Thread by @hollywelker

In a facebook discussion of the crappy Mormons who felt entitled to stiff a 15-year-old girl who babysat 7 kids for 9 hours because they went to the temple, someone pointed out that this is a clear example of "moral licensing." 🧵1/

https://twitter.com/_robotshane/status/1572225855769935873

Moral licensing is the psychological phenomenon wherein humans feel that doing something they perceive as good--say, working out at the gym--gives them permission or license to do something they perceive as bad, or at least less good--like having an extra large smoothie. 2/

Those immoral #Mormons justified the moral evil of cheating & lying to a minor who cared for their children all day because they perceived doing a temple session as so righteous that it canceled out any fraud & deception they might have committed. 3/

Obviously that's bullshit, especially because, as my friend pointed out, doing an #endowment session is pretty dubious as moral goods go. 4/

Sure, the COJCOLDS claims that #templework offers myriad benefits, such as
strengthening the testimonies of those doing the proxy work and
helping dead people get into the celestial kingdom, an assertion so silly that I find it painful even to draft this tweet. 5/

But temple work doesn't really make the world a better place. It doesn't clothe the naked or feed the hungry or shelter the homeless or heal the sick.

So using the temple as justification for cheating a minor is deeply, deeply rotten behavior. 6/

Think of the parable Jesus would create about Pharisees & Sadducees who did this. The #GoodSamaritan is about the moral licensing that let supposedly righteous people justify leaving a wounded person to die by the side of the road. 7/

One reason this all resonated so much for me is that it articulates how I feel about my #MormonMission.

Serving a mission was supposed to be a moral good, an act of profound generosity & service with all sorts of tangible & intangible benefits. 8/

OK, yes, I did teach a few people who joined the COJCOLDS. One became a stake president. He & his family love the church, so good for them.

But the moral goodness did not outweigh moral badness. 9/

The believe that missionary work was a moral good justified all sorts of TERRIBLE behavior, like guilting missionaries into going out to work when they were extremely ill or not letting them go home for a parent's funeral. 10/

Nearly every failure of the missionary program was blamed on missionaries' moral weakness, laziness, & unrighteousness, instead of on the fact that the trying to get people to join your church is a fundamentally problematic enterprise. 11/

The concept of moral license helps explain what George Bernard Shaw said about one of Henrik Ibsen's characters: “Brand dies a saint, having caused more intense suffering by his saintliness than the most talented sinner could possibly have done with twice his opportunity.” 12/

I actually read "Brand" on my mission & found Shaw's statement in the introduction to the play. I thought it was hilarious & shared it with one of my companions, who didn't find it funny at all. Guess it hit a little too close to home. 13/

Anyway, as Jesus said, "By their fruits ye shall know them."

The fruits of the COJCOLDS are hoarding wealth & cheating teenagers. Both the COJCOLDS itself & its members use moral licensing to justify behavior we can all see as wrong. 14/

The COJCOLDS used to hire people to take care of their meeting houses. This meant that the buildings were actually clean, & someone in need in the ward had a job.

Now the church expects members to clean the chapels for free, so they can hoard that much more money. 15/

So the rotten Mormons who stiffed a teenager are simply mimicking the rotten behavior the COJCOLDS as an institution has modeled for them.

Another way to discuss this issue is to say that the COJCOLDS & its members lack integrity. Because they do. 16/

Again, think of what Jesus would say about all of this.

The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints & its members exploit their perceived righteousness as moral licensing to be exactly the sorts of people Jesus condemned. #irony 🧵end 17/17

OK, picking up this 🧵again: a non-Mormon friend ask me via email about the fact that Utah has the highest rate of affinity fraud in the country. He found this really weird but there are good reasons for it. 18/

The problem is so severe that COJCOLDS leadership has had to issue repeated warnings to members about the dangers of trusting their fellow Latter-day Saints. 19/

newsroom.churchofjesuschrist.org/official-state…

But those warnings can't overcome the constant indoctrination about the necessity of trusting priesthood leaders, not just in Salt Lake City but on the local level.

Mormons are taught not to question the authority of men called to lead them. 20/

It’s an attitude beyond trust. It’s a surrender of agency, which the church is pushing more & more, telling Latter-day Saints that they do not actually have free agency after decades and decades of that being a bedrock doctrine of the church. 21/

churchofjesuschrist.org/study/new-era/…

This is a doctrinal innovation the church has to take as information readily available on the internet undermines the church's truth claims. They can't let people make their own choices, because those are likely to lead out of the church. So they demand total obedience. 22/

Being Mormon often involves very stupid financial choices, like getting married & having babies while still in college & without a source of income, discouraging women from working, & having more kids than a couple can easily afford. 23/

Mormons also buy into the prosperity gospel, because they're taught to. The church tells Latter-day Saints that they will be rewarded financially if they pay 10% of their income to the church. 24/

So Mormons are taught to obey priesthood leaders without question, to be suspicious of people who aren't Mormon, & to expect miraculous rewards for giving 10% of their income to the church, even as they make TERRIBLE financial decisions. 25/

So when a good Latter-day Saint with a temple recommend comes along with a money-making scheme that seems too good to be true, do Mormons say, "Yikes! This seems really sketchy! I better run away!"?

NO! They say, "Sign me up, Brother Nelson!" 26/

Even if Mormons stop to evaluate a money-making scheme, they're as liable to do it by asking the Spirit for confirmation that it's a good idea--meaning they'll see whether they feel warm & happy vs dark & worried when they think about it--as doing genuiine due diligence. 27/

So of course Latter-day Saints are easy marks for con men practicing affinity fraud.

They also have a lot of training in conning and exploiting people themselves. 28/

More to the point: hiring as a babysitter someone who knows & trusts you & assumes you won’t cheat or lie to them, planning all the while not to pay them, is also a form of affinity fraud.

It’s a way of exploiting your relationships w/ people so you can cheat them. 29/

To quote Jesus again: by their fruits ye shall know them.

Fraud & deception are among the major fruits of belonging to The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

That's a pretty shitty harvest, but hardly surprising, given what I've laid out. 30/30 (for now).