Our own Blixa added a nice comment on The Foyer regarding this article. I will quote her here:





So, you are saying that Blixa, as a member of "The Foyer", has a hard time functioning in normal society? That's rich. She is a highly regarded professor and author, and undoubtedly makes more money than you do. I'm positive that she has more education....and class.



I didn't think I would say this, but nice bitch slap, Port! ;-)



It's a damned good thing you never did. You would have a lot to answer for.

Let me ask you a question, BC. If you know that the Lord's counsel, according to the Bible, and according to the CHI involves spouses staying together under these circumstances, then why are you advocating divorce, speaking in "lay terms". You do realize that you are directly defying the Lord by doing this, don't you?
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I read 4 more articles from the site. Honestly, I can't tell if it's supposed to be a parody or not. Little help?

Does anyone here know if bcspace is really such an asshole? Is it a persona this person plays here on MD? Is it a joke, or a front, or something else?

Why does bcspace play such an ignorant hard-core black and white thinking Mormon asshole?

How does bcspace function in normal society?

And on that note, is there a way to block this person's idiotic posts?

Yes, you can put him on Ignore. Simply click on BC's profile. Underneath his name, you will see an icon that says, "Add friend" or "Add foe". If you add him as a foe, then all of his comments in any given thread will shrink. You will not actively see them unless you choose to click on that particular post. You will have to actively click on it to see his posts from that point on.

No one seems to be able to give a definitive answer. The consensus, unfortunately, seems to be that the website is genuine. One good thing to note, is that the author of this article is NOT a Church leader, in any sense...as far as being a GA, etc. In other words...he is not speaking in an official capacity for the Church in any way.

Actually, I would like to see the Church come after this guy. The things that he are saying directly contradict the gospel.

Family courts outside of Utah do not, as a general reliable rule, take such things as "apostate" dad or mom into account when deciding custody issues. The courts would likely demand the parties attend family counseling to prevent the divorce.

Any priesthood holder, whether leader or home teacher or neighbor, who gives this bad bad BAD advice is guilty of unrighteous dominion and should be stripped of his priesthood. This is completely contrary to the gospel and to church policy.

And any woman who follows it is an idiot and deserves to be required to sit through multiple sessions of Marriage and Family class, taught by part-member family members.

EA, if it's a parody it's an extremely well-played one. spamLDS aka Greg West has been posting his vitriolic comments on LDS & Evangelical discussion blogs for months now. Here is one discussion on it from a friendly ex-Mormon atheist after West accused him of "anti-Mormon obssession."

That doesn't rule out the possibility that West is just a guy having a laugh at the expense of the people who believe he's serious, but if that is the case, he's one of the most consistent, long-term trolls I've ever seen.

But I've seen people that crazy in the evangelical camp who were genuine, so I believe he could be for real.

On the one hand, they choose an anacronym that adds up to SPAM. That is an ironically derogatory term in context. They also use hilariously wrong reasoning, thick-headed anti-intellecualism, blatantly quote out of context, and so on in pretty obvious ways. The cocksure pose seems exaggerated for effect too. On the other, I've seen their style of argument used seriously often enough that it plausibly could be real. I'm leaning towards parody, especially with this article, but I really can't say for sure.

I could see how writing parody articles can be done for the sheer joy of making fun of others. And I've known trolls who've enjoyed the long con. That's usually the best kind of trolling. But point taken.

I can say that if I were to troll LDS critics for a loooong time with a secret alias using approaches I know are wrong, what I'd be doing it for is the congrats I'd get from LDS who would think I am the real deal.

I read the full quote before I posted that.
I was assuming he was talking about the TBM mother getting full physical custody of the child (in which the father would still have visitation rights with the children but they live with their mother most of the time), since there would be no reason that apostasy from Mormonism would deny him shared legal custody. The divorces in my family where the Mom has full custody, the father still spends a lot of time with the kids on the weekends, holidays, and other events. If the TBM chooses divorce, then I believe the apostate parent is going to become more hostile to the church and do everything in their power to prevent the children from being brain washed into the religion. And I also believe the children will become hostile to the church that broke up their family.

I could be wrong, but I thought the only cases where a parent gains full legal custody (in which the apostate would not be allowed any visitation) are in cases of child abuse/endangering their life. But, I guess in Utah they could probably get away with calling apostasy of a spouse a type of child abuse/endangerment, and stripping the parent of all rights to see the children, if that's what this bigot is suggesting.

Situation 1: A Christian man learns of the Church and joins without his wife, leaving the Body of Christ. He tries to influence his family and bride to learn the truth of the re-stored gospel.

GOOD!!!! The family will stay together and grow together if they join. If not, they will still blessed.
Any opposition to this effort is bigotry.

Situation 2: A Mormon learns of Jesus and His Sacrifice and leaves the Mormon Church to become a Christian. He tries to influence his family and bride to learn the truth about Christ and the Gospel.

BAD!!!! Divorce that anti-Mormon prick. Better yet, keep his children away from him. If he is actually an atheist, try to find ways to turn your whole family against him.

wat

I've seen him do some other things which have nudged me in the "genuine" direction. He mentioned in a comment on his site how Andrew S ought to be careful about posting his real name on the Internet because employers were going to Google him and learn about his hatred of Mormons, then he later deleted the comment. Strange move for a carefully calculating troll.

The only comment he's ever left on my blog (from here):


Nothing really over-the-top or exaggerated about that, it's pretty much the standard missionary script; it was just rather silly because it didn't even attempt to engage the actual discussion going on. Moments like that are what make me think he's for real and just that clueless.

I could be wrong though. He could just be a long-term troll with a lot of time on his hands. The world may never know.

I mentioned in another thread that I found that hate site about a month ago when I was reading this TBM blog authored by a black man who shares his powerful testimony and conversion story. He had the SPAM widget on his sidebar and the article showing was the divorce post. After I read it, the words really upset me because of recent threads on MAD where posters were encouraging divorce of apostates. (I'm very sensitive to this topic because of in laws who inferred they would support my husband if he left me because of my disaffection)

If the site is a parody, the sad part is that there are real LDS who agree with and support this bigoted behavior.

I highly doubt this guy is a parody. He posted inflammatory comments on my blog for a few months and pretty much said he was trying to pick a fight with me. When I didn't play along, he stopped commenting.

BC: The Foyer is a mixed bag of people, but I count among its members some very good friends. Far from being antisocial losers who can't handle reality, they are some of the finest, most ethical people I know.

This is what bothers me the most as well.

Bridget and I had a discussion about this in another thread....The thread regarding "A Question for Gazelam". Obviously, these folks who take this position have not read 1 Corinthians, Chapter 7.

Check Mike out here where he is reporting on zoning problems that LDS Inc is facing in trying to build another McTemple in Phoenix AZ:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T9AGcOKzgbY

What a douche, he wears a sticker on his shirt like a friggin primary kid that reads "I support the temple".


Check out Mike's lame ass tag line at the end of the clip: "SPAM -- The most despised TBM site on the INTERNET" Seriously Mike? More despised than even FAIR/MA&D??

I wonder if Mike is a Meldrumite?

Look at his picture. This guy has most likely confesses his masturbation problems to his bishop. I just hope he uses hand sanitizer before he prepares the sacrament.

Someone should invite this most feared TBM to Shady Acres.

It's been a while since we have had some fun with a TBM.

Our resident TBMs bcspace and Gazelam have become predictably boring.

I have applied to participate on his site. I'll let you know if he approves my membership. I was honest with him, so he probably won't. But if I am able to get on his site, I am going to approach him honestly, from a member's perspective, and see what he thinks about the scriptures I quoted. Breaking up families is not what the gospel is all about.

Haha! Thanks, liz!

Actually you should check back with that site and see the ginormous retort my rather small remark has generated. Holy cats! Here's some of my favorite bits:



Hmmm...I'm stumped how those remarks "obviously" indicate that I consider religion and Mormonism to be anti-intellectual. Or even SPAM itself for that matter; my few words were directed only a single post on that website. It's pretty fascinating that Mr. West understands comments directed at him as being equal to an attack on all religion and/or all of Mormonism.

It's also puzzling how my criticizing anti-intellectualism means I'm saying God doesn't exist.

But Mr. West is adept at reading between the lines, apparently:



Well, there's more here than just "English convention." If one really wanted to avoid assigning gender one could do it quite easily---in fact, I've done it right here! The male gender is assigned in this case because of the overall ideologic of his argument: here and in the earlier post the underlying assumption is men leave/women stay, a binary that neatly fits a patriarchal and essentialist gender code: men think/women feel.

The title of this recent post is "We've Struck A Nerve Again--comments on Anti-Intellectualism."

ORLY?

500 words +, and a rhetorical display that drags in brave marines, the pyramids at Giza, Bishop Tutu, Sir Isaac Newton, bigfoot, Judas, Brutus, Benedict Arnold, Lillburn Boggs, William Law, and generations of mothers and babies to counter only 33 words of off-the-cuff personal criticism? I think the lady doth protest too much.

Yeah, that was English convention, like, 30 years ago.

Now the convention is to avoid engendered language when the gender is uncertain, otherwise use "he or she." Rather cumbersome, but that's what the books say. S/he works well for online settings.

On a side-note, what is it with Mormon apologists and resisting gender-inclusive language? It's like a thing with them.