Another (!) brilliant article in the New York Times - How the Gay Rights Movement Radicalized, and Lost Its Way

[ProfesoraLou]

How the Gay Rights Movement Radicalized, and Lost Its Way

If the New York Times was captured (and I really thought it was), it has broken free.

This is rational, balanced and personal. Really important writing.

www.nytimes.com/2025/06/26/opinion/gay-lesbian-trans-rights.html

Hmmm..I have some thoughts on that, will post more tmw. I was thinking also, what about issues like contraception? These are controversial w religions incl Catholicism.I guess the factual approach would be to say what each is & the info, but not recommend the morality of one over the other. But some parents would feel that mentioning is itself inappropriate.

I think for small children, "families come in different shapes and sizes" will cover it. I'm wary of RSE because very often it seems like an occasion for teachers to introduce their own ideological or cultural enthusiasms.

Sometimes I think of that (possibly apocryphal) story about the kid who mentioned she had two mums and the teacher went off on a big speech about LGBTQ+ inclusion before it turned out the kid was Muslim and her dad had two wives.

I wonder if that kind of thing happens a lot in Utah. Salt Lake these days is full of Californian transplants who move there for lower taxes, less crime and better schools, but who don't really get the local culture. And there's still a lot of down-low polygamy in Utah that a San Franciscan might mistake for something else.

Utah still allows polygamy?? I've been reading about Mormonism recently & a lot of deconverts say that they began having serious doubts when they realised that Joseph Smith did practice polygamy (in fact he had 34 wives, some who were already married to others, & one who was only 14🤢) . Apparently there's been a lot of denial among leaders that he had multiple wives. Do the mainstream Mormons see the down-low polygamists as not following the faith correctly?

Sorry that's a bit off-topic...

It's very illegal, and probably the easiest way to get kicked out of the mainstream LDS church, but it never really went away, especially in the rural areas.

The history and theology behind it is... complicated, and church leadership prefer to treat it as an embarrassing bit of history that they'd rather not talk about.

Ah right, thanks. I was aware that a few did it from TV programs that implied it was a rare fringe. That's unlucky it's still around... I suppose such men are only legally married to one of the wives?
Yes, articles I've read gave the impression that discussing Smith's polygamy would raise too many questions about his character & general claims, so it was until recently barely discussed in the mainstream.

The expert on all this is Dorothy Allred Solomon. Her memoir Daughter of the Saints is a great read, but for something shorter try this: polygamy in america - polygamy today - mormon polygamy | Marie Claire

The novel The 19th Wife is a good read about the Mormons and polygamy en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_19th_Wife

It's a fascinating subject. I'm not LDS, but a few branches of my extended family are, and thanks to 19th century polygamy I have zillions of cousins in Utah and Idaho. This probably includes Dorothy Allred Solomon, because everyone with 19th century Mormons in their family tree is related to everyone else with 19th century Mormons in their family tree.

The mainstream LDS have gone out of their way over the past 100 years to become boringly wholesome and law-abiding normie Americans whose eccentricities are mostly in the realm of not drinking tea or coffee and not swearing. (I sometimes watch reaction videos on YouTube. I can always spot the Mormon ladies because, no matter how dramatic the thing they're watching, they never say anything stronger than "oh my gosh" or "what the heck")

The fundamentalists who held onto polygamy after 1890 are their own very spicy subculture, which ranges from people who try to practice it ethically, to really abusive incestuous clans. The latter are more fringe but get more of the headlines.

I should probably write about this in depth 😂

You should write more, v interesting! The article made it sound like Dorothy didn't notice any discord between wives as a kid, tho obvs there could have been behind closed doors

. I'm glad the ones who do this now mostly try to be ethical. I'm sure some people want to practice it ethically, and some can be happy, but like any multiple partner arrangement, I don't think it would work for the majority of people. (Plus the inherent sexism of allowing polygamy but not polyandry) I'm interested in why people opt for these kind of strict fundamentalist lives, will definitely read.

Can I just ask : I don't get why modern Mormon polygamy is illegal? I don't agree w it, but if the man only legally married 1 woman & marries the others only in a Mormon ceremony, what law have they broken? Wouldn't it only be illegal if they were legally married to multiple women?

Sorry. This strayed rather from the thread but it's v interesting to me.

You might enjoy this podcast episode:

https://overcast.fm/+AA_aa9OlwlQ

Can I just ask : I don't get why modern Mormon polygamy is illegal? I don't agree w it, but if the man only legally married 1 woman & marries the others only in a Mormon ceremony, what law have they broken? Wouldn't it only be illegal if they were legally married to multiple women?

Ok, as far as I know with the main polygamist group, the AUB, the first marriage is legally registered but subsequent marriages are only religious ceremonies and are not reported to the authorities. Which itself creates problems because (a) the Utah police are wise to these tactics and (b) if the husband goes to prison that causes obvious problems in terms of support for the plural wives and their children who aren't legally recognised.

The hardcore fundamentalist groups, I mean the bad groups, mostly congregate in remote rural areas and try to stay under the radar. They aren't interested in following the laws of the heathen United States.

Thank you, I like that podcast but didn't realise she'd done a Mormon episode.

Thank you- so in Utah it's illegal to have the extra wives even if it's a non-legally binding religious ceremony? Sorry, it's just this interests me as I'm comparing it to the UK where a Muslim man can have multiple wives & not be arrested as long as it's only a religious ceremony. Maybe we should try the Utah approach...

Unlucky that the bad groups are the ones more under the radar...One benefit of the Internet is that it can give people in that kind of situation a way to get outside help, but ofc they might not be able to do that.

I wonder if the polygamy is a draw for young male recruits? I read about the Rationalist subculture after the Zizian murders & I suspected the Rationalist practice of widespread polyamory (w bad effects on women) was a reason why some men were do keen on it. Not that there's not a lot of genuine feeling & belief involved, but that could be another factor.

Sorry to resurrect this, but I'd been wondering which YouTuber this was, and came across Academic Agent's Substack today - it seems to be him?

Yeah, that's him - his politics are not mine at all, but sometimes he comes up with a telling phrase.

Yes, he does seem a bit racist, saying things like 'blacks are a different species, closer to homo erectus', claiming that 'Evola (fascist philosopher) was right, the US has been negrified' and apparently praising the Nazis for resisting a 'two-tier government' .
I've read some of his articles and some seemed fairly reasonable, but clearly his overall views aren't v moderate.

https://hopenothate.org.uk/2024/03/26/jacob-rees-mogg-invites-far-right-activist-onto-his-gb-news-show/

I don't pay much attention to Hope Not Hate. Their definition of "far right" seems to include anyone who's slightly more conservative than Penny Mordaunt. They're also very keen to smear left wing GC feminists as far right.

But yes, AA has some pretty smelly opinions. He'd better watch it with the antisemitism, or he might end up in Corbyn's new party.

I know Hope Not Hate are often extremely inaccurate, and far right in general is a much overused label.

But in this case, what do you call someone who praises Evola, the SA, Mussolini and Franco, and calls black people a 'different species' 'closer to Neanderthals'?

His Nazi support definitely suggests anti Semitism. From his writing, he seems more concerned with 'low IQ' and 'less developed' black people though. All horrible.

That's the issue with the extreme overuse of 'far right'. 'Racist' too. It becomes harder & harder to use it to describe real extremists when it's so overused.

I think Hope Not Hate's stuff on him is accurate though. I quoted screenshots of tweets they showed, assuming they're reproduced accurately, it's straight from the horse's mouth.

And yet, he also often praises Tony Blair. I'm not sure why he's such a Blair fanboy, but he is. I bet they don't screenshot those quotes.

Old comment I know, but I missed it, I think I was on vacation.

I think factual talk would be the way to go. There likely would be a few who would object, but overall I think that even in the recent past, a very large majority of people, including very religious people, were willing to accept a fairly neutral, factual passing on of this kind of information in school, as well as approaches like treating other students and people with respect and consideration whatever you think about the fact that they are gay or a lesbian, or their dad has two wives, or whatever.

The comment about getting back to the fresh Prince period is interesting, I was thinking something similar in relation to my work, which is in libraries, today. They are now a focus for all kinds of culture war stuff around censorship, sexuality, race, and so on, with libraries being formly on the progressive side, and seeing conservatives as attacking them. A lot of younger people in library work seem to think it's always been like that.

It's not though. Thirty years ago when I was getting started it wasn't like that at all, libraries were very respected and supported, including financially, across the political spectrum. Conservative religious home educators were as dedicated to libraries as crunch hippy unschoolers. And both accepted that libraries would include some things that they themselves were not in agreement with.

What we see now is almost wholly a result of libraries themselves abandoning political neutrality, just as education systems have, and breaking down the agreements around tolerance that existed among those who use those institutions.

Excellent article and calibre of writing.

Thank you for such a detailed response, I always like to hear your viewpoint. I have some thoughts on that which I'll add tomorrow...

For now, I'll just say that coincidentally was reading about a new US library organisation formed based on neutrality.

https://alplibraries.org/code-of-ethics/

I read their code of ethics, it seemed good on the whole to me though I disagree with some, or at least felt it could be explained a bit more clearly.

I'd be interested to hear your thoughts when convenient.

Oh thank you for pointing me to that I had not heard of this organisation. I will be interested to see what kind of membership they gain.

Looking through their ethics code, I can say that it follows, really in almost every detail, all the things I was taught about the way a public library is meant to operate. I can't see any of this as having been controversial at all in the past.

The part that might make some pause, and which would always have been a complex line to walk, is probably the bits about "community standards," including where they relate to selecting material for children. People feel uncomfortable with this I think because they would prefer some kind of objective line they can look to when deciding how to treat materials. If feels uncomfortable to say that in one town, a certain set of standards are normative, and across the country in another town, or even in another nation, another set of books is appropriate.

Ultimately though I think that's the way it has to be. There really is no other better standard for what kinds of materials are grossly irresponsible or inappropriate. The way library professionals try and in some sense to avoid being completely controlled by the most accepted social views is by making sure they carry materials that also reflect minority or more controversial viewpoints. It's the only way to avoid the person views of the librarians becoming the standard.

I definitely agree with this, thank you for giving you thoughts. The community standards bit gave me pause too.

I've read a lot on the history of US book debates, and I'd definitely agree there are books that any sensible person should see are completely inappropriate : Gender Queer, Lawn Boy, Any Juno Dawson are obvious candidates. 

But I do think that part of the reason some people lazily assume that the books are being wrongly banned (bc stupidly they don't investigate them properly) is bc there have been and are cases where books are banned for questionable reasons, so they have a somewhat 'boy who cried wolf' reaction. I was looking at an Utah organisation the other day which had a huge spreadsheet full of dangerous books. The books ran the gamut from truly disgusting stuff like the above 3 I mentioned to some that I found laughable. 'The Giver' for encouraging communism & rebellion against authority, 'The Chocolate War' for being disturbing, usual suspects like Forever, and silliest of all, imo, the mildly scary preteen Doll Bones for the 'horror theme'.

The 'rebellion against authority' issue I found particularly odd bc I was always under the impression that US encouraged the challenging of unjust authority, indeed I thought that was the foundation of it.

I do understand worries about sexual content, but worries about stuff like Forever seen overblown to me. I mean, I'm speaking as someone whose UK-based mum read it on the school bus w the rest of her class in Year 8, and nobody became prematurely sexual as a result.. Books are rarely challenged in the UK or Europe, and yet they have lower rates of teen pregnancy, violence and drug use, despite all the sinful literature they must be reading.

. I'd have a lot more sympathy w concerns about teen girls reading modern smut. I've seen you mention this issue before I think... I have a pen pal in Poland who complains about smut obessesion among her friends there,,and after reading a few pages of such beastiality-focused delights as Bull Moon Rising, I would happily support a ban on those, I have sympathy for the argument that they're a female equivalent for porn (tho at least don't harm actors) Also dark romance, the amount of attempts to spin violent abuse as 'helping people reclaim their trauma' makes me furious...

Incidentally, it seems quite a few romantasy authors are Mormons. Stephanie Meyer is obvs the prime example of this. I wonder if such strict restriction of books sometimes causes a strong reaction in the opposite direction later?

Sorry for the rambling post, I guess my point is that there should be a universally accepted standard that books like Lawn Boy are unacceptable, but community standards are probs the best standard for other stuff, as one community's dangerous/harmful book will be fine for another community.

Always thought the sudden funding for jobs promoting Trans and the pure deaf brainwashing the supporters show smacked of Putin and his ability to divide - obviously worked in Trump's favour too because they knew they'd push it too far. Saw it with Brexit.
A friend even knows someone who is paid to keep Trans stories in the news! He doesn't really believe any of it but apparently makes a great wage. I would not be amazed to find out it was linked to Russia at all.