Actually, I think this is one of your strongest points. This certainly wouldn’t be the first case we’ve heard about where athletes (particularly football) are catered to when it comes to the Honor Code. If you live in Utah, you’ve seen many of the stories in the newspaper over the past two or three years on this point.

If tattoos aren’t banned from the Honor Code, why do they need to be airbrushed out of photographs promoting the athletic program? This certainly appears to be a double-standard.

Given the way BYU is administered though, doesn’t that say something about how he viewed the meaning of the quote? That’s more of what I was getting at. I happen to like the quote too. I just think they way it is used tends to be a bit. . .excessive.

John, the burden of proof rests with you because you are claiming that the honor code is inappropriate to a University Education.

Did she? Because there are a LOT of hoops to jump through if you want to be female and teach at BYU. (For instance, they have no maternity leave policy. (!!))

Nonsense.

The real-world implementation of a policy is a rather practical measuring stick as to its effectiveness and appropriateness.

I understand that church schools can be a great environment for students and many people love them. I just know I would hesitate to send my daughters there.

I think comparing BYU and missions in many ways is comparing apples and oranges. Going on a mission is a commandment for young men, going to BYU is not. The missionary environment is one of extreme focus on one task – missionary work. Therefore, rules are in place to help facilitate that. These rules are important given that *everyone* is expected to go on a mission and that with such a diverse group of people, some structure is necessary to prevent chaos.

However, I actually have a problem with plenty of the mission rules. It is an overly militaristic environment, IMO. I do think the notion of “teach them correct principles and let them govern themselves” could be better applied to mission life, despite the need for some rules.

BYU, on the other hand, is an entirely voluntary endeavor. Not only that, but as the other John pointed out, people compete pretty intensely to get accepted there. Generally speaking, the people who are there want to be there and worked pretty hard to get there. It seems like they could be trusted to make many of their own decisions without an Honor Code.

I think you have some really good points, and I especially appreciate your perspective as someone who attended BYU but didn’t grow up in Utah.

The problem I think some of us have, is that we’ve known too many Latter-day Saints who were from Utah, who went to BYU, and now don’t know how to deal with conflict in the Church for the very reasons you spelled out. They just don’t get that there can be Mormons in the Church that don’t see eye to eye on every moral issue with them and still be good members. I don’t mean to blame BYU entirely for this – I suspect most of it is just their personality type. But it doesn’t help when they go from one structured environment with lots of rules to another structured environment with lots of rules.

I should probably point out (and you probably already know all this but others might not) that while I am a “John H.” I am not the “John H.” on this board, that is John Hatch. I was going by simply “John” which seemed to be unclaimed, but I have been told to knock that off (though I think that was at T&S). In any case I have adopted the confusing habit of adding a different descriptor to my name for each story as appropriate. Hopefully other Johns won’t adopt the same method of distinguishing themselves. These systems really out to have unique usernames and log-ins…

As you might expect, I agree with your post. I would add that I won’t encourage my children to go to the Y, male or female, though I would probably steer the as of yet non-existant girls away from it more than the boys. Which raises the question, if the Y is extra bad for women, then wouldn’t it be similarly bad for men because of how women are treated in that environment? The classic example that I cite comes from one of my wife’s med school friends who went to BYU and was actively discourage from going into medicine by the faculty. She was shocked when flyers were put up all over campus for a pre-med party with the notice that, “Wives are invited too!”

I should probably also point out that while in college I (and other LDS students) violated the BYU Honor Code nearly every day without falling into sin.

I think often you are right, that the institution or at least many people who are at BYU, feel that women have certain (traditional) roles and get a bit irritated with a woman who is seriously seeking a career path or professional skills.

My wife was president of the Women In Medicine group/club at BYU when she was a pre-med student and I think part of the reason this organization was created was to give some extra help and moral support to those BYU women who were going down that path — to attempt to counteract some of the negative feedback women were getting as a result of that decision.