Brandon Flowers

[poliphilo]

Brandon Flowers is a Mormon. Oh, right....

I've believed in some pretty silly things in the course of my life but there are some things- some organised bodies of belief- that are just too silly even for me. 

And Mormonism is one of them. Its prophet? Clearly a con-artist.  Its scriptures? Mark Twain called them "chloroform in print".

And isn't there something about never taking off your underwear? Or is that the Jehovah's Witnesses? I get those two mixed up.

You gotta read up around your beliefs. You gotta ask questions.

And if you're in your mid-twenties and you've seen a bit of the world beyond Utah and you still believe in the angel Moroni and the golden tablets and the green spectacles, it can only mean you're a bit of a fool. 

I don't mean unintelligent. I mean intellectually incurious.

Why should I want to engage with an artist who is intellectually incurious?

I feel the same way about all those Hollywood stars who are into Scientology. Travolta, Cruise: I avoid their films.

I quite liked Hot Fuss, but I think I'll be giving the latest album a miss.

Comments

[jackiejj.livejournal.com]

I understand from a friend's research--his cousin was dating a Morman, and he got alarmed and went online to check out the Mormans--that women can't go to heaven unless they marry a Morman elder, and then they are mated for all eternity (God help them, so to speak, if they grow unutterably weary of each other!).

So when these boys in white shirts and black ties show up at my door, what hope, really, do they have for me--I'm not mated, and no Morman is going to provide me an Elder for Eternity in time, I think.

I'm doomed, and they don't care.

But probably they don't know, because they never checked to find out.

Once, being kind, I took one of their bibles, then tossed it into the linen closet near the Christmas candles and forgot about it--until the same two white-shirted men (I think--they all look the same) came back with another "elder" to close the deal.

I made them angry! I said, "Here's your bible back. I am not interested, I only took it to be nice, and I am an Episcopalian, so please don't ever come back."

"Why not?" asked one of them, looking belligerant.

"Sorry," I said, and shut the door in their faces.

They're salesmen for Moroni, and why they should care about doomed me I can't imagine.

They should concentrate on young girls who have a shot at a good Morman wedding in Salt Lake, because they could get into heaven.

Not me. Too late.

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

I was just looking at a website where ex-Mormons were posting about what an unreadable tome the Book of Mormon is.

Joseph Smith was a con-artist who- rather like E. Ron Hubbard in our own day and age- thought it might be rather fun (and profitable) to start a religion.

He set it up so he- and his cronies- could have lots and lots of women.

There's an element of dodginess in all religions. So far as I can see Mormonism is dodgy through and through.

And I hate the way they try to sell it on the doorstep- as if it were soap powder.

[halfmoon-mollie.livejournal.com]

I deleted mine, so you can stop being disturbed about it.

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

I'm sort of sorry everyone deleted. There was the beginnings of an interesting controversy there.

My problem with Mormonism is that it's founded on a transparent act of deception. Other religions may be as silly, but- largely because they're pickled in time and art- the silliness is less apparent. Anyone who cares to do a little basic research can discover just what sort of a joker Joseph Smith was.

Religions claim to be true. If they're not true they have no business existing. Most religions have some admixture of truth in them. The only truth I can see in Mormonism is the moral teaching that Smith lifted (en bloc) from the New Testament.

[halfmoon-mollie.livejournal.com]

my buttons are easily pushed when it comes to religion, even though I don't have one. I apologize for anyone whose feelings I might have hurt.

I realize it would be best for me to stay out of such things, because I can't argue without getting angry.

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

There's no harm in getting angry.

A lot of my entries are fueled by anger.

I'm sorry I upset you. I'm sure there are lots of fine people who are practising Mormons. But I stand by what I said; I think it's a lousy religion.

[dadi.livejournal.com]

Ummh well considering how many zillions of people believe in shit like the immaculate conception, the virgin birth, the resurrection of the body and the infallibility of a human being (the pope).. I can't really wonder about that other stuff...
There is just no limit to the shit humans are able to believe in..

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

The only difference between the Catholic nonsense and the Mormon nonsense is that the Catholic nonsense has inspired some rather good art and the Mormon nonsense hasn't.

[zephyrcrow.livejournal.com]

Yup! Better iconography in general. If Brandon Flowers had any real fashion sense, he'd be a Catholic.

Personally, I'm not into their music because I talked to the guy on the phone and he was a pompous fool.

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

Ha, I'm not surprised! :)

[lblanchard.livejournal.com]

The way it was explained to me once, by someone who married a Mormon apostate, was that Mormons have their choice of marriages -- "till death do you part" or "forever." The ones who opt for "forever" wear a certain kind of special underwear.

I imagine they get to change it, because I was then told a hilarious story about a "forever" guy who forgot to pack more of his special underwear when going to a conference and couldn't just run to the K-Mart and get some more. If they could never change their underwear, he'd have had no problem.

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

Do we know what the special underwear is made of or what it looks like?

[lblanchard.livejournal.com]

I can't help you there, although I gather it was pretty modest.

[sina-says.livejournal.com]

the holy undies (aka, "the garments") are simple off white cotton things to be worn all the time. the top looks something like a basic undershirt for the men and a little cap sleeved undershirt for the ladies. both sexes have bottoms a lot like boxer shorts. i have ex-mormon friends.

mormons creep me out. i'm also fascinated by the bizzareness of it.

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

But they're allowed to take them off to wash them, right?

The Mormons I've come across all have that airbrushed, inhuman quality that people take on when they give up their right/duty to think for themselves.

[seaslug-of-doom.livejournal.com]

On one of my cross country moves I dropped into Mormon Central, in Salt Lake City. As I strolled along the quiet walkways I was reminded of nothing so much as one of the Disney parks. The place had that cartoony, happy land sort of feel; and like DisneyWorld, in Orlando, the compound probably had numerous tunnels below, full of computers, and banks of camera monitors, and racks of costumes. Interestingly, recruiting staff at the counters and stationed on corners, were almost invariably pretty young women. I wanted to get one of their bibles, but that required a home visit.

Re Scietologists: A gang of them were at the Super Wal*Mart the other night. They had set up card tables and metal folding chairs under a tarp, and they had their little blue plastic stress machines (very retro with black and white analog gauges and large twisty knobs) ready to go. They were generating quite the business amongst the Wal*Martians.

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

My only contact with Mormons has been with their cold-calling missionaries. We have a Mormon church a couple of blocks away, so we see quite a lot of them.

I feel sorry for them. They always look so innocent and clean and ill-adapted to life in the real world.

[solar-diablo.livejournal.com]

I've never read the Book of Mormon, but felt I had a fairly good understanding of their doctrine and theology via secondhand sources, until while reading a book for a seminar (The Americanization of Religious Minorities by Eric Mazur) came an aside the author makes that the Book of Mormon contains a prophecy about the advent of the Constitution of the United States. Well and good, except:

The US Constitution was adopted in 1787.
The Book of Mormon was published in 1830 by a man born in 1805.

Now the cynic looks at that info and immediately the red flags go up. Retroactive prophecy as a basis for belief? My colleague pointed out that if you are a true believer, however, you don't get hung up on the dates, but rather are amazed and comforted that your holy book is reaffirmed by the events in history (seeing as they believe the Golden Plates were obviously around much longer than the Constitution, it's just that Smith didn't get ahold of them until the 19th century). But he smiled wryly and shook his head in full understanding of my consternation over how Mormons can so blithely disregard this and similar difficulties with their doctrines/scriptures.

[solar-diablo.livejournal.com]

Sorry, this was a rather slapdash response. I should point out my colleague in the department is an ex-Mormon with an extensive background in their apologetics, so I find him a credible source to turn to when I have questions about the faith. Moreover, his family (including his wife) are still devout Mormons so he is sympathetic to it and not bitter. He simply could no longer reconcile his Mormon faith with his education.

[beentothemoon.livejournal.com]

I grew up relatively near the Mormon temple outside Washington D.C. It was a great monstrous building, visible from the beltway and it resembled nothing so much as the Emerald City of Oz. There was a bridge over that portion of the beltway closest to the temple and some jokers would always write "Surrender Dorothy" on it, big enough to read from the street.

As a young girl I was terrified of witches, mostly because of The Wizard of Oz. Someone --probably my father-- had told me that I was a witch myself (why else would I be named Rhiannon?) and that I was going to have to fight other witches.

He told me the temple wasn't a church, but actually the Emerald City whose true color we couldn't see it because we didn't wear green glasses, and that the angel Moroni perched atop a spire wasn't really a statue of some angel, but the Wicked Witch of the West who had been turned to gold (not melted like the movie says). What looked like a trumpet was in truth her broomstick, which held a vial of antidote to turn her back to life. A drop would drip into her throat once a night and someday --soon-- she would come back to life and come after me.

I spent years having night terrors because of that.

Thanks dad.

(sorry this story wasn't apropos of anything, I just like to share it when talk of Mormons comes up)

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

Aren't parents wonderful?

I used to tell my kids stories about how the fields near our house- which are full of concrete gas vents- was a vampire graveyard. The two older ones were in on the joke, but the youngest one believed me.

Baaad Dad.

The thing about parenthood is we don't get any practice at it. I wince now at some of things I did or failed to do.

The killers

[alice-g.livejournal.com]

That would be an error of judgement, the new album is a bleeding triumph.

Mormonism, if nothing else, was the basis of a particularly funny South Park episode.

Maybe boycott something else, the album is awesome and you'd be missing a treat. Alice xxxxxxxxxx

Re: The killers

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

I did like the first one quite a lot...

By the way- I think Michael Newton is awesome. Everyone should read these books. I'm halfway through the third- which is called Life Between Lives. It's more of a technical guide for hypnotherapists doing spiritual regression, but it still contains interesting material.