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Letter Clarifies Intent of Byu Honor Code Change


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42 minutes ago, Duncan said:

it's from his book, boyd k. packer: watchman on the tower, pg 211. He recounts an conversation with a young tongan man who was  a RM and he asked if he were dating and the guy responded with there is no place to live (I am not sure what that means) and he could not get to the Temple. Then then next paragraph talks about Elder Packer talking at a youth fireside and he felt "restrained" about talking about Temple marriage. The next line is what I quoted, "where are we as a Church if I feel restrained from talking to young people about Temple marriage" Then it talks about Pres. Kimball's plan or idea about smaller Temples going to developing nations (obviously Pres. Hinckley fleshed out that idea!) but back in the '70's and 80's it was different

if you can't get married then there is no exaltation, I think section 132:15-17 talks about "seperate and singly" without exaltation"-course that opens the questions then are we wasting time sealing married people together in Temples, as per the above verses. These verses don't open up the possibility of getting sealed for anyone in the next, otherwise who are the 'seperate and singly'?

Thank you, Duncan. I don’t have that book, but it seems (surprisingly to me, but whatever, he’s only human) that Elder Packer was reticent to encourage something he felt (or that he discerned that they would feel) too impossible to do under the circumstances. I don’t think he was known for being a cheery optimist. Elder Jensen went a step further and said he felt that, for some, there is no hope for a sanctioned marriage. Maybe he was having a bad day. I don’t think a GA would address a gay support group and encourage them to pursue a temple marriage either, but instead leave it up to the individuals to ponder in their hearts and seek private counsel as they see fit.

If you can’t get married now, there are opportunities after physical death. Proxy work is a panacea for all seemingly impossible situations. Yet , not all God’s children may take advantage of them, and so the “separately and singly” clause. As an optimist, I think there are transcendent, spiritual powers stronger than those that often render someone feeling unqualified for temple marriage in this life.

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16 minutes ago, pogi said:
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There was also lot of wishful thinking, impatience, and unreasonable speculation.

I think there should be some accountability on the part of the school too.  I am not impressed. 

I'm not sure what you mean by "accountability."  If the claims about the HCO pan out (that the Honor Code Office folks were giving out bad information), then I think a serious comeuppance is in order.  But that's an internal administrative matter.

I was also not impressed with the two-week delay in clarifying the "misunderstanding," but sorting such things out can take time.  Meanwhile, the BYU spokesperson did put out a tweet at the outset of this (2 weeks ago) that should have given everyone pause.  That was, in hindsight, probably insufficient. 

On the one side, BYU/CES could/should have moved faster (and the HCO should not have been giving out bad info), and on the other side, those now outraged could/should have exercised more patience and common sense (and they shouldn't be screaming and ranting, and generally failing to resort to any sort of reasoning, evidence, or good faith effort to persuade).

Thanks,

-Smac

Edited by smac97
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2 hours ago, longview said:

They apparently thought it important enough to try to squelch this student's First Amendment Rights to free speech, freedom to assemble, and freedom of religion.  It is telling that you seem unfazed by thuggish behavior.

My understanding is that none of those rights exist on private property. Doesn't BYU censor/ban protests and assemblies?

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12 minutes ago, pogi said:
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What form should such accountability take, in your view (sincere question)?

There are lots of people pointing fingers at students as if it was their fault for misunderstanding, or that they were wrong for wishful thinking, etc. - it would be helpful if the school acknowledged that they did a poor job of introducing and explaining the new policy, and that any misunderstanding is understandable, and that any violations of the honor code during this time will be excused. 

I agree with this.

12 minutes ago, pogi said:

It would also be helpful to clarify the rationale, because their follow up clarification was equally unhelpful for me.

This, not so much.

The Honor Code has been in place for a long time.  It's underlying principles have been taught for a long time. 

12 minutes ago, pogi said:

When BYU faculty call into the honor code office for clarification, and the honor code office interpreted the new honor code in the same way that the students who were demonstrating did, then we can't point the finger at anyone but the school. 

I think BYU should investigate the mess at the HCO.

Thanks,

-Smac

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8 minutes ago, smac97 said:

This, not so much.

The Honor Code has been in place for a long time.  It's underlying principles have been taught for a long time. 

Given the clarifying letter, I am not convinced that the principles are well understood. 

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10 minutes ago, smac97 said:

I agree with this.

This, not so much.

The Honor Code has been in place for a long time.  It's underlying principles have been taught for a long time. 

I think BYU should investigate the mess at the HCO.

Thanks,

-Smac

I agree an investigation is a good idea. My guess is the HCO was given some direction on how to handle the language change. If not , if I were a HCO employee and knowing the history of the Church and the Honor Code, and I saw the change in language I would not give any student or facility advice until it was clarified.

 

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2 minutes ago, pogi said:
Quote

The Honor Code has been in place for a long time.  It's underlying principles have been taught for a long time. 

Given the clarifying letter, I am not convinced that the principles are well understood. 

I think the underlying principles were presumptively understood.  And the one-page letter from the CES Commissioner is certainly not the sole source of information about the Honor Code and the elements of the Law of Chastity that pertain to it.

Thanks,

-Smac

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5 minutes ago, smac97 said:

I think the underlying principles were presumptively understood.  And the one-page letter from the CES Commissioner is certainly not the sole source of information about the Honor Code and the elements of the Law of Chastity that pertain to it.

Thanks,

-Smac

That may be the case, but being unclear is not how you dig yourself out of this hole - that's how they got themselves in the hole in the first place.  When there is a problem of miscommunication and understanding, and your goal is to clarify the misunderstood principles behind the honor code, then these students deserve better than what they are getting. 

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1 minute ago, pogi said:

That may be the case, but being unclear is not how you dig yourself out of this hole - that's how they got themselves in the hole in the first place.  When there is a problem of miscommunication and understanding, and your goal is to clarify the misunderstood principles behind the honor code, then these students deserve better than what they are getting. 

Well, you may have a point there.

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56 minutes ago, smac97 said:

I appreciate and respect that.

I'm not sure Outrage Culture is only affecting "a minority of those involved."

If we contextualize this by looking at what has been happening on college campuses elsewhere, I think the presence and influence of the pheonomena I noted become more acute.

I think understanding motives and cultural context help me understand things better.

If and when these folks use reason, evidence, efforts to persuade, etc. to further their viewpoint, I'm happy to listen.  But the antics we are observing are deeply problematic, and largely devoid of reason, evidence, or efforts to persuade.

In short, they are acting like bullies.  Emotional bullies, but bullies nonetheless.  I don't think that is "focusing on the flaws and weaknesses."  I think it's simply noting the problematic behavior and tactics on display.  It's calling a spade a spade.  It's a refusal to be cowed or intimidated into silence by illegitimate, bullying behavior.

Thanks,

-Smac

I can understand your perspective.  For myself, I'm trying to meet them where they are right now, in the hurt, and not wait for them to be reasonable first.  The best way to stop a bully is to show love and try to understand why they do what they do.  From my experience, it doesn't work to wait until the bully fixes themselves before being willing to engage.

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1 hour ago, smac97 said:

For most, I think so.

Some probably have no particular plan, and are just lashing out based on knee-jerk and/or unreasoned anger and raw emotion.

I'm not sure the "emotion" is pretended.  To the contrary, I think it's authentic.  Such knee-jerk, emotionalistic reactions are often a big component of Outrage Culture.

Some in our society think that their emotions alone validate their position.  Reasoning, evidence, logic, persuasion, etc. become unnecessary concerns.  

I agree.  These are the three main ingredients that came to mind.  There are likely a spectrum of motivations in play.

I have a hard time envisioning that, particularly for kids who have grown up in the Church.

Maybe so.  And if that's the case, they can break the contract with BYU and transfer elsewhere.  Nobody is forcing them to stay.

But if they want to stay, they have to abide by the terms they agreed to at the front end.

Well, not really.  They are adults.  I expect them to act like it rather than resort to the sorts of antics we saw happen yesterday.

As a lawyer, I see this sort of immaturity all the time.  Party A voluntarily and freely enters into a contract with Party B, and later has regrets.  I don't think those regrets justify Party A in ranting against the contract they accepted voluntarily, and from which they can walk away.  And if there are adverse consequences to Party A choosing to away from the contract, then I'm not sure I am going to call that a "plight."  It's a situation of their own making.

No, not for everyone.  But if you want some examples of the sort of Outrage Culture + Oppression Olympics = Virtue Signalling I had in mind:

ESSvOpDWoAANTfF-e1583425455889-1024x673.

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https://www.sltrib.com/news/education/2020/03/04/after-byu-honor-code/

Party X's raw, unreasoned emotion is often going to be difficult for Party Y to fully understand.

Thanks,

-Smac

I understand.  It is really hard to be compassionate when we don't think someone deserves it.  I struggle with that myself but I want to get better.  I see my often times lack of compassion for those I don't agree with or understand as a weakness and I'm trying to get better.

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4 minutes ago, bluebell said:

I can understand your perspective.  For myself, I'm trying to meet them where they are right now, in the hurt, and not wait for them to be reasonable first.  The best way to stop a bully is to show love and try to understand why they do what they do.  From my experience, it doesn't work to wait until the bully fixes themselves before being willing to engage.

That's an intriguing perspective.  I'll think on it.  Thank you for sharing.

-Smac

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6 minutes ago, bluebell said:

I understand.  It is really hard to be compassionate when we don't think someone deserves it.  

I'm not lacking in compassion.  But I'm tempering that compassion with an expectation that these folks grow up a bit, and also with resistance to their bullying tactics.  

Thanks,

-Smac

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42 minutes ago, pogi said:

There are lots of people pointing fingers at students as if it was their fault for misunderstanding, or that they were wrong for wishful thinking, etc. - it would be helpful if the school acknowledged that they did a poor job of introducing and explaining the new policy, and that any misunderstanding is understandable, and that any violations of the honor code during this time will be excused.  It would also be helpful to clarify the rationale, because their follow up clarification was equally unhelpful for me.   When BYU faculty call into the honor code office for clarification, and the honor code office interpreted the new honor code in the same way that the students who were demonstrating did, then we can't point the finger at anyone but the school. 

Much of what you say here has merit. However, I would not be so quick to totally excuse students and others for jumping to conclusions. 
 

When a professor tells his class that what in retrospect has turned out to be his own misinterpretation is something he has been praying for for a long time and he implies that those who don’t agree with him are not heeding the prophets, it is clear his behavior was largely driven by wishful thinking. He should have been more restrained and prudent. 
 

I agree with Smac that the underlying principles of the honor code have been in place for a long, long time. To suddenly declare that homosexual romance and courtship is now permissible in the Church and on its college campuses would amount to a jarring sea change. It is not reasonable to believe that major changes to doctrine/teaching/practice in the Church are driven by tinkering with school honor codes and not the other way around. 
 

I would pose this question to any who feel that the students have been ill used. What logic is there in approving of romance and courtship between individuals of the same sex when there is no possibility that marriage between such individuals would ever be allowed? Wouldn’t that be setting them up for considerable frustration and agony later? That would strike me as cruel. 

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1 hour ago, bluebell said:

I'm working on trying to understand people's hurt better.  While I think that Smac is correct about a minority of those involved in the issue, his perspective as an overall answer to my previous question doesn't help with my goal.  It doesn't help me love anyone more or understand anyone better.  

I'm not trying to justify my own beliefs or annoyances with this whole issue (I'm really good at that on my own).  I'm looking for help in seeing things from another's perspective, a perspective that didn't seem reasonable to me.  I don't think it's possible for me to do that by focusing on the flaws and weaknesses of the people I'm trying to understand better.  

I want to commend you for this spirit. I am not gay, but the church that I want to love keeps pushing me away, first with an impatience with my questions, second with a suspicion (distrust?) about why I am asking so many questions - what is my real intent, and third a significant absence of understanding of my hurt when they view their words as just "telling me how it is" when they coldly assure me that my Godly sweet wife of fifty years cannot possibly have the gift of the Holy Spirit because she hasn't experienced LDS baptism and confirmation. That is just the way it is. I like the word "empathy," but don't think it is sufficient to describe what I "feel" is lacking in the attitude of so many I have met in the church who have never known, or have forgotten what it is like to be on the outside looking in. Perhaps it is better characterized as a lack of compassion because it is all so plain and clear to them. They wave their magic wand as if to swat away the hurt, and say "I don't mean this to be offensive" or "I am just telling you what we believe" hands on hips. "Why don't you get it?" It is all very painful.  

I once gave the invocation at a large banquet at which the vast majority of folks were LDS. I was "feeling" so good at having been asked to offer the blessing for the evening by a high ranking person in the church. I thought there was hope that one day I might belong. After the banquet a lady came up to me, looked straight at me and said "That was a pretty good prayer, but I just wish they wouldn't let non-members pray!" Pop went my balloon. She cut me down in one sentence. She also appeared oblivious to how her words hurt.

I can't feel what it must be like to be gay and at the same time have a heart to be in the church. Goodness, I am a straight non-member looking in the windows of the great and spacious building and many of the folks inside are looking out laughing at me like I have two heads. Anyway you have always been kind to me. That is maybe a key ingredient that other miss. Thank you. 

Edited by Navidad
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24 minutes ago, smac97 said:

I'm not lacking in compassion.  But I'm tempering that compassion with an expectation that these folks grow up a bit, and also with resistance to their bullying tactics.  

Thanks,

-Smac

I'll rephrase.  What I meant is that it's hard to have compassion like the Savior, who I believe has compassion on us even when we are in the thralls of immature and bullying behavior.  I really struggle with it.  But since being more like the Savior is my goal, I'm trying.

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16 hours ago, Calm said:

It is a very unfortunate social development imo. Got to wonder what life would be like without that paradigm. It is not like prostitution, porn, etc didn’t exist. And looking at some Asian literature, it highly romanticizes youth. You have older men being patrons of young, innocent boys. There appears to be little physical sexual relationship in the mainstream stuff I have seen, but the feel is intended to be erotic from what I have studied (didn’t want to make assumptions).  Same thing happens with girls though seems like more often they are much closer in age. Less patron and more friendship. 

And one can’t blame it on Christianity or uptight morality resulting from that faith as that was around long, long before the paradigm was. 
 

Maybe it all started going downhill as soon as we started wearing clothes. 

For all the good the Victorian Era spearheaded it gave us a lot of baggage and because of the size of the Empire that baggage went virtually everywhere.

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3 minutes ago, Navidad said:

I want to commend you for this spirit. I am not gay, but the church that I want to love keeps pushing me away, first with an impatience with my questions, second with a suspicion (distrust?) about why I am asking so many questions - what is my real intent, and third a significant absence of understanding of my hurt when they view their words as just "telling me how it is." I like the word "empathy," but don't think it is sufficient to describe what I "feel" is lacking in the attitude of so many I have met in the church who have never known, or have forgotten what it is like to be on the outside looking in. Perhaps it is better characterized as a lack of compassion because it is all so plain and clear to them. They wave their magic wand as if to swat away the hurt, and say "I don't mean this to be offensive" or "I am just telling you what we believe" hands on hips. "Why don't you get it?" It is all very painful.  

I once gave the invocation at a large banquet at which the vast majority of folks were LDS. I was "feeling" so good at having been asked to offer the blessing for the evening by a high ranking person in the church. I thought there was hope that one day I might belong. After the banquet a lady came up to me, looked straight at me and said "That was a pretty good prayer, but I just wish they wouldn't let non-members pray!" Pop went my balloon. She cut me down in one sentence. She also appeared oblivious to how her words hurt.

I can't feel what it must be like to be gay and at the same time have a heart to be in the church. Goodness, I am a straight non-member looking in the windows of the great and spacious building and many of the folks inside are looking out laughing at me like I have two heads. Anyway you have always been kind to me. That is maybe a key ingredient that other miss. Thank you. 

Thank you.  I'm trying.  

It's hard feeling like "other," lots of different emotions to deal with.  Sometimes people don't deal with all of those difficult emotions very well.  But how can I love others as myself if I'm not willing to mourn with those that mourn?  Too often I have wanted mercy for my own weaknesses and justice for everyone else's.  I need to do better.  

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4 hours ago, Daniel2 said:

; I firmly believe those Honor Code agents were briefed and given exactly what they were supposed to say,

I think this is probably true given the consistency of answers...though it would be weaker evidence if the phones were answered by only two or three people, who working together would hear each other.  Possibly the first one even shared their experience with the heavy volume of calls and how they were responding intentionally trying to make it easier for their coworkers and therefore it was possibly borrowed language.  Still, it makes more sense to me lower standing workers would tend to be more cautious, the "no longer prohibited" language likely came from someone feeling secure in their job.

Assuming the briefing, the briefing was most likely done by one of the high ups in the HCO office who had received instruction from the boss of HCO (if the boss didn't do the briefing themselves) if it's like most departments I have seen.  So the question would be where did this HCO admin get the language they gave to others.  Was the "no longer prohibited" told them by their HCO boss who was told by their boss who was I would guess told by the President of the University the language was cleared (I doubt Worthen wrote the new HC text, but would be surprised if he didn't at least approve it) or was it their interpretation of what they were told?  Was it the interpretation of any of the bosses in the line?  Was "no longer prohibited" direction they had received when they (Worthen or one of his assistants perhaps) had been notified of the new handbook and possibly told to make the HC consistent?  

With enough possible sources of the wording of the HCO replies, I don't see it as strong evidence that that wording was initially meant to be official by those who approved the official change in the text.  I assume the official spokespeople for the HCO and BYU would use what had officially been agreed upon.  I believe that is Kevin Utt and Carrie Jenkins.  Any additional material is likely imo to have been added by someone trying to be helpful to those who would be answering the phones at HCO and not because they were intentionally pushing an agenda, but because that is how they truly thought it was meant to mean.  

Quote

In short, the university struggles in ‘serving two masters,’ to a degree.

I see that as a sensible conclusion.

There were, imo, plenty of others who interpreted the change in the text that way, it was a reasonable interpretation imo, if not a cautious one.  It is even likely the HCO briefer discussed their interpretation with HCO colleagues and they agreed that is what it sounded like or at least appeared to agree...I can see someone in the 'line of authority' saying 'looks like BYU bishops get to handle all that now just like they do in the rest of the world' (though that may be my bias showing as that is how I interpreted it) and that being taken one step further to mean that BYU would now have the same standards as other universities and therefore no longer prohibited.  The desire to satisfy "two masters" at once would strongly push imo an approach to align BYU's treatment with other universities.

As a side note, my husband the UVU professor was unaware of the controversy until I mentioned it last night, which was shocking to me, but yet another example of how BYU is rather in its own little unique world.  UVU was 73% Saints in 2017, 60% had already served or were planning to serve missions and many professors are Saints (last president was Matt Holland, current one is a convert), so it has huge cultural influences from the Church.

https://www.uvu.edu/iri/documents/surveys_and_studies/2017_fall_omnibus_report.pdf

I suspect there was quite a bit of discussion about the BYU HC (mostly humorous I am guessing) at UVU, but that it completely bypassed my husband would indicate it was casual and the controversy was not seen as impacting UVU in the slightest (the only recent references I see to BYU in their newspaper are for sports).  I would be very interested to see a study of UVU and BYU LDS students and faculty as to how they saw the differences in the honor codes working out, if UVU LDS students felt there was something desirable in an environment that maintained a church standard sexual moral code.  Given what I have heard, they are all very grateful the no beard rule is nonexistent there (though again could be my bias as I love my husband's beard and it was a big plus he got to keep it when we ended up at UVU rather than BYU like he had originally hoped (his dad was a BYU prof).  We are both very happy he is at UVU rather than BYU.  More relaxed overall from what is reported by his BYU colleagues, which better fits his personality.

UVU Student Code of Conduct:  https://www.uvu.edu/catalog/current/policies-requirements/student-code-of-conduct.html

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2 hours ago, california boy said:

Believe me, trying to reconcile those issues took me a very long time.  So I understand completely how you feel.  

I just want to say thanks for putting forth an effort to understand this very complicated and emotional issue.  It makes me feel that there are some members who do want to understand the questions and eternal issues that gay members have.  It is much easier to be dismissive and not try to understand what a person is actually saying or questioning.

I tried messaging you but you don't have that option apparently so I'm just going to ask here:  

My friend, who is actually a professor for BYU, and I have a small blog (I don't want to link to it here as it seems too much like advertising, so I'm not sure exactly how best to get you that info) and we try to write a couple of articles a month on whatever happens to be relevant in our lives at the time.  This time it's my turn to lead and I want to write about the stuff happening on campus with the changes to the honor code.  Can I quote your response to me earlier on why so many people are struggling on campus right now?  I can attribute the quote to you with your full name, just your first name, or leave your name off of it completely.

If you can message me feel free to answer that way.  Otherwise, I hope the OP will pardon the small threadjack.  

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6 hours ago, Bernard Gui said:

I see a young woman in the center-left background striking and pushing a man, and another person restraining her.

Just an FYI...This is a better view for most things, but from another angle there were two who came up and pulled her back briefly and then looked like they were standing next to her in case it happened again

Edited by Calm
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1 hour ago, Scott Lloyd said:

When a professor tells his class that what in retrospect has turned out to be his own misinterpretation is something he has been praying for for a long time and he implies that those who don’t agree with him are not heeding the prophets, it is clear his behavior was largely driven by wishful thinking. He should have been more restrained and prudent. 

In all fairness, he did clarify with the honor code office first.  It wasn't just his misinterpretation - many faculty, students, and the HCO itself misinterpreted it.  You can't really blame a teacher for believing the honor code office.  If what the HCO told him was actually acurate, then he would have been right about not heeding the prophets.  His comment should be excused based on the fact that he was basing his comment on information from what should have been considered a trusted source. 

1 hour ago, Scott Lloyd said:

I agree with Smac that the underlying principles of the honor code have been in place for a long, long time. To suddenly declare that homosexual romance and courtship is now permissible in the Church and on its college campuses would amount to a jarring sea change. It is not reasonable to believe that major changes to doctrine/teaching/practice in the Church are driven by tinkering with school honor codes and not the other way around. 

I don't disagree, but it wasn't just the students who got caught up in this systematic failure to understand or communicate well.

1 hour ago, Scott Lloyd said:

I would pose this question to any who feel that the students have been ill used. What logic is there in approving of romance and courtship between individuals of the same sex when there is no possibility that marriage between such individuals would ever be allowed? Wouldn’t that be setting them up for considerable frustration and agony later? That would strike me as cruel. 

It should not necessarily be considered tacit approval of behavior simply because it doesn't violate a specific honor code.  That's how I interpreted things originally. 

 

 

 

Edited by pogi
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