Alone and Unobserved

I got a call last night from a young woman who said that BYU was conducting a survey of its alumni and that I had been randomly selected from a pool of however many thousands to participate, and did I have fifteen minutes to complete the questionnaire over the phone? I was nervous but intrigued, so I said yes.

Sample exchanges (paraphrased):

Girl conducting survey: “Please indicate how much you agree with the following statement: ‘The BYU Honor Code is necessary to protect students who would normally make good choices against students who make bad choices.’ Your choices are ’strongly agree,’ ’somewhat agree,’ ‘no opinion,’ ’somewhat disagree’ and ’strongly disagree.’ “
Me: (choking with laughter) “Strongly disagree.”
GCS: (nervous chuckle)

GCS: “How would you characterize the dating environment at BYU?”
Me: “High-pressure and artificial.”
GCS: “High-pressure and what?”
Me: “Artificial. High-pressure and artificial.”
GCS: “While you were at BYU, how often did you go on dates? Your choices are ’significantly more often than you wanted to,’ ’somewhat more often than you wanted to,’ ‘as often as you wanted to,’ ’somewhat less often than you wanted to’ and ’significantly less often than you wanted to.’ “
Me: “Well, considering that BYU did its best to discourage me from dating men, I have to choose ’significantly less often than I wanted to.’ “
GCS: (Another nervous chuckle) “Oh, okay.”

GCS: “If you were starting your university career for the first time right now, would you choose to attend BYU? Your choices are ‘definitely yes,’ ‘possibly yes,’ ‘no opinion,’ ‘possibly not’ and ‘definitely not.’ “
Me: “Definitely not.”
GCS: “What are some of the positive aspects of BYU that would make you more likely to attend if you were starting your university career for the first time right now?”
Me: “Well, I loved the performing arts groups I belonged to, and the campus is beautiful, and everyone is very polite.”
GCS: “What are some of the negative aspects of BYU that would make you less likely to attend?”
Me: “I’m a gay ex-Mormon.” [Which, I know, isn't a 'negative aspect of BYU,' and I really should have gone more into the double standard BYU has for gay and straight students, and for non-Mormons vs. ex-Mormons. Dammit!]

I was actually impressed with some of the questions, particularly those that invited criticism of the Honor Code and its enforcement, and the ones dealing with the dating atmosphere at BYU. Other questions had way too much Mormon codespeak, like “Did attending BYU make magnifying your Church callings more or less important to you?” Are they asking non-members these questions, or do they have special questions for the Mormon (or formerly Mormon) alumni?

I was also fairly impressed by the young woman conducting the survey. She handled herself very professionally even though she’s just a lowly sociology student and probably wasn’t really comfortable with a lot of my responses. After it was over she thanked me profusely for not being a wrong number, hang-up or screaming bitch (although she didn’t express herself in those terms).

I wonder how many responses like mine they’re getting, and I wonder even more what the questions imply about upcoming changes in BYU policies, procedures and culture. As I said at one point during the survey, I don’t go there anymore, so I really don’t care how the Honor Code is administered, for instance–but I do have vivid memories of my friends’ unfair and draconian treatment at the hands of the Honor Code office, and I would be happy if that never happened again to anybody. It’s probably too much to hope for that they’ll do away altogether with the morality-policing part of the Honor Code and just treat the students like adults, but maybe they’ll recognize at least the “protecting good students from bad students” is ridiculous and harmful in the long run.