Windy Sydney

The Church has unveiled a new video on lds.org telling the Young Women about the brand new Personal Progress books and website... and they are PINK! Ooooh, that will get girls to pay attention. Pink! Please watch the video. Please. You won't be disappointed.

Okay, see what I mean about the word Pink? Hilarious, isn't it? It's PINK!

Anyway, I would love to go into detail about this video and how disturbingly bad and wrong it is, and so I'm going to do it. You have been warned.

First of all, what ever happened to people being real? The women in this video are in la-la land, smiling that spirit-driven smile, glancing at one another as if they are in the Brady Bunch opening. Look how proud they are of their new pink handbook! The one they had nothing to do with! The one men wrote and gave to them!

They look like they are so drugged up on Prozac that they can't even focus on the camera. They are so sweet... but not a good sweet. Too sweet. So sweet that the sugar in my bloodstream as caused me to go into church-shock. Give me a break ladies... be who you are. Not who the church wants you to be.


But that is the main problem with the whole personal progress thing anyway...

It teaches young women who the church wants them to be, and doesn't give them any room to be themselves. It's a shame really.

The personal progress book taught me that God wanted me to be feminine, a mother, a wife, a temple-attending-tithing-paying robot like the rest of my Mormon friends... but I knew that wouldn't make me happy. I knew it in my head and in my heart... and when I told my leaders about this, I was told to pray more. To fast... and then I wasn't being sincere with my prayers because their advice didn't work. I didn't fit their mold and it was because I wasn't good enough.

There was a lot of talk about my "divine role" when I was a teenager. They make it sound so wonderful, don't they? A role that God himself wanted me to fulfill?

Why do this to young women?

I'll tell you why.

To keep the machine moving.

I have read on forums that baptisms are down, people are leaving the church and taking their entire families with them. The internet has made it difficult to keep the hard-to-believe doctrine away from potential converts and interested members.

The main way to keep the church growing is to tell the young men and women at an early age that they must follow God's plan to marry in the temple, have lots of babies, and raise them in the church. That way, there are tons of small children ready for their brainwashing as soon as they can say "Jesus Wants Me For A Sunbeam."


Let's get back to the review...

Look! There is a picture of the temple on the front of the progress book. Wow, thats something. Isn't it? I mean, heaven knows a young woman can't have enough pictures of the temple, right? You see, that is to remind them, as often as possible, what their goals SHOULD be. Temple marriage and children.

They promise that there are plenty of blessings that come with getting married in the temple, or just attending the temple in general... but everyone I have ever talked to about this can't really say they were more blessed than someone else. It's just a promise that can't be delivered.

Parents who were married in the temple have just as many problems, accidents, sicknesses, and random acts of anything than the rest of us.


What blessings are they talking about? The afterlife? Thats funny... because no one knows what happens in the afterlife, and they are drilling these things into the heads of young ladies that the only way they will be happy is following their directions. It makes me sick to my stomach.

Now, they tell the young women that they will learn new things, study the scriptures and pray every single day. These are things the young women are probably already doing in most TBM households. The new things they learn? How to sew, cook, clean and organize a home, how to care for babies and children, how to be a helpmeet to your priesthood holding husband who is the head of the family... you get the idea.

They offer pretty ribbons and necklaces as gifts for completing the lessons. This is amazing when you see it from the other side. What young woman doesn't want to earn those pretty ribbons? Those necklaces? What young woman (especially in a Mormon Community) doesn't want to show her friends how well she's doing and how many ribbons she has earned?

A tip for young women seeking truth? Go to JoAnn's and buy some ribbons. Give me a break.


Oh, yes... the young women are going through so many changes in their lives. Of course people notice. Especially the church. The church wont let them forget. The separate them from the boys, and constantly feed them "girl stuff" (for lack of a better explanation). What harm could come from teaching men and women the same thing about scriptures and church doctrine in the same class?

The entire video is just... fake. It's sad how they talk to the young women as though they are 5 years old and can't possibly comprehend anything without the super-sweet baby talk.

I'm so glad I'm out.

Andee