Jane_Doe

I am a member of society, former attendee of BYU-I and have many loved ones whom are graduates of BYU Provo, and family members currently attending BYU. I find being able to articulate one’s concerns at be an important skill. I can’t help find a solution to a problem that’s not expressed. And no, I don’t find educating women to be a problem or sinful. Same with women being able to choose to work. Same for folks attracted to members of the same sex. I have encountered folks ( both at BYU’s, in the church, and in general) whom have very harmful ideas of “ masculinity “, which frequently involve curtailing the agency of others and limiting thier own growth.

Indeed. You have a “call to arms” and yet cannot explain what your concern is. I am trying to understand.

Again, that’s not helpful for me to understand what you mean here.

People can listen to the same talk and hear very different messages. There is an extremely high probability of that being the case for this talk. As I’m specifically interested in how YOU are using the term, my asking you for your own definition in your own words, rather than me imposing my hearing on to you.

Can you elaborate on what you mean when you use the term “marshmallow men”?

You have not elaborated on what you consider to be “marshmallow men”. But a woman working does NOT mean her husband is of lesser quality. Neither does A woman earning a degree somehow make a man weaker.

You are judging me, your coworkers, thier husbands, etc. Again: a woman working or having a education does not equate to “omega-males”. Rather, a man should CELEBRATE another person getting a degree, working a good job, other other accomplishments.

We’re talking about the here & now Earthly life. Again, a woman working does NOT mean her husband is some type of lesser quality. It is very inaccurate and offsenive for anyone to make such an assumption or judge them at all.

Myself: all of the above. I enjoy my job: it gives me puzzles, new things to learn & solve, etc. That doesn't mean I don't also prize my family extremely. But I also do enjoy my work. Which isn't to say that there aren't headaches involved with it that I regularly gripe about. Running through other ladies I know: - She works at a school because she enjoys being able to learn how better educate her children, and to help other kids & families learn. It's a "because I have been given much" attitude. Plus, she enjoys having the extra money in the family budget to save for children's college and rainy-day fund. - She works because she wants to & enjoys the connection with other adults. She goes stir crazy and clinically depressed when she's been a a stay-at-home mom. - She works because she loves her husband and doesn't want him gone 100+ hours a week working multiple jobs. She'd rather have him work one job, and then come home to be with her & the kids both emotionally/physically. She choose to work some herself rather than have a MIA husband. - She works because her husband has health issues and it's uncertain how long he'll be able to work at all. Her working means they have savings now and if he needs to stop working she already has an established career. - She works to better learn & challenge herself. She's loves the new skills she's acquired and wants to keep growing mentally. None of these ladies are working because their husband is lazy or a dog. In fact, I know each of the husbands and they are all good hard working men at the job & at home as husbands & fathers. It's HORRIBLY inaccurate and offense to both the ladies and men to assume "oh she's working, he must be low quality".

Pardon me: but that seems really shaky ground for a huge position and inherently HUGELY judgmental one.

You do realize that that's an assumption, and yourpostions seems to be largely built on it?

Why do you believe that a woman choosing to work somehow means her husband is of lesser quality? (If I'm incorrect in my understanding of your viewpoint here, I apologize and please help me understand better).

*Thumbs up to your awesome sounding wife and hilarious grandma* I totally acknowledge and respect you & your wife's decision of how to do things. I am assuming that at least some of your female coworkers are married and that they (your coworkers) choose to work. Do you find that in anyway reflects badly on said female coworkers or their husbands?

Im first establishing groundwork. Hence the phrase “for starters”. And yes, I have seen people whom do disagree with this groundwork, hence my stating it to make sure that this foundational point is discussed & clear.

I’m going to answer this in general, as I don’t have any particular ties to BYU. For starters, a person should be thier best self, independently of how well anyone else is doing. We should also congratulate others for being better verisions of themselves without feeling threatened by thier progress. Hence a girl doing well, including getting get a education & job, doesn’t threaten a boy, or vise versa.

I’m going to passionately disagree with you on about every point here @mikbone. Honestly I’m not even sure where to start.

Your brother seems like he's carrying some major hurt. I doubt any answer here will truly help him- rather specifically resolve that decade+ of old hurt. I just don't see that happening. But to answer the question nonetheless: vast majority of the time, things are indeed focused on Christ & the concepts of loving each other-- as they should be, those are the most important. Sometimes there are specific situations where loving your neighbor does come to a specific call of action: such as the need for us all to fight this pandemic and take care of each other. It's not a "I can do whatever I want and I'm not going to affect anyone else" situation. Yes, there is that strong urging for covid cautious in scheduled programs (closing down Sacrament meetings, temples, etc) and individuals day to day (asking people to vaccinate, mask, social distance, etc). As to people struggling with this urging: yes some people do indeed struggle. We're all human: some readily follow, some rationalize blatant blowing it off, some kind of in the middle, etc. I'm not going to pretend that's not the case. We're each supposed to study things out: think for yourself, look at leaders words, consult with the Lord, etc. It never should be about just blindly following. I personally do find that the covid-cautious route is wise and agree full heartedly here. I also acknowledge that others have more internal conflict on this topic. And my heart goes out to those people: I myself have struggled with other topics. My heart is sympathetic and moved, though I still urge what I believe to be best (the covid-cautious route). And I totally acknowledge whatever path you've taken on this and other issues.

A deaf person is perfectly capable of functioning in society and communicating as a hearing person. ASL is amazing and the deaf people I knew (whom were majority LDS) considered it to be a legit miracle from God. There are also many other tools to aide with things (texting, alarms with lights, etc). Is it the same life as a hearing person? Obviously not. But it is still just a legitimate and such individuals should not be approached as if they are “broken”. Likewise it’s not abusive for parents to not automatically force thier children to be something they are not naturally. Rather, it should indeed be a carefully thought out decision.

And @NeuroTypical lands a 300% bullseye into the heart of the matter! Amazingly well said.

You're still approaching tings from the perspective of "a deaf person is disabled and less able to communicate". Would you likewise try to "cure" me of being autistic? Or Traveler's brothers for being color-blind? Or a left-handed person such as myself? Do you likewise see these as ailments that need to be fixed and you don't understand why anyone in those boats won't jump at the chance to be "normal"?

<I'm not deaf, but I am basically familiar with deaf culture, having attended a deaf ward for 18 months specifically to study ASL and deaf culture. And I happen to think deaf culture completely rocks.> To best explain this, a parallel example is helpful: I'm not a neurotypical person. Officially, I'm high functioning autistic. I see the world in logic and equations, and have a powerful ability to break down any problem -- I invented my own version of calculus at age 12 because it was useful and obvious to me. On the flip side: there's a lot of "normal" social nuances that are baffling to me: fashion, social cues, correct level of delicateness, etc. Naturally, I make "weird" gestures, I can talk "strange", and be "too blunt". Growing up, my mom approached this a problem to be "cured": according to her, I had a "disability" and needed to learn to "act normal". .... and honestly that approach was hugely damaging to our relationship and my self esteem. I am not broken: I am me. I am a daughter of God. Yes, the way I AM. To quote Elder Holland "there is nothing wrong with singing in your own voice". My daughter is now very similar to me: at age 4 she was doing 100 piece puzzles, age 6 starting multiplication, etc. She is clueless about fashion. And that's ok: she is beautiful. And if anybody tries to "fix her disability" I'm going to go Rage Mama Tiger at that idiot. Likewise, a deaf child is beautiful. Yes, she/he is different than a standard hearing kid, but still beautiful. Deafness often brings a great eye for beauty, a composite nature, a deep awareness of how others are feeling, etc. A deaf person is are not "broken" and don't need "fixed". And cochlear implant hearing is not true hearing either. And there can be a lot of resentment if somebody approaches them or their kids that way.

Why?

What's already done: All eligible folks in my family got vaccinated as soon as they were able to. My daughter was/is too young. Everyone distanced and wore masks very diligently through middle of summer, despite frequently being the only persons in the room to do so. We did start attending in-person church again, my daughter frequently being the only kid in Primary to mask. Our interactions with non-family were small in count (+outside + cautious), but super important to us. through July we were less masked, but still cautious. What's now being done, as the result of life events + numbers going crazy + First Presidency letter: putting the mask back on and more reclusive. If the only people at risk were adults whom willfully choose to not vax, that would be one thing (my sympathy is low for them). But it's not: we still have unprotected kids, including our new baby, all of those people whom still need medical care to be available for non-covid stuff, and exhausted health care workers like my dad. And my duty as a responsible citizen / child-of-God is not yet done. So, back to stronger caution for us. I really really want to be able to work full-time from home again. I've postponed baby's baby blessing. I'm really hesitant about continuing in-person church, knowing how so many of my ward are very un-cautious. As to folks that have other views: I'm tired. I acknowledge your view, same I think it's dumb or wise. But i don't want to have this conversation again with folks I know surface-level in real life. I'm just too tired, and hate how this whole thing has become crazy political and extreme-ified. I don't want to hear my literal neighbors rant about the whole thing (whether it's a wise or dumb perspective), I'd rather just care for you without that contention.

Zooming out to what is known: -Hawaii is in a very tough position when in comes to covid. They rely economically on tourism from all around the world. So lots of opportunity for things to come in. Most of the population is also very concentrated in certain areas- the population density of Waikiki is 7x that of Tokyo. So they want people to come in, but also want to not have things go rampant. Hence a lot of thier actions as a state -BYUH is a prime example of this: their students come from all around the world, in addition to general Hawaii tourism, the Polynesian Center is a huge part of BYUH’s history, culture, and students finances - if it has to shut down many students won’t be able to work and pay for school/living. -It’s a HORRIBLE situation to be in as a decision maker. You want to respect individual choices, but there’s also the group to look out for. I do get the impression it was a school-admin decision to mandate the vaccine. And they appear to be working hard to make things work for cases where a student declines. I’m not sure how the current general rules are in Hawaii. -Zooming specifically about this one student: I would like to know a fuller picture of what’s going on (if we’re going to stick out noses in her specific affairs). The linked news article appears extemely biased in its accounting of things. Like I’m wondering: if you have an autoimmune condition severe enough that getting a vaccine has large chance of death: would you not likewise have problems with other vaccine? What would happen if you actually did contract the full disease - is that not even more life threatening? Would it be safest for you to do an online school rather than a densely populated international tourist attraction? There’s so many unanswered questions here, I can’t even begin to make a call.

I think it’s fair, that if you’re contributing to something, to have reasonable expectations of what the contribution is going for. You also have right to choose withdrawal support if things aren’t going. On the or there side:people receiving the contribution have the right to know what the associated expectations are, and to decline the contribution of things aren’t reasonable or they choose to take a different path. And all all of the above should be separate from affection! Love is not a bartering chip!!