On scandal and excommunication
 

Excommunications, in theory, that bother me:

1. advocacy for leftist political positions.
2. for creating art.

Essentially Mormon social conservatives dictating culture based on their own prejudices.

If we are going to excommunicate #1 and #2, why not excommunicate people who advocated awful rightist political positions?

An LDS church devoid of artists, and full of Bybees, is not something I care for.

It's not what the LDS church is, but if we are not careful, we may see the mullahs take ascendancy. This church is not destined for success. There is no "destiny" about it. It is all on free will and agency.

Good thoughts, Mr. Waters.

As a moderately liberal Mormon who works in the humanities, the conservative bias and unjustified depreciation of art is in my face on a regular basis. I don't expect everyone to agree with my politics, I'd just like to not be considered immediately suspect for them.

In the early 90s, hundreds of ultra-conservative, quazi-survivalist supporters of Bo Gritz were excommunicated. The fact that it was done quietly, as opposed to the September Six, speaks volumes.

This doesn't bode well for a leftist survivalist artist-sympathizer like me.

You can think of me as what you would get if you crossed Bo Gritz, Neil Labute, and Sterling McMurrin with just a pinch of Joseph Smith (the cockiness part).

Yea, that sounds about right. People sometimes think I'm in the Michael Quinn mode, but those who take the time soon realize that I'm more a mix of Eugene England, B.H. Roberts, Emerson, and the "asking questions" side of Joseph Smith.

I can be hypersensitive and arrogant, but I can think outside the box and reach out to the ward misfits. Basically, if I'm left to my own devices I'll do just a little damage and a whole lot of good.

It is our destiny to be criticized by the Tex's and Indy's of Mormondom for leaving the 99 to go after the 1.

Far be it from me to interrupt this self-congratulatory circle jerk.

What speaks volumes is not that the September Six excommunications were not done quietly, but that the September Six went to the media to complain about it.

Has there been a BYU professor fired because he was too conservative? I wonder. Because even BYU can tolerate only so many right-wing loons.

Will Bybee be excommunicated?

It is apparently somewhat rare, but does happen, that the general authorities will signal to a Stake President that someone ought to be excommunicated.

So it depends on whether the General Authorities think he ought to be exed. But mainly it depends on Bybee's stake president.

The LDS church is weakly, nominally, against torture. Bybee can argue as well that he is against torture. Of course, his argument is somewhat parsed--that causing drowning effects, physical violence, stress positions, sleeplessness, isolation, laying in your own shit and piss tied up in the fetal position are not torture.

But let's say, he is honest and says, "Hell yes, I am for torture. It's worth it to preserve this country." He has only contradicted a weak press release from the church. Do people get canned for contradicting a weak press release?

Other matters for which he might be excommunicated--for bringing disgrace upon the church, due to bad publicity, because of sin. Also, for committing a crime.

Neil Labute was disfellowshipped because he wrote a play in which two Mormon (fictional) characters were portrayed as gay "bashers". It's hard to imagine two LDS men as gay bashers, I know.

Labute brought disrepute to the church, I guess, while Bybee does not. I guess that's the thinking.