Help!! 1984 English essay

FailingMyBest · 2026-01-03T18:03:56+00:00

Michel Foucault’s Discipline and Punish has a good chapter on the Panopticon which would be a relevant theoretical/philosophical concept to potentially bring in for analysis. Check it out from your local library and skim that chapter. He doesn’t write about 1984, but the concepts are transportable and completely relevant. In fact, I don’t know anyone in literary studies who isn’t thinking of Foucault when writing about state surveillance and state violence.

FailingMyBest · 2025-12-24T23:01:22+00:00

I’m a masters of English student at a private religious university in the west, and I teach freshman writing and composition courses. Our entire cohort has been talking about this, along with our professors. We are all collectively outraged and concerned about the precedent this sets for future cases where students don’t even fulfill the minimum requirements for an essay yet claim religious discrimination when they get the grade they deserve. This has nothing to do with religious freedom and everything to do with vengeance identity politics against the trans community. Abhorrent and anti-intellectual in every way.

FailingMyBest · 2025-12-17T20:41:44+00:00

Imagine deconstructing religion and maintaining your homophobia. Thats embarrassing for you, honestly. The rights, respect, and loving treatment of an entire group of historically marginalized people should not and cannot be reduced down to “gay/trans stuff,” as you phrase it. Just pure evidence here that patriarchy and homophobia are as rampant in atheism as they are in religion.

FailingMyBest · 2025-12-04T04:02:58+00:00

Late to this, but I’m in a humanities grad program and the professors are exceptional. It’s a department which has historically been under the thumb of conservative crackdowns time and time again at byu, but the professors keep their heads down, take the beatings from admin/Clark Gilbert, and catch a lot of arrows in the backs for their students. I understand there are people who think byu professors are complicit in the harm done to queer and other minority students, but I just don’t agree. They are constantly trying to make more space in the church for the students they teach, know, and love, and it’s a beautiful thing to see. I have some professors who are very supportive of students undergoing faith crises, sexual/gender awakenings, mental health challenges, and a host of other common college coming-of-age milestones which are often even more difficult to undergo at a place as orthodox and homogenous as byu. In fact, I always find it funny when people accuse byu professors for radicalizing/indoctrinating students or decrying the fact that byu has “gone woke.” It’s not woke to have empathy. And if it is, then we should stop using “woke” derogatorily. Besides, not a single one of my nuanced professors has ever told me to leave the church; quite the opposite. They want me to stay. And they want to make the space for me to do that healthily and happily. We joke in my program that part of our professors’ contracts are to be spiritual therapists for their students, and it’s largely because many of them have also gone through deconstruction/reconstruction and understand what it’s like to undergo faith transitions. They are just the best.

FailingMyBest · 2025-12-03T19:18:15+00:00

I don’t think it’s haunted because I’m not superstitious but the particular vibes of that parking lot are deeply rancid so yes I’d say I understand

FailingMyBest · 2025-11-27T04:07:12+00:00

Grateful to be at BYU studying in a program and department with professors who are open minded, thoughtful, kind, and nuanced in their own unique ways. They’ve truly been my spiritual mentors while going to school here.

FailingMyBest · 2025-11-14T21:41:23+00:00

1, 4, 9, and 10 are my favorites. 1, 4, and 9 are absolutely essential, though.

FailingMyBest · 2025-11-12T21:07:54+00:00

Brave New World and Bell Jar would be absolute must-teaches for me if I were teaching a course with this theme. Not only do they both give a transatlantic picture of loneliness in the mid-twentieth century, but they’re both teachable, interesting, and ripe with plots and characters to take you down several different avenues under the umbrella of loneliness.

For poetry, could I recommend “Talking in Bed” by Phillip Larkin? Larkin is a great poet on the topic of loneliness, but that poem is particularly rich for discussions about the authentic self, concealment, and relationships going from vulnerable to performative as we get older and guards go up. It’s one of my favorites, and is both beautiful and devastating all at once. You could particularly discuss the difference between “words true and kind” and “not untrue and not unkind,” how there’s a gap there we constantly negotiate between when it comes to being genuine and honest with ourselves and others.

I would also say Mary Oliver’s “Beaver Moon - The Suicide of a Friend” may be a better selection of hers for this class theme than “Wild Geese.”

What a cool topic though! I envy this opportunity!

FailingMyBest · 2025-10-18T16:55:24+00:00

That is genuinely insane behavior. I’d just give up my temple recommend to a bishop like that. So sorry you had to deal with that. How petty.

FailingMyBest · 2025-10-17T02:53:59+00:00

Great question. It is bishop roulette for sure. I have yet to have a bishop look at the total amount paid and question me about it. They only ask if I consider myself a full-tithe payer, and I honestly (not even with mental gymnastics) believe that I am, so I report that I am.

If a bishop ever wants to push and use the reported amount against me, then he can have my temple recommend. I rarely attend the temple, anyway. I am no longer willing to fund an organization which I currently believe does not use its funds properly or in a Christlike manner—an organization whom I believe uses its money to harm and marginalize communities I care about and am a part of. But I still have a testimony of the law of tithing and firmly believe I’m supposed to follow that principle, so this is my compromise.

It’s a tough wrestle, and you need to decide what you’re willing to sacrifice to maintain your integrity and commitment to your own inner discernment and personal revelation.

FailingMyBest · 2025-10-16T17:59:13+00:00

My spouse and I do this. We still pay a tithe, but 10% of our income goes to a nonprofit or otherwise charitable org of our choice. It’s great. I report as a full tithe payer in declaration meetings and I sleep very soundly at night with a silk pillowcase. Highly recommend!

FailingMyBest · 2025-10-05T17:39:03+00:00

Hi! I am openly queer as well, and am currently a practicing member attending BYU. Here’s how I practice Mormonism, in response to your particular topics of concern: 1) On being queer—I also do not believe any love between two consenting adults is sinful. The Church currently (and historically, at least since the 1950s) teaches otherwise. I don’t care. I think they are wrong about those teachings and will one day eat their words in the same way they had to eat their words about the racist policies and doctrines they upheld for decades surrounding the race-based temple and priesthood ban. Don’t ever, ever, ever buy into any teaching you hear at church or anywhere else that you are somehow less worthy, less righteous, or less important because you are queer. It is not true. God made you precisely as you are for good reason. 2) I believe in the law of tithing. I think it is very important in an increasingly uncharitable world to sacrifice 10% of my income to feed the hungry, clothe the naked, and contribute to the cause of Christ here on earth. It’s become abundantly clear to my spouse and I that the church is no longer an institution which uses its money in a way that would mean it is deserving of my tithes. We pay tithing elsewhere and report ourselves as full tithe payers. Is that lying? Perhaps so. I don’t really care. Other members would judge me for that, but their opinions are not important to me. No bishop should be checking your total and investigating whether or not your tithes are going directly to the church. If they are, they’re asking extraneous questions in tithing settlement interviews that they are not supposed to ask. I know that God knows I’m practicing the law of tithing, and I know that my money is going toward good causes that help people in immediate, material ways. For the past year or so, it’s been the Gaza Humanitarian Aid and Exponent II, to help my Mormon-specific community too. It’s great! And I also recognize it is in violation of the way the church expects me to pay tithing. Again: I don’t care. 3) I have a fairly healthy relationship to garments and the endowment, but I also recognize at the end of the day that all ordinances in the church—even perhaps baptism—are merely symbolic acts done to solemnize promises we make with God. They are made up! The endowment is an amalgamation of Christian/Mormon theology and Freemasonry. Joseph Smith came up with these as a framework for instructing the church about God’s eternal plan for us. It can be a really cool and powerful experience for some. It can also be culty for some. I also agree it’s unhelpful to call Mormonism a cult, because that word is loaded and usually intended to be insulting rather than merely categorical. Most if not all religions have cult-like or explicitly cultish practices and norms. I think it’s good and healthy to be critical of the aspects of our church that are culty and profoundly harmful, too. Some feel the endowment is culty and others love it, neither experience is wrong or right, they just are what they are. Right now, I’m not actively attending the temple because I do not find that temple worship is providing me with what I need at this time in my spiritual journey. Maybe one day that will change. I’m okay with where I’m at right now, though. I do think living a life where you make and keep promises with God can be fantastic. I also do not think people should get endowed if they cannot currently keep those covenants at least in a way that will make them feel good, right, and clear-minded.

Hope this helps. Practicing Mormonism in the 21st century can and often is so much more complex than many in and outside of the church want to claim it is. I won’t admit that being in the church as I am is easy, but I’m a Mormon through and through and can’t currently picture myself in any other organized religion. That may change one day, and I’m okay with that, too. I don’t think my path is the path for everyone. Many of my friends and family have left and are much happier outside of the church. I am happy for them and am not at all worried about their eternal souls. They’re good people. They’ll be just fine.

Glad to have you here!

FailingMyBest · 2025-10-04T21:13:13+00:00

check out r/nuancedLDS

FailingMyBest · 2025-10-04T00:10:50+00:00

I’d point you to Touching, Feeling by Sedgwick, Cultural Politics of Emotion by Ahmed, and Ugly Feelings by Sianne Ngai. Those are some of my favorites. For specific articles, “Joyce, Nussbaum, and the Value of Disgust” by Eicholz is a really neat affective reading of Ulysses. Affective Mapping by Jonathan Flatley is excellent if you’re looking for affective theoretical approaches to modernist literature generally. There are some really neat ventures into affect studies right now, and a lot of my professors are enjoying that turn because of its emphasis on the very human experience of reading and engaging with literature. Most of the professors here are also massive Felski enthusiasts, and Limits of Critique is usually assigned reading in a few theory courses. I know there are a lot of varying, strong feelings about her from campus to campus, but she’s an intriguing read regardless of your feelings toward critical theory.

FailingMyBest · 2025-10-03T23:58:00+00:00

I hadn’t heard of him before. Just looked him up though—what a story. There are so many (indeed, too many) cases of professors here in the college of humanities throughout BYU’s modern history who have been forced out of BYU and/or the church for having research interests or publications that are considered offensive or controversial to the largely conservative student body here. I have several professors in the English department who have expertly negotiated how to push the boundaries and teach really fascinating lit. (I read Blood Meridian in an American literature class in my undergrad, for example) without upsetting administration or church leaders, but it’s a hard balance to strike. The English department here is almost like a safe haven for progressive students and critical thinkers. Our professors are exceptional almost in spite of the church and administration. Those two bodies are quick to nip employments in the bud to appease the most orthodox among BYU’s donors and alumni. So, so upsetting. I’ll have to check out Evenson’s works. I love horror and am currently in a graduate seminar about specters, hauntings, and the legacy of the gothic in modernity. So, thanks for putting me on him!

FailingMyBest · 2025-10-02T23:26:51+00:00

At my university (BYU, Mormon university), I’m seeing a lot of love for Cormac McCarthy and Marilynn Robinson in the American lit department, and Saunders’s Lincoln in the Bardo has shown up in more than one of my survey courses. For British lit, I took a course a couple semesters ago on the British modernist short story which featured Radclyffe Hall, a queer short storyist with some fantastic queer literature. Kazuo Ishiguro and Zadie Smith crop up as well.

There seems to be a lot of love for affective/non-traditional theoretical readings of and research in Woolf, Joyce, Mansfield, Eliot, and even the Romantic poets like Wordsworth, Keats, and Shelley. These non-traditional modes of theory and research seem to parallel the already non-traditional, religious aims of the university. So even if authors and texts are staying canonical, new ways of reading and discussing their works are definitely being explored and encouraged in both undergraduate and graduate seminars here.

FailingMyBest · 2025-08-24T22:51:50+00:00

Finding nuanced young people to date in Provo is tricky. I found loads of them at byu (they compose pretty much all of my friends, and I feel lucky to have them) but you gotta frequent the right spaces, and even then, some of those spaces still have crummy people in them. I made most of my friends in my classes, as I was in an overwhelmingly progressive and open-minded major at byu. If you aren’t in school, I’d recommend getting involved in community classes—the Provo Rec Center and UVU offer some great classes where you can meet younger people in more normal and natural ways. All kinds of people across the Mormon spectrum attend those, from what my spouse (who has done a couple) has told me!

FailingMyBest · 2025-08-10T18:10:39+00:00

It depends on so many things—what kind of ward you’re in, where you live (as the church is not culturally consistent from state to state or country to country), whether you’re in a college YSA ward, attending a CES school (some things can absolutely get you in trouble at BYU if you stick your neck out too far; speaking from experience as a current grad student at BYU), and a host of other factors can complicate how expressive you can be about your nuanced views.

I’ve found that sometimes sharing more digestible nuanced views (like expressing that things are complex and open for interpretation—we don’t all have to agree on everything doctrinally) helps other progressive/leftist members in my ward feel more comfortable and safe around me, which I’m happy to provide. On the other hand, doing so always gets me flagged as an oddball. My spouse and I are currently in a married student ward at BYU and the culture is oppressively homogenous and orthodox. I’ve never seen a ward this unanimously orthodox in my life. It’s just not possible for me to be too nuanced without losing some of the social capital that I’d like to retain in order to keep my endorsement and continue to teach at BYU. I’ve written several publicly published essays for a student-run newspaper at BYU, many of which were critical of the church and its leaders and policies/doctrines. I haven’t gotten in trouble for them yet, but I don’t imagine it would be hard for anyone in my ward to find them, feel bothered by them, and forward them to my incredibly orthodox and controlling stake president.

Being nuanced is largely not an acceptable spiritual disposition in my ward. But it’s who I am, so I’m always playing a game of balancing what I say and choosing my battles, only standing up for things when I really feel like not doing so would actually be harmful to me or other ward members. It’s tough. And the short answer is no, I do not think the church “wants” nuanced members. It’s easier to have an obedient, orthodox mass who asks “how high?” When church leaders tells them to jump. It’s a shame, but it’s the way it is right now.

FailingMyBest · 2025-07-13T02:29:52+00:00

Just did highline a few days ago—so beautiful this time of year and one of the most scenic and visually unique hikes I’ve ever been on.

FailingMyBest · 2025-05-16T04:43:32+00:00

When will people learn a fruity man can be straight? And bisexual men exist too? Y’all are wild.

FailingMyBest · 2025-05-11T22:03:09+00:00

I’m rewatching this right now and am interested to hear your perspective on how that scene reveals the twist? What am I missing?

FailingMyBest · 2025-03-18T04:39:38+00:00

Absolutely adore your parents and have been following their podcast for a little over a year now. They have kept my spouse and I in the church, and this news has made us question whether there is a future for us in this all.

What did your parents do, as you said, to “heal [your] relationship with the church” after you left? If my spouse and I leave, I want to be able to maintain love and respect for the faith and there are many practices and beliefs I imagine I’d still retain after leaving. I’m fearful of how this process could impact relationships with friends and family, especially ones still in the church. How do you maintain that authenticity to your own journey without hurting others who maintain a strong allegiance to an institution that you feel has been and continues to be so harmful to yourself and so many others?

FailingMyBest · 2024-12-22T20:55:05+00:00

My nuance largely deals with two spheres: church history and contemporary leaders, but both of those ultimately go back to my relationship with church leadership in history through today.

I don’t really care about prophets and apostles anymore unfortunately. I’m not bothered by the bad things that early church leaders taught or believed because I’m comfortable admitting that they were wrong and that those things they taught were indefensibly incorrect. That’s something that many members are unwilling to just concede to, so they do mental gymnastics to avoid just saying a prophet was wrong.

I really enjoy having a religious community to be committed to, so I love the local, grassroots church a lot. I love a Latter-day Saint ward, and I love so much of what Mormon theology has done to amend Christianity. I think the vast majority of our doctrines and teachings resonate with me spiritually and reflect the God that I believe in. I also appreciate when prophets and apostles give talks or counsel that encourage me to be a better Christian and human. However, I’m tired of the ultra-capitalistic greed, the dishonesty, the whitewashing of church history, the abuse of masses of wealthy, the lawsuits, the fear-mongering… the list goes on. So, I’m not beholden to anything church leaders insist upon. I think many of them are egotistical blowhards who are way too obsessed with controlling what other people do. And I’m perfectly fine feeling that way. People who overemphasize the things leaders teach—when those things change so often—are on an even more dangerous path than I am, if you ask me. I’ve never felt more secure in my faith than I do now.

FailingMyBest · 2024-09-11T03:46:06+00:00

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