Tony Ortega the Village Voice walks us through the founding of Magic Underpants Inc. Go read the whole hilarious post. But if you want a nice summation of why the Mormons are attacking the homos (never forget: they started it), you can’t do better than this:

It’s complicated. But anyway, try to understand that if your entire worldview was based on the completely unreliable ravings of an early 19th-century flim-flam artist with a harem fetish, you too might have a burning inferiority about your belief system, and you might manifest that inferiority by picking on the queers, who make an easy target and scare the bejesus out of your typical Mormon.

38 replies on “A Brief History of Mormonism”

  1. It’s NOT about what they believe, it’s about HOW they act. I will fight to defend their right to wear magic panties in their home and place of worship. If they insist I wear magic panties too, they’ll have a knock down drag out brawl on their hands. The same goes for marriage.

  2. If you want a detailed, scholarly approach to Joe Smith, check out Fawn Brodie’s book “No Man Knows my History”. It used to be tough to find, and LDS elders would check it out of libraries & never return it. A full list of the dozens of women Joe married, and some details about his days as a con man.

    Usually, with discussions like this, some LDS faithful jumps in with the “we’re so persecuted” line. Any LDS Sloggers?

  3. There are plenty of good books on Mormon fundamentalism (Under the Banner of Heaven, 19th Wife) but I highly suggest Escape by Carolyn Jessop. It’s a first person account of the polygamist Mormons living in Utah/Arizona and is increadibly emotional and facinating.

    Of course, most modern day Mormons don’t live like this, but it was their religion that founded this practice and I think they should continue to be associated with it.

  5. Let’s not forget the Founding Father was a predatory pedophile, too. Plenty of documentation in Professor Brodie’s book of his heavy-handed seduction/coercion of the daughters of his followers. Kind of bizarre to persecute gays with THAT skeleton in your own closet, but there you are.

  6. Everybody knows that they’re afraid that all their “elders” are going to go to California on their missions where they will be required by law to get gay married with their mission partners.

  12. True story- I had a pair of Mormon missionaries visit me just after I finished reading “Under the Banner of Heaven”… I preceded to discuss controversial Mormon history with them for two hours straight, at which point THEY told ME they had to go. HA!

  13. You don’t have to go back to the 19th century to find evidence of Mormon nuttery. Check out the top ten teachings of one of their most revered prophets/apostles at

    http://www.i4m.com/think/leaders/spencer…

    which includes the following bit of revelation:

    “I do not find in the Bible the modern terms “petting” nor “homosexuality,” yet I found numerous scriptures which forbade such acts under by whatever names they might be called. I could not find the term “homosexuality,” but I did find numerous places where the Lord condemned such a practice with such vigor that even the death penalty was assessed.”

    Also, NO ORAL SEX for breeders, either:

    “The First Presidency has interpreted oral sex as constituting an unnatural, impure, or unholy practice.”

    And no masturbation!

    “Prophets anciently and today condemn masturbation”

    What about foreplay, you say?

    “Among the most common sexual sins our young people commit are necking and petting.”

    But wait, perhaps he can offer a persuasive metaphor?

    “How like the mistletoe is immorality. The killer plant starts with a sticky sweet berry. Little indiscretions are the berries — indiscretions like sex thoughts, sex discussions, passionate kissing, pornography. The leaves and little twigs are masturbation and necking and such, growing with every exercise. The full-grown plant is petting and sex looseness.”

    These are the Mormon positions as of a few years ago. They don’t sound like much fun, do they?

  14. Look at it this way – they had to change their marriage practices because the government sent the US Army in to force them to.

    Now this bunch of Johnny-Come-Lately gay folks comes along and says, “Hey, we want to marry.” And the government lets them!

    You’d be pissed too.

    Of course, if they let the gays marry, then perhaps legalization of polygamy is down the road. It’d be interesting to see what the Mormons do then.

  16. Guess I should have read the article first. (I’ve read the Brodie book mentioned, so I felt that I knew all about Joe.)

    All four of the Brodie books mentioned are awesome. The Sir Richard Burton book is great: the guy was one-in-a-billion.

    Oretga leaves out a key point: When Joe was scamming the farmers, he was banging their wives & daughters! Say what you will about the con man, but he was an all-time lothario!

  18. Yikes.

    I can’t believe this. I honestly can’t. I can’t believe that the gay community would resort to such Gestapo tactics.

    As for the quote there, let’s just turn it around for a second – “you too might have a burning inferiority about your belief system, and you might manifest that inferiority by picking on the Mormons, who make an easy target and scare the bejesus out of your typical queer.”

    This is truly disgusting. Instead of making the case for gay marriage on merits, you’re making it by demonizing others.

  19. @18, what planet are you on?

    THE MORMONS PICKED THIS FIGHT. They provided more than 75% of the funding for the pro-Prop 8 campaign—and that’s funding actively solicited by the church leaders from the rank and file. Nothing said in this comment stream is untrue. Have you read Mormon history?

  20. I honestly can’t believe a religion would send orders to all it’s churches to back Prop 8 with time and money, @18.

    Payback’s a b..ch.

  21. @18: Are you actually comparing peaceful street protests with Kristallnacht? Get a grip.

    Being Mormon is a belief system. One can choose to be Mormon, or not (unlike being gay, which is notoriously difficult to “un-choose.” ) Since they are claiming those beliefs as justification for their attempts to influence public policy it is entirely appropriate for their beliefs to be publicly examined and, if discovered to be ridiculous, ridiculed.

    A month ago the phrase “magic underpants” was relatively obscure. The Church of LDS brought this upon themselves.

  22. Guys, I’m no happier about Prop 8 passing than you are. I just don’t see the point of going apeshit on a tiny little religion, simply because they gamed the system better than we did.

    All these people out on the streets, what percentage of them gave money to “No on Prop 8” ? How many of them volunteered to go door-to-door, to talk to people and explain to them why Prop 8 was wrong and should be defeated?

    Of course the Mormon religion sounds silly. So do all religions when boiled down to their basic element – in that sense it’s no different from mainline Christianity, or Islam, or freakin’ paganism. I don’t see how this has anything to do with Prop 8.

  23. My pet theory is that the Mormons backed Prop 8 to make nice with the fundies so that Mormons are accepted as “real xtians” and Mitt can be the repug candidate to 2012. I personally doubt that the fundies will go for it. The Mormons get a bunch of bad press from teh gays with little positive to show for it.

  24. 21: Ah, I see, your position is more defensible because sexual orientation is not a choice, whereas religious identity is? And you’re telling *me* to get a grip?

    You guys need to look at some very very basic rhetoric. “Ad hominem” is a fallacy which involves responding to an argument by attacking the identity or belief of the person making it, rather than the argument itself.

    If you believe that LDS participation in the political process is illegitimate, then you need to make that case, not simply complain after the fact that they were more effective at organizing and fundraising. After all, they are simply people who acted in accordance with their beliefs, just as you and I would.

    Finally, from a purely solutions-oriented standpoint, I’m not sure what this accomplishes. Do you think the mind of a single person who voted for Prop 8 will be swayed by these ugly anti-Mormon screeds?

  25. @24: Whether or not focusing outrage specifically on the church will prove the most effective tactic is something only time will tell. I have my doubts on that front as well, but that die is cast.

    I know perfectly well what an Ad Hominem attack is, but from your remarks it seems to me that maybe you don’t. The fact that Mormons believe that their “prophet” was issued Divine instructions from an angel who delivered these instructions inscribed on golden plates which were then whisked away out of sight before anybody else could see them is not beside the point here, because the LDS Church is claiming that the contents of those alleged golden plates constitutes a basis for making public policy. If we’re now to be ruled by a set of mystical golden plates, I for one would like to see them. I can go look at the Constitution in a case in the Smithsonian. Where are the plates?

    And yes, religious identity is a choice. If people don’t have the choice to abandon a religion they don’t believe or support, then that’s called a cult. I for one am completely fed up with people claiming that their patently silly views should be exempt from criticism because they go to a special building every Sunday and sit on an uncomfortable bench to hear them.

  26. I thought there were laws against churches with tax exempt status directing their followers to vote a certain way. L-D-S may not fear G-A-Y, but they damn well better fear I-R-S!

  27. What’s with you getting off on poking fun at Mormon mythology, quirky as it is? Would you say that people whose views on same-sex marriage are informed by their Jewish faith are silly because they were handed down by God on stone tablets?

    Besides, if you indeed believe that the Mormon argument was that angelic golden plates are a sound basis for public policy, you must then also believe that the majority of Californian voters, who are not Mormon, agreed with them!

  28. Jordan is right. Protests and boycotts against the Mormon church are perfectly just and necessary. Objecting to the way the Mormon church has strong-armed its way into politics is legit. Objecting to the way religious people of all stripes use their supposed piety as a shield behind which to hide their bigotry is totally valid. There are a million completely justified reasons why gays (and everyone, really) can be pissed at Mormons.

    But making fun of Mormon mythology and religious practices, while certainly amusing, is not helping our cause at all. It just leaves us open to charges of prejudice and intolerance ourselves. If we’re going to run around calling everone else bigoted everyone else bigoted ( (a tactic i approve of!), it behooves us to avoid bigotry ourselves.

    (Keep in mind that I don’t think protesting Mormon temples is bigoted. I think criticizing their underpants is.)

    I’m kind of sad Dan Savage is playing this game because he’s one of the smartest and most aggressive people we have on our side. I’d prefer he didn’t compromise the strength of his other arguments with this kind of petty, small-minded crap.

  29. This is starting to feel mean-spirited. Why make fun of people? The gay lifestyle is gaining acceptance but by tearing others down (Mormons), it risks swaying public opinion the other direction! Why not take the high road in this case. Protest, sure – but don’t get petty and personal and start making fun of others, it might backfire!

  30. When you use your church to take away my constitutional rights, what the fuck do you expect? We don’t roll over like we used to when the old fucks that want to make us second class citizens were in charge. They are on their way out and so is their obsession with oppression. Good riddance. Now we fight like hell you bastards.

  31. Would you say that people whose views on same-sex marriage are informed by their Jewish faith are silly because they were handed down by God on stone tablets?

    Damn straight I would, especially if they claimed that God handed down those tablets in 1957. And yes, when Christian and Jewish groups have sought to place monuments to the Ten Commandments in public places such as courthouses, I’ve opposed that as well. Again, you may well be right as to the advisability of criticizing the religious on the basis of their beliefs on a tactical level, but the fact is they invite this sort of criticism by using their beliefs as arguments. It’s like Intelligent Design — it’s fine with me if people want to believe Noah’s Ark really happened, until they insist that it be taught in schools. At that point I feel like they should come up with some proof to back up their arguments or shut up.

    As to the majority of Californians agreeing with them: Although I take issue with the whole premise of how the initiative process was used there to strip rights from a minority, on a certain level you are right — the people voted how they voted. However, the Mormon church engaged in a very high-profile campaign there, and the people affected by it have every right to hang the consequences of that around their neck. The LDS Church here is quite visibly engaging in attempts to shape public policy, and they deserve the backlash they are getting from the public that must suffer through the resulting policy.

    One month ago the fact that these people believed in sacred bloomers and the Angel Moroni and his Disappearing Golden Tablets was not a subject of constant public ridicule. The fact that it is now has everything to do with the way they thrust themselves into the spotlight through their actions. If they don’t want to bear the unpleasant glare of public outrage and ridicule they should stop being so publicly outrageous and ridiculous.

    I realize that here in the Northwest there are many Mormons, Jack-Mormons and backsliders whose feelings get hurt when this stuff is mocked. If it will make you feel better, you can mock my crazy-ass ancestral religion all you want. Besides, let’s face it, the Amish are funny. But at least they don’t try to force everybody to ride in horse-drawn buggies.

  32. If you know much about Mormon doctrine, it’s pretty obvious why they responded the way they have on this issue. Mormons believe in eternal marriage. And not only does marriage persist, but being married is a requirement for receiving the best eternal rewards. It’s for these reasons, I would argue, that Mormons react more strongly to the very existence of homosexuality than other religions. Combine this with a basic disagreement over the role of religious beliefs in a civil society and this is the unfortunate result.

    It has nothing to do with the other beliefs and practices of Mormonism and everything to do with their particular beliefs regarding marriage.

  33. The Mormon Church has zero credibility when it comes to marriage. The same church that fights gay marriage also spent decades fighting good old-fashioned heterosexual monogamy!

    Mormon Church 1995:

    “Alternatives to the legal and loving marriage between a man and a woman are helping to unravel the fabric of human society. I am sure this is pleasing to the devil. The fabric I refer to is the family. These so-called alternative life-styles must not be accepted as right, because they frustrate God’s commandment for a life-giving union of male and female within a legal marriage as stated in Genesis. If practiced by all adults, these life-styles would mean the end of the human family.”
    – Apostle James E. Faust, “Serving the Lord and Resisting the Devil,” Liahona, Nov. 1995, Page 3.

    SAME Mormon Church 1862

    “Monogamy, or restrictions by law to one wife, is no part of the economy of heaven among men. Such a system was commenced by the founders of the Roman empire….Rome became the mistress of the world, and introduced this order of monogamy wherever her sway was acknowledged. Thus this monogamic order of marriage, so esteemed by modern Christians as a holy sacrament and divine institution, is nothing but a system established by a set of robbers…. Why do we believe in and practice polygamy? Because the Lord introduced it to his servants in a revelation given to Joseph Smith, and the Lord’s servants have always practiced it. ‘And is that religion popular in heaven?’ it is the only popular religion there,…”
    – The Prophet Brigham Young, The Deseret News, August 6, 1862

    Here is a whole collections of declarations from the Mormon Church condemning monogamy using the same dogmatic rhetoric they use today again:

    http://www.i4m.com/think/sexuality/homos…

    The Mormon Church was on the wrong side of history then and now.

  35. Jon Krakauer wrote this great book on the Mormons called “Under the Banner of Heaven: A Story of Violent Faith”. The early Mormons were even more extreme than their modern-day membership, endorsing principles such as ‘Blood Atonement’, ‘Plural Marriage’ and even assaulting wagon trains passing through Utah on their way to California.

    Whenever I hear people talk about ‘Islamists’, I wonder if they have ever noticed the Christianists that surround us every day; people whose zeal for fundamentalist extremism is so great that they believe that God wants them to kill, lie, cheat, and steal in his name. It strikes me as so very odd that they see a moral deficit in consensual sexual activity between adults, and yet so no moral deficit whatever in endorsing violence from the pulpit.

    Warren T Jeffs, the head of the fundamentalist LDS in Colorado Springs was on the FBI’s ten most wanted fugitives until he was apprehended recently. The charges against him including the organized rape of children. He didn’t think this scheme up on his own, though; his dad had been doing it in Colorado Springs for decades before him.

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