The Work and the Glory book series depicted Joseph Smith's polygamy as an anti-Mormon lie.

Hey, Mormons! Remember how The Work and the Glory books depict Joseph Smith as DEFINITELY NOT a sexual predator practicing secret polygamy and polyandry and any character who disagreed was an anti-Mormon liar? Guess what? That's a dishonest portrayal of history and those "anti-Mormons" weren't the liars.

This feels really important to me because of how prominently this book series was displayed in Mormon households around me growing up. 

I did a lot of babysitting for Mormon families in the 2000s, and it was always there, right on the family room shelf next to a bunch of other church books. 

My grandma still has her copies, the ones that I borrowed and read one summer during high school.

I didn't bat an eye when I read that Joseph Smith's polygamy was an anti-Mormon lie in the books because I was never taught the truth!

The church lied to me. 

The church knew I was not learning an accurate narrative. They didn't bother to tell the truth. They're only reluctantly doing so now because the Internet has freed people to find information on their own and that's for forcing the church's hand. 

Controlling information by whitewashing, actively lying, and gaslighting members when we complain that we WERE NOT taught this information about very relevant and important church history is one of many reasons I think the church is a cult.  

I'm tired of genuine expressions of pain being labeled as "hate"

It's culty to silence people who talk about why they left the church. People should be able to talk about the ways the church caused them pain and trauma.

This focus on keeping it all "positive" and spreading "peace" is impossible when there is real harm done by the church.

It is not "hate" or "being anti-Mormon" to tell real stories and express real pain!

When you hear a Mormon say that someone is spreading "hate" or being really "anti", that probably means they heard someone talk about real pain caused by the church, but they just don't want to hear it.

For most of us who leave, we realllllly want to be heard! Just to be heard! That's all. We don't have to agree. We don't have to believe the same things.

But so many of us never even get to talk because we are told we are being hateful, that we are deceived, or that we are attacking someone's faith by expressing our own pain... 

The church does real harm, but Mormons will ignore it for the sake of following the prophet.

I'm heartbroken, distressed, and feel emotionally exhausted every time there is a push to try and bring Mormon church abuses to light, but then nothing substantial changes. The church does real harm. It's so frustrating. 😢😢😢

It also makes me feel unsafe.

This kind of thing (the recent focus on the mishandling of sexual abuse by the church) makes me realize how much more important the organization of the church is to Mormons than the actual suffering of human beings. Following the prophet is more important than anything else, even when prophets are wrong and causing irreparable harm.

Prophets can be wrong! It's a fact!

That obedience to an organization is such a huge part of some people's lives that to acknowledge the pain it causes is a bridge too far, and that's terrifying to me.

It's terrifying and culty to see that human suffering has to be dismissed by good people in order to hold their beliefs together.