Competition and Mormonism?

So I must first make a disclaimer that I already have an intense and well-fed skepticism of the Church Education System.  The following is one of the reasons:

Today, my Institute teacher, (who is a great guy, very nice, very funny) decides to take the class on a rant about "Competition".  He states that all competition is bad and of the devil.  He uses various things that the Devil has done in the scriptures to show that competition is bad.

I raise my hand near the end, finally fed up with the craziness of this discussion and hope to redirect ideas.

I state that competition in itself is an amoral principle.  That being, of itself, neither good nor bad.  We experience opposition, or resistance in all things.  I am always competing against gravity.  Is gravity evil for opposing my physical movement?  Of course not.  Nor are Newtonian Physics for that matter a tool of Satan.  Money in itself is not an evil institution.  We give it for Fast Offerings to feed the poor and Tithes to build temples, all these morally good and upright ends.  We do know from the scriptures that the love of it, however, is the root of all evil.

I then go on to say that he is right in the fact that the derivatives of competition can be good or evil.  For good, diligence, hard work, charity, fun, etc.  For evil, pride, envy, lying, cheating, stealing, etc.  Depending on how competition is used and in what spirit can produce good or evil.

My Institute teacher then takes what I said and says that the Devil defines things in shades of grey (implying that's what I just did, ironically, turning myself from a metaphorical Devil's advocate into an actual Devil's advocate).  Then reads off quotes from General Authorities about the evils of competition.


So I went home and did some research of my own.  To begin in the scriptures:

Lehi in 2 Nephi 10 states repeatedly that, "For it must needs be, that there is an opposition in all things.  If not so, my first-born in the wilderness, righteousness could not be brought to pass..." (2 Ne 2:11)


How convenient that Russell M. Nelson in the October General Conference of 1984 states, speaking on the spiritual power of work and labor:

"The Lord, through his prophet Lehi, said, "It must needs be, that there is an opposition in all things." So, in reality, competition forces us to improve.  It deserves our praise and our gratitude.  Without it we could not reach the heights that are otherwise ours to achieve."
(Nelson, Russell M.  "Protect the Spiritual Powerline". The Ensign. November 1984. Emphasis Added)

I may be crazy, but I think there's an echo in here.


Gordon B. Hinckley, while First Counselor in the First Presidency, stated:

"Be fair.  As you move onward in your lives, in your university studies and beyond, avoid shady and unfair practices.  Clean competition is wholesome; but immoral, dishonest, or unfair practices are reprehensible, and particularly on the part of a Latter-day Saint.  Be fair."
(Hinckley, Gordon B.  "Four B's for Boys". The Ensign. November 1981.)

Weird.  That sounds just like something I heard come out of my mouth today.  But a lot simpler.  Way to go President Hinckley, you obviously aren't verbose and arrogant like I am.  That's why you were a Prophet, and I am not.


Immoral or amoral, I spend all of my time as an Economics major looking at the equations of the vices and virtues of competition in Capitalism.  I signed up for Institute to get away from that for an hour.  I signed up for Old Testament so I could learn about the story of David and Jonathan but instead I learned that when it comes to competition that I should curl up and die when somebody wants to play basketball because the inherent competition is the Devil's offspring.

Oh you silly Utah Mormons.  Gotta love 'em.

If you re-read with only these letters, in this order, it has a secret message:

G-E-T  M-E  O-U-T-T-A  H-E-R-E

Maybe I should work on my cryptograms.  Probably.