Quote:
Originally Posted by SeattleUte
Read Mike's post. He said ETB made Mormons conservative as they are. Yes, he was way out there but Mormonism is bred in the bone conservative. It always has been. If anything ETB had the opposite effect on Mormons.
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I think you're wrong here. While Mormons are conservative to ultra conservative as a whole, having an ULTRA conservative in charge makes the church a much safer place for those views. It causes them to enter the main stream of thought. I remember being a freshman at BYU in 1993 and one of my hall-mates trying to convince me that the John Birch society was tacitly endorsed by the church because of ETB's former affiliation. He was young and dumb, but he believed it. Anecdotal I know, but my point is that having a leader that far on the right gave his view point fertilizer and a lot of room to grow that it would not ahve had otherwise. If what you are saying is that the membership didn;t need much of a nudge to head that direction then I can argee with that.