Comments on: Missionary Self Abuse

Comment by: George

2008-02-26T10:34:03Z

Waaaaaaaahahahahahahahaha
What happened to “hold on to the rod” thing???
Hahahaha I’m not saying masturbation is a good thing but, but… come on people use your brain… masturbation = all the mission problems…. ???

Comment by: Jonathan Blake

2008-02-26T10:46:32Z

Let’s just say that, from the picture in the video, the mission president appears to have received extra helpings when he received his “Endowment”. That rod he’s holding to is extra long.

Comment by: Kullervo

2008-02-26T12:14:44Z

You should watch all sections of the talk. The masturbation segment got all the attention, but I don’t think it was as frustrating to me as the general framework that allows these inferences. The first segment actually pissed me off the most, because it lays out the twisted, abusive logic of Mormonism in general and its magnification on a mission.

I actually am really glad I went on a mission. Not the best two years of my life, but an important two years, and an experience I wouldn’t trade. Plus, I went to Germany so I don’t have to feel guilty about converting anyone to an embarrassingly false religion. There were definite downsides, but experiencing the bullshit and coming through it intact was really important in the formation of my adult identity.

Comment by: mel

2008-02-26T13:24:55Z

He doesn’t read the so-called scripture refs to “self-abuse”, just lists them. But the first says it all:

Romans 6:12-13
12 Let not sin therefore reign in your mortal body, that ye should obey it in the lusts thereof.
13 Neither yield ye your members as instruments of unrighteousness unto sin: but yield yourselves unto God, as those that are alive from the dead, and your members as instruments of righteousness unto God.

Actually, he didn’t include vs 13 … I wonder why? Reading this aloud would have been good for some outbursts of evil giggling and no doubt would have cost the kingdom of god a few more baptisms — ’cause, you know, every time a missionary masturbates, god’s plan dictates that another soul be lost.

Yeah, my member is no longer a member of TSCC and still quite alive I should say. Though I’ll give the church this: guilt is a powerful aphrodisiac. Righteous indeed.

Comment by: Jonathan Blake

2008-02-26T15:15:49Z

Kullervo, I once worked within earshot of a sales department. It made me sick how the supervisors manipulated the salespeople with threats, peer pressure, rewards, whatever it took to bring in the sales. This mission president reminded me of them. Mine weren’t so blatant, but we were baptizing at an OK rate. I’d hate to see what kind of pressure would have happened otherwise. It might not have gotten as bad as this Yahoo with his holly rod, but there was plenty of pressure to produce good numbers even while they denied that numbers were important.

mel, I must agree that some things just aren’t as enticing now that they’re not forbidden. Leaving the church has had at least one bad effect, there’s a lot less deliciously forbidden in my life.

I hasten to add lest anyone misunderstand that this doesn’t mean that I’m moving on to even more naughty things as if sexuality were a gateway drug; just that I’m learning to live with less of the thrill of being tempted by the forbidden.

Comment by: chandelle

2008-02-26T21:39:51Z

personally, i find masturbation to be a great releaser of tension and also a wonderful drug-free treatment for migraines. TSCC should loosen up; it might make the rates of antidepressant use go down if all the women received vibrators instead of roses on mother’s day.

Comment by: Jonathan Blake

2008-02-27T12:49:27Z

I would pay to be in a sacrament meeting when—ahem—massagers were handed out to the sisters “because our mothers work so hard that they need a little relief now and then”.

Comment by: Equilibrium

2008-04-21T21:34:22Z

Hey y’all, I really appreciate how you guys have raised attention to these sound bites. I think it helps me, and helps us all reason through what was going on in our missions with a fresh perspective. I recorded that zone conference by accident, and kept it under my hat for 4 years.

7 months after I posted these clips, the old missionaries of the Toulouse mission have caught a whif of them, and are getting pretty vocal about it. I’ve been getting some pretty harsh responses, most of them trying to scare or guilt me into taking them off the internet. I guess I knew it was only a matter of time, but I am still surprised about how angry they are that I would actually reveal something like that about my mission.

Comment by: Jonathan Blake

2008-04-22T04:59:23Z

They are leaving some interesting comments on YouTube. It’s a hard thing to have your beliefs called foolish. But it needs to be said. Too much of my youth was wasted under the sway of men like Pratt. I hope the LDS church can wake up to the damage it is doing in the name of sexual purity.

Don’t let them convince you to take them down. It’s important that thinking and tactics like this need to be held up to the light of day.