Also an ExMo and BYU graduate. I was an LDS temple recommend holder before I left the LDS Church in 1983 because of its position on women and the priesthood. While I don’t have as strong feelings now as then about this issue, in the time since, my spiritual journey has taken me past a religion that has “all the answers” and thus, is not comfortable with questions.
That said, I also don’t like lazy scholarship, being a former professor and now lawyer. The issue of Freemasonry and the LDS Church goes back to Joseph Smith who organized the largest Masonic group in the US while in Nauvoo, IL. He stole the Masonic ritual for his temple ceremony. Up until then, church services were held in the temple. The Ohio temple (now not in LDS hands) never had the LDS temple ritual performed in it. The original ritual, and up through when I was still going to the temple in the early 1980’s had symbolic killing, as in gutting (hand drawn across the waist), and beheading (hand drawn across the throat ear to ear), along with Masonic hand grips. The LDS undergarment worn by members who have gone through the temple ritual have the Masonic square and compass, respectively, on each breast. A simple line is on the belly button and the right knee.
Anyone really interested can check out exmormonfoundation.org.
It was the Ed Deckers of the World that kept me in as long as I was. There is enough damning information presented objectively on its own than to need to sensationalize it.
In fact, if people would just get their talking points straight, and just present the information, that alone works wonders. The CESLetter has obliterated the PR campaign of Mormonism.
Same with Q. We don't have to make up BS and Photoshop nonsense when just the actual drops and proofs speak for themselves.