Ward Preacher Podcast Episode 5 - Making the path of the Lord Straight

In Episode 5 of the Ward Preacher Podcast, we emphasize the teaching of John the Baptist as well as talk about the baptism of Christ and some of his early miracles.  This corresponds to the Come Follow Me curriculum for Matthew 3, Mark 1, and Luke 3.

Soundcloud:
https://soundcloud.com/user-961318159/ward-preacher-ep-005-making-the-path-of-the-lord-straight

Youtube:

Ward Preacher Podcast Episode 4: The Word of God

This week's podcast focuses on the Come Follow Me curriculum for John 1

Soundcloud:
https://soundcloud.com/user-961318159/ward-preacher-ep-004-the-word-of-god

Youtube:

Ward Preacher Podcast Episode 3: Curiosities surrounding the Wise Men

This week's podcast covers the Come Follow Me material for the upcoming week, Matthew 2 and Luke 2.

Soundcloud:
https://soundcloud.com/user-961318159/ward-preacher-episode-3-curiosities-surrounding-the-wise-men

Youtube:

Ward Preacher Podcast Episode 2: God chooses how he talks to people

Episode 2 of the Ward Preacher podcast

Soundcloud:
https://soundcloud.com/user-961318159/ward-preacher-ep-002-god-reveals-things-the-way-he-wants

Youtube:

Ward Preacher Podcast - Episode 1, Did Christ intentionally set up his kingdom to fail?

Episode 1 of my podcast:

Soundcloud:
https://soundcloud.com/user-961318159/ward-preacher-ep-01

Youtube:

What is this nonsense about a "Mormon Male Gaze" circulating?

So I was given a link to an article a few days ago called "The Harms of Projecting the Mormon Male Gaze."

This is not the first time I have seen well-meaning but misguided attempts to attack modesty standards, but it is probably the most thorough.  It is also nearly entirely wrong.

The article begins with the writer rehearsing an account in which she complained to a male who had given a talk in church about a joke she had not appreciated, "the more doors that get slammed in your face as a missionary, the prettier your wife will be."

She describes approaching the speaker and saying the following:

"I’ve heard this joke a lot, and I’ve also heard how it affects the young women and girls, including me. It can make us feel like a young man expects to be rewarded with a pretty wife after serving a mission, or that we’re a trophy he earns for enduring hardship.  It’s also hurtful because it makes us feel like we’re only valued for our looks, not for our kindness, or our personality, or our spirituality.  And for the women who consider their looks to be a little plain, it can make us feel like we’re not deserving of a man who worked hard on his mission."

It's a fair point to say that young men should not expect the result of missionary service (or any other religious devotion) to be a wife, attractive or otherwise.  The best motivation for service should be to help the children of God, and ultimately to return to his kingdom.

It's not a fair point to say that she should feel like she's a trophy who is only valued for her looks.  It seems presumptuous to assume that missionaries everywhere are all hoping to marry her personally, or if she is not taking this to mean that missionaries are thinking of her personally, she has no business being hurt by the idea that missionaries hope to have an attractive spouse.

It's also unfair for girls who think they look plain to feel like they don't deserve a man who worked hard on his mission because hard working missionaries hope to be married to an attractive woman.  This is part of the reason that the "prettier wife" saying exists... because so many men can relate to the desire to have an attractive spouse.

The author then recommends that such jokes be avoided, particularly in audiences that contain women and girls.  Not having heard the context of the comment in this case, I cannot defend it as being humorous or appropriate, but I can imagine a circumstance in which a man, hoping to praise his wife, might use this idea in an acceptable manner.

For the author, the concern seems less about the joke, and more about a perceived systemic problem with males in the church.  She describes it by saying:

"The Mormon Male Gaze (from ‘male gaze’) is rooted in the flawed idea that a young woman’s body is automatically, inherently sexually alluring to the priesthood holding men all around her. She is alternately seen as a temptation to be eschewed or a reward to be given.  Both interpretations objectify the young woman for her body. When the Mormon Male Gaze befalls a girl, the young woman herself bears the burden of being appropriately alluring, so as to be a reward to “worthy” young men, while not being overly alluring to “tempt” other men. According to the many accounts I gathered, the projection of this Mormon Male Gaze is usually done by adult women to younger girls, or by women to each other.  The projection of the gaze exists even when the threat of actual gaze does not."

First of all, a woman's body is inherently sexually alluring to all males who are at least 12 years old.  This should not be surprising.  Tremendous amounts of advertising uses scantily clad women to part men from their money, and Youtube and Twitch streamers who show cleavage and/or tight apparel have far more views than those that do not.

This is not a new phenomenon.  The reason prostitution is called the world's oldest profession is because it is true of men all over the world and throughout history.  It's biologically true.  The daughter of Jared seemed keenly aware of the effect of the female body on a man when she proposed a plan to dance before Akish:

"And now, therefore, let my father send for Akish, the son of Kimnor; and behold, I am fair, and I will dance before him, and I will please him, that he will desire me to wife; wherefore if he shall desire of thee that ye shall give unto him me to wife, then shall ye say: I will give her if ye will bring unto me the head of my father, the king.  And now Omer was a friend to Akish; wherefore, when Jared had sent for Akish, the daughter of Jared danced before him that she pleased him, insomuch that he desired her to wife. And it came to pass that he said unto Jared: Give her unto me to wife. And Jared said unto him: I will give her unto you, if ye will bring unto me the head of my father, the king." (Ether 8:10-12)

The result of this arrangement was a conspiracy formed by Akish to kill his friend, Omer, the king.

How could the daughter of Jared be so confident that this man would commit murder because he saw her body and liked it?  There may be more to the story, but it is at least in part to the fact that all men are inherently drawn to a woman's body.

Though King David was certainly at fault for the incident with Bathsheba, it is worth noting that the impulses that persuaded him to discard every decent principle he had come to embrace started when he saw a woman's body from his rooftop.

Though it is difficult to precisely describe the strength of this power, a man killing is friend and a good king cheating, lying, and ultimately murdering are things that have happened under its influence.

It is completely fair to say that women are not the "gatekeepers" or that women bear sole responsibility to keep men from behaving badly, as the author of this article points out later... but if a joke about attractive spouses is supposed to be avoided out of consideration for the feelings it invokes in others, certainly some care should be taken with appearance out of consideration for the powerful feelings it invokes in others.

Second, the point about the objectification of women is flawed.  Since men naturally seek an attractive woman,  marriage to a beautiful woman should feel like a reward; the blend of love, happiness, and attraction certainly felt that way to me.  Additionally, a bride should feel like a trophy when she is married.  This does not mean she should lose her humanity, or any of the other qualities she has... it means that she should feel physically beautiful.  That's at least one point of wearing a wedding dress... to stand out as an object of admiration and desire.

It is a problematic marriage in which the wife is no longer the object of her husband's admiration.  Of course she should be valued as an individual with talents and qualities besides physical appeal... but expressing physical love in the bonds of marriage does not have to take anything away from a wife's other attributes and values.  It adds to the relationship when the husband continues to hold his wife as an object of beauty and admiration, in addition to honoring all her other roles.

The author of the article proceeds to group several items together under the "men shouldn't view attractive wives as rewards" heading.  Some of these ideas can be addressed by understanding that men actually should prize their wives and feel like their relationship with them is a reward... but a couple of them are actually valid points:

"- Leaders who require girls to accept the invitation of boys to dance at church dances.

- I bought you dinner and was a perfect gentleman all night; don’t I deserve a kiss?”

 I personally think that dancing is a terrible way to interact, and I agree that forcing acceptance is a bad idea.  This reinforces the behavior in the second example... the idea that physical affection should be handled by making deals.  A kiss should be an expression of actual love, not a service to be purchased or exchanged for other goods or services.  Even within the bonds of marriage where there should be an expectation of love, the value of physical intimacy is diluted when it is demanded, withheld, or treated like currency.

Another subject the author of this article tackles is something they label "the lustful priesthood guardian fallacy."  The idea is that young women leaders ask women to cover themselves so they do not tempt priesthood leaders, and the main objection is that if they are meant to protect these girls, the ease with which they are tempted makes them bad protectors.

I am going to hazard a guess and suggest that the author of the article would probably not approve of a nudist girls camp, even if there were no men there.  Would it be OK for a person to come in to a church meeting completely naked?  Most people, even who object to the standards of modesty imposed by church leaders, would probably still be uncomfortable being naked.  While this may seem like a straw man argument (after all, she is not arguing for exhibitionism), it serves to show that there is a line in which a person is not covered well enough.  Acknowledging that there is a line means that the real debate is not "modest dress standards are bad" but "what constitutes inappropriate dress," which is a very different argument.

Her argument about gender reversals also falls flat for two reasons.  It is equally inappropriate for men to expose themselves, whether or not women are the people forced to look at their junk.  Also, men and women are... (surprise)... different.  While there exist some women who are deeply affected by visual stimulus, men, on average, are affected far more.  Dennis Prager did a great video on this idea.  Thinking that men and women can be interchangeable is perhaps the biggest fallacy in this section.

The last section the author covers is titled "The Modest is Hottest/SexyModest fallacy."

Here she is recycling the argument used about women should not tempt men while simultaneously being attractive to men, as though it is only possible to do one.

My wife was always self-conscious about showing too much skin, and even before we were together, she went to extra lengths to be modest including wearing shorts over swimsuits, wearing shirts underneath dresses with questionable necklines, and mostly wearing t-shirts and pants.  In other words, she strictly followed modesty council.

In spite of her following the guidance of church leaders, she was (and still is) very attractive.  She is not the only one who has figured out the trick to this supposedly no-win scenario.

Even if a person does buy in to this either/or idea, then would it not also follow that a girl can't tell a boy that he should value her more as a person than a sex object while simultaneously showing her chest off?  And isn't that more what church leaders are trying to teach young women?  If a girl wants to be respected for her intelligence, her wit, her compassion, or any other non-sexual attribute, then maybe she should work to make those attributes more noticeable than her body?

At the end of the article, the author went into a tin-foil hat level conspiracy (probably hyperbole, but I could not tell for certain) about how the church's history with polygamy and pioneer DNA lead jealous women to lash out at potential rivals for their husbands' affection.  Of course, that's utter nonsense.  A far more reasonable explanation is that people have struggled to keep the standards of their faith for thousands of years... and that a bit of counsel from those who are more experienced is likely good (by the way, that's a huge reason we have the scriptures).

The issue that this article represents is more serious than the problem it seeks to investigate... which is that there are individuals in the church who do not understand the basic differences between men and women, or how to handle these differences, but that are certain that leaders in the church are wrong.  That this article seems to resonate with so many people... that is the issue.

Instead of being angry about a "Mormon Male Gaze," it would be helpful for people to learn how men and women work... and until they have learned themselves, to trust that the guidance of church leaders is based on real experience that, if followed, will probably help rather than hurt.

How I discovered that socialism might not be evil

One of the lines in Star Wars: Return of the Jedi that bothered me was the excuse that Obi-Wan gave to Luke after the relationship between Luke and Darth Vader was revealed:

"Luke, you're going to find that many of the truths we cling to depend greatly on our own point of view."

The idea that something is true or untrue depends on our perspective has been reprehensible to me.  As a Christian conservative, I love the idea of universal general truths, and I abhor concepts such as moral relativism.  The constants of gravity does not change based on current societal trends.  The immorality of murder cannot be removed by popular vote.  Jumping into a volcano is a bad idea.  Water is composed of hydrogen and oxygen.  The United States declared independence from England in 1776.  USC beat Texas in a double-overtime football game at the Coliseum 27-24 in 2017.

These facts do not require a particular perspective, or that the observer have certain feelings.  They are objectively true.

In my youth, as I studied religion, politics, history, and science, I became more convinced of the importance of these universal truths.  One of the natural applications of this was the evil of socialism.

The idea that the government should be able to take property, without any due process, from some citizens, and give it to other citizens, is legalized theft.  I have always been opposed to the concept that any person is entitled to the property of others.  The old Marx saying from each according to his ability, to each according to his need may seem appealing in terms of helping the poor, but attributing an entitlement to unearned goods and services without providing incentives to work, produce, and earn is hazardous at best, and at worst, a major contributor to the murder, imprisonment, and tyranny seen in communist nations in the 20th century.

In the past couple years, socialism has seen a resurgence in American politics, only this time, accompanied by the ultimately meaningless adjective "democratic."  Democratic socialism is marketed with the same promises that leftist politicians have made for decades including health care and education, and with the indication that these things can be made affordable by taxing "the rich" (a group that is rarely defined specifically, and when defined, could not produce enough revenue to purchase all the promised services, even if taxed at a rate of 100%).

In the past couple years, I have struggled to understand how so many young people could get so excited about such a bad, old idea.

Of course, I saw the simplistic memes that described everything government did as "socialism."  Memes with clever captions told me that I drove on socialized roads or that I was protected by socialized fire departments and police departments, but universal health care and universal education was something else entirely.  Of course, conservative meme producers were quick to point out how disingenuous promises of "free stuff" are.  They could point to times before any income tax and demonstrate that society managed to function relatively well without socialized services.  The libertarian sentiment"taxation is theft" has become a memorable slogan, even though it is also simplistic.

People on the left have frequently pointed to corrupt corporate interests (some of which, to their credit, were legitimately bad).  Some of their pundits have suggested that capitalism itself was the culprit... that in all cases, it promoted greed... an unfair generalization.

People on the right hosted discussions where they described socialism as evil... not just an unsustainable idea, but actually evil, and in every case.  

While in the past, the universal absolute statement would have immediately appealed to me, now something seems off about the assessment.  Thinking about the concept led me to realize that the issue was more complicated than I had initially thought.  Perhaps my perspective was giving me a simplistic view of these socialist ideas, and that I could benefit from the counsel of Obi-Wan.

This sort of introspection is rarely easy.  No one likes being wrong, and questioning the philosophies that have shaped perspective could lead to uncomfortable places.  Societies have taxed their citizens by force, and have used the generated revenue to do various things (including those that I believe are necessary).  How could it be acceptable to compel participation for public good in some cases and not others?  Was it possible that I had already unconsciously given my approval for socialism?  How could this compulsion be balanced with the idea that humans have basic freedoms?

In the end, Obi-Wan was right.  The anti-socialist philosophy to which I had clung for most of my life depended greatly on my own point of view.

There is a different point of view... a context... in which socialism works.  I do not mean just some universal services that require common funding such as the military, but an actual case in which people who produce little or nothing should be entitled to the income of others who produce and earn based on their individual production.

This context is called family.  Most particularly, a family with children.

A parent, particularly a father, is obligated to work to produce not only for themselves, but for children who produce little or nothing.  A newborn baby, for example, will incur numerous expenses, and in return will produce large quantities of dirty diapers and sleep deprivation.  Toddlers are experts at turning clean clothing into dirty laundry, clean dishes into dirty dishes, and small disappointments into crises worthy of glass-shattering screeching, but of course, none of these skills are particularly marketable.  Older children may be able to help more, but certainly not enough to offset the costs of larger meals and bigger clothing sizes for their growing bodies.  Regardless of the inability of children to provide in meaningful ways, a parent who does not impart of their substance to provide food, clothing, and other tangible necessities (in addition to the emotional necessities) is criminally negligent, and in the worst case, should be compelled to provide these things.

While children do not have the capacity to fully support the financial costs of the family, they do have an obligation to help assist in basic tasks of which they are capable.  It is appropriate for parents to require their children to do chores, to tidy up after themselves, and to help one another, all without any additional compensation.  In the context of a household, the idea from each according to his ability, to each according to his need is actually a good concept.  Everyone pitches in, developing selfless motivations, to assist one another to be successful.

The goal of this implementation of socialism is to help children to become capable of production, so that when they are old enough to be free and independent, they will have received the necessary preparation.

That means that, in order for socialism to function in this context, the following things are necessary:

• The non-producers consent to the producers presiding over them
• The producers train the non-producers to become productive (as apprentices)
• The producers have close ties to the non-producers for whom they are obligated to provide
• The non-producers have natural incentives to become producers

This also means that in larger contexts, such as the context of the United States federal government, this model cannot work:

• There is too much grey area regarding who is or is not producing and who should preside
• Apprenticeship is not practical without cooperation to that end between the non-producer and the producer
• There are no natural ties to relate non-producers to producers, which means bureaucracies are needed to assess tiers of production, bind individuals in different tiers to one another, facilitate transfers of goods and services, and to enforce compliance
• There is not any significant incentive for any tier to produce more or to improve

The other important factor that helps socialistic practices work in a family setting is love.  Mothers and fathers have natural tendencies to care for their children.  This means that, even in cases when a child cannot become a producer (e.g. children with mental and physical disabilities), there is still a motivation in parents to care for their children.  While there may be exceptions, most people would not characterize interactions with bureaucracy as "loving."  

Elder Dale G. Renlund shared that "the greater the distance between the giver and the receiver, the more the receiver develops a sense of entitlement." (April 2016 General Conference).  This idea highlights the most significant aspect of determining the success of socialistic practices: scale.

On a family scale, individuals are obligated to cooperate in love and respect for the benefit of all.  On a neighborhood scale, families should have a desire to help and serve one another, but not necessarily provide for every need.  On a city scale, resources such as police, fire departments, or sanitation should be shared.  On the state scale, highways, prisons, and other resources should be pooled.  On a national scale, the scope decreases to things that cannot be individually applied such as treaties with other nations, currency management, and defense.  On a global scale, nothing is obligated.

This is not to say that individuals or private foundations cannot voluntarily take up causes on a larger scale... it is to say that these contributions must remain voluntary.  A person who would rather contribute to the Prevent Cancer Foundation than MSF or the Red Cross should be able to do so.

Efforts to compel participation in socialism on large scales tend to have success with one of two properties:

1. The socialistic practices have limited success in some areas while they can still be propped up by the wealth generation of capitalism (which is seen with some Nordic nations)
2. The socialistic practices have limited success when the government kills and/or imprisons anyone who dissents (which could be seen in Venezuela, North Korea, the USSR, and Nazi Germany)

In either case, the consolidation of power necessary to compel participation is prone to corruption and mismanagement.  I do not like the idea of Congressional Leader Nancy Pelosi making health care decisions any more than I imagine the American left loves the thought of President Donald Trump making their health care decisions.  Additionally, the successes of these systems are unsustainable as capitalistic wealth creation is drained away.

Many proponents of socialism have their sights set on alleviating poverty on grand scales, but ultimately, individuals ought to do what they are able to make life better in their immediate vicinity.    As noble as it may be to help everyone in the world, it might be smarter to look from a closer point of view.  Take care of yourself and your family first.  As you are able, help your neighbors.  Remember the counsel of Elder Dieter F. Uchtdorf, and "Lift where you stand."  

The more people give to help their own families, the better off everyone will be.