I´m a Mormon & it´s ok
(”Be happy, Be Mormon” Mexican bumper sticker)
For my 17th birthday I received the following from a friend:
- “Why I Am Not A Christian.” by Bertrand Russell
- “Brigham Young´s 27th Wife.” A trashy novel about polygamy
- “Orgasmo.” A trashy fictional movie about a Mormon porn star.
I first realized that people thought Mormons were strange in the perilous era of middle school. I mentioned my religion to a friend and she blurted out, “you´re Mormon, aren’t they like….” and ran off not completing the sentence. This realization has over the years turned into what I can only describe as abject confusion as to why it is seen as socially acceptable to bash Mormons. It is not viewed as “ok” to say things like “Those Jews sure are a looney bunch, man their sacred rituals are stupid!” or “Native Americans, they are CRAZY, I heard that they even believe animals and nature are Gods. IDIOTS!” But, I have seen, heard, and experienced many occasions where people leap past this double-standard to insult Mormons & Mormonism. On my mission Spaniards felt free to shout obscenities or insults at us that they would never yell to a nun or to similar Jesus freaks, like us, of other faiths.
Anti-Mormon books written by dissenters or critics are described as “unbiased & totally neutral.” While Mormon literature & culture is disdained by an unprecedented alliance of liberals & Christian Coalitioners alike. A poll conducted in June (2006) by the Los Angeles Times found that 35% of registered voters said they would not consider voting for a Mormon for President. The poll found that only Islam would be a more damaging faith for a candidate.
My blog-nemesis, dooce dot com (can´t link to my nemesis!), gets literally thousands of hits every day. Her husband quit his job because she makes tons of money off of her blog, which pretty much just consists of dissing Mormons & complaining about living in Utah.
Why is it this ubiquitous religious inside joke to make fun of Mormons? I just want to say hey guys, “Mormons are people too!” Nice, normal people for the most part. PBS recently did a documentary called “The Mormons” on the LDS faith, and while many of the people they interviewed seemed to me to be less than legit (with the generic subtitle of “author” or “poet” I am just not convinced about their authority on the subject), they covered many topics and tried to be objective. Check out the link above to view selected interviews or the full program online. It´s interesting for Mormons & non Mormons alike.
In the words of Victor Hugo, “Toleration is the best religion.”
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June 8th, 2007 at 5:38 pm
I understand whole heartedly. It seems whenever I come in contact with high school acquaintances that don’t know me extremely well they end up asking overwhelmingly ignorant questions that make huge assumptions about current day Mormons being polygamous. I watched “The Mormons” documentary and thought it did an ok job of trying to be biased, yet I wonder how one can come away getting a clear picture of what Latter-Day Saints are like today having just watched an hour and a half focusing on the Mountain Meadows Massacre and the short lived Polygamous history of our early church. They put far too much emphasis on those two relatively minuscule (especially Mountain Meadows) historical points. I understand how polygamy was a part of our history, and that the mountain meadows massacre (however incomprehensible it is today), yet I don’t base either of those events in my identity as a Mormon. I just hope that viewers watching the documentary didn’t get filled with the sense that LDS members focus much of their belief off of those events.
I transcribed a response to the Documentary that was aired the friday following the Documentary air date, it includes responses from the kued journalist who did much of the commenting on “the mormons” and responses from LDS historians. Its pretty interesting, if you want a copy I can email it to ya
June 8th, 2007 at 6:06 pm
I totally agree. PBS did give a lot of attention to a few RANDOM things, but I think they were trying to address questions that people of other faiths ask. But, besides the skewed proportions of events covered, I think the interviewees said some interesting things. And what was that suicide bomber missionary all about?? Sounds like he´s just a loose cannon. Period! Has nothing to do with the fact he´s an X- Mormon.
June 9th, 2007 at 12:23 pm
I don’t like dooce either.
June 11th, 2007 at 2:57 pm
I had a lot of comments about this thread so to avoid my problem of burying people in an avalanche of my verbiage I think I will just mention a thought I had about Thomas’ assertion that he believes atheists are a misunderstood minority and they would have a slim shot at getting the presidency.
Well, it is perhaps true that if we are talking gross statistics, a large number of the public has negative feelings about at least those who claim confidant allegiance to atheism, but any of those negative feelings probably at the very minimum merely mirror the feelings that the atheists have about those same large numbers of the public. Looking down on the intelligence and even from whatever vantage point the morality of worshipers is commonplace. I think certain extremely disrespectful works about believers in current popular release should suffice as support for that statement, but I could provide much more if necessary. I first gleaned these sentiments mainly from my experiences as a graduate student at Stanford, where atheism and the usual co-occurring political worldview seemed to embolden people to say things that would in other contexts seem wildly inappropriate, right to my face. I remember being asked at a party, you don’t really DO THAT, do you? and like questions to which there really is never a good answer.
And I think it tends to be the sense of exclusivity and superiority over others’ beliefs that perhaps makes candidates of certain religions also similarly suspect, ironically. It isn’t usually the fact that a candidate has a certain religion, it is whether they have one that is viewed to be exclusive in doctrine, meaning that Mormons, atheists and certain other groups, rightly or wrongly, have the reputation of feeling they are right and other people are going to some version of hell, sacred or secular. That’s why the presidential religions that tend to be popular are the wishy washy variety that don’t make strong doctrinal commitments. Presidents who don’t even attend church, like many of the recent ones, are the most popular, even though they do, to placate said masses that their beliefs are rather compatable with the average statistical American analog, give verbal homage to some belief or other.
This could be that people have a reflexive fear about the consequence of giving someone power over them whom they know thinks they are either stupid or evil. But I think the obscure religions’ similarity with atheism in the minds of the public go a bit further, but along a similar vein. I think deep down, most people feel unable to find secure source of a belief in a higher power or in its nature, or even whether they are able to rule one out in spite of doubt. Mormons, in their unique and rather confident theological commitments and atheists in their declaration that they have managed the unlikely feat of proving a negative, probably to this 90 something percent we are talking about, give rise to automatic suspicion about the source of their confidence about things that most people consider unknowable.
But in response to atheists’ supposed sense of exclusion, I would argue that if they could choose whether to be looked down upon by middle America or by the institutions they ARE secure within, such as academics and even government (after paying homage admittedly to a religion, but hey, if you aren’t violating a belief in anything else, why not be willing to do this what does it cost? very little), I think that most atheists hands down feel they have a pretty good deal. They are in with the crowds they want to be in with, and the ones they aren’t in with, well, groups at least sympathetic to atheism at least have made comfortably sure they can’t be hurt by the believers, even now to the extent that they are claiming they shouldn’t have to see crosses or phrases on coins they don’t want to see.
CA
June 12th, 2007 at 11:51 am
Good post, and I was glad to find your blog.
July 8th, 2007 at 9:39 pm
[…] American culture to harshly criticize Mormons & what is it like being LDS today? Kate presents I´m a Mormon & it´s ok posted at Kate’s […]
July 21st, 2007 at 8:11 am
For me the main problem with negative coverage is it fuels the personal attacks about my beliefs & religion.