DezNat in the News Again

[ttribe]

28 minutes ago, Scott Lloyd said:

I’m no fan of or apologist for DezNat, but it occurs to me that if “progressive” individuals and parties would cease to push the baseless narrative that it’s only a matter of time before the Church of Jesus Christ begins to approve of same sex marriages and solemnize them in the temple, DezNat would lose much of its raison d’etre. 

Do you also blame rape victims based on what they were wearing at the time?

[BRMC]

DezNat is a response to progressives.  Two extremes that opposing viewpoints love to point at and say "see"

[The Nehor]

21 minutes ago, BRMC said:

DezNat is a response to progressives.  Two extremes that opposing viewpoints love to point at and say "see"

One extreme is being normalized.

[BRMC]

25 minutes ago, The Nehor said:

One extreme is being normalized.

Both sides think the other extreme is being normalized.

[Calm]

2 hours ago, Chum said:

Can this be reasonably read as Don't Feed The Troll?

No. I don’t think most posters here are trolls. I like Smac’s style myself. It is more understandable for me, I can see both accurate dissection and mistakes easier.  But I understand that others don’t. 
 

But it is obvious that some posters do not like others’ style.  I think it would be nice to the rest of us not to have to wallow through the expressions of dislike too often.

Edited December 11, 2021 by Calm

[The Nehor]

35 minutes ago, BRMC said:

Both sides think the other extreme is being normalized.

They aren’t equally right.

[BRMC]

10 minutes ago, The Nehor said:

They aren’t equally right.

Both sides think that.

[JLHPROF]

1 hour ago, BRMC said:

DezNat is a response to progressives.  Two extremes that opposing viewpoints love to point at and say "see"

And as usual the truth is in the moderate middle.  Just like politics.

[JLHPROF]

9 hours ago, bluebell said:

I wish the church leaders would be a little stronger in denouncing Deznat.

Or maybe one could splinter off and lead them.  It's been a while since we had a good splinter movement.

Have a progressive Apostle break of with the progressive members like Ordain Women etc or an orthodox Apostle lead the Trump/Deznat/Antivax crowd.

Any takers?  Elder Uchtdorf?  Elder Bednar?

[LoudmouthMormon]

Perspective is a good thing.   How many actual Deznat folks to we think there are?  I'm guessing not many.  The internet's ability to embiggen tiny stupid things is at play here.   What's the average age of an espouser of Deznat?  I'm guessing the majority are quite young - early '20's or younger.  A few headlong crashes into real life tend to knock the dumb out of people.

Various types of nationalism (white, black, Christian, atheist, LDS) haven't exactly been on the rise anywhere in the US in the last half a century or longer, have they?

I mean, it's good to be informed, but is there a reason to treat this stuff with any more seriousness than we treat the flat-earther movement?

[JLHPROF]

28 minutes ago, LoudmouthMormon said:

  What's the average age of an espouser of Deznat?  I'm guessing the majority are quite young - early '20's or younger.  A few headlong crashes into real life tend to knock the dumb out of people.

Interesting.  I'd have guessed the opposite.  The young aren't usually orthodox in approach or traditionalist in belief.

[The Nehor]

34 minutes ago, LoudmouthMormon said:

Perspective is a good thing.   How many actual Deznat folks to we think there are?  I'm guessing not many.  The internet's ability to embiggen tiny stupid things is at play here.   What's the average age of an espouser of Deznat?  I'm guessing the majority are quite young - early '20's or younger.  A few headlong crashes into real life tend to knock the dumb out of people.

Some real ones and possibly a bunch of Russian and Chinese bots echoing them. Real life is not knocking the dumb out. Not yet anyways.

36 minutes ago, LoudmouthMormon said:

Various types of nationalism (white, black, Christian, atheist, LDS) haven't exactly been on the rise anywhere in the US in the last half a century or longer, have they?

They have.

36 minutes ago, LoudmouthMormon said:

I mean, it's good to be informed, but is there a reason to treat this stuff with any more seriousness than we treat the flat-earther movement?

Flat-earther people don’t have a natural enemy or target. Same with JFK and Illuminati conspiracy wonks. The whole conspiracy movement has been co-opted from harmless lunacy into a weapon to target people and organizations.

[The Nehor]

2 hours ago, BRMC said:

Both sides think that.

Well, I guess you can flip a coin and decide who is right.

Or you can study the whole thing out and figure it out.

Whichever works best for you.

[california boy]

5 hours ago, Calm said:

I, can’t speak for others, would appreciate if you and anyone else who has said the same thing (no longer will respond) about him or someone else stuck with this resolve as the number of threads that are getting derailed into a discussion about Smac’s style and others as well is already too many imo. You have made your personal opinion clear, ignoring any of his or anyone else’s comments will show well enough you (or anyone else) do not value the approach.
 

 Just think, if you don’t respond in his topics he has no reason to dissect your posts, accurately or out of context.  

I have made it VERY CLEAR to Smac on multiple occasions for him to not Fisk my posts.  That I want the context of what I have to say to remain for the very reasons that I have stated.  And his responses on this very thread show exactly why he distorts my comments.  I mean really?  Accusing me of aligning with Deznation? An anti LGBT group.  

I don't want to derail this thread either.  But I also don't want my responses to be fisked, by taking them out of context and distorting them.  As long as he keeps fisking my posts, I will continue to object and not respond.  I can't stop him from doing it.  But I can stop responding to his fisking.  And I can call him out when he distorts what I say.  

There.  I have said my piece.  I am ignoring his followup post.  Let's move on.

[Chum]

1 hour ago, LoudmouthMormon said:

Various types of nationalism (white, black, Christian, atheist, LDS) haven't exactly been on the rise anywhere in the US in the last half a century or longer, have they?

Threats groups wax and wane constantly. In 1970, the US averaged 400 domestic terror attacks a year. Leftist groups (Weather Underground) dominated the early part of the decade, Marxist-Lennist (FALN) groups the latter.

25 years ago, the FBI was most concerned with White Supremacists. 15 years ago, it was foreign and domestic Islamists. For the last few years, the FBI has been warning about White Supremacists, far more than any other ideological group.

[Chum]

1 hour ago, The Nehor said:

The whole conspiracy movement has been co-opted from harmless lunacy into a weapon to target people and organizations.

People who work in our hospitals, schools and local election offices would emphatically agree with this. The constant stream of death threats against them and their families is unprecedented in my lifetime.

[CA Steve]

11 hours ago, Calm said:

 I think it would be nice to the rest of us not to have to wallow through the expressions of dislike too often.

It would be nice to not have to wallow though text walls of fisking too.

[smac97]

11 hours ago, california boy said:

I have made it VERY CLEAR to Smac on multiple occasions for him to not Fisk my posts.  

I have considered, and rejected, your request to alter my posting style to suit your preferences.  I assume you would do the same.

11 hours ago, california boy said:

That I want the context of what I have to say to remain for the very reasons that I have stated.  

Actually, I think my style of posting provides plenty of context.  Certainly more than your hostile, tendentious, inaccurate caricatures and paraphrases. 

See, by quoting you verbatim and then responding just below, and by breaking up your comments rather than responding to entire posts or paragraphs, and by providing links to the content I am adddressing, I am letting the reader see what I am doing.  

Alternatively, I could do, well, what others do, which is to make a vague reference to a person's statement, to neither quote nor link to it, and either paraphrase it in a very loose and inaccurate way, and/or substantially mischaracterize it, and/or disregard the statement and instead focus on a subjective reaction to it (as if that reaction somehow imputes evil motives onto the person who made the statement).  A case in point: Your characterizations of Elder Holland's talk as  "dog whistle instructions ... {calling for} anti LGBT actions" and "aggressively {going} against those that are LGBT" and "{I} personally feel it was a very deliberate attack on the LGBT community."

11 hours ago, california boy said:

And his responses on this very thread show exactly why he distorts my comments.  I mean really?  Accusing me of aligning with Deznation? An anti LGBT group.  

DezNat folks are decontextualizing and distorting Elder Holland's remarks.  They are distorting Elder Holland's remarks so as to justify their own personal biases and antipathies.  I think their behavior is both dissembling and foolish.  I've critiqued this and similar misconduct many times now.

In retrospect I should not have said that you have "aligned" yourself with them.  So I retract that and apologize.   You are simply emulating their tactic of distorting and misrepresenting Elder Holland's remarks.  Is that better?

11 hours ago, california boy said:

I don't want to derail this thread either.  But I also don't want my responses to be fisked, by taking them out of context and distorting them.  

Again, I am quoting you verbatim and in piecemeal and then responding.

Your comments about Elder Holland's remarks are devoid of quotes, and are instead reliant on distortion, decontextualization, subjective emotionalisms (yours), and worse.

11 hours ago, california boy said:

As long as he keeps fisking my posts, I will continue to object and not respond.  

As long as you keep misrepresenting and distorting what the Latter-day Saints are saying and doing, I will continue to respond and defend the Latter-day Saints.

11 hours ago, california boy said:

I can't stop him from doing it.  

I know.  And I can see that it's frustrating.  I am very grateful that people like you are constrained from having power to censor people like me.  Unless, of course, people like you have their way regarding the weaponization of "hate speech" laws, as we discussed last month:

Quote

There really are people out there who are in favor of the government using vaguely-worded hate speech laws to punish religious people for the content of their speech.  I think such folks would be throwing conniption fits if their speech were so targeted.

For myself, I am very much in favor of robust protection of speech, including speech I personally dislike or with which I disagree.  Consider the words of Justice Louis Brandeis in Whitney v. California, 274 U.S. 357 (1927):

Quote

If there be time to expose through discussion the falsehood and fallacies, to avert the evil by the process of education, the remedy to be applied is more speech, not enforced silence.

For some, though, "enforced silence" of religious people by the government is preferable.  These bullying antics are one of the reasons I have had such a hard time giving serious consideration to these folks.  If their position were really meritorious, then they could participate in the Marketplace of Ideas and, through explanation and evidence and analysis, persuade people to their point of view.  Instead, they resort to bullying and shaming tactics.  And even worse, some even are keen on using (exploiting, really) the power of government to punish speech they dislike (and/or deflect and distract when this happens).

The Constitution is a grand and beautiful document, though I am quite concerned about encroachments on Free Speech and Religious Liberty.  

You and I haven't been getting along now for many years.  I've sort of resigned myself to that.  But as long as people like you attack and/or misrepresent/mischaracterize the words/conduct of the Latter-day Saints, I will respond and defend the Latter-day Saints.

11 hours ago, california boy said:

But I can stop responding to his fisking.  

Certainly.  You can not speak, or speak.  Whatever you want.  

11 hours ago, california boy said:

And I can call him out when he distorts what I say.  

And I can call you out when you distort what Elder Holland said.

See how that works?  Consider the words of Justice Louis Brandeis in Whitney v. California, 274 U.S. 357 (1927):

Quote

"If there be time to expose through discussion the falsehood and fallacies, to avert the evil by the process of education, the remedy to be applied is more speech, not enforced silence."

I am grateful to live in a time in which you and I have the right to say what we like.  

11 hours ago, california boy said:

There.  I have said my piece.  I am ignoring his followup post.  Let's move on.

I'm fine with moving beyond my posting style and getting back to the topic of DezNat.

I think these people are behaving stupidly and foolishly when they distort and mischaracterize statements from Elder Holland or other leaders of the Church so as to falsely use them to justify their personal biases and antipathies.  A fair and reasonable reading of Elder Holland's talk simply does not yield the idiotic notion that he was calling for violence in any way, shape or form.  He was, instead, calling on BYU faculty to defend, by purely scholarly means and in a purely metaphorical sense, the Church.  For them to claim or imply otherwise is to resort to rank dishonesty and bearing false witness.

Thanks,

-Smac

Edited December 11, 2021 by smac97

[Scott Lloyd]

13 hours ago, JLHPROF said:

And as usual the truth is in the moderate middle.  Just like politics.

Not necessarily. 

[california boy]

Unfortunately some do take Elder Holland's remark as a dogwhistle to take up arms agains the LGBT community.  I never said it was the purpose of such language.  I only said that some respond to that kind of language.  A clarification from Elder Holland may have diffused some of that thinking.  He chose not to clarify his remarks. As a result some in DezNat are using those remarks to further radicalize their anti-LGBT rhetoric.  Regardless of Elder Hollsan's intentions, many in the LGBT community are left wounded and hurt by his remarks.  While others like the former mayor of Ogden feel emboldened and supported by Church leaders.  His remarks also creat an us vs them mentality.  Something that others build upon and use as an excuse to justify their actions.  For those like DezNat, it makes them feel they are fighting a holy war that needs to have bold actions.  It can be used to recruit more individuals by telling them it is the work the Church leaders "want them to do" but can't.  This is how radical groups function.

It seemed like a simple thing for Elder Holland to do.  I guess not to Elder Holland for some reason. 

Edited December 11, 2021 by california boy

[bluebell]

18 hours ago, Calm said:

I, can’t speak for others, would appreciate if you and anyone else who has said the same thing (no longer will respond) about him or someone else stuck with this resolve as the number of threads that are getting derailed into a discussion about Smac’s style and others as well is already too many imo. You have made your personal opinion clear, ignoring any of his or anyone else’s comments will show well enough you (or anyone else) do not value the approach.
 

 Just think, if you don’t respond in his topics he has no reason to dissect your posts, accurately or out of context.  

Yes please!  If you find that you can't discuss stuff with a poster without it going off the rails or devolving, and you can't not respond when they post something you disagree with, then put them on ignore.  

[Tacenda]

34 minutes ago, california boy said:

Unfortunately some do take Elder Holland's remark as a dogwhistle to take up arms agains the LGBT community.  I never said it was the purpose of such language.  I only said that some respond to that kind of language.  A clarification from Elder Holland may have diffused some of that thinking.  He chose not to clarify his remarks. As a result some in DezNat are using those remarks to further radicalize their anti-LGBT rhetoric.

It seemed like a simple thing for Elder Holland to do.  I guess not to Elder Holland for some reason.

Especially if they've read, or heard Elder Packer's statement, that I'm sure they've heard about. http://www.withoutend.org/elder-packer-danger-homosexuality-20-years/

“The dangers I speak of come from the gay-lesbian movement, the feminist movement (both of which are relatively new), and the ever-present challenge from the so-called scholars or intellectuals.”

[bluebell]

3 hours ago, CA Steve said:

It would be nice to not have to wallow through text walls of fisking too.

That's why the ignore feature is so nice.  

[BRMC]

3 hours ago, smac97 said:

 

DezNat folks are decontextualizing and distorting Elder Holland's remarks.  They are distorting Elder Holland's remarks so as to justify their own personal biases and antipathies.  I think their behavior is both dissembling and foolish.  I've critiqued this and similar misconduct many times now.

 

-Smac

I don't think they are at all.  I think they are being accused of it, but I don't think they are actually doing it.  Also, it's difficult to address "DezNat".  DezNat is a hashtag.  You can't control who uses it.   Like any other idea that isn't a formal group, anyone can attach their name to it.

Personally, I prefer your posting style.  I don't know what "fisking" is, though.

[BRMC]

3 hours ago, Scott Lloyd said:

Not necessarily. 

I agree.  I don't think the truth is always, or even usually, in the middle.  I think there is truth on both sides, but tribalism doesn't allow people to recognize it.   They are too bent on defending their tribe.