Do I need to say more to make that an interesting title for a post? .... I didn't think so.
First let me make it clear that I like the idea of food storage. It's pretty reasonable and smart. Say a massive blizzard comes through Utah, shuts everything down, the state calls in the National Guard to dig us out, blablabla. Well, I can say that Wal-Mart wouldn't be getting its shipments of food and if I hadn't stocked up and the roads didn't really open up for a week or so, then I'd have to go bother my Mormon neighbors who had a years supply.
But that's where it ends - a years supply? Seriously? That is SOOO much food! I like the 90 day supplies, those are nice, BUT A YEAR IS FREAKIN CRAZY TALK! What a weird 'practice' in the church. The whole Armageddon obsession in the church is really too much. I Googled 'food storage' and nearly all the sites were Mormon related, I switched to 'images' and nearly all of them looked like the picture above. You flip through a Deseret Magazine and there's food storage ads.
As I said, it's reasonable to-a-point. I remember being a teen in a 3rd hour combined meeting at church and it was about food storage and personal preparedness. People were going off on having food, climbing gear if earthquakes made new mountains, radios, EMP-proof electronics (?), and college textbooks to give our children an education after the end of the world. Seriously?
But it gets better. Then we were talking about where to go. They prepared 'meeting' houses for the elderly or single people to gather, such as the home of someone with one of those years supply food storages. Or how most people could gather to the church. It was a sturdy building, could easily support a lot of the members. Then some talked about bringing guns to defend the building against marauders and bandits who would know that they'd have those legendary years supply food storages. Course this is where the bishop interjected, thankfully, to say that he would let anyone and everyone inside, he wouldn't turn anyone away.
My issue is the mindset. Mormons building literal fortresses up in Park City to survive the end of the world, massive food storage depots in basements, and preparing to live like vagabonds out of Mad Max or The Road. Yup, the end of the world comes and your still in California ... how about that Park City castle now? Living in Utah and the earthquake hits, the mountain falls on your freakin house ... how about that food storage in the basement now? I wonder how many people have wasted half their incomes on bomb shelters and Park City fortresses in the church. Or all the 5-gallon buckets of wheat people have in dank corners of their basements. Mine do!
Stock up reasonably, it doesn't hurt to have food storage, to ensure the integrity of the structure of your home, but for gods sakes Mormons, stop wasting all that money on 'peculiar' things like the "Super-Duper Mormony Booper 1-Full-Year Food Storage Shelving Spectacular" shown here by Mrs. Allred-Tanner-Nielson.
I think food storage is a throwback to the days when the GAs all came from farming backgrounds, and couldn't conceive of not storing food. Farmers had years' supplies—they had to last from harvest to harvest! But, if we called it a " pantry", it wouldn't seem so apocalyptic.
ReplyDeleteIs it a good idea to have savings and food storage? Of course. But the Mormons turned it into a measure of righteousness rather than a practical matter, so to often they store impractical items, like the buckets of wheat they'll never use.
Yes, so true, good insight. And it is a measure of righteousness through obedience. But I mainly get thrown off by how they always connect food storage to being self-reliant and being prepared for the end of the world. By this point they get into all kinds of crazy shit.
ReplyDeleteHaha...I was having a conversation concerning this about a week ago. More specifically, concerning what to do with the (above mentioned) buckets of wheat that my parents have had sitting in their basement for over a decade. Whatever they do with it, I doubt they'll ever replace it.
ReplyDeleteWhen I was at BYU we were told to have a small food storage in our dorm rooms. Please tell me they're not doing that anymore.
ReplyDeleteThey advise it, but since I haven't been to my ward regularly in over a year I wouldn't know. Honestly I try to have enough food to last me a couple weeks at any given moment, but ....
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