Who is reading "No Man Knows..."

[MikeWaters]

The only reason I read the book was because a colleague at work was reading it and asking about it.

So I started reading it. And then it turned out than an acquaintance of mine grew up with the Lafferty's so I had an additional source of information.

The craziness of the father, IMO, was downplayed by Krakauer.

I give you two examples:

1) him violently killing the family dog
2) peforming physicals on kids as the pseudo-doctor he was (for school physicals or something), grabs a kids glasses and throws them against the wall (breaking them), saying "you wouldn't need glasses if you ate beets!!" [?I can't remember the vegetable, but it wasn't carrots!]

We are talking about a certifiably terribly disturbed individual. You don't get that picture from the book. You don't get the sense that these boys were in many ways nothing more than the exaggerated replica of their father.

Hence my suspicion of Krakauer's dishonesty. Fusnik11 has backed me up on this before (Fusnik11 claims to know Krakauer or his family or something).

If he had just stuck with the story at hand, and not tried to make wild unsupported unconvincing extrapolations (and not been dishonest in his research IMO), he would have been much better off.

And it is not terribly surprising, that he has been accused of dishonesty and purposeful distortions in "Into Thin Air."

If you want to learn about Mormon culture, Krakauer will not give you anything close to an accurate picture. Yet he claims to. And that is why I have a problem with his book.

[SeattleUte]

Problem with Krakauer's book

1) It added nothing new or original to critique of Mormonism, essentially rehashing what had been done by Brodie and others;

2) His effort at originality, making the sensational claim that Mormon folk doctrine of "Blood Atonement" spawns henous murderers isn't credible. I believe Mormonism is the source of many kooks, including murderers and child molesters running around primarily in the Southwest part of the United States, but he overstated the problem;

3) His book suffered by comparison to his other very fine works such as Into Thin Air and others;

4) He seemed to have an axe to grind, and sure enough, he knew Mormons while growing up in Oregon and didn't like them.

But it wasn't all that bad. And to someone uninitiated in the inherent wierdness of his subject I can see that it could be a facinating read.

[fusnik11]

Originally Posted by SeattleUte

4) He seemed to have an axe to grind, and sure enough, he knew Mormons while growing up in Oregon and didn't like them.

Wowzers, are you willing to extend that commentary to his adulthood?

I know a family of Mormons he likes a lot.

[Jeff Lebowski]

Originally Posted by SeattleUte

Problem with Krakauer's book

1) It added nothing new or original to critique of Mormonism, essentially rehashing what had been done by Brodie and others;

Interesting. No matter the topic, you always steer it back to some form of Brodie worship.

(sorry, couldn't resist )

Originally Posted by SeattleUte

2) His effort at originality, making the sensational claim that Mormon folk doctrine of "Blood Atonement" spawns henous murderers isn't credible. I believe Mormonism is the source of many kooks, including murderers and child molesters running around primarily in the Southwest part of the United States, but he overstated the problem;

And I think you are overstating his overstatement. To me, he was mainly arguing that religious extremism (in any religion) is dangerous. A pretty easy argument to make.

Originally Posted by SeattleUte

3) His book suffered by comparison to his other very fine works such as Into Thin Air and others;

I would put it behind "Into Thin Air", but better than the others.

Originally Posted by SeattleUte

4) He seemed to have an axe to grind, and sure enough, he knew Mormons while growing up in Oregon and didn't like them.

I don't know where you got that. I recall him saying that he had several LDS friends growing up and that he liked them.

[SeattleUte]

Originally Posted by Jeff Lebowski

Interesting. No matter the topic, you always steer it back to some form of Brodie worship.

(sorry, couldn't resist )



And I think you are overstating his overstatement. To me, he was mainly arguing that religious extremism (in any religion) is dangerous. A pretty easy argument to make.



I would put it behind "Into Thin Air", but better than the others.



I don't know where you got that. I recall him saying that he had several LDS friends growing up and that he liked them.

I was going to say that his book suffered by comparison to Brodie's, but forgot. She will always be the benchmark for Mormon critique. I think he could have approaced his subject in a less sensational manner and said a lot of valuable things about plenty that is disturbing. He just didn't possess a deft enough touch when dealing with this issue.

Do you think he likes the LDS Church? I think almost anyone who devotes a lot of time and effort to writing about it has an axe to grind. I agree with those who say there is no such thing as perfect objectivity and this is no truer than when people are writing about the LDS faith. It seems that most any major work is written by somebody who has had a lot of contact with the LDS faith, and either wants to critique or defend it. From his book I don't think he likes the LDS church. Hence his experience must have been negative. (You may be right he never said he didn't like Mormons he knew in so many words.)

[Jeff Lebowski]

Originally Posted by SeattleUte

I was going to say that his book suffered by comparison to Brodie's, but forgot. She will always be the benchmark for Mormon critique. I think he could have approaced his subject in a less sensational manner and said a lot of valuable things about plenty that is disturbing. He just didn't possess a deft enough touch when dealing with this issue.

There you go with more Brodie worship...

Originally Posted by SeattleUte

Do you think he likes the LDS Church? I think almost anyone who devotes a lot of time and effort to writing about it has an axe to grind. I agree with those who say there is no such thing as perfect objectivity and this is no truer than when people are writing about the LDS faith. It seems that most any major work is written by somebody who has had a lot of contact with the LDS faith, and either wants to critique or defend it. From his book I don't think he likes the LDS church. Hence his experience must have been negative. (You may be right he never said he didn't like Mormons he knew in so many words.)

Amen on the objectivity theory.

No, I don't think he likes the church. But you were implying that he disliked the mormons he knew while growing up in Oregon, something that does not square with what he stated in his book, as I recall.

He claims to have always been an agnostic (quite a few of those in Seattle, apparently). As such, I would not expect him to portray a sympathetic view of the church. My bet is that his research for this book hardened his view of religion in general, and mormonism in particular. And that is understandable. He was researching one of the more bizarre and outrageous stories of "religious-zealotry-gone-bad" in U.S. history. As I have said before, anything associated with such a story is going to suffer by association.

[Goatnapper'96]

Originally Posted by SeattleUte

I was going to say that his book suffered by comparison to Brodie's, but forgot. She will always be the benchmark for Mormon critique. I think he could have approaced his subject in a less sensational manner and said a lot of valuable things about plenty that is disturbing. He just didn't possess a deft enough touch when dealing with this issue.

Do you think he likes the LDS Church? I think almost anyone who devotes a lot of time and effort to writing about it has an axe to grind. I agree with those who say there is no such thing as perfect objectivity and this is no truer than when people are writing about the LDS faith. It seems that most any major work is written by somebody who has had a lot of contact with the LDS faith, and either wants to critique or defend it. From his book I don't think he likes the LDS church. Hence his experience must have been negative. (You may be right he never said he didn't like Mormons he knew in so many words.)

He commented that he always wanted to write a book about the LDS Church. He spoke of his interactions with the mormons in his hometown and how he was intrigued with the religion's ability to imbue upon its youth such devotion. I am sure he likes individual mormons that he knows, but if that book is indicative of his sentiments I am left convinced he does not think highly of the LDS religion, even if he thinks highly of particular LDS people.

If one wants to write a book about mormons and they pick that story upon which to base it, call me closedminded but I agree with my favorite dickhead. I don't know if he had an axe to grind but I came away of the opinion that he was not favorably disposed towards the LDS religion or any religion for that matter.

I also concur with SU that the LDS experience is so insignificant that anyone who writes about it has a conclusion and then looks for facts to support that conclusion.

However, I still think the book was a pile of crap.

[Archaea]

It is my observation that nobody of any significant acclaim, honesty or ability has written a critique of Mormonism. Within our own culture, we may or may not have the artistic abilities to bring forth such a work. Outside of the culture, we have not been significant enough to draw the attention of the world's elite. They have ignored us and hopefully ignore us until we are incapable of being ignored.

It may take another couple hundred years before we are significant enough that competent, talented scholars address our history and uniqueness. Until then, we're left with persons such as Bushman who do a journeyman's job but with no apparent flair for storytelling, or Brodie who was the first non-hagiographic look at our history, some ability to story-tell, but not much balance or awareness of her own bias. So far, we don't have the standard by which to judge our histories, or intellectual contributions.

[RockyBalboa]

SeattleUte Said: Do you think he likes the LDS Church? I think almost anyone who devotes a lot of time and effort to writing about it has an axe to grind.




Sounds like someone we all know.....

[SeattleUte]

Originally Posted by Archaea

It is my observation that nobody of any significant acclaim, honesty or ability has written a critique of Mormonism. Within our own culture, we may or may not have the artistic abilities to bring forth such a work. Outside of the culture, we have not been significant enough to draw the attention of the world's elite. They have ignored us and hopefully ignore us until we are incapable of being ignored.

It may take another couple hundred years before we are significant enough that competent, talented scholars address our history and uniqueness. Until then, we're left with persons such as Bushman who do a journeyman's job but with no apparent flair for storytelling, or Brodie who was the first non-hagiographic look at our history, some ability to story-tell, but not much balance or awareness of her own bias. So far, we don't have the standard by which to judge our histories, or intellectual contributions.

Part of the problem, from what I've observed, is that unless you've been touched or damaged by Mormonism it just isn't very interesting to you. It isn't of no interest, but not so interesting as to devote a life's work to it.