I saw that she was there and I figured they were probably together, but I didn’t notice the rings. Too bad for Heather, I guess.
Probably. I don’t remember much of what he said about his life, but it’s hard to reconcile him saying “I love her” with his admitting to Nicki that he’d slept with other students. Her whole “you don’t deserve love” tirade proves she was willing to say absolutely anything to keep Cara Lynn away from him. Nicki was always like Roman and Alby and her mother in that she never had a problem with lying to get what she wanted. I sort of came to admire their ruthlessness. They could be very slimy and also didn’t hesitate to violate God’s laws (murder, gay sex, birth control) if they wanted to. They could always find a justification for it but they were just totally committed to their own self-preservation in a way a lot of people aren’t. I don’t think even Bill’s frustrating selfishness really stacked up (although he cheated with both Margene and Ana). He did make an effort to play by the rules. Some of the best moments in the series were when we thought Bill might be moving in that direction. In terms of the show, it’s still hard to believe a law-bound guy like Bill was supposed to triumph against those people. I guess he was finally able to do it when he made it personal, had the resources of the state of Utah, and when Roman had died and Alby got crazier, and the Greens disappeared.
Oh, and I guess the Henricksons could still be getting money from the casino in addition to whatever life insurance Bill had. Barb probably would have inherited Bill’s stake, and we can assume the casino was financially successful because they haven’t had anything to do with it for a couple of years.
You know what bothered me about that entire plotline?
I was taught in the mormon church that premarital (or extramarital) sex is a sin next to murder in severity. The only thing you could do that’s worse is kill someone.
But nobody – not one single person – addressed the loss of virtue/virginity with Cara Lynn. Hell, I was put through a bishop’s court and disciplined for letting myself be sexually abused and not one single mormon in that entire show addressed the fact that Cara Lynn committed what to mormons is considered a mortal grievous sin. She wasn’t called to repentance or given steps to repentance or required to seek forgiveness or anything. I can’t even believe Nikki didn’t trot out the old mormon trope of nobody will ever want you for a wife now because you’re a damaged, dirty, licked cupcake*.
The licked cupcake is a reference to a Young Women’s object lesson I had once. The teacher brought in a platter of beautifully decorated cupcakes and set it down on the table. She chose one, picked it up, and licked it, then set it back down on the platter. She then instructed each of us to come up and choose a cupcake. Of course, nobody took the licked cupcake. As we sat munching on our cupcakes, we were told that the cupcakes represented sexual sin. If we indulged in sex before we were properly married, we would be like licked cupcakes. No righteous, kind, decent, mormon priesthood holder would ever want a licked cupcake. Fool around with boys at your own peril because if someone licks your cupcake, you might not ever get married, and then you cannot get to the Celestial Kingdom.
These lessons were pounded into our heads constantly. That was probably the message that was most emphasized, second only to the commandment to strive to be a wife and mother in Zion (and nothing else, thankyouverymuch). So I could see Nikki giving Cara Lynn a pass on wearing a pair of modest shorts, but I cannot see a mormon child having sex and simply getting away with it. I suspect the exmormon writers on the Big Love staff are all men and missed the constant reiteration of sexual purity that was inflicted on the girls. Perhaps they didn’t have that same experience so they don’t realize how it’s always the woman’s (or girl’s) fault when two people have sex out of wedlock. In my experience, priesthood holders managed to get away with more like a slap on the hand while females tended to be sanctioned more, in the cases of sexual sins.
I would so love to see the class lesbian make a beeline for that one and lick the icing off in one swoop of the tongue just to see if the teacher could improvise.
There was no such thing at the time. If anyone in the class was gay, they were so far in the closet, they didn’t even know it themselves.
I stood up to a teacher once and got quite snotty with her about the lesson where in we were instructed that “the sole purpose of a woman is to be a wife and mother.” So what if you don’t want to do that? What if you want to do other things in addition to ‘wife and mother’? She would not back down. She would not deviate from the party line. She read the lesson straight from the manual and did not budge one hair from her stance. There was no improvisation. I finally stalked out in a huff and refused to return to class. She did what she was supposed to do and held the line. I did not; I was supposed to just swallow that, accept it, internalize it, and be happy about it.
Mormon sunday school is like plugging into the Borg. You will be assimilated and there is no place for independent or critical thinking.
I wonder if the writers were trying to do a “the women won out in the end” thing, and also “Mormon women do it a bit differently when not under control of the men” for those of us not familiar with the LeBarons.
I don’t think it’s that hard to reconcile at all. What else would he say to (or about) a 16-year-old girl he wants to molest?
Personally, I think he had indeed done it before. He’s single, in his 30s, attractive… why isn’t he married, especially in the Mormony environment of Utah? Because he’s got a thing for teenage girls and doesn’t want to be married. I find it easier to believe that he’s a repeat offender than I do that he’s just a single guy in his 30s who, out of the blue, decides to fall for a 16-year-old. As far as how Nicki found out, she said that she had Bill’s help finding stuff out. Maybe he used his PI, or maybe his Home Plus HR contacts to do some digging (although if it was that easy to find, I don’t know how he’d be a teacher). Maybe Ivey said something like, “Don’t turn me in, it’ll be my third strike” or something like that.
I guess we can’t know either way (unless the producers just come out and say so one way or the other). But for me, he was always a weird character – even before we found out that he was screwing a 16-year-old. So he’s guilty, sez I.