Mx. Luna Corbden πΈI have to kill this darling, so I'll just leave it here:
"I'd wager to say that the average, un-degreed social justice activist on the internet today has what would have been, in 1998, a masterβs level education in social justice studies."
Yes, in addition to the news, today I'm editing my client's chapter about that time she was expelled from BYU without a tuition refund for voluntarily confessing sexual "sin".
#Sexcommunicated
#exmo
#exmormon
#ReligiousTrauma
#LDS
#Mormon
#exvie
#Exvangelical
This is my client, Natasha Helfer, reading her poem I Have Served You at the riverside vigil immediately following her LDS disciplinary hearing in 2021:
#exmo #exmormon #ReligiousTrauma #LDS #Mormon #Sexcommunicated #memoir
Natasha Helfer - "My Last Message to The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints" - Poem
The LDS Church has changed many of the things I criticized in my book, Recovering Agency (2014). For my client's book, I'm writing a quick footnote on how they're trying to get away from the "Courts of Love" that "disfellowship" and "excommunicate" noncomplying members, because of course I have a whole bit in Recovering Agency unpacking this language.
Is it because of me? I have no way of knowing. I'm certainly not the first person to point this out. And I'm going to point it out again in my client's excommunication story. I will not stop calling it excommunication in favor the new *checks notes* "withdrawal of membership," because it is still excommunication. Members think of it that way, exmembers still do, and it's still cutting heterodox members off from status and connection in their community.
#exmo #exmormon #ReligiousTrauma #LDS #Mormon #Sexcommunicated
Started editing today. From my client's Facebook post in June 2019 that led to her getting excommunicated in 2021:
"Beware of any person/organization/system that assumes they know better than you about what you need or donβt need."
I quoted the full post in the Intro that I wrote over a year ago, and have been re-reading it over and over this year where I quote it again in the climactic ending.
It's been right in front of my face this whole time.
My mom assumes she knows better than me about what I need or don't need.
She's made this clear all along.
And this person (me) has been so conditioned to be used to it from my mom, that, even though I can see this when it's happening to other people, I still, after everything I've been though, can't see it when it's happening to me.
"She means well."
No. No past self. She does NOT mean well. What does that even mean?
When people ask me, "How do you know you're not brainwashed *right now*?" I always answer: "I do not. I probably am brainwashed right now."
Because it bears out, over and over and over.
Once this project is finished (Sexcommunicated), I'd be qualified to write a book covering a collection of prominent LDS excommunications. That would be cool. Or, assuming some of those excommunications are just as interesting (they probably are), I could write similar books for each of them, especially if the subject gave me full access like Natasha has.
So many things, so little energy or income.
(I just learned that Bill Reel's excommunication council was secretly recorded but NOT BY HIM and not with his knowledge! Someone managed it from outside the room, but no further details in this article. I spend time in Natasha's book discussing her decision not to record, and their suspicions nevertheless play a big part in how things played out. Runnell's secret recording is interesting, too. "A city built upon a hill cannot be hid. So let your light so shine before men." This one topic alone could make a whole book.)
I think this marks the 6th full length book I've written (only two of them published). My scripture is only a few chapters from being done, so 6.5. (I feel like I'm forgetting some other work. I always do.)
This one is 90k words. I will probably need to make some hard cuts unless we just want a longer book. Much will depend on the publisher. (The book proposal is mostly done, too.) I write fairly densely, so we're not going to cut much through deleting dead words.
I had a little cranberry fake champagne in celebration. It pairs well with 72% chocolate.
Well, speaking in only ultra-rough draft* terms, I finished writing a book today.
(*I wrote the last 3 chapters in portable chonks because there were so many events and details to cram in, and I might have to delete, move stuff around, and polish transitions. But the prose covering all the main and most of the minor points now exists.)
Time to start the homestretch to finish a book by the end of the week!*
* It might take just a little bit longer, but I hope not. I have 3 chapters framed out that just need an ending and then heavy draft edits. So uhm... what was I thinking?? I can't do that in 10 hours! But I will try!