MsJack wrote:
It does not matter in the long term whether or not Dan, William, Bill Hamblin, Midgley, et al manage to convince the administration at BYU or the authorities of the LDS church to revive FARMS. It matters in the short term, because if they accomplished that, they could get back to running the FARMS journal and producing material there for the rest of their careers. But it won't matter in the long run, and here's why: it isn't administrators and authorities who need to be convinced. Rather, it's the rising generation of young LDS scholars completing graduate work in biblical studies, history, and other relevant fields, who need convincing.
Without heirs and proteges, the days of the FARMS crowd are numbered. And almost the entire generation of younger Mormon studies scholars (people in their 20s and 30s) has rejected the FARMS approach. Even those who were originally inspired by and drawn to FARMS in their youth have since become disillusioned with their former mentors, and the few who remain nominally interested in apologetics are forging a dramatically kinder and gentler path. A new generation of Hamblins and Midgleys and Petersons and Gees is not on the rise.
So yeah, keep on rolling sock puppets and baiting people on with whispers of clandestine meetings where the antics of key FARMS apologists are being discussed and the criticisms of them found wanting. There will always be enough people on this forum to care enough about something as transparently stupid as that to drag it on for 15 pages. The real score can be seen by examining the number of young people who have valued the FARMS approach enough to model their lives after it. If you're not a fan of the FARMS approach, then what a glorious future it is.
This is absolutely on the money. That's why I'm convinced now that Bradford and Co. won't worry at all about the online antics of Peterson's group if they really still have to defend the decision that was made. They know they've got the "youth movement" on their side, and they're going to use that to their advantage.