#at least in Utah mormon culture

[curtailedwhale]

Asked a neighbor if she had any standing baby swaps and she had no idea what I was talking about. The general idea is that you take turns watching the other party's children while they go out so everyone gets free childcare and a chance to go out. Now I'm curious...

(It's okay if you have a different term for it, answer yes if you had/have standing free babysitting appointments)

[hiseyeisonthesparrow]

Is there a language you want to learn? Do you want more experience talking in and understanding your mission language? Do you want to interact more with minority + immigrant members of the Church?

Try going to a language branch or ward!! Seriously, just do it!! We'd absolutely love to have you! Doesn't matter if you haven't spoken it in years or if your accent sucks or even if you don't understand a word of it!! It's a great chance to get out of your comfort zone and meet members of the church with non-traditional-LDS backgrounds or heritages!

I attend a Portuguese-speaking unit! Everyone is so kind and welcoming, plus we have potlucks once a month with delicious food! Even if you just say "Oi, tudo bem?" [«Hey, everything good?»] to someone I go to church with, they'll gasp in shock and tell you how impressed they are. My dad often spends late nights helping immigrant friends with their citizenship documents and serving in other nontraditional ways. The sweetest old lady I know basically founded the entire LDS Church in Angola -- just knowing her makes me so much more motivated to put in effort to share the gospel.

I went to a Russian ward once with an old friend. I didn't understand a word but I was practicing reading Cyrillic so I got to try and butcher the hymns in Russian! Afterwards, an old lady came up to us and said how grateful she was that younger people were coming. My friend did all the talking for me in his own broken Russian but I felt the love of Christ radiating so strongly in that moment.

My medium-support-needs autistic cousin goes to a Spanish ward! It's his current special interest and he speaks in a mix of English and Spanish on my family's group chat. He knows the independence days and temple statistics of every Spanish-speaking country and very freely shares them with us.

Seriously! It's a big jump out of a lot of people's comfort zones but it's so worth it to visit, or even join, a language ward or branch. :}

[unbidden-yidden-deactivated20240]

Okay so in the same vein as this post, I want to reality check the people who keep asking (yes I've been this person too, don't @ me) why oh why are Jews the only group leftists are willing to categorically deny self-determination to, and the reason is that most of them are tits deep in Christian supercessionism and don't even know it and have absolutely no desire to change that.

The reason they deny self-determination to Jews is the same reason that they would deny any claim to self-determination of, say, Mormons. If the Mormon church tried to claim Utah because it's the epicenter and birthplace of Mormonism [Edit: apparently the birthplace of Mormonism is western New York and not Utah whoops, but the point stands] and therefore they may as well have an indigenous claim to it, people with brains would rightfully lose their shit.

"But it's a culture too, not just a religion!"

So? Have you met any Mormons and spent time with them? They have their own culture.

"Okay but Jews are an ancient people!"

Please look at the batshit Mormon theological view of the Twelve Tribes and their attitudes towards Native Americans.

"Okay but our history is real!" Yep! These people don't know the first thing about Judaism and Jewish history and don't care.

The reality is that most westerners are hellbent on ignoring Jewish history and ethnoreligious identity because literally all of western civilization is built on Christian supercessionism. Even the people who leave Christianity and hate it (and "all religions") with a violent passion still refuse to engage in learning about Jewish cultural and ethnic history because you cannot do it without engaging the history and texts that they blame as the roots of Christianity and therefore they discredit all of it out of hand.

Obviously they're super fucking wrong about this. You, my fellow yid, and I, both know that. But unraveling the supercessionism means understanding their culpability in Jewish suffering and how they benefit from institutionalized antisemitism.

They are extremely unlikely to do that.

Why? Because if they unlearn Judaism as "just a religion" &/or "Christianity without Jesus" and begin to understand it as an indigenous Levantine group, they then have to reckon with the reality of how much Christianity has stolen from Jews and how much of their hatred for Jews is baked into their western goyische psyche by intentional Christian misunderstandings of Judaism.

Am Yisrael cannot to them be a real people with deep tribal roots and a strong culture, because then they would have to separate Judaism from Christianity and question their assumptions about us and our history.

"But Judaism accepts converts!"

Okay, as someone who "converted," I'm going to say no, not really, actually. Conversion is a convenient shorthand, but it's not accurate. Converting to Judaism means a mutually consensual adoption into the Tribe, after thorough vetting, at least a year of study and perseverance but probably more, and the main, primary promise that you make is about choosing to share the collective fate of the Jewish people. Yes, this adoption and naturalization is through the medium of the spiritual/religious aspect of Jewish identity, but it's way more than that. To be a Jew is to know that I might get stabbed on my walk to shul for being visibly Jewish, and to accept that possibility because the idea of not living as a Jew is worse. Gerim have to be ride or die because a serious chunk of Jewish history is on the "die" side of that equation. You have to be just a little bit nuts voluntarily take on that risk (reminder that I say this as a ger who is happily Jewish) and it must come from a place of profound love for and identification with the Jewish people. And once you join the family, that's it. You don't get to ever stop being a member of the family, even if you become estranged from it.

It's a people, with a deep history and culture, and anyone who joins it takes on both. Obviously your genetic makeup and ancestry don't change, but everything else does.

Understanding that major difference in Judaism in a serious way means that they would have to let go of their world view that their religion and culture are separate, that Christianity intentionally divorced faith from culture in order to acquire as many converts as possible, and then begin to understand how Christianity has shaped their understanding of culture, tradition, what religion is, ethics, and values. And they would have to then make an effort to separate their understanding of Judaism and what they think they know about us from Christianity, however they do or don't relate to it.

[his-red-right-hand]

What do you think Danny’s childhood was like/took place at? I personally head cannon him as being from PA due to the hunting culture and he seems to gravitate more east coast. It would make sense if his mom was dead/disappeared, but somehow we was able to go through the education system normally.

*slaps Danny on the back* This asshole can fit so much childhood trauma in it. *is visciously stabbed to death*

Moving on, we know that Danny has at least spent some time in Utah as that's where his driving licence is registered. Being a Brit I don't know a huge amount about the individual states beyond stereotypes, but given Danny's utter hatred of "regular everyday folks", Utah makes sense. Being surrounded by that many Mormons will drive anyone to murder.

Our boy has an antisocial personality type, which by itself does not make a murderer. The other two components are Male and Child Abuse.¤ And Danny was raised by a Vietnam War vet with a Mother who was either entirely absent for some reason; or was there but had so little impact or involvement with his life that she is basically a nonentity to him.

We know his father wanted him to join the military, raised him to succeed in it. I already have my issues with military training for adults, but as a way to raise a child? The only surprise we should have in regards to Danny murdering his fagher is that it didn't happen sooner.

I imagine that his father's inability to let go of the military was some sort of attempt at a coping mechanism against PTSD, probably combined with a fair amount of self medication.

I'm certain there would have been hunting trips/"wilderness training" from a young age. How old do you think he was when he made his first kill?

Danny at school, I imagine, would be a loner. He lacked the emotional grounding to be able to make friends, and we know he has explosive temper issues. I can see this turning into a sort of bad boy appeal as he grew older and learnt to charm and manipulate people around him. And like most narcissists, he can be very charming and likeable. If he wants something from you.

Tl;dr: Danny was physically and emotionally abused by his veteran father, who thought it was more important to teach his son to be a Warrior and a "Man" over how not to murder people for drawing a dumb comic making fun of his murdersona.

¤ We don't have enough cases of Female Antisocial Personalities being caught doing crime to do an analysis on them, which either means they do it less or they're good enough to not get caught.

[scaly-freaks]

Kind of going off your post about how brown and black characters in HOTD and GOT are completely wasted or demolished or turned into a crude caricature.

Ummmm the HATE that is thrown towards Elia Martell is absolutely absurd. The way they hate the idea of this character and are honestly happy with how her character was destroyed is so telling and disgusting.

The hatred and discontent is so real and frightening and we saw a glimpse of that with those leaked texts from some random discord. I guess what I’m just trying to say is racism is far from dead and it’s seen in this fandom.

And yes the entirety of Arianne Martell’s character being a seductress is insane.

Also wanted to mention that the only other time I’ve seen brown characters in the show are as brothel workers. Of course nothing wrong with that sort of work. But it’s the sexualization that’s creepy.

Yeah. Yep. It's just depressing. Sometimes I find myself accepting it because it's so normal at this point, but then I'm like...no???? I hesitated making Amara Dornish and visibly non-white because my own self doubt made me want to . I thought eh I'll just make her from the Riverlands or something, it's less complicated. But then I make her, and people love her and it's not an issue (it's just stuff I've internalised over the years thanks to how society is set up). Which obviously goes to show the people who create our media are deliberately fucking up representation so that we just stop asking. They can create compelling characters that are centred they just don't want to a lot of the time.

That being said, British TV that specifically isn't popular outside of the UK, represents non-white characters quite well and doesn't turn them into caricatures of their culture/ethnicity (at least most of the time). In this case I am talking about American productions and non-British audiences.

On the note of Elia Martell...a lot of the times she is fancasted as Indian. Stereotypes about Dorne are also stereotypes used against Indians ('she smells Dornish' - no two guesses on what Aerys meant). I've seen Indians be used as punching bags for racism by every other race as if it's a free-for-all, to the point where very horrible and very real issues like misogyny in India are treated frivolously and with 'oh well they're all just like that.'

The mistreatment and racism against Elia has real life parallels because of the otherness of Dorne, and since Dorne brings to mind South and Western Asia so much (the way they hid in caves when the dragons came is very reminiscent of Afghan guerilla tactics and their tough terrain that invaders can't adjust to) that's usually the area of the world I associate it with.

It's all very other other other and now pair that up with snow-white daddy Rhaegar and his lily-white, dark-haired Stark girl (because mind you, I understand white blondes have had issues with how they're represented as slutty caricatures onscreen and brunettes as more clever and by extension more desirable in the long-term).

Elia didn't stand a chance against two white people pairing up, and that is honestly the only time when I'm like "you know what, stop fan casting her as desi." The woman is raped in front of her children and watches those same kids die in front of her, and even that isn't enough to stop the cruel jokes.

And yes, absolutely, there's nothing wrong with being a brothel worker. I adore stories about people in the grassroots, brothel workers especially, just trying to survive and get by in the world. But watch the brown workers be immediately depicted as more "comfortable" with this lifestyle, and just naturally promiscuous as compared to their white counterparts.

Meanwhile irl, if the brown person in question is a Muslim for example, their values in terms of modesty are mocked and derided and deemed an extremist 'other'. And then I guess you can be a Mormon in Utah and be just fine.

I honestly don't know if any of this made sense, or if I articulated without room for misunderstanding. Trust me, I do think about this a lot. I'm Kashmiri, and I've lived in England all my life, and my dating pool has mostly been white because that is what's more available. I've dealt with fetishisation/sexualisation (never for the ethnicity I am which most people couldn't even guess...uhhh hilarious) and it's forefront on my mind despite my active decision to leave it out of my fics as much as I can.

It can be very cathartic to talk about, but sometimes I'm like, you know what Amara, I'll take this extra little bit of suffering away from you bc girl you're already dealing with a lot (Aegon)

[good-jewish-omens]

[VERY SERIOUS DISCLAIMER FOR THE FOLLOWING TEXT: I wrote this about three hours ago. It is currently 11:45am CST on 10/7/2023, and about an hour ago news sources started reporting Palestinian liberatory action. This situation concerned me before, and due to the connections the genealogical industrial complex has with the Israeli occupation and the Mormon church, I believe eyes should be on this. I do not believe this is a Palestinian effort, if I know anything about anything of US white supremacist extremist hate crimes, this reeks of it. Anyone saying that it is a Palestinian effort must be approached with extreme caution, especially if they are a Zionist. This is exactly the kind of thing that could be scapegoated. Do not let it. This is also about Chinese Americans and indigenous Americans, who have had a blood quantum measurement also put onto us.] I'm Ashkenazi Jewish + indigenous North American and I have been warning people for almost a decade that this was going to happen. I have had an extremely difficult time with reconnection to my bio family, and I am not the only one. 23andMe and other DNA database sites have capitalized on adoptees and lost indigenous people since their inception. It was a part of their initial business model. I keep my identity close to my chest, largely from white people but I'm also careful about who I share it with IRL - I'm passing as an active adjective. One of the reasons I don't get into it is because of these companies alone. When I have spoken about who I am with people who it was a mistake to talk about it with, their answer to all my woes is to "just take a DNA test if you really want it so bad." When I explain further what these companies do and how this data is collected, with several of them having headquarters and offices in Israeli-occupied Palestine and Utah where the Mormon church is extremely involved (solidifying a very legitimate business connection & alliance between two religious self-claiming "authorities"), I am dismissed. It does not matter to people. There is a staunch belief that if you "really are that thing, you have to prove it with DNA," AS IF THERE IS NO OTHER WAY TO DO THIS.

This data is dangerous. I'm an anthropologist, currently working on digital anthro among other things. It has never been safe for the thing that white supremacists use to determine our humanhood to be collected by a company whose mission is to profit on eugenics and genocide. This was always going to happen. In this instance, it was specifically Jews and Chinese people which this article title does not do justice.

If you have taken one of these tests in your life, there is now not really much you can do except protect yourself in the ways you can. Their ToS and copyright agreement are extremely unethical and always have been. You can request for them to destroy your data, but that doesn't actually guarantee that it's going to happen or that they haven't already sold it/shared it or your other information for research or commercial marketing purposes. Otherwise, I highly recommend a) doing the most you can to protect yourself online, b) locking down your finances and credit if you feel comfortable and confident doing so, c) and familiarizing yourself with the Nuremberg blood quantum chart below to see if you are affected by this given your results because yes, this is their end-game. If you fall on this chart at all, you are at risk. This is about the blood that runs through your veins, not about your social and cultural life as you know it right now.

Given my disclaimer above, please watch out for further news on this. This is not nothing. This is extremist terrorist planning that has the potential to be very far-reaching.

[pimo-and-sad-about-it]

Alrighty, this is going to be long, but I accidentally agreed to go to Desert Book today, and OH BOY do I have a lot to say.

I just moved back to Utah, and okay sure, it's been a while. I just don't think I ever realized before how WEIRD Utah culture is. It's hard to believe I ever thought this was normal, tbh. And nowhere is the weirdness of it all more obvious than in Desert Book.

For those who don't know, Desert Book is an LDS bookstore where you can get scriptures, scriptural coloring books/toys for kids, and ofc your holy underwear. It's weird as hell, and I found quite a few things in there while wandering around today that I just had to share.

First of all, the T-shirts. These are harmless enough, and actually pretty funny in the Mormon (or at least Utah for the first one) culture. Very silly, and yet they still bring me some degree of annoyance for unknown reasons.

Next we have the Lego temple sets! Because who doesn't want to build their own...

Next we have children's toys with missionaries and Book of Mormon heroes, most of which are white (naturally). Because ofc, what kid doesn't want to play with Nephi and his missionary buddies?

Now here's where it gets more concerning. TSCC is HUGE on agency and people CHOOSING to enter the church. There's a whole chapter in the Book of Mormon about how baby baptisms are an abomination. And yet, everyone seems so sure that 8 year olds are perfectly accountable and ready to make decisions that will supposedly affect their eternity. But let's be real, no eight year old is going to say no when their parents have been hyping them up for it for years and all their friends are doing it, too. At that point, it's not a choice, not really. Just a few days ago I watched my brother-in-law practice "baptizing" my niece, who is not yet three!

Last but certainly not least. The pressure for kids (specifically boys) to go on missions is UNREAL. You can get these piggy banks and make sure your little kids pay tithing first, save for the mission second, and THEN they can use their own money for fun. The book with the little boy preparing for his mission on the cover? In the nonfiction section, btw.

Anyway, the other thing I wanted to mention but forgot to take a picture of was that they literally had a BYU creamery where you could buy ice cream inside the bookstore. Maybe there's nothing wrong with it, per se, it's just so weird and so Utah that I'm not even surprised.

So yeah. That's how my day's going.

[planetofsnarfs]

Former mommy vlogger Ruby Franke once said, in one of her many, many mommy vlogs, that she would never accept being “canceled,” and anyone who didn’t like the way she treated her children just hated “responsibility.” 

Yesterday, a judge sentenced Franke, who pleaded guilty to four counts of child abuse this past December, to one to 15 years for each count, to be served consecutively. The Utah Board of Pardons and Parole will determine the exact amount of time she will serve, though it will not be more than 30 years as that is the maximum allowed for consecutive sentences in the state. 

Some might say that’s a little more than “canceled.”

Ruby Franke, like many Mormon ladies in Utah, had a family YouTube vlog documenting every day of her life with her husband and six children and dispensing parenting advice. It was called “8 Passengers” and it was hugely popular among the kinds of people who watch family vlogs. How huge? Two and a half million followers huge. 

Then, one day, she bragged in a video about how her daughter Eve’s kindergarten teacher texted her to tell her that she didn’t have any lunch, and could Ruby please come bring her one, whereupon Ruby informed the teacher that it was Eve’s responsibility to pack her own lunch, and if she didn’t have any she would just have to go hungry. Ruby added that she hoped no one gave her daughter anything to eat. 

This got a lot of traction outside her usual audience of family vlogger fans, from people who didn’t think it’s actually great parenting to starve children. 

Not long after that, she recorded a video with her son Chad who revealed that, a month after he came home from a “wilderness camp” for troubled teens (which sounds a lot like that horrifying one Paris Hilton was sent to), he played a silly prank on his little brother, waking him up and telling him to pack his things because they were all going to Disneyland. His punishment? He wasn’t allowed to have a bed for the next seven months and had to sleep on a bean bag. 

Ruby laughed and laughed the entire time like what she did was real cute. 

This didn’t go over well with viewers, and eventually someone started a Change.org petition to demand that the Utah Department of Child and Family Services do a welfare check. They started calling as well, and eventually they checked on the Frankes and, well, didn’t do jack shit. While they didn’t do anything, 90 percent of Franke’s sponsors on her YouTube channel did. They left.

It was at this point that Franke started portraying herself as a Good Conservative Mom who was being canceled by Bad Liberals Who Hate Responsibility.

“The reason we got canceled was because I was demonstrating, as I have done from day one, what a responsible mother looks like,” she said in a 2021 interview with The Wrap. “And it scared the living bejesus out of these kids who do not want to be held accountable. So that is the motive for the hate being thrown at me. I’m the antidote to their acting out, and they know it.”

Yeah, either that or they figured — correctly — that if this is what this woman thought was okay to put on camera, that whatever was happening off-camera was 10 times worse, or at least had the potential to get there. 

Eventually she abandoned family vlogging in favor of family counseling and joined forces with Jodi Hildebrandt, who was also charged in connection with this case. No one heard much about her until Franke’s 12-year-old son escaped Hildebrandt’s home (where he was staying) and ran to a neighbor for help, emaciated and covered in wounds and duct tape. 

Police arrested Franke, and not for the crime of being a responsible mother.

Via New York Times:

From May to August 2023, Ms. Franke, a mother of six, created a “concentration camp-like setting” for two of her children, who were 9 and 11 at the time, Eric Clarke, the Washington County attorney, said during the sentencing hearing. She regularly denied them adequate food, water, entertainment and beds, and isolated them from others, he said. Ms. Franke, 42, also forced her children to do physical tasks in extreme heat, without shoes, socks or water, Mr. Clarke said. They were forced to stand on hot concrete in the summer heat for hours and sometimes days at a time, he added, and were beaten and regularly bound by their hands and feet. The injuries were so severe that the children required hospitalization.

If you’re wondering where the duct tape came in, it is because Hildebrandt and Franke “treated” the areas from where they were handcuffed and legcuffed with “homeopathic remedies” and then wrapped them in duct tape. 

Franke later revealed in court that she also believed that her children were “possessed” and that extreme discipline was the only thing that could save them. this was a belief, she said, she got from Hildebrandt. Indeed, much of her court statement involved blaming Hildebrandt for more or less brainwashing her into believing that child abuse was what her kids needed. 

Hildebrandt is her own kind of monster, so this would be believable if not for everything else Franke thought was a great idea before May of 2023. So much for all that accountability she once loved so much.

It is possible that if, instead of assuming Franke was being “cancel cultured” for “demonstrating … what a responsible mother looks like,” the police and DCFS actually took the complaints seriously in the first place, those kids never would have been hospitalized or otherwise further traumatized. Wouldn’t that have been nice?

[douxettriste]

One of my graduate school options (the University of Utah) had to close their LGBTQ+ student resource center. This closure coincides with the Utah state government enacting a law that prevents public schools from promoting diversity, equity, and inclusion.

I was actually born in Salt Lake City, Utah (where this school is located). And yes, if you’re wondering, I was raised Mormon. Growing up gay in a Mormon family (especially in the early 2000s) was not a fun time, as you might imagine.

I haven’t lived in Utah in a long time. My mom relocated when I was still a kid (after she remarried). My siblings and I would spend the school year with her, and the summers with my dad (in Utah). Once I became a teenager, and my own life got going, my trips to Utah became less frequent.

As I got older and denounced religion, I never had the impression that I would ever want to move back to Utah (which is, basically, the Mormon capital of the world). It’s a beautiful state, but the energy can feel oppressive due to the prominent LDS culture. However, as I’ve been exploring graduate school programs, the University of Utah seems like a good possible option.

Salt Lake City is progressive (especially in comparison to the rest of the state). The last time I was in Salt Lake (2021), I enjoyed myself. I have family in Utah as well, in case an emergency were to arise. I am also familiar with Salt Lake, whereas other schools I am interested in, they are in towns and states unknown to me.

I have even wondered if it might be healing in a way, to move back - at least for a couple of years while I’m in school. Or who knows, it might be miserable lol. But policies like this have put a sour taste in my mouth, and are making me question my decision on whether to apply or not. Granted, I currently live in another red-state hellscape anyway, so I’m used to the bullshit. It’s just a very strange time, generally speaking and also politically.

I don’t really have a grand message with this post. I just wanted to vent about it a little. I do plan to go out in the fall to tour the campus and have a trial lesson. So, I guess I’ll see how I feel after that.

[the-warmesthello]

barb

putting a tw at the beginning of this because i probably should. tw for religious trauma (including some mormon terminology), mention of fungi, homophobia (including derogatory use of the word queer), dysfunctional parenting, grief/mourning, alcoholism, bad mental health times all round, some tough parts of the therapeutic process

really i didn't expect this to get heavy part way through so if you want to skip the worst bit (aftermath of the banana incident), it's most of the next rb. :)

(btw i am nevermo, correct me if i got something wrong)

born on the 21st of december, 1934 in provo, utah

was raised in the latter day saints

had a keen interest in chemistry from the time she could express it, but because sciences were discouraged for the girls in her family, learned mostly about the science in domestic work

amazing baker, had the exact ratios for each ingredient memorised by the time she started school

became fascinated by fermentation and saw the scoby and starters as her pets, watching them make bubbles for hours on end

learned the old burning-things-with-a-magnifying-glass trick, but only used it for leaves because the ants didn't deserve that

one time when she was 6, she made chloroform out of cleaning chemicals, put it in a glass bottle, and smashed it in front of her bullies to see what would happen

(she got in trouble for that)

(worth it)

just before school started, her parents noticed that she would always hold books very close to her face, amongst other things, and when they took her to the doctor she became the proud owner of some incredibly nifty glasses, if she did say so herself

only had one friend in school, alma merrill, who she thought was kind and funny and beautiful and...

just the greatest

even though she didn't understand what barb meant when she talked about exothermic reactions, she'd still sit there and nod along, and she had so many exciting things to say in return even though it wasn't what barb usually liked

when she grew up, she wanted her husband to be just like alma

when they were 13, alma was told to stay away from her because she was 'queer, and not only in the loony way' (neither barb nor alma could figure out what that meant)

after that, she focused most of her time on her studies, which her parents were now suddenly encouraging of

("at least it'll keep her away from sin," she heard her parents whisper when they thought she wasn't there)

graduated high school at 15, youngest ever at her school

brigham young university wouldn't let her in until she was 16, so she took a gap year

she was told to stay on the property except for church, but as long as she did her chores and continued to learn household management, she was allowed to do whatever she wanted

she took this opportunity to study mechanical engineering, watching her father teach her brothers how to fix the mower then reading about engine torque

she knew that her ideas on how to make it go faster wouldn't be listened to, so she told her younger brother, isaiah, what to say and let him take the credit

he needed the praise, but it still hurt

but it was overshadowed by how good it felt to be right when her idea worked

at university, she was a bit too young to participate in the whole courtship thing that made up the backbone of social life there

she couldn't understand why her peers would choose to do all that for just some guy, but maybe she just wasn't old enough yet

graduated an accelerated course, a bs in applied physics with a minor in biochemistry, in 1954 at 19 years old

immediately applied for work in the military for the travel benefits

worked her way up very quickly since the need for chemical and nuclear weapons was increasing and they needed an innovative mind

at first it was weird, the way things were so different outside the church, but eventually she came around to the office culture of relaxed chatting over coffee while on break

and huh, come to think of it, the people she met were all different, and most of them seemed like pretty decent people to her

there wasn't an exact moment that cracked her belief, more just an increasing awareness of her own cognitive dissonance

and when she was invited to come back to provo for her endowment, she didn't respond

in late 1955, she got an offer from the a.s.s. to join their equipment development program for field agents where she would get full reign over what she did, and how could she say no to that?

and, ok, so there's this one guy, right? he's a field agent, his name is curt, and he's infuriating, but very conventionally attractive, and you know, theoretically, it wouldn't be awful to date him

is this what a crush is?

she thinks this is probably what a crush is

it takes a lot of work to feel this way, but she's pretty sure that she could be, no, is attracted to him

and she gets to be the one to supervise him on missions!!

but the issue is that curt has this friend and they're always together

if she wants to date this guy, she has to find some alone time, so she has to get rid of the friend

however... this guy, curt's friend, he's shockingly competent at his job, and he stops curt from dying constantly

plus, he's nice to barb, even if it's in that weird stiff british way all the mi6 guys seem to be

and one day, when she's briefing them on a tool neither of them have ever used before (of course they haven't, barb invented it herself), this friend, who's been staring behind her the entire time, says 'why don't you make the handle smaller? that way it's not as bulky and makes it easier to press the buttons on the right in a combat situation'

and oh.

the answer was that simple.

from then on, he stops being known as 'curt's friend (british)' and starts being 'owen (my best friend)'

they become each others' sounding boards, each of them dumping all their ideas out and talking through it with each other

barb knows how all the technical stuff for how her inventions work, but owen is detached enough to not overthink it and just state the obvious that she forgot

owen is continually formulating arguments and debates; why he should get a raise, why his partner (who barb still hasn't met yet, she hopes she'll get to meet her some day) should consider his point of view in conversation before going off on a tangent about something that wasn't even what he suggested, why whatever politics going on in england actually does affect his siblings, etc.

picking apart his arguments and playing the devil's advocate is one of barb's favourite things

curt is an unwilling participant in this little club of theirs, and often provides what she assumes he thinks is comedic relief

and for the first time, barb is content with how things are going for her

[mormon-character-tournament]

Group Two Round Three

Character info from submissions under the cut

Elder Calhoun (Canon) Elder Calhoun is a lovable and charming new missionary, fresh from the MTC. Geeky and lacks charisma, but won't let that stop him from doing his job. He is the only member of the church in his family. Started his mission mere months after getting baptized. Has considerably more faith than his companions

Mallory Book (Canon in comics) Mallory Book is a very successful, cut-throat lawyer, and a co-worker (and often rival) of She-Hulk. She is from Utah, has been crowned Ms. Utah, and graduated magna cum laude from Brigham Young University and served as a senior editor of the BYU Law Review. Although the comics my never touch on her personal beliefs, it is safe to assume she is at least culturally Mormon.

[bookish-bi-mormon]

1st week at my new job, as a Utah Mormon born and bred, I've never worked somewhere without at least 5 other mormons, and my last few jobs were AT BYU. I was expecting a culture shift, moving states and environments. Here are my thoughts.

- everyone here already knew I went to BYU. I knew my boss would know, cause it's all over my resume. But my coworkers were all like "so, you went to BYU right?" Like they've all been talking about me before I got there. It's the hot Goss, having a Mormon here I guess. 😅

- a lot of people don't seem to care, and if religion does come up they shy away from it. One guy said his mom went to BYU, but we quickly established our experiences with mormonism were very different, we respect each other but we didn't talk about it anymore.

- one guy described himself as a "recovering evangelical" and he really knew his stuff about the LDS church. I got the feeling he'd been waiting to talk to me about it. To crack jokes and prove how much he knew. It was funny 😅 but also kinda weird. In some ways I felt like I was being interrogated.

- that same guy, when I mentioned I can't go to the temple anymore, for queer reasons, said, in a very jokey voice "that means so celestial kingdom for you either!" Which was ... certainly a thing to say xD idk. I didn't know how to respond.

- people here seem to respect my pronouns less than they did at BYU. Maybe I just haven't been clear yet. I've had to clarify multiple times that I'm glad I went to BYU and I had a good time there. It has a lot of flaws and I'm glad I'm done, but It's mostly fond memories.

[taperwolf]

I'm seeing arguments about the term "culturally Christian" a lot, and I have conflicting feelings, so I'm going to do the inadvisable thing and work them out here.

As I understand the debate, the difficulty seems to be that certain atheists — who were either raised Christian or, at the least, in a Christian culture without being of a minority religion — object to still being referred to as culturally Christian. Many of them were deeply hurt by Christianity, and all are frustrated at being identified with a religion that they do not participate in, that they vehemently reject.

People on the other side of the argument are mostly pointing out that acculturation — and the network of unexamined beliefs and privileges arising from it — doesn't go away because you reject the religious part of that culture, or by becoming a minority part of that culture. An analogy raised is that you don't get to opt out of whiteness by declaring you're against white supremacy.

To make my starting position clear, I am an atheist. I was raised as a Mormon. Mormon culture is mostly overlapping with the religious end of US Protestant culture, and participates in Christian culture more broadly, though probably 75% of people calling themselves Christian would deny that Mormons are Christians at all. (This is either over the Mormon view of the Trinity clashing with the Nicene Creed, or a conviction that no matter what they say, Mormons really just worship Joseph Smith, depending on the theological sophistication of the denier.)

I spent most of my time while growing up in Mormon-dominated areas — the Mormon Corridor of Utah, Idaho, and Wyoming — but I did spend several years as a member in places where it's a minority denomination, if not a minority religion. But culturally, I was not substantially an outsider. Holiday observances were largely the same, I wasn't under any pressure to conform my behaviour or appearance to local mores, and if other kids didn't have 6:30am religious instruction classes or dramatized Book of Mormon tapes in the car stereo, they had analogous things like vacation Bible study and whatever the thing was before they had Veggitales.

And I mean, I went through some serious shit from Mormonism and the Mormon church, and I went through some shit from Christianity writ large; I reject Mormonism and consider it a cult, and I don't have a lot better opinion of Christianity in any of its flavors. I've studied, both formally and informally, various religions, to varying degrees of depth, and I don't have a high opinion of the class of human institutions that fall under that umbrella.

But I can still be fairly described as culturally Christian. This is despite my rejection of the religion, and despite the Christians who would have denied me the label Christian to start with.

But I do get the antipathy to having that label applied to you. To someone who the Christian faith and its practitioners have treated horribly, it feels like an accusation that you, by exact virtue of having been abused, are still participating in that abuse to others. And sometimes that's exactly the point that people using the term are making. That being oppressed on one axis doesn't mean you're not participating in oppression on another.

But it can still feel like you recently had a spinal injury, that you're now in a wheelchair, and you're being turned away from a support group because you're culturally abled.

[luckylolabug]

What made you decide to have Seb's family be Mormon???? Just curious lol

Oooh, boy, time for me to stand on my Newsies box and shout from the rooftops. My time has come.

Longer explanation under the cut, but TL;DR it's a lot of context clues based on the very minimal we see in the show, compared to my own personal experience growing up in Utah where a HUGE chunk of my school and also my best friends were from LDS families. Take it with a grain of salt of course, everyone's allowed to headcanon their own thing!

Long answer:

Partially, because he comes from a homesteading farming family, and my personal ideal is that puts him out near Farmington which as far as religions go, is 78% LDS by population. That's a HUGE chunk, and there's too many kids in drama club for at least ONE of them to not come from a predominantly mormon upbringing, honestly likely more than one. But if I'm picking someone out of their group that is most likely to lean into it, it's Seb. Sorry not sorry.

Mormons have traditionally large families, I say this with love. We don't know his family PERSONALLY but we know they bought out three entire rows of bleachers to come see his performance. I had moments before then in Season 1 (which I'll touch on in a second) where I started slowly leaning towards my personal thought process that he might come from an LDS upbringing, but it was the moment he pointed his giant family out that really sealed the deal for me. Also, sorry, but it's a giant family of blondes with blue eyes in Utah? The theory writes itself.

A lot of the happy-go-lucky and almost naive at times energy he has is SO surrounded in that culture to me that it's really hard for me unsee it. I went to school with at least six guys that looked and spoke exactly like Seb did as far as his wording goes, and every single one of those was either a deacon or had some leadership role in their church in high school.

This one's a bit more personal, because I went through my own similar experience (though my family is Jewish and not LDS) as well as physically watching one of my best friends in high school go through the exact same plotline. But the smidge we get in season 4 about not being out to his dad yet and being nervous about it really hit my religious trauma like a TRUCK, and my friend who went through it when we were in HS (her dad was a bishop, so it was REALLY hard for her to admit her sexuality for a long time) has said the same thing. Coming out experiences in general can be extremely scary before they're freeing, and when you're growing up as a queer person in Utah, you're not only worried about your family, but also the fact that a seriously good chunk of the state population is religious and conservative. I never personally came to terms with my own sexuality until I moved out of the state after I graduated, but my entire upbringing there was pretttttty pressurized and I felt like I had to follow a lot of social standards that didn't apply to me at all. Hiding a big part of yourself from the people you love sucks!

Another projection, but it tracks, is finding who you really are as a theater kid. (Think the brief "Im home" scene when he's in Sharpay's costume for the first time) I had *multiple* LDS friends (plus me as the group's Jewish gal) who fell into theater and discovered how to be themselves because of it, and it was almost like a second person entirely. A place and group of people that you could finally be who you were supposed to be around. That's sort of the vibe I'm going with as far as Seb's character development in my re-write series, because it's incredibly important to me.

Anyways. Thank you for asking because clearly I have SO many thoughts on this subject.

[follower-of-odin]

24, nearly 25. Cis white guy. Bi, but you wouldn't know it from looking at me. Mostly into women. Taken; sorry, but not sorry, as my partner is lovely, and I cherish them. New Uncle. I'm still living with family... there's a long story behind that .

I have been Heathen for... almost 10 years. That amazes even me. Some of those years, I was still officially a member of the Mormon church, only because, as the son of a living mormon returned missionary, and a dead pioneer mormon mom, I was sure I wouldn't be allowed to officially leave. My ex-mormon background is a little more complex than that, but I figured it's worth mentioning.

I'm very depressed, and, though a believing Heathen, I have not been a practicing one for a while. This is in large part due to still being dependent, and, therefore, unable to provide the offerings to them that I wish I could. Depression is also a contributing factor, as well as the settler colonial situation I live in... as a settler... on land where these gods were not previously worshiped. The gods, at least whichever gods from whichever pantheon were responsible for this corner of the world, made what is available here, and therefore, whatever grows here is already theirs. Just as I can't give my neighbor the house he already owns, I feel I can't give an offering of, say, strawberries, to the beings who created and own the strawberries. And if it doesn't belong to the gods, it rightfully belongs to the native inhabitants. Yes, I was born here, and it's all that I know, to whatever extent I know it, but that isn't what I mean, and anybody reading this already knew that. An offering is a sacrifice, and it isn't a sacrifice if it isn't something which you personally owned, had the right to, and gave up. Besides, how much dominion do they have here? The land spirits are totally different, and my ancestors most likely owned slaves, Indigenous and maybe even Black, so I'm not worshiping my ancestors, at least not the biological ones. Maybe my mother, rest her soul, but that's it. Can't believe I used to think the Mormons didn't own slaves. "They were racist, yeah, but they fucked off from the US, so I guess they must have been so racist, they didn't even want to own slaves, because then they'd have to be around non-white people." Nope. Not the case. They brought slaves into Utah, and bought Paiute slaves in there, many of whom were children. Horrifying shit.

Perhaps I'm hard on myself; I've often heard that. On the other hand...well, really, I don't know if there's a way out of that. It's largely, though not exclusively, other white people, and/or white settlers, who have told me I'm too hard on myself when it comes to the intersection of colonialism and modern Heathenry. Some people of color have also told me this, but, though people of color, they aren't Indigenous to this land. On the other hand, I don't expect, don't have the right, to seek absolution from an Indigenous person. They're working hard just to survive after centuries of Hell, the last thing any of them need or want is to coddle some white guy who thinks he's so different from the others just because, though culturally Christian, he seeks to de-Christianize himself, by adopting yet another European* tradition. Yeah, real special there, dude, you're so different and non-hegemonic, hanging around in a basement like a recluse, waiting for your family to stabilize so you can finally live your life and maybe make a small difference someday, or so you keep telling yourself. Although I suppose the guilt is, paradoxically, to help me feel better. I'm not helping anyone, but I feel guilty and angry at myself over that, and I figure that at least someone who is guilty by inaction is going through mental and emotional pain, so some small measure of justice is satisfied. Nobody is helped, but a bad person hurts. If that is justice, that's some poor justice.

I was going to make this a short pinned introduction post, to explain why I sound this way, but this isn't short, is more than an introduction, and I won't pin it. Against my better judgment, I'll still post this.

*Yes, I'm fully aware that Judaea, the homeland of Yeshua, is in Western Asia. Let's be real, though - it isn't Assyrian Christianity, or Coptic Christianity, or Armenian Christianity, or other forms of Christianity that have reigned in Europe for almost 2 millennia, which gave birth to religions such as Roman Christianity, Lutheranism, or Mormonism. Those last 3 derive from the European Christian traditions, which are dominant in the US. This is why I described Christianity as European; the totality of Christianity isn't European, Christianity isn't inherently European, but the dominant forms of Christianity in my country are European.

[weedstoner]

the biggest culture shock I ever got in america, as an american, was driving through southern utah and all the mormon communities. all the houses are huge and have two main entrances and two garages at least because multiple wives/families live in the same home. literally nothing happens on sundays except church, not even fast food places are open. it's crazy