It’s not like this hasn’t come up before, but in light of the recent discussion about my online handle (”exmoron”) being offensive (whether that is the intention or not), I thought maybe I should change it. Just so everyone is clear here, I came up with it not specifically to poke fun at Mormons (Mormon/Moron) but because I think of my past self as a moron. Certainly the Mormon/moron similarity did influence my name choice, but it wasn’t the sole rationale. I recognize it is a bit pretentious to claim that I’m not still a moron (I mostly certainly am in many areas; I hope not in the one that is my profession…), but I’m trying.
Anyway, I’d like to know what people think about this issue and whether or not they think I should change it in light of the fact that most people who see it on here interpret it as a cut at Mormons (even though I don’t honestly think there are any more Mormons who are morons than there are non-Mormons who are morons). So, I created a poll. You can also leave feedback and give suggestions for a “new name” (I couldn’t help myself with the new name wording
).
One final note, I am trying to maintain some anonymity (if you really want to know who I am, you can email me). The anonymity is for two reasons. (1) I am a college professor and I try not to let my personal views influence my students. So, I try to keep my personal views fairly hard to find online by posting anonymously. (2) My family (not my wife, but just about everyone else) takes anything critical of Mormonism as a personal attack. Family is more important to me than religion (or even criticizing religion), so I also try to keep my comments and thoughts about religion secret from them. In an ideal world, this wouldn’t be necessary, but our world isn’t ideal (thus the need for criticism).
