capitalism with an oligarchic twist.

[Damien the Leper]

I really do love you Mark. But you're such a damn cynic...but I love that about you too. Damn you to the Telestial Kingdom...damn you!

[thesometimesaint]

Yeah- the Republicans. Good luck with that! Them family farmers are a real hotbed of communism- yessiree! And small business owners and the self- employed just LOVE more regulation!

Of course all of these will go along peacefully to Communism- who wants to work hard and make a million when you can work for the government for minimum wage anyway??

The economy as brought to you by the same folks who manage that great and efficient entity- the post office!

I better shut up or I may get an audit.....

There are now so few family farms any more it's hardly worth looking at. It is virtually all Corporate. To be accurate it was the family farmers whom built the Progressive Era in politics in America. http://economics.about.com/od/americanagriculture/a/farm_policy.htm

It was our small family businesses that demanded more regulations. Particularly against monopolistic business practices, Trusts, unfair trade deals, and price gouging.

Here is the Federal governments pay scale for Civil Servants. While slightly above minimum wage for GS1 step 1 it quite quickly becomes a middle class wage.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_Schedule_%28US_civil_service_pay_scale%29

It was Congress that saddled the Post Office with an impossible requirement. Have on hand 75 years of retirement funds, and no ability to raise rates to cover it. Name me ONE private business that is required of by law.

http://business.time.com/2013/04/12/the-post-offices-biggest-problem-isnt-saturday-delivery-its-congress/

Are you applying for a 501c(4) exclusion from paying taxes?

[mfbukowski]

There are now so few family farms any more it's hardly worth looking at. It is virtually all Corporate. To be accurate it was the family farmers whom built the Progressive Era in politics in America. http://economics.abo...farm_policy.htm

It was our small family businesses that demanded more regulations. Particularly against monopolistic business practices, Trusts, unfair trade deals, and price gouging.

Here is the Federal governments pay scale for Civil Servants. While slightly above minimum wage for GS1 step 1 it quite quickly becomes a middle class wage.

http://en.wikipedia....vice_pay_scale)

It was Congress that saddled the Post Office with an impossible requirement. Have on hand 75 years of retirement funds, and no ability to raise rates to cover it. Name me ONE private business that is required of by law.

http://business.time...y-its-congress/

Are you applying for a 501c(4) exclusion from paying taxes?

Ah yes, of course I forgot the governmental subsidies available to those farmers! Who wouldn't go along with getting paid to NOT plant crops?

Yet of course the post office survives- doesn't it? Even though in the case you cited it is clear that government once again has shot itself in the foot.

That is what central planning always does- Just wait til we see the real ramifications of our new health care program. Health care by the same wonderful folks who brought you the post office!

Now there is something to look forward to!

[Scott Lloyd]

Even when I was in Utah I wasn't very conscious of the Deseret News growing up. Is the Deseret News itself a Utah Mormon thing? How widely distributed is it outside of Utah?

The two general-circulation dailies in Salt Lake City are the Deseret News and the Salt Lake Tribune. Both have statewide circulation.

The Deseret News is the oldest newspaper (and the oldest business) in Utah, having been started by the Mormon pioneers in 1850, just three years after Brigham Young and the pioneers entered the Salt Lake Valley. Today, as in the past, it is owned by the Church.

But I don't know what you mean with your question about it being a "Utah Mormon thing." Like I said, it is a general-circulation daily, and as such, it is directed to all the residents of Salt Lake City and Utah, not just Mormons. In the past couple of years, a weekly national edition has been launched that contains the best non-Utah-specific content from that week's editions and is mailed out nationwide. And the Deseret News has an online presence that, of course, goes everywhere and is doing very well at the moment.

I mentioned the Tribune in the context of your comment about rebellion, because the Tribune traditionally has courted the affinity of people in the state who don't like Mormons or Mormonism. My hunch is that Mormons who subscribe to it get some sort of rebellious -- but fairly benign -- satisfaction in being non-conformist, given the Church ownership of the Deseret News and the reputation of the Tribune.

I think it's funny how many LDS people outside of Utah want to send their kids to the "Church/LDS/Lord's University". With other options like BYU-I and BYU-H and Sothern Virginia U., this trend might decrease. I wish I could say the idea that allegiance to BYU is akin to allegiance to the LDS faith was a Utah Mormon thing, just because that would mean it was more limited in scope, but unfortunately I have seen that in many places. Of course now you have me wondering whether I am being vocally hostile toward BYU and thus exhibiting some rebellious spirit.

Southern Virginia, of course, is not a Church-owned school, though it very much caters to an LDS market and student body.

I haven't noticed that you are being vocally hostile toward BYU. Am I missing something?

We have a minor rivarly in our ward over how many people graduated from BYU versus USU.

That's quite common, and is very much to be expected, given school allegiances. (As the Beach Boys said, "Be true to your school.") But I do wonder how much of it is attributable to this relatively benign sense of rebellion you have described.

Edited May 16, 2013 by Scott Lloyd

[mfbukowski]

As I said...in its purest form. I don't believe in imposing any style of government on anyone. The Law is non-utopian.

Briefly: the dictatorship of the proletariat is the rule-unrestricted by law and based on force-of the proletariat over the bourgeoisie, a rule enjoying the sympathy and support of the labouring and exploited masses (Lenin, The State and Revolution).

http://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/stalin/works/1924/foundations-leninism/ch04.htm

[Mola Ram Suda Ram]

And one of my favorites:

http://www.marxists....ag/19660101.htm

"Give correct leadership".... How nice to know there are still immutable correct principles somewhere!

I love this too. It is saying the same thing as "If we can just get this guy in, he is the right guy, it will work this time". Or "If we just spend more money it will work this time. The problem with Russia was that they didn't spend enough money".

The Communist Party U.S.A. (Marxist-Leninist) requires all its members to place the Party’s interests above their personal interest, to be diligent and unpretentious, to study and work hard, to unite the broad masses of the people, and to overcome all difficulties in order to establish the dictatorship of the proletariat and build a modern socialist state, and on this basis to advance towards the achievement of the loftiest ideal of mankind – Communism.

So how would they "overcome all difficulties in order to establish the dictatorship of the proletariat".

Are you guys even reading your history here? Mao anyone? Hello.

Edited May 16, 2013 by Mola Ram Suda Ram

[thesometimesaint]

Ah yes, of course I forgot the governmental subsidies available to those farmers! Who wouldn't go along with getting paid to NOT plant crops?

Yet of course the post office survives- doesn't it? Even though in the case you cited it is clear that government once again has shot itself in the foot.

That is what central planning always does- Just wait til we see the real ramifications of our new health care program. Health care by the same wonderful folks who brought you the post office!

Now there is something to look forward to!

The subsides replaces those monies spent on the production costs, not on the profits that could have been garnered. There is a greater good in maintaining farmers and their farms than in letting them go bankrupt for momentary financial gain.

How long can you last financially while going bankrupt? IE; If you personally had to put away in 10 years enough money for your unborn grand-children's retirement.

Politics is a useful tool whether it is used for promoting the general welfare, or destroying it. It is our good friend Grover Norquist that wants to reduce government to the size that he can drown it in a bathtub. A true Libertarian Paradise like Somalia.

I certainly have my misgivings about the ACA. It is far from what I wanted. Giving the American citizens the same healthcare options available to Congress critters. However so far the ACA has performed reasonably well. Despite House Republicans voting 37 times to repeal it, and Republican governors refusing to implement it.

I certainly don't want my government to operate on the profit motive, and I don't want my government to go bankrupt either. The Post Office actually was running a slight surplus before Congress that decided to destroy it. http://www.pbs.org/w...-service/11433/

Spend more in bad times, and spend less in good times. If we're silly enough to fight wars then we need to be rational enough to increase taxes to pay for them.

Edited May 16, 2013 by thesometimesaint

[mfbukowski]

How long can you last financially while going bankrupt?

Really?

You can't obviously. You try another business after you go bankrupt instead of getting bailed out by the government. Obviously family farms don't work anymore.

Neither does the coal and ice business my great-grandfather was in.

[mfbukowski]

Are you guys even reading your history here? Mao anyone? Hello.

You don't mean to imply that the cultural revolution actually used force do you?

Millions of people were persecuted in the violent factional struggles that ensued across the country, and suffered a wide range of abuses including public humiliation, arbitrary imprisonment, torture, sustained harassment, and seizure of property. A large segment of the population was forcibly displaced, most notably the transfer of urban youth to rural regions during the Down to the Countryside Movement. Historical relics and artifacts were destroyed. Cultural and religious sites were ransacked.

Mao officially declared the Cultural Revolution to have ended in 1969, but its active phase lasted until the death of the military leader Lin Biao in 1971. The political instability between 1971 and the arrest of the Gang of Four in 1976 is now also widely regarded as part of the Revolution. After Mao's death in 1976, reformers led by Deng Xiaoping gained prominence. Most of the Maoist reforms associated with the Cultural Revolution were abandoned by 1978. The Cultural Revolution has been treated officially as a negative phenomenon ever since.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cultural_Revolution

Clearly this is revisionist nonsense, like that talk about the holocaust actually happening!

[thesometimesaint]

Really?

You can't obviously. You try another business after you go bankrupt instead of getting bailed out by the government. Obviously family farms don't work anymore.

Neither does the coal and ice business my great-grandfather was in.

Do you go broke instantaneously, or does it take a while?

We as a society have determined that certain industries need governmental help from time to time, because the economic, and in the case of farms physical greater harm, results from not giving that assistance. Really no more different than when Joseph(of Egyptian fame) had the pharaoh store the excess of seven years of grain in good harvests to feed the people for the seven years of bad harvests.

Coal is still the biggest producer of electricity in the US. We do use electricity in our modern day homes.

Actually the ice business is bigger than ever. We just have shifted it from mass production to more individual production. It is hard to find a refrigerator that doesn't make ice, and in many models it comes with an ice dispenser in the door. Your air conditioner output is measured in the tonnes of ice it can melt in one hour.

[mfbukowski]

Do you go broke instantaneously, or does it take a while?

We as a society have determined that certain industries need governmental help from time to time, because the economic, and in the case of farms physical greater harm, results from not giving that assistance. Really no more different than when Joseph(of Egyptian fame) had the pharaoh store the excess of seven years of grain in good harvests to feed the people for the seven years of bad harvests.

Coal is still the biggest producer of electricity in the US. We do use electricity in our modern day homes.

Actually the ice business is bigger than ever. We just have shifted it from mass production to more individual production. It is hard to find a refrigerator that doesn't make ice, and in many models it comes with an ice dispenser in the door. Your air conditioner output is measured in the tonnes of ice it can melt in one hour.

Thanks for your views- we disagree. There is no point in going on.

[Ahab]

Thanks for your views- we disagree. There is no point in going on.

Sounds like a man who is contemplating suicide. No need to go on?!? Get a grip, man!!! It's not that big of a deal!

[Ahab]

Clearly this is revisionist nonsense, like that talk about the holocaust actually happening!

Heh, yeah, since that's just an interpretation not founded on any facts since there are no facts to found anything on.

[Mola Ram Suda Ram]

You don't mean to imply that the cultural revolution actually used force do you?

http://en.wikipedia....ural_Revolution

Clearly this is revisionist nonsense, like that talk about the holocaust actually happening!

Rofl too funny. Well not really but I get were you are coming from.

[Damien the Leper]

http://www.marxists....ninism/ch04.htm

Please don't project Leninism onto me. I disagree with that statement.

[mfbukowski]

Please don't project Leninism onto me. I disagree with that statement.

As a member of the CPUSA you are a member of a Leninist organization.

http://www.marxists.org/history/erol/periodicals/red-flag/19660101.htm

Central Committee of the Communist Party USA (Marxist-Leninist)

Declaration of the C.P.U.S.A. (M-L)

First Published: People's Voice, Vol. I, Nos. 6-7, Sept 27-Oct 4, 1965

Reprinted: Red Flag, Vol. I, No. 1, January-February 1966

Transcription, Editing and Markup: Paul Saba

Copyright: This work is in the Public Domain under the Creative Commons Common Deed. You can freely copy, distribute and display this work; as well as make derivative and commercial works. Please credit the Encyclopedia of Anti-Revisionism On-Line as your source, include the url to this work, and note any of the transcribers, editors & proofreaders above.

The Communist Party of the United States of America (Marxist-Leninist) is the vanguard of the working class of the United States of America, the highest form of class organization. The aim of the Party is to carry forward the historical traditions and contributions of the Communist Party in the United States.

BRIEF HISTORICAL NOTES – HISTORY OF MARXISM-LENINISM IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA

The historical struggle of the American working class was carried forward by the formation of the Communist Party U.S.A. in 1919 with the adherence and acceptance of the Party in the Third International. With less than several hundred members and under the direct attack of U.S. imperialism, the Party waged an unceasing struggle against the capitalist system. After years of struggle, the Party, in 1927, was forced to deal with the presence of Trotskyism within the ranks of the Party and it waged a fierce struggle against those representatives of bourgeois ideology within the ranks of the Party.

[Mola Ram Suda Ram]

Please don't project Leninism onto me. I disagree with that statement.

Um dude if you agree with the CPUSA then you must agree with Lenin. They go hand in hand. They are the same freaking thing.

[Damien the Leper]

Um...no. I'm part of the CPUSA because there are more ideals that I agree with. My being a communist is not synonymous with being a Leninist. My views and reflections don't fold neatly into a box. I got into an argument with an anti-Mormon who told me what I have to believe in order to rightfully call myself a Mormon. Such arrogance and audacity!!

[mfbukowski]

Um...no. I'm part of the CPUSA because there are more ideals that I agree with. My being a communist is not synonymous with being a Leninist. My views and reflections don't fold neatly into a box. I got into an argument with an anti-Mormon who told me what I have to believe in order to rightfully call myself a Mormon. Such arrogance and audacity!!

If you disagree with the central tenets of an organization, why be a member of it?

Just be an "independent thinker" and take from here and there as you like. I have found that belonging to organizations can get you involved in all kinds of things you never thought you would get involved with just because it was the "rules" of the club to do or believe such-and such.

I decided to form a club with one member- me- and have been happy with that arrangement most of my life.

The best part is that I don't have to travel for meetings !! On the other hand, if I want to travel, it is a perfect excuse!

[Ahab]

If you disagree with the central tenets of an organization, why be a member of it?

One reason could be that his idea of the central tenets do not agree with your idea of the central tenets.

Just like some guys who think you have to believe certain things to be a Christian, like them, otherwise you're not part of their club.

[mfbukowski]

One reason could be that his idea of the central tenets do not agree with your idea of the central tenets.

Just like some guys who think you have to believe certain things to be a Christian, like them, otherwise you're not part of their club.

There is a written constitution

[Damien the Leper]

Perhaps this is evidence that labels are worthless. The worthless labels I have attributed to myself are:

Mormon

Gay

Christian

Pluralist

Communist

LDS

Republican (a very long time ago...then I had an exorcism)

Humanist

Episcopalian

Essentially, not one of those labels is relevant. The only label I should be concerned with is:

I am me.

[Ahab]

There is a written constitution

Okay. So what?