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Wednesday, January 18, 2012

Sex / Religion "Mormonism's Lethal Culture of Sexual Dysfunction"

Posted by David Schmader on Wed, Jan 18, 2012 at 12:53 PM

From Jared Spurbeck's shocking and illuminating piece posted on Yahoo!'s Contributor Network, about a little-known, very private, and totally effed-up practice within the Mormon Church:

I sat in my Mormon bishop's office, red-faced and silent. I was humiliated and scared; humiliated that I'd told this strange adult such personal things, and scared that he would follow through with his threat of church discipline. Scared that I wouldn't be able to go on a mission and that everyone would know what a failure I was. My crime? As an 18-year-old adult, I had just confessed that I masturbated. A few years later, after being publicly shamed for my sins, I was still unable to break my "addiction" and came very close to killing myself.

I wasn't alone

In 1982, Mormon Kip Eliason killed himself at the age of 16 because of "the immense feeling of self-hatred" he had, as a result of not being able to comply with the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints' teachings regarding masturbation. Mormon youth of both genders are taught that it is a sin, and told to confess their sexual sins to their adult male bishops, in one-on-one interviews behind closed doors. Church discipline is not usually prescribed for the sin of masturbation, but bishops are given wide latitude to act as they feel the Spirit dictates.

About those adult male bishops conducting the sexual interrogations behind closed doors: Bishop sounds fancy, but Mormon bishops are, for the most part, married male church members. (Any male church member is eligible to be a bishop—even black males, after 1978!—but typically only married men are selected, Jake tells me.) So, these interviews involve a private interview on sexual habits with, say, your friend's dad, or the old guy down the street.

Read Spurbeck's whole piece here. (And thanks to Slog tipper my father-in-law.)

Comments (20) RSS

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They don't usually ask the girls if they masturbate... because everyone knows girls don't do that sort of thing!

Posted by ex-mormon on January 18, 2012 at 12:57 PM

My husband left the church for this very reason. He confessed his sin (one he'd been feeling immense guilt over for years) to his Bishop in preparation for his mission. He wanted to out himself to the whole ward (he felt he'd done them all wrong by blessing sacrament w/ his dirty hands). The Bishop said, "it's no big deal. Every man struggles with this."
After having this horrible sin dismissed as something insignificant, my husband declined his mission and left the church.

Posted by REW on January 18, 2012 at 1:20 PM

cue "it's no crazier than any other religion".

you know what? Dems are too big of pussies to make Mormonism an issue in the general. And that's too bad. Because Karl Rove sure as fuck would.

Posted by Max Solomon on January 18, 2012 at 1:26 PM

Not masturbating causes cancer. God totally wants you to live in frustration and then die of cancer. Yup, that guy's a bastard.

Posted by treefort on January 18, 2012 at 1:29 PM

I have a couple of ex-mormon friends, they'd confess stuff to their bishop, even when they hadn't done anything, just to freak him out. Catholics had the same experience with confession and again I know plenty of people who didn't confess stuff they did and did confess stuff just to freak the priests out. When I was a teenage the evangelical protestant churches were big on hauling teenage couples in front of their churches and making take vows not to do drugs and to remain "chaste" until marriage. After church the kids would roast a bowl and screw in their cars.

I don't see how this is very secret, shocking, or limited to the Mormon Church.

Posted by MichaelfromHA on January 18, 2012 at 1:34 PM

Religion perverts. Period. What's really sad is how people put this on their own children. Fucked up! But they now have the internet and I suspect more than a few eyes are being opened.

Posted by Vince on January 18, 2012 at 1:49 PM

If knowing the response to admitting your sins is being publicly shamed, why the hell would you do it? Also, why bother with closed doors if he's just going to turn around and tell everyone about it anyway? And what form does this public shaming take?

Posted by Knat on January 18, 2012 at 2:08 PM

My boss--and friend--is a Bishop in the LDS church and he's got more than he can handle dealing with kids who have very real drug issues, come from homes with very real physical and emotional abuse and kids who he's trying to help stay in school. Every religion has its fringes, but the reality is usually far more mundane.

That said, IMO Cee Lo Green had it right.

Posted by I Got Nuthin' on January 18, 2012 at 2:24 PM

So instead of Policy Wonks the Romney administration will have a Wanking Policy?

Posted by Anastasia Beaverhausen on January 18, 2012 at 2:29 PM

"Mormon bishops are, for the most part, married male church members"

David-- just to be clear, the "married" part is a good thing right? Imagine if these private interviews had been conducted with adult men who had sworn a life of celibacy.

Posted by eclexia on January 18, 2012 at 3:47 PM

@7 Aw, you used logic! How quaint.

As a former Catholic, I can say that though God may not be real, religious organizations are, along with alienation and depression. I can also tell you that I have never felt so utterly alone than when I attended Easter mass on a warm sunny day surrounded by hundreds of people and my extended family. I worried about reactions, about how long I would or could maintain the charade. And the best part? My family, middle-class New Englanders that they are, are relatively permissive on the national scale. All of that is small comfort to a teenager who worries about being isolated from people he has trusted for social (and yes, economic) support his entire life.

It's sociology, not geometry.

Posted by Xenos on January 18, 2012 at 3:51 PM

10: Yes! It's nice they're married. But they're also just laymen schmucks.

9: You win!

Posted by David Schmader on January 18, 2012 at 3:52 PM

Onan the Barbarian.

Posted by Roma on January 18, 2012 at 3:54 PM

But the local buses tell me that Mormons are just regular people?

Posted by Mugwumpt on January 18, 2012 at 4:10 PM

So should the billboards read "I'm a Mormon. So I don't masturbate, or I will have to confess my sin to my Bishop, who will publicly shame me."

Doesn't quite carry the same being-a-Mormon-is-so-totally-normal spin to it.

Posted by catballou on January 18, 2012 at 7:26 PM

Almost as bad? Buying INTO the bullshit as a Mormon teen and not jerking off even once until you are in your mid 20s-- or beyond.

Posted by SecretBYUBottomBoy on January 18, 2012 at 7:55 PM

@4 Why would God create cancer if he doesn't want us to get it?

You don't masturbate, you die from cancer and you go to hell because you're a Jew. The system works!

Posted by sirkowski

on January 18, 2012 at 8:08 PM

It seems one or two sinful omissions could counteract a whole lot of sinful emissions.

Posted by Proteus on January 18, 2012 at 8:50 PM

Having grown up Mormon, I confessed to masturbating a few times to my bishop, once the traditional annual interview started (after I turned 12, I think). It was horrible and awkward, and neither of us questioned the creepy exercise at all. You guys need to understand: when you grow up Mormon, you grow up cult. No questioning, no objectivity, period. It's not like growing up Baptist or Catholic. It's on another level.

Posted by katallred on January 18, 2012 at 10:54 PM

Every time I tell my boyfriend about things like this from my Mormon past, he shits himself and says "That is NOT ok!" It's interesting to see these horrible things from the outside in, because when you grow up Mormon, this kind of creepy thing just seems totes normal.

Posted by KingofQueenAnne