1505: Did Dallin H. Oaks Lie about BYU Electroshock Therapy?
Mormon Stories Podcast
Dr. John Dehlin
4.5 • 5.7K Ratings
🗓️ 19 November 2021
⏱️ 121 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Recently in a speech given at the University of Virginia, Mormon apostle Elder Dallin H. Oaks denied that Electroshock Therapy as a form of gay conversion therapy was used/studied during his tenure as president of Brigham Young University in the 1970s.
Join us on 11/18/2021 at 3pm (mountain) where we will discuss the history of Electroshock Therapy at BYU - and determine whether or not Dallin H. Oaks was being truthful when he denied that gay Electroshock therapy was used/studied at BYU during his time as BYU President. We will be joined by historian Connell O'Donovan and Kyle Ashworth.
Show Notes:
- Part 1 of Mormon Stories discussion about Oaks' visit to UVA
- "Going Forward with Religious Freedom and Nondiscrimination," address by Elder Dallin H. Oaks at the University of Virginia on November 12, 2021
- Q&A session (and partial transcript) with Dallin Oaks before the UVA address Latter Gay Stories podcast, hosted by Kyle Ashworth
- Mormon historian Connell O'Donovan
- "On The Record: A Chronology of LGBTQ+ Messaging," by Latter Gay Stories Affirmation LGBTQ Mormons, Family, and Friends
- Dallin H. Oaks’ bio
- "A Message to Young Men," Boyd K. Packer's "little factory" talk from 1976 General Conference, in which he compared sperm production to a factory as a way to discourage boys from masturbating
- A side-by-side comparison of the original vs. the Church-edited version of Hartman Rector's 1981 General Conference talk "Turning the Hearts"
- "Effect of Visual Stimuli in Electric Aversion Therapy," by Max Ford McBride, Psychology dissertation, Brigham Young University, 1976
- FAIR's response to electroshock and vomit aversion at BYU
- Legacies, BYU Electroshock Documentary, Gentile Pictures, 1996
Goodbye, I Love You by Carol Lynn Pearson - The Miracle of Forgiveness by Spencer W. Kimball
- "The Abominable and Detestable Crime Against Nature: A Revised History of Homosexuality & Mormonism, 1840-1980," by Connell O'Donovan
- Dr. Allen Bergin apologizes for his role in carrying out electroshock aversion at BYU in the 1970s
- "Dallin Oaks says shock therapy of gays didn't happen at BYU while he was president. Records show otherwise," by Peggy Fletcher Stack, Salt Lake Tribune, November 16, 2021
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Hello everyone and welcome to a special ladder gay stories and Mormon stories broadcast. |
| 0:07.6 | We are excited to be able to join together with the two platforms to discuss a very important |
| 0:13.6 | topic and that is that of President Dalin H. Oaks recent visit to the University of Virginia. |
| 0:21.4 | If you followed the news and the latest happenings in Mormondom, you will be familiar with his |
| 0:26.1 | recent visit to the University of Virginia's law school where he spoke on two different fronts. |
| 0:31.3 | One was a earlier meeting with the lawyers at the University, potential lawyer, lawyer students, |
| 0:38.3 | law students at the University of Virginia and did a little Q&A which is part of what we will |
| 0:43.8 | be discussing in this special live broadcast and then a second rotunda 2021 Joseph Smith lecture |
| 0:52.0 | there at the University of Virginia campus. So for those of you who are joining us and seeing |
| 0:57.7 | some fresh new faces on the Mormon Stories channel, you will also for our ladder gay stories audience, |
| 1:04.3 | see some fresh new faces on this channel as well as we're collaborating our efforts in this specific |
| 1:10.5 | episode with the Mormon Stories audience. And we have some great guests who are lined up today to |
| 1:16.2 | discuss a little bit more about this topic. What we really want to do is try to understand for those |
| 1:21.0 | of you who have been following this the recent news as of Friday of last week, we want to try to |
| 1:27.3 | better understand exactly where Dalin H. Oaks was when he said things weren't happening at BYU. |
| 1:34.5 | In particular at that Q&A meeting with the attorneys earlier in the day in his visit at the |
| 1:41.8 | University of Virginia, he had a quote that said that BYU had abandoned the practice of electro-shot |
| 1:48.5 | therapy prior to him taking over as president of BYU. So we want to talk a little bit about that. |
| 1:55.3 | We want to discuss the reality of the situation in the 1970s, particularly what was going on |
| 2:02.4 | within LDS Mormondom and perhaps we could say at the intersection of sexuality and reality at LDS |
| 2:11.7 | Street and LGBTQ Avenue. What was happening at BYU within the church in the 1970s, specifically |
| 2:19.3 | when Dalin H. Oaks took over as president of BYU. So we brought in what I want to consider some of |
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