Suspension of Disbelief and Compartmentalism

Written by Bill Law

How the ideas of “Suspension of Disbelief” and “Compartmentalism” relate to each other and how this dynamic affects an individuals relationship to their religious organizations.

As a person who struggles with their relationship to the LDS church I do a fair bit of thinking about why that is.  A lot of people who struggle with the church say that they had no idea the church had these troublesome things in its past and when confronted with reality can know longer be in the church and still maintain their integrity.  That is not my story.  Others say they knew some things about church history, but put them on a shelf.  Eventually the shelf got so heavy it crashed and left them without a testimony.  That is closer to my story, but I still don’t think it is a good explanation.

For myself, I don’t think it really matters how much stuff is on the shelf.  Something else external to the shelf has caused me to look at the history of the church and look at it more objectively.  This is one of my attempts at trying on an explanation and seeing if it makes sense of my relationship with the church and how it came to its current state of being.

We learn how to behave and interact in the world largely by trial and error.  We learn what is socially acceptable by doing things that aren’t socially acceptable or watching other people do things that aren’t socially acceptable and seeing the reaction of society.  I suppose this is a bit negative.  We also do things that are socially desirable and see the results of those actions, which reinforce the behaviors that are acceptable.

These lessons are highly situational.  What is acceptable or desirable in one environment may be very unacceptable in another.  We compartmentalize our behavior.  We behave very differently at home, at school, at work, at church, and when alone with our friends.  It gets even more complex than this as your position within the environment also affects what is appropriate or desirable behavior. 

There was a study that argued that work environments where cussing occurred had a stronger sense of community. Why would that be?  Does the sense of community allow people to be more relaxed and allow them to feel free to cuss, or does the cussing increase the bond within the members of community?  I believe that both occur simultaneously. 

Relationships of any sort are really just about trust.  A relationship between a supervisor and employee is really about a manager trusting the employee to act in a way that will reflect well on the supervisor and the company and that the supervisor will act in a way that meets the needs of the employee to feel valued for their efforts.  This trust builds in a transactional sort of way. 

To illustrate, imagine yourself on a work team that has to fix a problem because another group failed to foresee how a change they made would affect your team.  The manager says with a smile something like “those bastards over in IT did it to us again.”  One reason the statement builds community is because it creates a common enemy for the team, but another reason is because of the word “bastards.”  By using that word the manager is being “open” and in a sense is sharing vulnerability. 

Your team knows that your manager won’t use that word in other environments, therefore her willingness to use it with you, is a demonstration that there is a closer bond or rapport that isn’t shared with those other groups.  This invites members of the team to be more relaxed.  Maybe the team isn’t relaxed enough to also use the word “bastard”, but surely feels more freedom to express frustration at the IT department.  In a small way both the manager and the team allowed themselves be a little more vulnerable.  After the exchange, both the manager and the team feel a great sense of community.  Both parties trust that the others won’t use the increase openness and vulnerability to hurt the other.

Another example is friends who rib each other about their recent performances during some sport.  One friend says something derogatory about the other and the other returns the favor by flipping him off.  Neither is mad. These are displays of friendship.  This behavior would never be used while at work or while serving in their religious positions.

Everyone must learn to compartmentalize behavior in order to interact positively in society.  Religions attempt and in some respects are successful at moderating behavior in all “compartments” of individuals’ lives.  Now we will look at the concept of “suspension of disbelief” and then attempt to show how that concept is related to compartmentalism and then tie that into the religious sphere.

The concept of “suspension of disbelief” is often used in terms of movie watching.  We see good guys get shot at by guys with automatic weapons and manage to escape unharmed, yet the good guy is able to take a 9mm,pop out from behind a barrier, and pick a bad guy off the top of a building with a single shot.  Another example was a man in a convertible who drove up a ramp sitting on the side of a freeway causing his car to do a 365 degree spin.  While upside down he connected a hook (which is attached to some immovable object) to the bad guy’s car.  He lands the car, does a bit of fishtailing, but otherwise escapes into the sunset unharmed. Meanwhile the bad guy’s car has a spectacular wreck and explosion.

Why do we participate in and enjoy something so spectacularly impossible?  Well to be honest, sometimes the implausibility becomes too much and pulls us out of the movie and our suspension of disbelief fails and we don’t enjoy the movie.  But we are willing to suspend a whole lot of belief and still find movies worthwhile and entertaining.

The concept of suspension of disbelief is largely an argument that the audience has a role in their movie going experience.  In any work of fiction there are going to be things that don’t completely make sense.  The audience acts with faith that there is some human interest and semblance of truth to make the movie worthwhile.  Some of the burden of whether a movie is successful falls on the shoulders of the moviegoer.  The moviegoer can choose to suspend disbelief or can be distracted by the inconsistencies to the point where the experience fails.

This doesn’t mean that the creators of the movie are free to do whatever and blame the moviegoer for being nitpicky if a movie isn’t well received.  If movie creators want a movie to be well received (and they do) then they need to create a film that doesn’t overly challenge the viewer's sensibility.

So far we have only talked about suspension of belief in terms of "over the top" action sequences.  There are much more subtle ways that a movie can make itself too implausible to be believed.  Sometimes movies are criticized as being too derivative.  Another way to voice this complaint is to say that the movie was so formulaic and the plot had been seen so many times before that it was overly difficult to suspend disbelief due to its predictability.

If you have watched very many scary movies, and you see a character go up to a monster to confirm that the monster is dead, you may find yourself laughing in anticipation of that character being eaten.  If you see a minor Star Trek character in a red shirt leading the way into a dark tunnel, you can bet something bad is going to happen to that character.  If there’s another hour left in the romantic comedy and one of the lead characters is about to divulge their undying love to the other main character, you can bet that other character is going to start dating someone else before they get the chance to express their feelings.  You can also bet that right before the end they will have "the talk" and be together.

When you know what is going to happen in a movie before it happens it pulls you out of the movie.  The movie is no longer authentic.  It just becomes actors on a screen performing a role.   Instead of being inside the movie you take a step outside the movie.  Sure you always knew the two dimensional characters on the screen weren’t real, but on some level you could relate to them.

This brings us back to compartmentalization.  We compartmentalize our knowledge that the movie isn’t real, with our belief in the characters as people we know and like.  In a 100% rational world, we would never find any movies enjoyable.  We couldn’t never resolve the cognitive dissonance between knowing that Leonardo Di’Caprio was paid to pretend he was sacrificing his life for Kate Winslett, and the emotional belief that Jack truly cared for Rose.  Instead we compartmentalize.  The story and actors may be completely fake, but we believe in and have faith in the meaning or emotions expressed by the made up story.

My struggles with the church doesn’t stem from the fact that the first vision story is implausible.  My problem is that I know longer relate to that foundational story, because the characterization of Joseph Smith has become so contrived and simplistic that I no longer relate to the correlated church version of the story.  I have been pulled out of the story by the lack of authenticity.  Correlation has made the teaching of church doctrine so derivative and simplistic, that I can know longer suspend disbelief as my more complex views aren’t accepted in the narrow and shallow universe that correlation has created.  Interactions within the religious setting have become role playing exercises where we say all the appropriate things.  The plot is so predictable, that it is no longer meaningful or helpful.  Interactions now lack any conviction or believability.

For example, Home teaching is now viewed as duty of assigned friendship and not about friendships based on trust where vulnerability and honesty are shared for the benefit of both.  When the home teacher asks “is there anything we can do for you.” This isn’t an honest interaction.  Sure, the person asking may be willing to do the service, but that service would be rendered out of a sense of duty.  We don’t care about the characters in the interaction.  The foundational interactions that gain trust and allow people to be vulnerable haven’t occurred.  The people in that interaction don’t trust each other as evidenced by the fact that they don’t know what the other person needs.  Home teaching is too simplistic and doesn’t provide the means for authentic relationship building where people trust each other enough into their real authentic lives.  Instead we frantically clean our homes to present an image of what we think the culture wants us to be, even though that’s not who we really are.

My problem is that the church has become fake.  A parody of what it should be.  I have been pulled out of the religious experience and am no longer able to compartmentalize my knowledge of certain aspects of history with the truths I have found within religion in the past.  Some of the blame may fall on me as an overly picky movie goer unwilling to suspend disbelief.  A large portion of the blame goes to some suits who have insisted on editing the cultural experience into an overly simplistic derivative plot.  I now stand as an analytical outsider of the culture, no longer able to relate or interpret my own experiences through the broader religious culture.  I am no longer able to compartmentalize my knowledge of history and science with my knowledge of what is true spiritually within the church.

The Muddy Water of the Mukuntuweap

Guest contributor Scott writes about the ancestor that inspired this fictional short story about Mountain Meadows Massacre. If you have spent much time around Mormon history, then you know that the Mountain Meadows Massacre is one of the singular events in Church history that has caused the most damage to testimonies, even some one hundred fifty-four years after the event. Many Latter-day Saints report either complete ignorance of the events until they began investigating the history on their own, or being given the idea that it was the Mormons who were the victims.

Few of us really grasped the unmitigated horror of the events. Few of us are able to buy the apologist explanations for the premeditated murder of 120 defenseless men, women, and children.

Read on and enjoy Scott's historical fiction piece.

One of my Mormon ancestors was Nephi Johnson, perhaps most famous for his involvement in the Mountain Meadows Massacre. I've often thought about the pain he suffered at the end of his life (he died in 1919), when he cried out the words "blood! blood! blood!" (as accounted by witnesses and Juanita Brooks) on his deathbed. I wrote this short story as a fictional account of a reporter attempting to interview him towards the end of his life about his involvement in the Mountain Meadows Massacre. To me, the ultimate message of the story, is that there is always hope. There is hope in disillusion and there is hope when we have lost faith. Most important, it shows how important the events of our life (especially the trying ones) are in shaping who God wants us to become.

The Muddy Water of the Mukuntuweap

On the last leg of a journey from Denver, David Gilbride had travelled along the Virgin River to Bunkerville, Nevada. The trip had been hot and dry, but the interview at hand was worth the trip. David hoped to deliver a powerful story for his editor at The Denver Post.

“You know why they call her the ‘dirty Virgin’ River don’t you?” rasped the bedridden man.

“No, why?” replied David.

A corner of the mouth beneath the old man’s white beard curled in a half smile. Sadness showed in his deep, gray eyes.

“Well, they call her the ‘dirty Virgin’ River because no one has ever seen her bottom.”

The old man managed a weak laugh, followed by an ugly coughing fit. David gave the man a reassuring smile, and then continued his quest to put the man at ease.

“That’s a very funny joke, Mr. Johnson. Do you remember the first time that you saw the Virgin River?”

A haze came over the old man’s eyes. Despite the empty look, David knew that the man was thinking back to another time. Mr. Johnson paused in a daze for a few moments before shaking his head at the interviewer.

“I . . . I don’t know that I can recall an event as specific as that. I’m very old, young man. I’m afraid my memory isn’t as sharp as it once was.”

He did remember the first time that he saw the Virgin River. Only she wasn’t dirty then. The sediment that comes during the spring and summer run-off had passed through months before. The river was smaller, but it was clearer—cleaner. He remembered the small desert trees that lined the bank of the river, and was surprised by how green the trees were. Surely the dry desert heat would have yellowed them by September. It was 1848; he was 15.

Before accepting the assignment to interview Mr. Johnson, David’s editor had warned that the man may be senile; however, despite this potential senility, David could not reject the assignment. It held too much promise.

“Of course, please forgive me, Mr. Johnson” replied the interviewer. “Let me start with some basic questions.”

“Can you please state your full name?”

The old man sat up straight. Rays of sunlight from a lone window highlighted the desert dust that flittered in the air.

“My name is Nephi Johnson.”

“Mr. Johnson, can you please tell me the year that you were born and where you were born?”

“I was born in 1833, in Kirtland, Ohio.” This reply was quicker than the others. The haze was gone. The interviewer began to feel more confident in the lucidity of his subject.

“Can you tell me the names of your father and mother?”

“My father’s name is Joel Hills Johnson and my . . . mother is . . .” His voice trailed off into a mumble. The haze was back.

When he was seven, his mother, Annie, was struck down with a horrible fever. It was malaria. She died in September of 1840. He always remembered that day and always remembered her. The morning that she died, his father was receiving counsel from Brother Joseph in Nauvoo. They were separated by the waters of the Mississippi. He remembered watching the rushing water for hours after she had passed. The sounds of the water were soothing to the innocent boy. When his father returned in the evening, they both wept by the bank of the wide, dark river.

Despite the distraction that he saw in his interviewee, David Gilbride pressed forward. With a better feel for the fragility of the man, he started into the most important questions of the interview.

“Mr. Johnson, this summer President Taft is scheduled to dedicate Mukuntuweap Canyon as a national park. I understand that you were the first white man to explore Mukuntuweap, specifically The Narrows of the Mukuntuweap. Is that correct?”

Nephi Johnson’s eyes grew wide at the question. A spark crossed his eye, and he thought about the question for a few moments before replying.

“The Mukun’tuweap . . . I haven’t heard that name in years. Yes, I scouted the Mukun’tuweap many, many years ago.”

The red rock walls of the Mukun’tuweap act as sentinels for the precious waters of the Virgin. The river’s water flows straight through the infinite caverns of the canyon. He was the first white man to see The Narrows of the Mukun’tuweap, though it was through no exploratory efforts of his own. For hundreds of years, only the Paiutes knew of the Narrows’ existence. Many explorers wandered through the plateau of the Markagunt, but they never found The Narrows. The Narrows are sacred to the Paiutes. They represent the temple of the Nuwuvi, the people. It is their Zion. He was led there by a Pah Vant chieftain to take part in their rite of passage. When a Paiute boy comes of age, he must travel alone into The Narrows to enter into manhood. This rite of passage is done in the spring when flashfloods are a constant danger. Wading through the waters of the Virgin, the boy must grasp to the gritty rock walls or risk falling into the fast moving water. To fall into the water shows only weakness, but grasping the sandy walls bloodies the hands. A young Paiute must make a choice: fall into innocence, weakness to his people, or bare the sting of raw hands on roughened rock.

“You were also an amazing Indian interpreter. They say that you spoke the Paiute language better than anyone, Mr. Johnson, better than Jacob Hamblin even.” At this, Mr. Gilbride began to sense more discomfort in the old man. Nephi Johnson became more agitated, he spoke words that David had never heard, and then he began to repeat the same word over and over.

“Mukun’tuweap, Mukun’tuweap, Mukun’tuweap . . .” The old man again fell into mumbles and began to sway back in forth in his bed. The accent of the mumbles reminded David of an old Indian mourning the loss of a loved one.

David Gilbride realized that Nephi Johnson knew where the interview was headed. Surely there had been others who had probed before. He thought about waiting to ask the question, but instead chose to ask before the man completely withdrew.

“Mr. Johnson . . . I wondered if you could tell me about the massacre at Mountain Meadows. I don’t know if you are aware, but you are the last living settler who has a recollection of that day. Can you recall any memories from the massacre?”

The swaying stopped. The sadness in Aaron Johnson’s eyes was replaced by flinches of something worse—pain.

“If you want memories, you can read the court testimony that I gave 40 years ago. There’s nothing more to recall” came the reply.

But he did recall. For over 60 years he had tried to shake the memories of that day. Over time, he was able to blank out the unimportant memories, but others were forever etched in his mind. Contrasts of colors, sounds, and smells swirled through his head: a white flag, the galloping horses, the smell of sage, the screams of the Paiutes—no not just Paiutes . . . the screams of children. He heard the screams of the virgin and saw the muddy water of the virgin—no, not muddy water . . . blood.

“Mukun’tuweap, Mukun’tuweap, Mukun’tuweap . . .” the mumbling and swaying returned. A fear gripped the old man, and he clung to his grimy handkerchief. After what seemed like an eternity, Nephi Johnson again sat up straight again. He was still once more.

“Mr. Gilbride, I will always cherish my memories of the Mukun’tuweap. I’m sure it will make a wonderful national park for the country.”

Had he seen The Narrows of the Mukun’tuweap before the massacre, they would have held no meaning. In fact, he would not have been led into The Narrows. He would not have understood. The bloodied hands of his soul gave him understanding—painful understanding. Although the innocent water that he waded through tried in vain to cleanse, his worn and bloody hands grasped continually to the rock until he reached the darkness of the deep canyon. In the darkness of the canyon came a waterfall. He removed his bloody hands from the walls of the canyon and allowed the rushing water to pull him into the shadowy waters below.

David Gilbride tried every way possible to get more information from Nephi Johnson. He spent nearly two hours with the man in the warn Nevada afternoon. At the end of their meeting together, both men were exhausted. David Gilbride returned to Denver with a heavy heart. Although he had enough material for a story, his interview with Nephi Johnson had not provided the groundbreaking revelations that he had hoped to hear.

He saw the Virgin River once more in the spring of 1918. It was a month after his interview with David Gilbride and two months before his own death. It would be the last time he passed by her. The clear water that he first saw as a boy was no more. The water was muddied, and the river was faster—furious. He realized that the clear waters he first saw in his youth were only temporary. Upstream the filth would come. The old man took some solace in his pain though. Something still remained the same: desert trees still grew at the banks of the river. They were green even. The small trees thrived from the virtue of the Virgin. However dirty she was, she still provided nourishment.

Walk a Mile in My Thongs

I’ll age myself here. Years ago, thongs were an article of clothing that didn’t run anywhere near your butt. They were actually sandals, as in flip flops, Zories and -thongs. Sometimes I desperately wish someone could walk a mile in my thongs and then give me an outsider’s perspective on what they would do if they really had been me for awhile.

No More Hammers

Over the years their voices have grown fainter as they cry from the pulpit “obey, obey obey…” As it echo’s off the walls of the chapel my mind now seems to turn inward to a voice more calm and more sure than it has ever been. I have spent too many years taking the me that God created and tried to make it into a picture perfect reflection of “truth” and “good”. I have always known that I was not a round peg created for a hole

In Search of Peace: Part One

In Search of Peace: Part One

“For the dear God who loveth us,
He made and loveth all…” Rime of the Ancient Mariner

Fifteen can be a very awkward age for a young man. The only home I knew through ninth grade was in the suburbs of Washington, D.C. In Maryland, my neighborhood and school friends were a study in racial, economic and religious diversity. Anyone who wanted to be my friend was my friend. All that was gone as we

What Is Real

By Oliver D. Anonymous

MIDWAY upon the journey of our life

I found myself within a forest dark,

For the straightforward pathway had been lost.

– The Divine Comedy, Inferno Canto I:1-3

When Dante awoke to himself, lost in a forest, he couldn’t remember how he had arrived, where he was, or the way he should go. Stumbling through the wood, with a bitterness of soul likened to death, he made his way to the highest point he could see, the Mount Delectable. But as he began the ascent, his way

EXCOMMUNICATION

"Brother John, it is the unanimous decision of this council that you be excommunicated from the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints."   I felt my heart sink, my eyes broke contact, my expression fell, my chest seemed to sink and as I went numb I felt the air pass out of my lungs like I had just forgot to breathe.   I didn't know what to do next.  I stood up from where I had been sitting, I didn't wait for anyone to grab me or try to