Nelson's Spiral of Death

[græy]

No, not the spiral of death the modern church is experiencing. Bill Reel and consig did their takedown on Mormonism Live, after which Bill posted on reddit (https://www.reddit.com/r/exmormon/comme ... proven_to/).

If I recall, consig also did a similar takedown of Nelson's story about getting robbed at gunpoint in Africa.

Nelson and Paul H. Dunn seem to have more than just their religion in common.

[jfro18]

That was a great podcast -I listened today at work... and Nelson is a bit of a serial liar, isn't he?

Here's the one that was pulled from his biography after the daughter and granddaughter of the person he was speaking about told Deseret Books the story was false: https://www.truthandtransparency.org/ne ... -m-nelson/

[Red Ryder]

I guess when you take the faith out of a faith promoting story all you have left is a story.

Interesting to see what happens if they pull the story from their websites or just go with it.

I mean it could have happened like he said it did.

Or the facts as simple as they are could be the truth.

I’ll choose Simple truth over faith promoting story.

[2bizE]

This spiral of death story came out about the time when Paul H. Dunn was at his prime with fabricated story telling…I wonder if this is where RMN learned to deceive.

[sparky]

I generally tend to think of the top leadership as sincere believers just doing their best, victims of the same false system that we all were. But things like this make that theory harder to believe. Sure, everyone misremembers some details of the stories they tell, and maybe adds a touch of dramatic flair in retelling it. But this goes from a completely benign aircraft hiccup to a miraculous near-death experience. From an engine stutter causing a precautionary landing at an airport to a flame-engulfed death spiral leading to an emergency landing in a farmers field*. An exaggeration that huge suggests intentional deception. Classic "lying for the Lord," making up ridiculous stories for the higher purpose of building faith in the church.

*Granted, an airport in Delta, Utah may very well be mistaken for a farmer's field

[jfro18]

On a positive note, missedinsunday.com is back in business and producing new memes... this one was a given...

[Hagoth]

I'm beginning to form a new definition of what kind of person likes to be called a prophet. Maybe a "prophet" who claims to experience miracles beyond what ordinary folks experience is just a liar?

[Hagoth]

There are really only two options when you take into account all of the Nelson stories that have turned out to be demonstrably untrue:

1) Russell M. Nelson is a bald-faced liar

2) Russell M. Nelson is delusional

Either option disqualifies him from being a trustworthy and competent leader.

[Corsair]

I am imagining that the apologetic explanation involves Nelson being actually concerned for his life at some point. Perhaps he overestimated the danger he was in. "Ask the class to share an experience where they thought they were in a dangerous situation and turning to prayer brought them comfort."

[Reuben]

There are really only two options when you take into account all of the Nelson stories that have turned out to be demonstrably untrue:

1) Russell M. Nelson is a bald-faced liar

2) Russell M. Nelson is delusional

Either option disqualifies him from being a trustworthy and competent leader.

I have a third option that also supports disqualification.

There are 3 major things that our brains try to keep consistent:
1. The external world
2. Our internal worlds (thoughts, memories, beliefs, actions, expectations, etc.)
3. The inferred internal worlds of people in our social groups

There's legit a system of rewards (peace, euphoria, pride) and punishments (cognitive dissonance, guilt, shame) to keep them all in sync. We all differ on how much our brains weight these. I'm certain that mine gives lower weight than average to #3, and higher weight than average to #2. Context matters. The sciences use #3 to give more weight to #1 and #2. Mormonism installs a philosophical framework that weights #3 higher by attributing consonance with the group to being on good terms with God.

Some people weight #1 and #2 lower than other people. Sometimes they're called mystics. Sometimes they make great leaders - people who are bothered less than others that reality doesn't match the one they want to make. Sometimes they make terrible leaders.

Now suppose #3 is really important to your brain, and #1 isn't. You'll actually remember things differently - more like what will please others - and your memories will be more malleable. You'll rely more on other people to keep you honest. You'll probably function just fine. But what if people stop correcting you?

So here's my third option: President Nelson has a casual relationship with reality and a strong drive for pride instead of shame. And he's risen to a position where nobody calls him on his BS - about spiritual things it's actually fawned over - so he ends up believing it.

I suppose you could call this delusional, but he seems to function just fine otherwise.

[sparky]

There are 3 major things that our brains try to keep consistent:
1. The external world
2. Our internal worlds (thoughts, memories, beliefs, actions, expectations, etc.)
3. The inferred internal worlds of people in our social groups

There's legit a system of rewards (peace, euphoria, pride) and punishments (cognitive dissonance, guilt, shame) to keep them all in sync. We all differ on how much our brains weight these

Reuben this is a really interesting and helpful framework, thanks for sharing! I've never seen it explained like this before, I'm going to have to ponderize this.

[Not Buying It]

Let's go back to the story about the armed robbery for a moment. At the time I thought it odd that a prophet, seer, and revelator, and apostle even, with protecting angels at his disposal allowed an elderly woman in his company to be manhandled and have her arm broken:

https://www.ksl.com/article/6660347/lds ... mozambique

I mean really, think about it for a minute, LDSLiving fell all over itself talking about how President Nelson's life was spared (https://www.ldsliving.com/When-Angels-S ... rs/s/80645), but when he says (direct quote) "We know we were protected by angels round about us", apparently said angels were too busy protecting Elder Nelson's life to protect Cindy Packard from getting her arm broken. What kind of LDS Superhero with all these awesome prophetic powers stands by passively and lets armed ruffians break a lady's arm? Hell, in Liberty Jail Joseph Smith rebuked the guards and they trembled (yeah, right) - Elder Nelson just stood there and let these guys rough a lady up to the point her arm was broken. And he didn't even heal her arm after with his magical apostle powers.

Either he doesn't have superpowers and he knows it, or he was too damn selfish with them to protect or heal Cindy Packard. Neither is a good look for him.

[Just This Guy]

So here's my third option: President Nelson has a casual relationship with reality and a strong drive for pride instead of shame. And he's risen to a position where nobody calls him on his BS - about spiritual things it's actually fawned over - so he ends up believing it.

I would offer an option #4. Rusty has a severe case of SPS (small 'priesthood antenna' syndrome). After a successful career in medicine he developed a rather larger and inflated ego. He did alright because his work was able top justify it. He did have to keep up appearances of how great he was to distract from his personal insecurity due to his lack of endowment.

Eventually, he took a job at LDS Inc where there are a lot more people with equally massive egos. He started out as low man on the totem pole, this included getting the occasional smack down from GBH and other people higher up them him. Going from being top dog in his field to whipping boy was a major challenge for him.

He managed to outlive everyone else and finally came to the top, only to inherit a church in a state of decline. Numbers are down across the board. The church is a embarrassment to the general public. The big moral pushes(IE gay marriage) he was behind backfired and he was on the loosing side. On top of that, I'm sure there is some cognitive dissonance that he big dog doesn't actually talk to Jesus like they lead everyone to believe. All that work to get to the top and all he gets is a mess.

IN his mind the most important thing is to maintain his legacy. He has to keep the ego fed, but it is harder and harder to do. He surrounds himself with "Yes" men, but the world goes around them to slap the church (and him by association) around that and fails to see his greatness.

Those insecurities are brought back up. He tries to compensate for them by fostering a public image that he is superman, in a spiritual sense. The irony is that the more he tries to compensate, the more people loose faith and respect for him and the more his insecurities show.

[Hagoth]

I suppose you could call this delusional, but he seems to function just fine otherwise.

yeah, I'm still putting it in the delusional category. He hasn't lost grip on reality but where his own ego is involved he can't always tell where reality ends and fantasy starts.

But I think it's more likely that he's just intentionally stretching the truth, whether for self-serving purposes or permitting himself to think that he's performing a service to bolster other peoples' faith.

I guess there is yet another option. Russell Nelson is a puppet of other people (e.g. Wendy, Sherry Dew) who keep rewriting his stories to make them more action-packed and he just goes along with it because he is told to do so.

[wtfluff]

I suppose you could call this delusional, but he seems to function just fine otherwise,

Let's face it: Anyone who claims to "know" things about religion, invisible all-powerful beings, etc. is delusional. Claiming to "know" things for which there is absolutely no real evidence is delusional.

However: The human brain has an immense capacity to compartmentalize religious (and other) delusions, and keep them completely separate from "reality" and allow people to function quite normally in society. Sometimes those delusions take over and those delusional people become dangerous. Most of the time the delusions remain compartmentalized. It's one thing that consistently amazes me about the human brain: That ability to compartmentalize. I did it as a believer. I still do it today; Though I don't spend quite so much time believing in an "all-powerful" dude living near Kolob wearing a swank toga. The delusional part of my brain focuses on other delusions nowadays.