Mormon No More

[Anonymous]

SilentDawning wrote:

nibbler wrote:

Haven’t seen the show, hopefully those that did can chime in.

It’s a TV show, right. Do you think they came out to their MP just to get an expected reaction on film?

That’s what I think. And I think it was unfair to put the guy on television without his apparent consent. At least they didn’t put him on speaker phone. I’d feel betrayed if I were the mission president.

I went back and rewatched that segment. I think lack of consent is an assumption, it is not at all clear or stated that he did or did not consent. Even if he didn’t consent (which I agree is possible, maybe even likely) there really wasn’t anything to consent to – we did not hear his voice except on the voice mail greeting in the attempt to call him. We only know what Lena and Sally said he said (and they were very nondescript in that aspect) and what they felt (they were more descriptive about that). If they even said his name I didn’t catch it. Truth is we don’t even know if that’s who was actually on the phone and that whole scene could have been a staged TV moment.

In the context of the program I think it’s perfectly fine for Lena (and Sally as the case was) to say how they felt talking to her mission president, or anyone else for that matter.

[Anonymous]

I think it’s a reasonable assumption that they ambushed the ex mission president. First, any reasonable mission president, when informed he would be on television while receiving a call from a gay couple announcing their wedding, would probably call the church office and ask what to do before agreeing. Likely, he wouldn’t agree at all, in my view.

Also, based on the couples’ reaction, it sounds like the mission president was surprised — kind and warm at first, but then, as one of the members of the couple said “weird” about the conversation after the partner in the marriage was identified as a woman.

I also think it’s totally fine for the gay couple to express how they felt talking to their mission president. But I’m not good with televising the conversation, even if it wasn’t on speaker phone. I don’t believe that was fair to the mission president.

[Anonymous]

SilentDawning wrote:

I also think it’s totally fine for the gay couple to express how they felt talking to their mission president. But I’m not good with televising the conversation, even if it wasn’t on speaker phone. I don’t believe that was fair to the mission president.

But their conversation wasn’t televised. We can’t hear what he said and really are only speculating about what he said based on what Lena and Sally said. We don’t know who that was on the other end. It could have been the MP, it could have been a producer or other show person or actor, or it could have been nobody.

I agree it probably wasn’t fair to put the MP on the spot (if that’s what really happened, most “reality TV” is not real) but since we can’t hear anything – and don’t even know his name – there really is no spot. It would be a whole different story if we could hear. My guess is the producers did contact him before or after the call (or both) and he declined to consent. Had he consented I think we would have heard what he said (likely edited for effect). That may also explain why he didn’t answer the call and opens the door for the call back to be fabricated.

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