Is The LDS Church After You, Your Money, or Your Ancestors? — episode transcript
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Is The LDS Church After You, Your Money, or Your Ancestors? — episode transcript
Simone Collins:
Hello, Malcolm. I’m excited to be speaking with you because there’s this weird mystery rabbit hole that I fell down a little while ago when one of the listeners to this podcast gave me this tip. He wrote, apparently, the Mormon church is making a huge push in Europe. Every third ad I’m seeing on YouTube is by the Mormon church. Even my younger brother, who’s completely apolitical and nonreligious, noticed it and asked me what Mormons believe, which is notable. Right? Like, that that they’re reaching this level of saturation in Europe that suddenly young men are being like, what are Mormons all about? Let’s talk about this. So I was, like, immediately interested because you know how I love Mormons. So he shared with his his comment a post by German Zoomer who posted a screenshot of one of these ads saying, she’s so cute. I love seeing ads with her. And this screenshot shows a young LDS missionary with sister Wise on her name tag smiling while holding a Book of Mormon. And to his tweet, let’s have a good times or let’s have good times responds. Yeah. But that’s how they get you. What to which German German Zoomer replied, yes. I purposely watch that ad longer than would be necessary even if I can skip. So YouTube understands that it should show me stuff like this and not some retarded slop, which is funny. People like the the it’s not just that the ads are saturating Europe. It’s that, like, the people seeing them really like these wholesome female missionaries and just wanna meet a good Mormon girl, and I love it. But I also had to ask myself, would targeting Europeans be a good idea for the LDS church? Because, I mean, it we’d understand that LDS birth rates are down. In the early nineteen eighties, like, around 1981, the LDS TFR was around 3.31 children per women, which was much higher than the national United States TFR of 1.81. Right? That is very respectable. By the mid twenty tens, and this is data from the 2016 Next Mormon survey, completed her median family size for US Mormons, especially Gen X who’d largely finished childbearing, was around 2.42, which represents a drop of roughly one child, like a 27% drop. so, basically, in around twenty years, you’re seeing almost a third of a drop in the the Mormon total fertility rate. Not good. Where sort of in contrast, Europeans are increasingly godless and facing this crisis of cultural identity. In Germany, around 43% of Germans without a migration background report no religious affiliation. Whereas in 1990, the overall nonaffiliated share was only 22%. So we’re seeing basically a doubling of nonreligious people. So we have nonreligious affiliation in Germany at 43%, Catholic at 27%, and Protestant at 28%. And then others basically negligible unless you wanna include the immigrant population. Polarization also, in Germany, between genders is high just like it is in The United States. In this twenty twenty five Bundestag election, the gap among the youngest voters was the largest recorded in postwar German history for the age group. So the left had roughly 35% of support among young women versus only 16% among young men, which is a gap of about 19 to 20 percentage points. That was the strongest party among young women. And then the AFD, the party that we’re kind of a big fan of, had roughly 27% of support among young men and then only 15% among young women. So you’re seeing this just, like, opposite directional move just like we are in The United States. So is it enough to just show a friendly young woman to tempt Europeans to join the LDS church with the hope that they can rediscover a cohesive community? I had to check to see where the LDS Church is in Europe because I thought it was kind of nonexistent there. But the church reported that there are 40,398 members, a 148 congregations, four missions, and two operating temples in Germany, just Germany alone at the end of twenty twenty four, which is not bad, actually. Like, that’s Yeah. Germany is not that giant of a country. and Spain is also up three to 4% in 2024. Italy up 2%. France up around 2% in 2024. Like, they’re not they’re not growing fast, but they’re I mean, they’re growing. And that means a lot in these In a world
Malcolm Collins:
where most religions are shrinking. Yeah.
Simone Collins:
Oh, not just shrinking, like hemorrhaging. You know, like, losses of, like, five to 10%, you know, just insanely high.
Malcolm Collins:
Well, I mean, this this makes me I mean, one of the problems with this, and I’ve seen this with my friends who do convert to Mormonism Mhmm. Is you lose most of the benefits of being a Mormon if you live in an area where there isn’t a critical mass of Mormons.
Simone Collins:
You really do need a critical mass.
Malcolm Collins:
Yeah. You need the critical mass. And one of the things that this whole conversation gets me thinking of is when you look at the number of secular people in a country like Germany, I’m like, well, how many of them would convert to techno puritanism if they knew it was an option? Right? Like, should we be doing ads in these countries? Should we be pushing in these regions? Right?
Simone Collins:
So what do I yeah. The other thing I I started to explore and I fell down this huge rabbit hole was church advertising. Because, yeah, this concept of a church advertising anything is kind of novel, I would say. I mean, one, like, ads have only existed for so long. Right? Like, this hasn’t really been a thing. And, also, churches haven’t when they were I don’t know. Before before online ads, I think sometimes churches would put out, like, editorial ads sometimes to, like, send a message about abortion or whatever. But, like, they weren’t, like, putting out the the church equivalent of a classified ad being like, come check out our church. I mean, I’m sure some probably did in newspapers or, like, advertised special Christmas services, but I didn’t see it if they did. Anyway, there’s I I felt that this whole thing of ad transparency so you can find out who is posting ads on Google and Facebook. Did you know this? And you can just go. You go to you can go to adstransparency.google.com, and then you can search by region. You can search by brand. You can search by keywords. Did you know this?
Malcolm Collins:
no. It’s actually really
Simone Collins:
cool because you can you can kind of see, like, what different organizations are doing to acquire customers at least in the online ad landscape. So it turns out that LDS advertising is far more interesting than I previously thought, and they they are probably I I would say, almost undoubtedly the most sophisticated and prolific religion out there when it comes to ads. So let’s first just to sort of set some framing, look at ads by other major religions. Mhmm. And I was looking for ads anywhere by advertising with the religion’s name and advertisers linking to the main religion website. So this is how I did my cross check. Okay. Right? So Roman Catholicism, they have over, like, oh, we’ll say approximately 1,400,000,000 members. Right? Like, it’s the biggest religion under 300 ads. and, you know, it was mostly, like, local parishes and stuff. That is very little. Okay? Eith Eastern Orthodoxy, they have over 250,000,000 members. There’s only one ad, and it’s not even for the religion. It’s for some comp it’s it’s out by some company called Eastern Orthodox Icons LLC, and they just sell, idolatrous icons. So not even an advertisement for the religion per se. Islam, 2,000,000,000 members. Right? Super big. Under 300 ads. And mostly for private companies that were built around Islam. So, again, like, not actually some central or even, like, organized collective religious body advertising. Judaism, around 14,800,000 members, under 300 ads, mostly for the Jewish museum, which alone has 108 ads. Like, a third of the ads more than a third of the ads are just for the Jewish museum, and the rest of the advertisers have under 10 ads.
Malcolm Collins:
What the heck is Judaism advertising? It’s like a nonconverting religion. Like
Simone Collins:
Well, they they need people to know about their history, and that’s why it’s for the Jewish museum mostly. Go to the Jewish museum. Where it’s funny, like, no one’s no one’s advertising the the Museum of the Bible or whatever, which now I really wanna go to in DC. I’m kinda mad that we’ve never been. We’re gonna have to maybe next time something brings us to DC for business, we need to we need to go to the Museum of the Bible. Can we do that?
Malcolm Collins:
I can only imagine how cool a techno Puritan museum would be.
Simone Collins:
It would be freaking awesome.
Malcolm Collins:
Much cooler than that. Like, big soft story, the one would be a bunch of, like, futuristic nonsense.
Simone Collins:
Yeah. Like, come, you know, join your cat lady companion to shoot things with lasers for five minutes. It would be fantastic. I would definitely enjoy that.
Malcolm Collins:
Talk to your AI friends. You know?
Simone Collins:
Like And, of course, it’ll have just a lot of superfluous loopy slides everywhere. Slide down to the 3rd Floor to try out the ball pit. Also, with lasers. It’ll just everything will be fun.
Malcolm Collins:
Go shoot the Xeno scum. You
Simone Collins:
know? Like,
Malcolm Collins:
have a Yeah.
Simone Collins:
Shoot the Xeno scum while going down the the twirly side. See how many you can get to get a prize at the gift shop. It would be so fun. I really okay. Someday, Malcolm. But, again, keep in mind the Jewish Museum has so much money. And I think, actually, a lot of this comes down to organizations that just have so much excess cash that they feel like they kind of have to spend money on ads. And I think this is one of the reasons why the LDS Church is really prolific.
Malcolm Collins:
No. The reason why the LDS Church you gotta be honest here. The reason why the LDS Church spends so much more on ads than other companies and has such a more sophisticated ad operation is a few fold, but it’s also fairly obvious. Okay. LDS members are expected to actually tithe. Jews Yeah. Don’t really tithe in large numbers.
Simone Collins:
But there’s a lot a lot a lot of large Jewish donors, especially to the Jewish museum.
Malcolm Collins:
Yeah. But they don’t tithe. Catholics don’t really tithe in large numbers. Most Protestant groups don’t really tithe. I mean, like, the biggest tithers you probably get are baptists and evangelicals and pentecostals, but they don’t come close to Mormon tithing.
Simone Collins:
Well, and if you’re tithing to, like, some kind of prosperity gospel billionaire or millionaire preacher, he’s not gonna spend his money on ads. He’s gonna spend his money on his private jet and his shoes. So of course.
Malcolm Collins:
Yes. But but the cash positivity rate, like, if you’re just doing the math
Simone Collins:
Oh, I see what you’re saying. The lifetime value of of an LDS customer, 10% of their pretax earnings is really high.
Malcolm Collins:
It’s yes. It’s a really, really there probably is no product you could get someone to buy on Earth. Like, I wonder if Scientology even gets those kinds of numbers.
Simone Collins:
No. You’re right. 10% of you yeah. Actually.
Malcolm Collins:
10% of a person’s pretax income is insane. So yeah. Yeah. That’s that’s been
Simone Collins:
a win.
Malcolm Collins:
Then you have the secondary reason why they do more ads, which is not only are their parishioners’ products, which are
Simone Collins:
valuable to them. Yes. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
Malcolm Collins:
Cash positive products. But their senior management group is very different from any of these other groups. Again, we’ve talked about this before, but it is important to note. The head of the Catholic church is a bunch of people who have never run a business in their lives. They spent their whole lives away from the general public, unmarried, and completely focused on things that no one else cares about in church bureaucracy and politics. Fair. The the heads of the Orthodox Church generally spent their entire lives on church bureaucracy and politics. Within some of the Protestant churches, they have some relation to the real world, but typically, they’ve been in preaching for most of their life. If instead you turn to the leadership group of the LDS Church, you’ve got a lot of former banking managers. You have a lot of former private equity guys. You have a lot of former CTOs, CMOs of organizations. Yeah. Running large companies is these people’s, you know, bread and butter. Right? That is that is what they cut their teeth on. That is what they spent their lives doing, and that is the the first way that they are going to treat the operations of their church. And so it makes perfect sense to them to see the parishioners as units on a spreadsheet and to go for an advertising for a strategy.
Simone Collins:
That’s very fair. Yeah. Okay. Then I’m gonna rattle off a couple more. So all of these have under 300 ads. Hinduism, Sikhism, Baha’i faith. Shinto, none. Taoism and Taoism under 100. Confucianism under 20. Compare that to the LDS faith, which has around 17,500,000 rec members of record, so, like, 18% larger than Judaism, which is impressive, which and I also didn’t realize until I looked at these numbers. But Islam is a 114 times larger, and Catholicism is 80 times larger.
Malcolm Collins:
Wait. Catholicism is only I I wanna Catholicism is only 80 times larger than Mormonism now. Yeah. Islam is only a 100 times larger than Mormonism 14 times. Yeah. Yeah. If you look at the rate that both of those faiths are bleeding members at at this rate And you help keep that going forwards. Yeah. And you’re like, I’m really afraid of the Muslim minister or whatever. Uh-huh. you know, maybe you need to be paying a bit more attention to the Mormons.
Simone Collins:
Need to recalibrate. You really need to recalibrate. Yeah. So, yeah, keep in mind. Right? Like, of all these I rattled off, they all have under 300 ads, typically less than that. Okay? How many ads do you wanna guess the LDS church has out?
Malcolm Collins:
Let’s just say on Google properties. Guess at least 50,000 or something. Like, big deal number.
Simone Collins:
Thousand. Not 50,000. But 2,000 ads on Google properties in The US and approximately 3,000 globally on Google Ads and then an additional 5,000 ads on Meta. And I think it probably has a lot more because I searched through all of these ads, And I also reverse searched the URL that I thought was associated with these German ads because I found using Google image search, this Mormon missionary woman. And then I traced her image back to a website in the YouTube channel with her on it and then used that website to search that website in Google Ads to try to find who is running the YouTube ad in Germany that our listeners sent to us, and I couldn’t find it. And so there might be this whole additional pocket of, like, secret European Mormon ads that I’m not seeing, and it’s driving me freaking nuts. But I went so far as to, like, reverse image search this lovely young Mormon missionary who’s just trying to do her job, and I’m stalking her like a crazy person. But, anyway, there are probably more. But still, that is it it is still impressive to have over 8,000 ads when no other religion can muster even 300. But, of course, to put that into a larger perspective, there are 7,300,000 ads for Amazon, 1,200,000 for Walmart, 400,000 for Facebook, 400,000 for Instagram, 40,000 for Sephora and ChatGPT, 700 ads for Claude. So to be fair, the Mormon church advertises more than Claude. Wait. More than Claude? More than Claude. And there are only 64 ads for Grock. So definitely a ton I mean, you know, the the Catholic church advertises more than Grock does.
Malcolm Collins:
So well, I mean, I think it’s because of Grok’s real advertising strategy, which is let Elon’s talking do it for them.
Simone Collins:
Oh, that’s yeah. That’s the that’s the advertising strategy.
Malcolm Collins:
Which is a smart way to do advertising, and it’s something that we try to do as well because it it does better than than other types of advertising to just be bombastic yourself, which, you know, we should focus more on within the documentary Mhmm. The products and tech that we make.
Simone Collins:
Spend nothing on marketing. Just be bombastic.
Malcolm Collins:
Well, and same with techno puritanism. Spend more time talking about that within it because I think that well, I oh, by the way, was looking up the trying to find these ads, and I got a bunch of ads for a movie that came out in 2024. Have you heard escape from Germany? No. It looked interesting. Apparently, it’s a movie about Mormon missionaries who got stuck in Germany after the beginning of World War two and Hitler’s party, like, drawing power and then trying to get out of the country?
Simone Collins:
Dude, no. I hadn’t heard of that. That’s That actually sounds
Malcolm Collins:
I it sounds interesting to me.
Simone Collins:
But it’s not the young, lovely Mormon missionary girl, so keep looking. Look for, like, dirty blonde, neat looking young lady. Alright? If you
Malcolm Collins:
see I I I want to you know, as we go through this, I do think more and more that it makes sense to build out mechanisms for techno puritan’s organization, the the index to have a way to get money from people, to do things like ad campaigns. because I just think that there is, like, a lot of people out there that if they just knew it was an option, like, a a version of religion that didn’t require them to accept a bunch of stupid shit, that a lot of people
Simone Collins:
No offense to Mormons who we love, and they have the best
Malcolm Collins:
I I hey. I wasn’t talking about Mormons. I was talking about all the other religions.
Simone Collins:
Oh, okay. Thank you.
Malcolm Collins:
Not not that the Mormonism might be high on the stupid shit o meter. Look. But
Simone Collins:
If if you just look at the surface, when you go deeper, it changes a little. Okay?
Malcolm Collins:
Okay. But if if you if they were just like, wait. Wait. Wait. Wait. Wait. I can I can be religious without needing to believe silly stuff or saying everything’s just a parable man? I think a lot of people would find that really compelling, especially people like in Germany and and and Sweden and Norway and other former Protestant areas where you have a large secular population now.
Simone Collins:
Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I the the fact that these ads in Europe were just catching so much attention is is something. absolutely. At least
Malcolm Collins:
film, like, an intro to techno puritanism that could be done as an ad.
Simone Collins:
Film or have a sexy cat girl tell people about it. Anyway, there are many ways you
Malcolm Collins:
could do I could put that together.
Simone Collins:
Yes. You can. Yes. You can. And perhaps
Malcolm Collins:
you should. Our our editing software is actually pretty good for something like that. Yeah. Put together a sexy catgirl with a Japanese accent explaining why. Anyway,
Simone Collins:
back to Mormon ads. Although, yeah, I I would love to see what you create on that front. What’s also super interesting about Mormon ads, like, the the more I dug deeper, the more I saw that there’s there are multiple nonprofit and for prod org for profit, sorry, organizations running ads for the LDS church. So the centralized organization, which like, the the Roman Catholic church doesn’t have a consolidated ad buyer local groups run ads, like, is same for evangelical protestants. The the LDS church instead has this, like, constellation of businesses that do its bidding for it that are under its direction, basically. so their organizations look basically, they service funnels into the religion. You have BYU, which is their university system that funnels into the religion. You have radio stations, which are owned by this company called Bonneville International. Also then news publications owned by Deseret News. Did you know that they were LDS affiliated as an organization?
Malcolm Collins:
I knew that Deseret News was yes. Their freaking logo is the b. It’s a Mormon
Simone Collins:
theme. They were just, like, riffing on the theme. I thought they were proud Mormons. I didn’t know that was, like, actually
Malcolm Collins:
the church thing. You said Mormon affiliated. I didn’t know that they were owned by the church.
Simone Collins:
Yeah. It’s under it’s under their the church umbrella along with Bonneville International. The digital content, which is run by Radiant Digital, books, Deseret Book Company, and then hospitality service companies like the Temple Square Hospitality Corporation. and it was mostly Bonneville International that was running the ads that I saw when I looked into it. And the only reason I knew that the church had several advertising arms was because I couldn’t find the missionary girl that German Zoomer saw with the main church’s ad sets. But then I did find BodyVille International by trying to search for them. Anyway, here’s the weirdest, weirdest thing for me about LDS church ads, which is a it’s gonna be a little bit different, I think, than your original thesis. So I agree that your thesis is there. And I also think this is why, for example, the LDS Church has probably bid up keywords around the word Mormon, etcetera, on things like YouTube so that influencers are more likely, like, subconsciously incentivized to publish content that glorifies Mormon style lifestyles or even criticism of the Mormon church because Alissa Grenfell think I even recently, now this
Malcolm Collins:
I is think the most honest endorsements you can get, the endorsements that people believe most thoroughly are from people who are critical of you. Mhmm. And so if a person goes out and says a bunch of stuff that’s critical about you and YouTube people still come away being like,
Simone Collins:
don’t know.
Malcolm Collins:
Fine. Yeah. and I think that in that way, a lot of the anti Mormon or ex Mormon YouTubers have done a lot more for the church than the pro Mormon YouTubers.
Simone Collins:
Yeah. Because they keep saying these things like, can you believe they do this? And a lot of people, including myself, listen and we’re like, I don’t know. That sounds kinda nice. Like yeah. Sign me up for that.
Malcolm Collins:
Can you can you believe they raise young women believing that one of their purposes in life is to be a mother? And and people are like, well, I yeah. I mean, yeah. I I can believe that. Or can you believe they demand that you don’t have a big performative wailing ceremony after somebody dies?
Simone Collins:
Yeah. Like, oh my gosh. Can you believe they have a grieving procedure that, you know, is is organized and community focused, but that doesn’t involve languishing in a deep depression for a long period of time. What? How terrible. Like, actually
Malcolm Collins:
Or can you believe that they pressure you to act happy or choose to be happy all the time? The nerve. The nerve. I’m like, well, that that seems largely mentally healthy. Yeah. Yes. Can you believe they don’t let you drink caffeine or
Simone Collins:
alcohol? Yeah. Like, how would that you know? I mean, caffeine is broadly good for your health in moderation.
Malcolm Collins:
Probably good for your health. That was
Simone Collins:
Not dirty drinking.
Speaker 3:
You know what the
Malcolm Collins:
really funny thing
Simone Collins:
No.
Speaker 3:
The funny
Simone Collins:
thing is actually, though, is caffeine is not outlot. It is hot drinks. Remember. Yeah. There’s this actually kind of really big thing. Like, dirty sodas are super big, and caffeinated, like, chocolate drinks are really big in LDS circles, which are extremely caffeinated. And it’s an active ongoing joke. Like, literally a joke used by a Mormon comedian who I love watching all the time called Jane Insane, like, that’s her username on YouTube, is caffeinated drinks. Like, her whole character is called, like, Mormon mom or whatever or Utah. You she doesn’t say Mormon. Utah mom. But everyone knows it’s Mormon. It’s all Mormon jokes. And, like, an ongoing joke is just an obsession with caffeine. Like, a a deep addiction and obsession with caffeine, which is I I think
Malcolm Collins:
Which you see across Mormons because they have all those soda shops. They’re whatever. Yeah. They’re dirty sodas. Yeah. But the point I was making, Simone, which you interrupted Sorry. Sorry. Is, yes, you are right. If you go to the original Mormon text like, if you did a techno puritan version of Mormonism, the dumb rules and new things that Mormonism has introduced actually resolves themselves if you went back to the original text. So, know, like, if you’re a techno Puritan, but a a Jew, you you throw off the later text. If you’re techno Puritan Muslim, you throw off the later text. If you’re a techno Puritan Mormon and you did the same, you wouldn’t have the caffeine restrictions because that’s not actually restricted in those texts. But another fun one that’s not actually restricted at all, which is a, I think, a very harmful restriction to the religion, is the anti masturbation restriction. Do you know what the text actually say, Simone?
Simone Collins:
No. I don’t. Is
Malcolm Collins:
it’s about a and and note, I’m doing this for memory, so I’m gonna get it a little wrong, likely. A guy who decided to, instead of doing his missionary work, spend time with a prostitute. And I’m like, that has nothing to do with masturbation at all. If he wanted to write a masturbation prohibition, he could have. But he wrote a a polemic, a good one, you shouldn’t sleep with prostitutes, about sleeping with a prostitute and why that’s bad.
Simone Collins:
Fair enough. I’m gonna yeah. We’re gonna have to look deeper on this. I I had no idea. I genuinely had no idea. That that’s pretty wild and kind of annoying at the same time. So there you go. No. So here’s the most emphasized thing on in in the Google Ads, especially, that were out there for the the LDS Church. Obviously, they’re the ones saying, hey. Like, the Mormon Church is great. Come have a missionary visit you. And it’s it’s basically just top of the funnel, like, come meet a a supportive community. It’s a really, really common message. Like oh, what did they say things like? Do you feel alone? Life is not meant to be a solo journey. Come join us this Sunday, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter day Saints this week to connect with God and make new friends. Sign up to connect with your local congregation. Or are you searching for a community of people who care? Church is a place where we gather together to learn about Jesus Christ and how we can follow him. He is the light of the world and offers healing and hope to all who come unto him. Join us this Sunday. We are excited to meet you. Representatives of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter day Saints will reach out to you soon. so they’re all like, are you lonely? Are you looking for community? Do you want family? Like, that’s a really big thing. And the call to action is always come have a missionary talk to you. Right? That totally makes sense.
Malcolm Collins:
Mhmm.
Simone Collins:
But what is the vast majority of ads for?
Malcolm Collins:
What is the vast majority?
Simone Collins:
Familysearch.org. Create a free account today. Create your free family tree. Your family tree stories live inside you. Add what you know and discover more. Get started. Your family story is worth remembering. Start preserving your family stories for free. Discover your ancestors free. And the advertisements are in all sorts of languages, Arabic, German, French, Italian, some I can’t even recognize. And then Spanish, who thinks like, Basically, oh my god. Are you related to a famous soccer player? Find out now. And then they also really lean heavily in Europe on the World Cup across several languages. Like, it’s really clear because I saw French ads on this as well. And you and a bunch across Europe. They were basically like, could you be related to, like, insert famous football slash soccer player? I think they realized it had a really high click through rate, and they, like, went hard on it. And I could not understand for the life of me after creating an account on familysearch.org. Because I was like, okay. Well, then this just must be their best recruiting mechanism. Like, clearly, this whole thing of, like, he has come on to him. Like, come to church. Like, that’s very daunting. I think it’s a lot to get someone to, like, ask a missionary to come to their house and go to a church. Like, you have to be, like, really hitting rock bottom or, like, completely isolated in your community to go for something like that, especially, like, in this day and age. Right? So I was like, well, then it must be the family search is just really, really good at converting people to the LDS church. So I go on. I create an account. I enter my email, and I’m like, alright. Let’s go. Like, I’m just gonna start getting spammed about the LDS Church and us. No. I don’t hear about them anywhere. For all I know, there’s zero affiliation between familysearch.org and the LDS Church, and I’m getting so freaking confused. And then I start adding in my family members, and I start going up, and I start adding in new entries that they didn’t have. And I start to see entries that they’ve already populated. And then you did your whole episode on the Mormon afterlife, and I realized, oh my god.
Malcolm Collins:
This is about converting dead people?
Simone Collins:
Dead people. Yes. Yes. They’re like, you know what? It’s stupid for us to just try to get live people to convert. We’re running out of names to baptize. I have a great idea. We’ve got a ton of money, and there’s a lot of people out there who wanna know if they’re related to famous soccer players. So this is it, guys. We’re gonna get all of the dead people. We’re gonna get them to add all their ancestors, and we are going to convert them posthumously to the LDS church. And I think it’s kind of brilliant.
Malcolm Collins:
No. It it is it is very brilliant. So I a few things here. Yes. One, it would does the site charge? Like, is
Simone Collins:
It’s there totally freaking free, and it is way better than, in my opinion, than Ancestry because they have all the same stuff. Like, you have your family. Like, stuff auto populates. It uses public records. I started our our family tree, and, like, there were some people there were a bunch that I did have to add manually with, like, death and birth rates and stuff. Like, it it it didn’t wasn’t super easy with some. But then others, I’ve entered in the name. It was like, oh, is it this person? And then you enter the right person, and suddenly, like, huge parts of your tree just, like, go boom.
Malcolm Collins:
That’s the way it works with ancestry.com. Right.
Simone Collins:
But on ancestry.com, you have to pay a stupid monthly raise. And on familysearch.org, all you’re giving up is the the religious affiliation of your ancestors. I mean, like, what do you care? Besides, if the LDS church is right, don’t you want them to be saved anyway? Like, you want them to convert.
Malcolm Collins:
By the way, I I double checked the the the masturbation thing because I was wondering when did LDS start believing this. And Yeah. Joseph Smith and Brigham Young never mentioned it once. The first mention that we have of it is a few scattered mentions in the late eighteen hundreds,
Simone Collins:
but it doesn’t really Kellogg. They were pre like that. Remember in, like, the early nineteen hundreds, people were
Malcolm Collins:
just No. No. You’re
Simone Collins:
you’re gonna go blind.
Malcolm Collins:
I’m not done.
Simone Collins:
Okay.
Malcolm Collins:
There are a few scattered mentions, but it’s not like textual commands in the late eighteen hundreds. It is in the early nineteen hundreds around the Kellogg period that they began to freak out about
Simone Collins:
it. Okay. So the fad stuck to the LDS church, like, one of those like, a sticky piece of gum.
Malcolm Collins:
Yes. This was, like, a fad that went through the education system and, like, health nuts in the early nineteen hundreds, and everybody else realized what stupid and gave up. Yeah. But Mormons never did.
Simone Collins:
Yeah. It was, like, the trans fat of its age. It was the it was the microplastics of its age. Like, oh my god.
Malcolm Collins:
It’s gonna kill you. It’s gonna make you go blind. This is the way it’s gonna make you go blind. Yeah.
Simone Collins:
He’s definitely blind. Why is he blind? He masturbated too much. Oh my god.
Malcolm Collins:
Oh, but I think that’s interesting that that you get all these but with with with Mormonism because oh, you went to a techno Puritan version of Mormonism, then it’s like, well, do I even need to tie it to the Mormon church anymore? Because they are apparently not in alignment with the original teachings. Because they they went back on tons of original teachings, and so it would be much harder to do. But and I and I wouldn’t say you have to do that to be a techno Puritan Mormon because right now, there’s really nothing in between techno puritanism and transhumanism. I can say I think there’s a few things or rules that they have that are stupid, like the caffeine rule, which isn’t even a rule really, or they’re we’re losing it these days. But that’s not a, like, a reason to leave a church over. Right? So there’s there’s no actual, like, theological incompatibility with normal Mormonism and techno puritanism, which is interesting. However, I’ve been thinking through the ad campaigns that they’re running. And, like, if I was running an ad campaign, how it would differ. Yeah. If I was running ad campaigns for them, how it would differ. And this community focused first one, like, come join our community.
Speaker 3:
Mhmm.
Malcolm Collins:
I would not do that first. I think that’s a really bad
Simone Collins:
That’s how it was across the board. Are you looking for a community that feels like family? Come join us this Sunday.
Malcolm Collins:
The problem is is these ads are going to convert in terms of getting people to come to events and in terms of stage one of the conversion process, k. Which is getting somebody involved in stuff. But the problem is that it doesn’t do stage two, which is what happens when they find out what Mormons actually believe. Oh. And a lot of people are gonna be like, wait. What? Like, come on, guys.
Simone Collins:
Oh, would you do the classic Malcolm thing and just lead with it to edit out everyone who would be
Malcolm Collins:
Yeah. That’s what I would do is lead with the Lead with the weird. Lead with the weird because then you get the people who want what you’re selling. Right? Like, do you want to stay with your wife forever in the afterlife? Right? You you add that to to to married guys. That’s a that’s a compelling pitch that people have made to me before. Totally. You know? Do you do you think that, like, you never have to work again or have no agency in the afterlife? Right? Like, is that actually what you want from an afterlife? Right? Mhmm. That’s a compelling pitch. Because there, you’re getting to the crux of how they’re different from other religions. Right? Yeah. With with techno puritanism, I would immediately lead with the theology. Right? I’d immediately lead with the, like, what if Christianity wasn’t stupid?
Simone Collins:
That’s very interesting. Yeah. I would never have thought about that. I mean, I think the real in terms of converting live people, the real win of the LDS Church Mommy.
Malcolm Collins:
Is that I forgot this 15 lessons.
Simone Collins:
You did? Well, remember, it’s 20 to get the x level.
Malcolm Collins:
Oh, I mean, 20.
Simone Collins:
Well, then do a couple more just to be extra sure. K? You can do it, buddy. Oh, okay. He gets a rainbow axolotl if he does 20 lessons.
Speaker 3:
Yes. I do.
Simone Collins:
Get her done. Axolotls are
Speaker 3:
for
Simone Collins:
closers. Go on, buddy. You can do it. I’m gonna be done in, like, five minutes. Okay? Off you go. Whatever whatever this is. There he goes.
Malcolm Collins:
This is nice. I need
Simone Collins:
I don’t think that’s working.
Malcolm Collins:
Tell him daddy can see him being bad, and they
Simone Collins:
Daddy can see you being bad, and daddy might do something about it. K. He’s crab. Okay. That’s your okay. Don’t hit the door with your head. Okay. He’s he’s he’s out. He’s he’s making his way. Okay. Great. Fantastic. I I think the
Malcolm Collins:
But this is hold on. Actually, to our other episode that we did, this is why he’s a bad boy in school, but a good boy in real life. He wants to crab walk or dog walk around the house to his lesson. Yeah. Why is that such a bad thing? Why is
Simone Collins:
it like And at school, it’s like, you have a behavioral problem. What’s wrong with your child?
Malcolm Collins:
That he’s just giggling and having fun.
Simone Collins:
Know? Right? And he’s yeah. He’s he’s getting his science knowledge done. Just whatever. Also, like, the yeah. Anyway, we could go along on that. They’re sort of, like, what is legally required for us to teach him and what I have to be able to statutorily represent to someone who tries to take our children away from us. And then there’s, like, their actual education. And you have to be responsible for both, which is really frustrating, but also it’s way easier than you’d think. So cool. But, yeah, I think this whole Mormon lifestyle thing is so underrated. The number of influencers who are very aspirational Mormons is huge, such that there is literally an entire ecosystem dedicated to snarking about them. Do you know how, like, successful you have to be to have your own snark community? I mean, the only other entity I know, aside from, like, some other Fundy Christians that has this level of snark, is Harry and Megan. And they’re just
Malcolm Collins:
literally freaking real. That, like, we and Leaflet have snark communities based on us?
Simone Collins:
Do we? Because I don’t see that.
Malcolm Collins:
Multiple snark channels.
Simone Collins:
They get, like, seven views. No. I’m talking when I say snark community, I mean, people who are making full time YouTube incomes way more than we are just by saying bitchy things about Harry and Meghan, about Ballerina Farm, about whoever it is in in a in the LDS like, look. Alyssa Grenville is a full time YouTuber who just makes money, like, concern trolling of how perfectly respectable LDS church practice is, probably converting a lot of people, which is ultimately good for the church, I guess. But so I think that that’s a very smart move on their part. If this is actually what they’re doing, it remains unproven. Like, they’re what’s really annoying about these ads is I don’t know, for example, if the LDS church is intentionally bidding up these ads. Or maybe maybe all these crappy ads are their way of bidding up Mormon keyword content. Like, could could they be decoy ads? Like, they’re really kind of crappy ads. Right? You’re like, who would click on this? But are they only putting it out so that the cost of other ads goes up so that people who put that content out get something? You know what
Malcolm Collins:
I mean?
Simone Collins:
Right? Mhmm. I don’t know. I don’t know. Like, for example, if you’re like, I will only run my YouTube ads on videos that have the word Mormon in them, then those videos are making better ad revenue, especially if you have a high bid price. Maybe this is the mechanism by which they do it. YouTube is
Malcolm Collins:
next it was an interesting thing that you found. Yeah.
Simone Collins:
It’s too disorganized for a a weekday episode, but I wanted to share it because it’s crazy.
Malcolm Collins:
My my big takeaway is what do you take away from when and how should techno puritanism advertise?
Simone Collins:
That’s a really good question. I I feel like there’s some juncture in society. I’m not sure when. When how when, basically, Tumblr and 4chan and maybe they’re already here, like, reach this age at which they’re having kids and need, like, the religion of Tumblr and 4chan, which is inherently a culturally generative religion. Yeah. Like techno puritanism, it’s just disorganized. It it has the id and the impetus of people who want to be culturally generative.
Malcolm Collins:
Who are secular, and they don’t want to be secular. They they want a religion that just isn’t stupid at face value.
Simone Collins:
Well, maybe the the larger thing, and this is may something also demonstrated well by the LDS church is you advert and and by the Jewish museum. You advertise when you have excess money, and you don’t advertise when you don’t. So when we have So either
Malcolm Collins:
we have to get rich or we have to find a mechanism for tithing of some sort.
Simone Collins:
Yeah. Or you do what the Audubon Museum is and just get a lot of, like, old single childless people super into bird watching, aka techno puritanism. And then when they pass away, they leave all their money to your bird museum, which is now incredibly overpowered and overstaffed, but in a way that we quite enjoy. So I think that’s kind of the thing.
Malcolm Collins:
So you always you can put us in your will if you’re an old person.
Simone Collins:
A techno puritan federation, which is the religious entity.
Malcolm Collins:
Yep. Then it has a a bank account and everything like that. So, well, I actually don’t know who set up the bank account yet, but it
Simone Collins:
was have a bank account yet. Yeah. I was like, oh god. I’m backing up. Does that went up right now? It’s just I I really should. Oh, right. The reason why I haven’t is I have to wait for some period for the IRS to officially accept us as a religion, and I think there was some waiting period. And they had to do all this application stuff.
Malcolm Collins:
They already did, didn’t they?
Simone Collins:
We did the original registration. But then in order to file a return, I had to do an additional one. Let me check-in on it right now since I have you on the line. Techno Puritan Federation EIN, officially registered in 2024. Still ending. I filed the return, but There’s so much paperwork with this. Okay. Hold on. No. Okay. Actually, we’re we’re yeah. We can. I just need to get and organize the paperwork and create corporate meeting schedule and minutes and documents template and create a bank account and then create a PayPal account, which I can do if you want me to prioritize that.
Malcolm Collins:
You don’t need to prioritize it. It’s if people wanted to donate that you would prioritize it.
Simone Collins:
Yeah. No one’s wanted to donate so far. I think we’re very we’re very small.
Malcolm Collins:
Because you’ve got the nonprofit, so there’s no point you know, that’s easy to donate to right now. Somebody was, like, a big believer or whatever, and they’re like, I wanna try to make it a thing. You let us know, and we’ll spin that up.
Simone Collins:
Yeah. I’m glad we did that. Yeah. We’re gonna be coming on three years soon enough. Are we little religion?
Malcolm Collins:
Since founding the religion?
Simone Collins:
And then you can put out your ad of sexy cat girls teaching people about the principles of techno feud wait. Technopuritanism. I almost said techno feudalism, which people are talking about more and more now. Kind of fun. It’s happening.
Malcolm Collins:
So yep. It’s a it’s it’s well, it’s weird to think that it’s become, like, a real religion now with it’s quite cohesive, I think. I I really am I’m quite proud of it in terms of a belief system that I am comfortable holding and that gets me through hard events in our lives and that helps us stay future oriented and that seems plausible and repeatedly is affirmed through, you know, the stuff that we read in the bible, which has really surprised me. Yeah. How how strongly the bible argues for it. Because there’s some takes that when I originally took them, I was like, like, the bible probably, we’re gonna have to do some tricky step thing around the wording to get this reading. Like, Jesus isn’t literally the son of god. And then I go to the bible, and it’s like, wait. It doesn’t seem to say that. Like, what the like, that that one was in fact, it appears to say the opposite. It appears to condemn that interpretation in a number of areas. Like, what the is this? It is specifically the line that I talked about recently. Like, anyone who says that Jesus is not in the flesh is the antichrist. Like, it’s it’s speaking of from the antichrist, I was like, that’s wild. Right? You know? And people would be like, oh, well, there’s he’s the son of God. And I’m like, if you’ve actually read your bible, you would know that that line is everywhere in the Old Testament. That’s a very common way to talk about somebody who is called out by God. And if you read it in the context of any Jew of that period, they expected a human messiah. Right? Like, everybody expected the messiah to be human. Right? But just, like, called apart. And so if he wasn’t human, he would have said that. Right? Like, that that would be a very important part of the the the central liturgy. And I think the the way like, the trick that techno purity system keeps pulling that allows it to pull off these, I think, like, magic shows was, like, how how do you get the text to keep agreeing with you when you take a petition that is still classically anti modern Christian? Is it’s that if you look at the biblical scholars, most of them, and I didn’t know this when I put this together, agree with our reading. The mainstream, if you look at, like, people who study, like, historians who study Jesus without the religious overlay, they do not believe that he ever claimed to be the son of god and that that was something that was added after he died. Given the way that the inclinations towards it are peppered throughout parts of the New Testament, they do not look like like it would be in there if he had said it. It would be way more clearly in there if he had said it.
Simone Collins:
Yeah. It’s it’s I’m going through the historical Jesus series on the great courses, you know, the the teaching company’s lectures, and it’s it is deeply disturbing me just, like, how much how many of the texts were just so clearly and documentedly making things up. Like, Bethlehem? No. Mm-mm. Jesus was not born in Bethlehem. That that, like, pretty clear in terms of what actually happened, like, per per the evidence that we have, which we should try to go by. I mean and and yet the thing that a lot of people take away from Christianity is like, oh, Bethlehem. Definitely, for sure. This was a thing.
Malcolm Collins:
Right. So how would it
Simone Collins:
take a certain temperature
Malcolm Collins:
for that?
Simone Collins:
There was never a census. Like, we would have known if there was a census at this time. It was kind of a well documented empire.
Malcolm Collins:
But by the way, for people who are wondering why he was in Bethlehem then in the story, it’s because of a prophecy that said that
Simone Collins:
Exactly.
Malcolm Collins:
He needed to be there, and so they added this. And you would say, wait. But you guys take a literalist reading of the bible. And it’s like, yes. A literalist reading of the bible within its context Yes. Which is as a recent oral memory of the actual Jewish messiah attempting to get things right, but occasionally making what today would seem to be mistakes.
Simone Collins:
Yeah. Or, like, the the the sorts of flourishes that were typically applied to to give weight to a character or story that may have in the past been, like, stylistic tropes that everyone kind of understood, to be stylistic tropes, but now we’re understood literally. Like, so many people to try to say that someone was important would say that someone it was a virgin birth. Right? Like, this was it was a it was a trope, the virgin birth. it wasn’t a it wasn’t a Jesus thing. And so then some people, but not in every book, in the New Testament, mentions a virgin birth, but that is not
Malcolm Collins:
Oh, it well, it has a secondary effect, which is if you read the Old Testament, there are a series of times where it’s a it’s a trope within the Old Testament. God intervenes to help a couple conceive a child, then that child goes on to do something great. God can Solomon’s a good example of this. God intercedes to help a couple conceive a child, and the child does something great. And this is a series that Jesus would have been fulfilling as, like, a trope happening over and over and over again within the testament. and for us, the I mean, this is the interesting thing about techno puritanism. It’s irrelevant whether the birth was actually virginal or not to the point of what virgin birth means Mhmm. Which is that it has biblical rhyming to it and that it, denotes a very important person in the history of the world, which I think this is where a lot of people would be surprised. Like, if you take a a literalist within the context reading of a lot of this stuff, you’ve gotta understand that a literalist reading of these types of texts as written within their time period isn’t literal. It’s it’s deep literal. It’s what what did it mean to have a virgin birth within this time period, and why would you add that trope in some books and not with
Simone Collins:
another And and why would you say that you, as a baby, were sent down a river in a basket? Because that’s not, like, just an old testament thing. Really early rulers of really early civilizations also Yes. Made up those origin stories for themselves because they wanted to sound cooler. Like, when you see patterns like that they’re so uncanny. You have to understand what almost certainly that means. Because just logistically speaking, how many people are putting babies in baskets and sending them down the river? I don’t know. I mean, maybe people I hope I’m both. Surely people did. Now I’m very disturbed by this idea. But it’s so weird that this is a trope anyway.
Malcolm Collins:
Yes. However But, no, that the the, where was the the point I was going with this? The oh, yeah. The other trick that we use, which really does feel like a trick is people, like, how do you keep getting lines from the old testament that make it look like nobody believed in a soul, or that they that they didn’t they they thought that you
Simone Collins:
would just die in a race again?
Malcolm Collins:
And the answer is the answer is is that is the mainstream academic consensus of what they actually believed during that period. The the what’s really and I I think, like, as a modern Christian, you can understand. You look Abraham, and this is one thing I wanna focus on in an upcoming track. And you understand Abraham was a Jew but didn’t believe all the things that modern Jews believed. Right? Like, you can understand that the belief system evolved over a period. Right? Like, the Adam and Eve didn’t have all the information that later Christians had, that Abraham didn’t have the laws that were handed down to Moses yet, that, you know, you you can go through and be like, well, this person didn’t have the full understanding of the religion. But then you get to what did Jews believe when Jesus was around? And you drop something like, the soul didn’t exist yet as a concept. And they’re like, oh, no. It was definitely more baked than that. And it’s like just just for clarification, by the time Jesus was around, some groups like the pharisees had begun to believe in something that was like a soul, but this concept was fairly new, like, within, like, two hundred years of his time period and it wouldn’t have been something that everyone would have necessarily accepted. And it appears, from what I can read of Jesus’ writings, because otherwise, it would really clearly be in there, he was of the group that didn’t believe in it yet.
Simone Collins:
Oh, interesting. I must have forgotten that detail. That’s super cool.
Malcolm Collins:
Well, I mean, I this didn’t have to be the case when I first hypothesized. I was like, look. This is just one thing I cannot bite in terms of a religion. It just seems silly to me. And then I reading the text, I was like, why why does the why does this work with the text? It shouldn’t work with the text. And what I later realized is it’s less of a trick than I thought. It’s what the academic consensus agrees these people actually believed. And it’s just that a lot of, later people are putting their theological beliefs on these earlier traditions, which is how we’re able to get these really clear It’s a it’s the core magic trick that techno puritanism is based off of, which is saying what they actually believed and meant.
Simone Collins:
Yeah. Similar to how people just imposed a fad, fear of masturbation to the LDS church. Poor things. And then you
Malcolm Collins:
go back and you’re like, they didn’t say it on the other side the older stuff. Yeah.
Simone Collins:
Yeah. That was a that was a weird fad.
Malcolm Collins:
It was global and really big for a while.
Simone Collins:
I know. I’m wondering if I should investigate. That that could be an interesting episode of, like, who who this must have come from someone who had a very weird vendetta. Like, I I I don’t know. I I feel like it it could
Malcolm Collins:
have just gone from, like, good episode. When the world started hating masturbation.
Simone Collins:
Yeah. Yeah. And, like, what people thought about it before. Because I remember even just recently reading things in the Old Testament that I thought were against masturbation, and then I realized they were actually against child sacrifice. I was like, oh, I misread that, like, the first time. And I wonder if a lot of other people are misreading it because it was about, like, passing your seed through the fire to Moloch or whatever, but, like, seed means children, not the other thing. It’s like, oh, okay. No child sacrifice. That’s very different from what I thought you were saying. Anyway, I love you so much. Gonna make you steak for dinner. Would you like french fries with that? Or just nothing. Just plain steak. Just going straight for it. Or would you like steak and fried rice? Or would you like French
Malcolm Collins:
fries with steak.
Simone Collins:
K. A quick break to version. I love you so much.
Malcolm Collins:
I love you too. And we have a a clean start, and we’ll make something work.
Simone Collins:
Cold weather. Right?
Malcolm Collins:
Yeah. Curl up and
Simone Collins:
Curl up and snuggle. That’s what it is. Alright. You ready?
Malcolm Collins:
Octavian, by the way, just in case you’re wondering what he’s actually doing down there Oh, no. He’s doing science lessons. And then on the screen, he’s watching a escape from Alcatraz YouTube where people try to recreate the escape from Alcatraz.
Simone Collins:
C’est la vie.
Malcolm Collins:
It’s not, you know, completely uneducational. It’s not like, you
Simone Collins:
know Yeah. I told him he could watch that channel for one day because he’s like, it’s educational. And I’m like, it’s slop that’s cosplaying its education, but you can you can do it this one day.
Malcolm Collins:
You can do
Simone Collins:
it this one day. Good. Yeah. Well, I make exceptions when he’s sad. Okay. Are you ready? Ready? Mhmm. Good.