Leaderboard

As a comedian, her biggest “crime” was that it wasn’t funny. A good comedian can get political points across while being funny.

W was despised as much as Trump is, but our short memories struggle with that. Bush was too nice a guy to push back (metaphorically) while Trump is so thin skinned that he’ll punch back to everything. I think that’s a big reason why MAGA likes him. Trump fulfills their dark fantasies by being as a nasty as possible to those who disagree with him. It’s a little troubling, actually.

It is not uncommon for a person to wield a great deal of power while posing as a bumbling idiot. We see this in literature with various heroes like Zorro, Batman and the all-powerful Superman. A prime element of an evil character is often someone utilizing various methods of plausible deniability of their involvement. This is not uncommon at all currently as leaders of nations race into war blaming their actions on their enemy justifying those they intend to kill or allow openly to be killed. The Traveler

Got it, private citizens posting things is okay.

Is this Jacob Hansen's version, or some other? Maybe it doesn't matter, because I see the same kinds of questions no matter whose version of "aggregate across multiple prophets" model I encounter. In theory, I think it is a good idea. Questions that I think tend to muddy the waters: 1) How do we determine who is and is not a prophet? Within a given tradition, there is usually consensus, but that also usually leaves some claims to prophethood (canonized scripture) out. We LDS accept Biblical and Book of Mormon figures as prophets, but reject Muhammad's. We accept Brigham Young through Russel M. Nelson, while rejecting Joseph Smith III through Staci Cramm (presumptive). I think it is worth acknowledging that your choice of prophets to include and exclude will impact the conclusions you end up drawing. 2) Once you've decided who to include in your list of prophets, then you need to determine what they said. This gets particularly difficult the further back in history you go. Did Moses really say all those things that are attributed to him? What about the letters of Paul? Even as recently as Joseph Smith, we end up going round in circles trying to determine what Joseph Smith said versus what his contemporaries claim he said. A lot of the time when I see someone like Hansen promoting this model, there seems to be an underlying assumption that we can accurately recall across years and generations and millenia what prophets taught. 3) Then there is the ever present question of interpretation, which, like the previous point, becomes increasingly difficult across time and culture and language. I think a "collective prophetic witness" type of model can be useful in getting at truth, but only if we are also willing to recognize where it will struggle.

How do you see that working with continuing revelation? Joseph Smith brought forth baptisms for the dead and promised “things which never have been revealed from the foundation of the world”. And in a moment of desperation he was also promised knowledge “that has not been revealed since the world was until now”. Joseph Smith also changed the universal understanding of the heaven/hell dichotomy to degrees of glory. A number of saints report they were ready to jump ship over that for the reasons you describe above. You could argue nuance, but that won’t address what Wilford Woodruff did. Previous prophets established that you wanted to be sealed to apostles so you have an unbroken chain to an exalted family. Wilford said your own parents are good enough for such an honor. You could argue that it was merely a practice or policy, but what about what Joseph F. Smith did? Peter taught that Jesus taught the disobedient in the days of Noah. Joseph F. says that’s incorrect, Jesus sent ministers instead.

It's become a punchline, even among women, how feminists will declare that men are the cause of all of society's ills, demand that men be forcibly segregated away from women so that women can be "protected", and then get upset because men are no longer participating in society. As I've mentioned before, this is a big part of why a lot of dudes would rather plunk down $30 for an anime girl statue if they want companionship than try their local dating scene.

For those wondering about my earlier posts with doors: Ms. Duncan's untimely death: