I have so many book ideas, and I have all the skills. It's a shame that I struggle with disabilities and lack of supports to heal and live so that I can write those books.
While writing about Natasha Helfer's excommunication, it occurs to me that there isn't a book (that I know of) about prominent LDS excommunications. Each and every one of the political excommunications I'm citing are interesting all on their own. And some I'm not citing (like Fawn Brodie) because they don't connect to Natasha's story.
I'd write that book after finishing my scripture, then the one on Abuse Culture.
I've also got a bunch of unwritten novels in me, and two novels (sequels to Emerald City Dreamer) that are in first draft and need finishing and publishing.
These lacks of support are intentional. I'm less competition now. My ability to speak truth to power is severely fettered.
I would give my maximum my efforts and talents to making cool shit for everyone. All I ask in return is to be taken care of with my basic needs and comforts. I don't need much. The idea that we need to be threatened and cajoled into working by the threat of starvation is a lie.
The truth there is that we need to be threatened and cajoled to do THEIR WORK FOR THEM.
Here's an incomplete list just of feminists excommunicated from the LDS Church for their feminist activism and writings:
Sonia Johnson, Maxine Hanks, Lynne Kanavel Whitesides, Lavina Fielding Anderson, Margaret Toscano, Janice Merrill Allred, Kate Kelly, and Natasha Helfer.
Most of these women are still alive, but are aging rapidly. It would be nice for someone to write about them while they're still here to interview.
At least I'm getting Natasha's story. She might not say she was excommunicated for feminist activism, but I consider her sex-positivity work to be deeply feminist.
And this list doesn't count the other awesome people excommunicated for thought crimes.
What do my fellow #Exvangelical antifascists think about this tactic?
I think it could be surprisingly effective, for those of us who grew up in it. Providing you've dealth with any #ReligiousTrauma enough for it not to trigger you.
I've never seen the phrase "that I know of" carry so much water:
'“There is no other religious organization in the world,” J. Anette Dennis, first counselor [LDS] Relief Society General Presidency, said, “that I know of, that has so broadly given power and authority to women.”'
And oh wow, they're just giving up temple secrets–I mean sacreds–to the news media now huh?
Anyway, apparently LDS women are supposed to be happy with the cookie they get but aren't allowed to eat, i.e. actually make real leadership decisions, without oversight from men, that affect anyone other than women and children.
(Yes, I got the "priesthood" in the temple but wasn't even allowed to talk about it, that's how much power it gave me.)
Keep trying, guys. Keep on trying right up until you give women real equal rights in that church.
'Dennis cited... President... Nelson, in which the current leader explained, “As a righteous, endowed Latter-day Saint woman, you speak and teach with power and authority from God.”
'If some women have not always appreciated this fact, it is because, Dennis said, “the adversary [SATAN!] wants to focus our attention on what we haven’t been given and blind us to all that we have been given.”'
Ah yes, DARVO. It's always the members' fault for misunderstanding. Even though I was told specifically and expressly and repeatedly that men were in charge and that I couldn't even talk about the honorary priesthood cookie I got in the temple.
I got an ordination by filling out a form online that I've used more often to invoke religious authority than I was ever allowed to use my honorary LDS priesthood.
You can get one, too, and you can make holy water or even officiate marriages:
Great to see that the #OrdainWomen movement still has momentum, by the way. I'm to the chapter in my client's book wherein she is active early on in that movement early '10s, and I had worried it might have fizzled. But nope! Still making headlines. Still making the LDS church react.
Heavenly Father: So the women will have receptivity to the Spirit and an enhanced moral compass. They'll be the nurturing and compassionate ones.
Jesus: Cool, cool.
Heavenly Father: Men on the other hand will struggle to tell right from wrong and will have to work hard to receive spiritual revelation. That way we can really test their faith.
Jesus: Yep, yep.
Heavenly Father: And that's not even the best part...
As Spencer Macnaughton reports, 1 in 3 American adults say that they have suffered from religious trauma. "Religious trauma occurs when an individual’s religious upbringing has lasting adverse effects on their physical, mental or emotional well-being, according to the Religious Trauma Institute."
"Experts say LGBTQ people — who represent more than 7% of the U.S. population, according to a 2023 Gallup poll — experience religious trauma at disproportionate rates and in unique ways. Very little research has been done in this field, but a 2022 study found that LGBTQ people who experience certain forms of religious trauma are at increased risk for suicidality, substance abuse, homelessness, anxiety and depression."
"And as political animus toward the LGBTQ community intensifies ahead of the 2024 presidential election, many queer people say their pain is resurfacing."
Weaponized religion kills people. And lots of Christians at this time, especially in the US and especially among Republicans, have weaponized religion to attack the segment of the human community that is LGBTQ.
As millions of their fellow Christians and fellow citizens watch in silence.