24AR29-02

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AR 29:2 - Where gender and religion are headed on our campuses

In this issue:

EDUCATION - surprising stats on religion and gender

MORMONISM - "Sound of Freedom" celebrity faces allegations of sexual abuse, necromancy

PERSECUTION - the apostles' blend of "gospel declaration and cultural apologetics"

Apologia Report 29:2 (1,643)
January 10, 2024

EDUCATION

"Gender, sexual orientation and religion among American college students" by Ryan Burge (Get Religion, Sep 20 '23) -- Burge starts by sharing an operational insight: "I basically use two or three surveys for everything you see on this Substack and my social media," except for what comes "from FIRE (Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression), <thefire.org> which is an organization that fights for the ability of individuals (students and faculty) to be able to freely exercise their First Amendment right to free speech. ...

"One of the major research projects that FIRE undertakes is an annual survey of college students to gauge how they think about the issue of free speech and if they feel like they have to stifle their speech because of hostility on campus. ...

"This is a real treasure trove of data about how the next generation thinks about all kinds of topics." FIRE's full report is based on 55,102 respondents, offers a thorough description of its methodology, and runs to 85 pages.)

"I am going to write a series of posts with this data ... but, ... from just the demographic variables ... I had to write about them specifically." (Nice to see a data dumper get excited once in a while, eh?)

For openers, "I restricted my sample to just those who are between the ages of 18 and 25 [which] means my sample is a bit smaller — 39,178." (Just the facts, maam.)

"The theme here is simply three variables: sexual orientation, gender identity and religion among college-aged folks.

"What really kicked this off was a report from Brown University <www.tinyurl.com/3rsdyez5> that indicated that 38% of their student body identifies as homosexual, bisexual, queer, asexual, pansexual, questioning or other. When that same poll was conducted ten years earlier, that share was just 14%."

Burge finds that "the vast, vast majority of young people identify as man or woman. In fact, this was the choice of 98.2% of all respondents in the survey. In other words, about one in 50 college-aged students identifies" (in a range of nonbinary, genderqueer, genderfluid, agender, unsure) "or prefer not to say" resulting in "quite a bit more variation - 72% of the sample identifies as straight. Another 12% says that they are bisexual and 5% indicates that they are gay/lesbian. These three response options encompass about 90% of all respondents in the sample. About 2% identify as pansexual or queer or unsure. ...

"About four in five men describe their sexual orientation as straight — it's only two-thirds [for] women attending colleges between the ages of 18 and 25 years old. That difference is largely reversed when looking at the bisexual share, where 16% of women say they are bisexual, compared to just 6% of men. It's notable also that men are nearly twice as likely to say that they are gay compared to women (6.6% vs 3.8%).

"Also, women are significantly more likely to say that they are pansexual, queer, questioning, asexual or are unsure of their sexual orientation compared to men. It's pretty clear from this angle that, at this cultural moment, women are much more diverse in their sexual orientation compared to men. ...

"More than two thirds of this sample of 18–25-year-old college students identify as a man or woman and indicate that they are straight in terms of sexual orientation. ...

"About one in 10 are bisexual men/women and one in 20 say that they are men/women or are gay/lesbian. The top row is rather barren with 2% identifying as "something else" on both gender identity and sexual orientation. ...

"The religious group that is the most likely to be straight is Muslims at 85%, followed closely by a whole bunch of other groups such as Protestants, Catholics, "Just Christians" and Hindus.

"But here's a really big surprise to me — only 78% of Latter-day Saints in college say that they are straight. That's seven points lower than Protestants and 13% of LDS students say that they fall into the "something else" category.

"The groups that are the least likely to say that they are straight are atheists at 55% and agnostics at 53%. It's pretty staggering to consider that nearly half of young atheists/agnostics are not heterosexual. "Nothing in particulars" are not far behind, either, at 62%. The nones are much less likely to be straight compared to their religious counterparts. ...

"Just one in 100 Christians say that they are not a man or a woman. Even among more left-leaning groups like atheists and agnostics, the vast majority identify as man/woman — 97% of each group." <www.tinyurl.com/6hkh5tyb>

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MORMONISM

"Sound of Freedom's Tim Ballard Is a Star on the Right. Why Would His Church Denounce Him?" by Benjamin E. Park (Slate, Sep 18 '23) -- "the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints shocked people who follow American conservatism after a spokesperson issued a statement distancing the institution from Tim Ballard, the founder of Operation Underground Railroad <ourrescue.org> and subject of the breakout summer hit film Sound of Freedom. <www.tinyurl.com/387fctyd> Ballard had 'betrayed his friendship' with a prominent LDS leader, the statement to Vice declared, <www.tinyurl.com/2vcbpj52> and his fundraising activities were deemed 'morally unacceptable.'

"It was a rare and stunning rebuke for a church that rarely speaks out about individual members. ... Vice revealed that Ballard's resignation from Operation Underground Railroad earlier this year came after an internal investigation into claims of sexual misconduct involving seven female employees.

"[T]here has been a growing divide between the LDS church and far-right-wing members for over a decade now. The radicalization of American conservatism - with its denunciation of mainstream news sources, forfeiture of traditional norms, and embrace of partisan-based 'alternative facts' - has had severe consequences within Mormon culture. ...

"Latter-day Saints, who had long been a target of American evangelicals who deemed their religion invalid, suddenly became their compatriots in battle during the culture wars of the 1970s and 1980s. Due to their ability to deliver on key social issues, like opposition to the passage of the Equal Rights Amendment, they were folded into the coalition known as the religious right. This granted the faith new social acceptance and cultural power. However, it also resulted in increasingly blurred boundaries between religious authority and far-right principles. As with white evangelicals, the doctrine of partisanship became inseparable from the doctrine of Christ.

"Such an overlap makes it difficult, therefore, when the two spheres come into conflict. It explains why, for instance, so many American Mormons were hesitant to follow the church's consul to get vaccinated and wear masks during the COVID-19 pandemic. It also explains why Mormons came in second to white evangelicals in polls determining which denominations were most likely to believe Donald Trump's lies concerning the 2020 election. ...

"Ballard's brand of revisionist truth-telling has been especially popular within the LDS community. ... [George] Washington, Ballard argues, was visited by the Angel Moroni, the same divine figure who delivered the gold plates to Joseph Smith; Lincoln, conversely, was inspired to write the Emancipation Proclamation after reading the Book of Mormon. ...

"Most jarring for many is the increasingly clear picture of Smith's practice of polygamy that this department has produced. After a new church-sponsored historical essay admitted that Smith had up to 40 plural wives, it shocked and angered LDS members who missed the earlier, simpler depictions of the faith's founder. Many of these members congregated around Denver Snuffer, a lawyer who denounced church leaders for giving up sacred doctrines in a quest for social acceptance. He declared that Smith never practiced polygamy but that plural marriage was introduced by Brigham Young, Smith's successor. ...

"More recently, a new conspiracy, led by Phil Davis, a Utah chocolatier, has gained popularity by borrowing from broader fears concerning the 'deep state.' A multipart documentary produced by this group alleges that Smith's death at Carthage Jail in 1844 was an 'inside job' performed by apostles, rather than an anti-Mormon mob."

The day after this news item was released, "Ballard issued a statement denying the allegations of sexual abuse, calling them 'tabloid-driven' 'baseless inventions.'"

Park concludes, in part: "Far-right media personality Glenn Beck, who is also a Latter-day Saint, offered his support on X in a since-deleted thread." <www.tinyurl.com/maucdyuf>