Elie Wiesel calls out Mitt Romney on dead Jew baptisms.

[Valmy]

I research alot of family history and personally I hate the Mormon database.  It is the wikipedia of genealogy, they just let anybody put crap in that thing.

[CountDeMoney]

On the other hand, if by the time I die I become someone who is remembered for something special 300 years from now, then surely there will be enough records of me so Mormon "history rewriting" won't do much good.

This is a huge issue with regard to archived material, as I and Money have pointed out, though he said it better than I did.
The Mormons have one of the most robust, well thought out data retention plans, whereas many government seem to have much worse, ad hoc, non-integrated systems throughout different government departments. 
What if in 300 years time the Mormon database is the only surviving, easily interrogatable database of any significance ?

Watch Part 2, Chapter 11 :
http://www.pbs.org/mormons/view/

Their archives make Mt Thunder look amateurish.

[garbon]

On the other hand, if by the time I die I become someone who is remembered for something special 300 years from now, then surely there will be enough records of me so Mormon "history rewriting" won't do much good.

This is a huge issue with regard to archived material, as I and Money have pointed out, though he said it better than I did.
The Mormons have one of the most robust, well thought out data retention plans, whereas many government seem to have much worse, ad hoc, non-integrated systems throughout different government departments. 
What if in 300 years time the Mormon database is the only surviving, easily interrogatable database of any significance ?

Oh no, the future might think Mormons were everywhere!

[Malthus]

The outrage is that they know it offends people and keep on doing it. It is sort of like telling an off-colour joke: no intent to offend at first, but if somebody says it isn't an appropriate joke for that company, telling more of the same rises to the level of obnoxiousness.

Actually, Marti, it is nothing like telling off-color jokes.  The LDS church has stated (since 1995) that no member can baptize anyone not related to them by blood.  Church officials don't know who exactly is related to whom in their congregations, so they cannot prevent the alleged posthumous baptism of people not related to existing members, but it isn't like they were deliberately telling off-color jokes.  It is more like someone used the word "niggardly" to describe a budget allocation, being told it is racially offensive, agreeing not to use it, and having someone in their employ use the word "coward" and thus upset the beef industry.

Marti? 

Are you now saying that some Mormons aren't in fact deliberately postumously baptising Jewish people? That's quite a different matter from saying that they are doing it, but it's not really offensive.

Which is your position?

[Malthus]

The outrage is that they know it offends people and keep on doing it. It is sort of like telling an off-colour joke: no intent to offend at first, but if somebody says it isn't an appropriate joke for that company, telling more of the same rises to the level of obnoxiousness.

No question it is boorish and tactless.  But no more so than ordinary proselytization, which just about every religion does.

I'd consider it more boorish and offensive, because there is no element of consent involved. But I agree that it doesn't rise above boorishly offensive.

[Razgovory]

Incidentally, if you want to point fingers, the practice of baptising babies who are unable to consent is infinitely more offensive and violating an individual's religious freedom than what Mormons are doing.

Oy Vey

Personally I was more offended by the photos my parents took of me as a child.  At least I was when I a Teenager.  Back then, lots of shit offended me.  I'd get so full of righteous indignation I'd be like Viking at a prayer Breakfast

"It is an insult for the simple reason that this is a deliberate violation the most fundamental values of the International House of Pancakes!  The only thing that pancakes have is their reputation,  actions like this attempt to sully that reputation and show a monstrous disregard for the international character of the establishment and the pancakes therein!"

[grumbler]

One is born into one's faith, one follows his faith if he wishes, one lives his life according to his faith if he chooses, he weds under the sanction and brings his children into the world under his faith.  That is the choice of faith.

For another faith to come around and say, "Meh, we're putting you on our books" and co-opting you into their faith postmortem is offensive, invasive and perverse. It's the delegitimization of an individual.  That's not a choice of faith.

I am (according to AnchorClanker) agnostic, and I agree with this message. Everyone should be able to follow their religion in private or public as long as they don't violate other people's personal rights.

Except that Seedy is arguing that Mormons should not be able to register their non-Mormon relatives with IGI in spite of such registrations being a religious belief (maybe obligation, I cannot tell).

[grumbler]

I do not really see it.  The baby was born into that religion. 

I don't get this.   How can you be "born into a religion?"  Isn't a religion a matter of belief?  Babies don't have beliefs.  Arguing that they are members of a religion because someone else says so is exactly what the Mormons are being accused of.

quote]It is like how you are forced to be a Polish citizen just because you were born to Poles in Poland no matter how limiting on your freedom to choose your national identity. [/quote]

I don't believe that citizenship is at all comparable to religious belief, and I don't believe that, absent belief, one can be "forced to be" a member of a religious group.

[Valmy]

I don't get this.   How can you be "born into a religion?"  Isn't a religion a matter of belief?

The same way you are born into anything.  It is often also a matter of culture, ethnicity and tradition.

I do not get this stupidity act you play sometimes.  You know damn well how people are born into religions.

[grumbler]

Are you now saying that some Mormons aren't in fact deliberately postumously baptising Jewish people? That's quite a different matter from saying that they are doing it, but it's not really offensive.

Some Mormons are alleged to have posthumously baptized Jews who are not related to them, just as some cathloics are alleged to have had sex with minors.  That's a far cry from saying that "the Mormon church" is doing the one or "the Catholic Church" is doing the other.  In both cases, the church agreed that they were not going to promote the practice any more, and in fact were going to forbid it.

In both cases, it is alleged that the practices still happen.  When it does, though, it seems to be an issue of individual misconduct, for which it is hard to hold a presidential candidate of that religion responsible merely because he follows that religion.

[crazy canuck]

I do not really see it.  The baby was born into that religion. 

I don't get this.   How can you be "born into a religion?"  Isn't a religion a matter of belief?  Babies don't have beliefs.  Arguing that they are members of a religion because someone else says so is exactly what the Mormons are being accused of.

One is born into a religion by being the child of and raised by parents who have a particular religious belief and who are members of a particular religious community. 

I do agree with you that religious belief is quite different than citizenship.  The former is often much easier to change then the latter which of course makes being born into a religious family less onerous then being born Polish.

edit: late to the dance.

[Razgovory]

I don't believe that citizenship is at all comparable to religious belief, and I don't believe that, absent belief, one can be "forced to be" a member of a religious group.

Why not?

[Malthus]

Are you now saying that some Mormons aren't in fact deliberately postumously baptising Jewish people? That's quite a different matter from saying that they are doing it, but it's not really offensive.

Some Mormons are alleged to have posthumously baptized Jews who are not related to them, just as some cathloics are alleged to have had sex with minors.  That's a far cry from saying that "the Mormon church" is doing the one or "the Catholic Church" is doing the other.  In both cases, the church agreed that they were not going to promote the practice any more, and in fact were going to forbid it.

In both cases, it is alleged that the practices still happen.  When it does, though, it seems to be an issue of individual misconduct, for which it is hard to hold a presidential candidate of that religion responsible merely because he follows that religion.

Have I said anywhere that I hold the Mormon Church, or Mitt, accountable? You are adressing arguments I'm not making.

I am merely addressing the issue that *when* Mormon people - whether on their own initiative or not - baptize *other people's* dead, Jewish relations, it is no mystery why it's offensive to the living relations. In the case cited in the OP, someone attempted to list someone who is still alive for "posthumous baptism"!  Obviously this is not a case of folks listing their own relations.

Hell, the Mormon Church agrees with me. They say it's against their policy and have issued an apology.

Moreover, I merely find posthumous baptism somewhat boorish and offensive, nothing even approaching having sex with minors in terms of severity.

[crazy canuck]

Are you now saying that some Mormons aren't in fact deliberately postumously baptising Jewish people? That's quite a different matter from saying that they are doing it, but it's not really offensive.

In both cases, it is alleged that the practices still happen.  When it does, though, it seems to be an issue of individual misconduct, for which it is hard to hold a presidential candidate of that religion responsible merely because he follows that religion.

Not sure what you are basing that on.  From the article.

Wiesel was among a group of Jewish leaders who campaigned against the practice and prompted a 2010 pact by which the Mormon Church promised to at least prevent proxy baptism requests for Holocaust victims. Wiesel said that proxy baptisms have been performed on behalf of 650,000 Holocaust dead

.

That implies that there is some form of "request" that is made to the Mormon Church in order for the ritual to be performed and that the only thing the Mormon Church has promised is that they will prevent such requests in the case of Holocaust victims.

[Malthus]

The outrage is that they know it offends people and keep on doing it. It is sort of like telling an off-colour joke: no intent to offend at first, but if somebody says it isn't an appropriate joke for that company, telling more of the same rises to the level of obnoxiousness.

In the same way that forbidding Muslim honor killings or teaching evolution in a class with fundies is obnoxious.

How is it in any way "the same"?