The Mormon Women Project Kickstarter

[juliann]

This is a very worthy cause. Neylan McBaine has been an unstoppable force for good in the Church. For those who are unhappy with radical groups like Ordain Women, this is the solution.

 

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1515518300/the-mormon-women-project-site-relaunch 

 

Since  the Mormon Women Project launched at www.mormonwomen.com in January 2010, we have relied on volunteer hours to design the site, produce the interviews, plan events, host social media outlets, and publish additional articles and resources. The work has been tremendous, and tremendously impacting. Consider these statistics:

• The Mormon Women Project has been cited in The New York Times, Washington Post, and Huffington Post.
• The MWP includes more than 350 interviews with women in 22 countries.
• The site was visited more than 90,000 times over October 2015 general conference weekend alone.
• Our interview with Neon Trees drummer Elaine Bradley has been read almost 40,000 times.
• Our Facebook group includes 8,400 fans, with active presences on Instagram and Twitter as well
• We have hosted events featuring Valerie Hudson Cassler, Camille Fronk Olsen, C Jane Clark, Emma Lou Thayne, Amy Antonelli and others.
• Sister brand Our Cooperative Ministry has featured lesson supplements from Fiona Givens, Julie Smith and other theologians.

 

 

 

 

Project is now funded, thread unpinned.

[Buckeye]

Good plug. Do you know if MWP is as openly hostile to OW as you are? I was planning on donating until I read to the end of your comment.

[Stargazer]

Good plug. Do you know if MWP is as openly hostile to OW as you are? I was planning on donating until I read to the end of your comment.

Heck, I'm hostile to OW, so it's a good thing I'm not inviting you to donate to me.

 

The Kickstarter page says nothing at all about OW, btw.

Edited October 23, 2015 by Stargazer

[Stargazer]

So, what, if anything, does this have to do with UMW ??

 

But whatever.  I've just donated to the Kickstarter campaign.  i gotta see where this goes.

Edited October 23, 2015 by Stargazer

[Buckeye]

Heck, I'm hostile to OW, so it's a good thing I'm not inviting you to donate to me.

 

The Kickstarter page says nothing at all about OW, btw.

 

Right. I wasn't planning on donating to the Stargazer Women's Project. MWP has seemed a very good endeavor, though. And as you point out, I've never seen any line drawing or opposition from them towards OW. They just respectfully disagree that ordination should be the goal, especially when there are more accessible avenues for improvement. 

[juliann]

Good plug. Do you know if MWP is as openly hostile to OW as you are? I was planning on donating until I read to the end of your comment.

I said for those who are unhappy with them, Buckeye.  Please don't add things that aren't there. Thanks.

[Buckeye]

I said for those who are unhappy with them, Buckeye.  Please don't add things that aren't there. Thanks.

 

I'll try to be clearer. You labeled OW as "radical." That's fine, but it's not a sentiment I want to support (financially or otherwise). Mormon women's groups can disagree with each other without being disagreeable. Labels such as "radical" cross that line, IMO. I haven't seen this sentiment from MWP and thought since you're a supporter you might know if that's actually their feeling too. I would hate to donate and then find out that MWP views OW as radical.

[juliann]

Within the Mormon spectrum, OW is radical (it certainly isn't outside of Mormonism.) I don't understand why that is a bad word. Our theology tends to be radical at points, Joseph's ideas were radical. We aren't speaking the same language here, Buckeye. 

 

We have had many threads here about women's groups. I don't want to derail this into another. Neylan has been nothing but courteous and gracious in dealings with other women's groups just as she has to the Church.  The interviews of so many diverse women alone are worth contributing to. 

[Buckeye]

Within the Mormon spectrum, OW is radical (it certainly isn't outside of Mormonism.) I don't understand why that is a bad word. Our theology tends to be radical at points, Joseph's ideas were radical. We aren't speaking the same language here, Buckeye. 

 

We have had many threads here about women's groups. I don't want to derail this into another. Neylan has been nothing but courteous and gracious in dealings with other women's groups just as she has to the Church.  The interviews of so many diverse women alone are worth contributing to. 

 

That's what I wanted to hear. Thanks. My experience with Neylan has also been positive. She has her views but she's not trying to exclude other voices. And that's what I took from your use of the word "radical." In a mild form, the term can mean something that is new or expansive; that certainly applies to many of Smith's ideas. But another use is a negative view that would exclude someone, or some viewpoint, as not worthy of inclusion in the conversation. That's what I understood you to mean. And it would give me pause if MWP took the position that OW should not be involved in discussions regarding women's roles in the church. Sorry if I misunderstood you.

[rockpond]

I do like Neylan.

 

Bill Reel and John Dehlin have been accused of priestcraft and such for requesting funding for their work.  Will Sister McBaine face the same fate?

[Buckeye]

I do like Neylan.

 

Bill Reel and John Dehlin have been accused of priestcraft and such for requesting funding for their work.  Will Sister McBaine face the same fate?

 

Not if you agree with her form of priestcraft. 

 

FWIW, I was floored at church earlier this year when an older sister described Neylan as a "radical feminist." When I asked what specifically she objected to she couldn't name anything. She just knew that Neylan was engaged in trying to find ways to make things better for women and so she must be radical.

[juliann]

That's what I wanted to hear. Thanks. My experience with Neylan has also been positive. She has her views but she's not trying to exclude other voices. And that's what I took from your use of the word "radical." In a mild form, the term can mean something that is new or expansive; that certainly applies to many of Smith's ideas. But another use is a negative view that would exclude someone, or some viewpoint, as not worthy of inclusion in the conversation. That's what I understood you to mean. And it would give me pause if MWP took the position that OW should not be involved in discussions regarding women's roles in the church. Sorry if I misunderstood you.

 

I think just about everyone agrees that radical voices are needed to start the conversation. But it takes those who can work from the inside to finish it . I gave my Stake Prez got a copy of Neylan's book and my RS Prez attended one of her lectures with me. 

 

FWIW, I was floored at church earlier this year when an older sister described Neylan as a "radical feminist." When I asked what specifically she objected to she couldn't name anything. She just knew that Neylan was engaged in trying to find ways to make things better for women and so she must be radical.

 

 

I don't think I have ever heard Neylan refer to herself as a feminist.  I don't have the page number or quote handy, but Deborah L. Rhode What Women Want: An Agenda for the Women’s Movement (New York: Oxford University Press, 2104) gives reasons why national feminism is just about dead. Very few women identify as "feminist" or want to. The word has so much baggage it is like dragging a ball and chain and it has nothing to do with Mormonism. 

Edited October 23, 2015 by juliann

[Buckeye]

I think just about everyone agrees that radical voices are needed to start the conversation. But it takes those who can work from the inside to finish it . I gave my Stake Prez got a copy of Neylan's book and my RS Prez attended one of her lectures with me. 

 

Yes. Years from now I think it quite possible that the greatest good OW will have done will be to create a space in which Neyland and others could be seen as reasonable. But that doesn't decide the issue of whether ordination should eventually happen. "Radical" suffragettes in the 1800s may have opened the space for women to obtain more modest gains, such as property rights, but in the end, voting rights were a laudable and appropriate goal.

[juliann]

I do like Neylan.

 

Bill Reel and John Dehlin have been accused of priestcraft and such for requesting funding for their work.  Will Sister McBaine face the same fate?

 

 Dehlin made a very good living from his efforts. It is hardly a fair comparison.

 

Neylan has even put her book profits into her project. 

[Tacenda]

Yes. Years from now I think it quite possible that the greatest good OW will have done will be to create a space in which Neyland and others could be seen as reasonable. But that doesn't decide the issue of whether ordination should eventually happen. "Radical" suffragettes in the 1800s may have opened the space for women to obtain more modest gains, such as property rights, but in the end, voting rights were a laudable and appropriate goal.

As much as some don't want to admit it, the church has made significant strides towards women's equality in the church when some women in the church (OW) agitated for it. And the door was opened or reopened to maybe functioning like the era with Emma Smith as the RS president or even better than that era.

[rockpond]

As much as some don't want to admit it, the church has made significant strides towards women's equality in the church when some women in the church (OW) agitated for it. And the door was opened or reopened to maybe functioning like the era with Emma Smith as the RS president or even better than that era.

 

I agree.  I think some decades down the road we'll look back and see these past few years as a turning point in the church... Let Women Pray, OW, Neylan & the Mormon Women Project, and other efforts that got us looking at, discussing, and acting on these issues.  As someone with a young (primary age daughter) who is already seeing discrepancies in the church, I'm pleased with some of the changes we've seen recently:

 

• Women praying in conference
• Sister missionaries starting earlier and having leadership positions
• Official, public recognition of the wives of Joseph Smith
• Pictures of general RS, Primary, and YW leadership next to the other GA pictures
• Women's session officially declared part of General Conference
• Sacrament Mtg planning moved to Ward Council
• Official, FP authorized, essays published on Heavenly Mother and Women & the Priesthood

 

I'm in a bit of a rush... there are probably other items to note but these are great to have witnessed!

[The Nehor]

I'll try to be clearer. You labeled OW as "radical." That's fine, but it's not a sentiment I want to support (financially or otherwise). Mormon women's groups can disagree with each other without being disagreeable. Labels such as "radical" cross that line, IMO. I haven't seen this sentiment from MWP and thought since you're a supporter you might know if that's actually their feeling too. I would hate to donate and then find out that MWP views OW as radical.

Radical is a pejorative now? Give it another 50 years and we will have language itself banned.

[MiserereNobis]

Radical is a pejorative now? Give it another 50 years and we will have language itself banned.

 

Newspeak!

[Meadowchik]

I'll try to be clearer. You labeled OW as "radical." That's fine, but it's not a sentiment I want to support (financially or otherwise). Mormon women's groups can disagree with each other without being disagreeable. Labels such as "radical" cross that line, IMO. I haven't seen this sentiment from MWP and thought since you're a supporter you might know if that's actually their feeling too. I would hate to donate and then find out that MWP views OW as radical.

 

Within the LDS context, OW is radical.  That's going by what "radical" means.

[Meadowchik]

I have Women in the Church on my dresser.  Neylan McBaine makes many good points in her book.

[Calm]

Me too.

[why me]

This is a very worthy cause. Neylan McBaine has been an unstoppable force for good in the Church. For those who are unhappy with radical groups like Ordain Women, this is the solution.

 

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1515518300/the-mormon-women-project-site-relaunch 

However, there could be problems in the future. Such groups like this will need to beware of who is joining the organization. If OW type women join the organization and begin to have a voice, the organization will fall by the wayside. I have seen this happen with groups before. The Students for a Democratic Society are a case in point. Eventually, Maoists took over the organization and the organization splintered into groupings, one being the weather underground. This all happened in the very late 60s, around 1969.

 

And this also happened to Mormonfeministhousewives, I believe. I don't know how McBaine will keep it all together. Also, the organization does seem to divide men and women which is not good for any organization such as churches. It implies that something is wrong with the church organization and so, there needs to be a volunteer organization to fix the problem. This can also be divisive since it brings different identities to the forefront and cause confrontations. .

 

Before the rise of internet activism, it did seem that the church was a perfect organization since it was organized by christ. Now we are discovering that christ got it wrong or the men he put in charge got it wrong and we now need a women's organization to rectify it. Interesting concept, if true.

Edited October 30, 2015 by why me

[Buckeye]

However, there could be problems in the future. Such groups like this will need to beware of who is joining the organization. If OW type women join the organization and begin to have a voice, the organization will fall by the wayside. I have seen this happen with groups before. The Students for a Democratic Society are a case in point. Eventually, Maoists took over the organization and the organization splintered into groupings, one being the weather underground. This all happened in the very late 60s, around 1969.

 

And this also happened to Mormonfeministhousewives, I believe. I don't know how McBaine will keep it all together. Also, the organization does seem to divide men and women which is not good for any organization such as churches. It implies that something is wrong with the church organization and so, there needs to be a volunteer organization to fix the problem. This can also be divisive since it brings different identities to the forefront and cause confrontations. .

 

Before the rise of internet activism, it did seem that the church was a perfect organization since it was organized by christ. Now we are discovering that christ got it wrong or the men he put in charge got it wrong and we now need a women's organization to rectify it. Interesting concept, if true.

 

One way to avoid outside volunteer movements is to allow those people to actually lead within the church. It's tough to have gender division if men and women are all serving together in the same priesthood quorums.

[why me]

One way to avoid outside volunteer movements is to allow those people to actually lead within the church. It's tough to have gender division if men and women are all serving together in the same priesthood quorums.

However, not all women want the priesthood. What to do with these women? Have a separate relief society for such women. Strangely, it doesn't seem that men have an option to opt out. I don't actually care one way or another. It is just interesting to see divisions in the lds church.

 

Either the church is led by god or by pressure groups regardless if such groups are benign. But such a group as this should be aware of whom they allow to become a member. It can very easily be overcome by more 'militant' types.

[Ares]

Back on topic please.  There are enough women and priesthood threads to continue this.