(February 18, 2021 at 8:25 am)onlinebiker Wrote: The only difference between a cult and a religion is - in the cult there is a guy at the top that knows it's all bullshit. In religion - that guy died.
Brilliant.
As for the topic at hand, I have perspective on Mormonism(yes, it IS cult. As an ex-member, I've looked into the BITE model and it lines up). Because yes, Joseph Smith did the polygamy AND underage stuff, as well as Brigham Young, and a few other early prophets. Polygamy was going on well into the 1920's but I don't know if the young wives thing continued all that way. Plus, there's a lawsuit going on right now where underage people have accused different church leaders of abuse that never got addressed by authorities or was covered up by the LDS organization.
In a simple answer: brainwashing. As a member, I had no idea that Joseph Smith was a polygamist. The church presented a picture of this devoted husband and father; he and Emma, his first wife, were this holy love story. I knew Brigham Young was a polygamist but in sunday school, where we were taught church history, we were reassured that any underage wives were merely taken in for dynastic reasons and nothing ever got sexual. As a member, you are inoculated against the truth by being told that your testimony is a fragile thing that Satan seeks to destroy. You are told to "doubt your doubts" and that any resources outside of the church that paint the church and it's leaders in a negative light is "Anti-Mormon propaganda" and you risked being led away by Satan if you looked at any of it.
These were very handy defense mechanisms. Until the church itself started posting historical information contrary to what I had been taught in Sunday school. Stuff that admitted to what the anti-Mormon propaganda said was true. You can't come back from a place where them lying to everyone is a good thing.
As for the lawsuit, the thing pressed in Mormonism is obedience. Through the use of behavior and thought control techniques, members become compliant and submissive to the leaders, who I was taught to believe were inspired holy men. Even local leaders, all the way down to local churches(which, by the by, bishops and stake presidents are not trained or schooled; they are called to the positions from among the congregation, based on other localized leaders getting a good feeling(the Spirit) when in fact THOSE leaders were chosen in the same way, all the way up to the apostles and prophet, who has no religious or social services schooling required at all).
We are taught that they have authority from God, which is handy to not only use the positions to propagate abuse but to also take advantage of the trust of others. As a young man, I had many a private worthiness interview with my bishops where borderline questions were asked about the state of my virtue. Yet I didn't blink an eye because it was "God" asking me in order to make sure I was pure enough to serve Him. The lawsuits involving the LDS church right now involve others who also trusted their bishops and were preyed upon by "God's men".
