Nov 24, 2019

Guest Commentary: Reporting on the La Mora massacre has harmed efforts to normalize Latter-day Saints

Graves of Rhonita Maria Miller and her children on Nov. 9 in Le Barón, Mexico. Three families were traveling in separate SUVs from their homes in La Mora in Sonora to farm town Le Barón in Cihuahua on Monday when they were ambushed in two separate attacks by cartel gunmen hidden in the mountains along the dirt road. As a result, three women and six children died. All family members had dual Mexican-American citizenship and belonged to a Mormon offshoot group not affiliated with The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
JACKSON DEAKINS
Denver Post
November 20, 2019

It’s time to be candid about The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS), or the Mormons. The massacre of nine U.S. citizens in the mountains of northern Mexico on Nov. 5, has drawn the international spotlight onto an enclave of Fundamentalist Latter-day Saints (FLDS) in Sonora. Headlines locally and internationally read “Mormons ambushed…”, “Mormon family massacred…”, “How a Mormon community became…” The coverage is heart-wrenching, horrifying, and a glimpse into the very drastic state of violence in Mexico — but these headlines mislead.

The people of La Mora, and fundamentalist communities aren’t Mormon. In fact, they are a sect, independent from the main body of the church — as Mormon as Anglicans are Catholic. In addition to highlighting cartel-fueled violence, the subsequent reporting has undone massive strides the church has taken toward normalizing their image and becoming more than the quirky “cult” they are still perceived as.

Mormons, or members of the LDS community, have historically been misunderstood, caricatured and hated for the novelty of their faith, often resulting in violence toward the group. The term “Mormon” originated as a slur, a jab at a prophet from their sacred text. Joseph Smith, the church’s founder and first prophet, was executed by a mob while imprisoned in Carthage, Illinois. His followers were forced to flee Illinois, and subsequently Missouri, while under an extermination order from the then governor of Missouri, Lilburn Boggs. Almost a third of the U.S. standing army was committed to a continuation of the extermination order by President James Buchanan, in what was known as the Utah War.

Following Utah’s assumption of statehood, illegalization of polygamy, and incorporation into the Union, offshoot sects of “fundamentalists,” those unwilling to abandon plural marriage, fled to Canada and Mexico, resulting in the formation of the La Mora community. From the church’s inception in 1830 to the ongoing coverage of the murders in Mexico, much, if not all, of what Americans assume about Mormons comes from a stigmatized, stereotyped image that hasn’t changed much since Smith’s death.

2011 is described by Time as a “Mormon moment” in American history. Mitt Romney, perhaps the most prevalent member of the church, was campaigning against Barack Obama and secured the Republican nomination. A smash-hit musical opened on Broadway and was nominated for 14 Tony awards; “The Book of Mormon” was the largest-scale pop culture phenomenon about a church ever.

Still, however, 82% of Americans surveyed by the Pew Research Center stated they learned little, if anything, about the church during Romney’s presidential bid. Likewise, as the auditorium cleared after a show, those who saw “The Book of Mormon” were left with the caricatures of Elders Price and Cunningham, perpetuations of how the public has viewed the church. In the same Pew survey, the most common one-word descriptor of the church from respondents was “cult.”

What coverage of the recent deaths in Mexico tells, aside from the gruesome realities of life in the region, is that eight years later, the perceptions are the same. Fundamentalist or not, members of the church or not, the incorporation of all sects of Latter-day Saints into a generic “Mormon,” does both LDS and FLDS a disservice in ignoring the essential differences between the two, like polygamy.

The public confusion of Mormon beliefs stems from media misrepresentations as old as the church itself — as seen in the past, this sometimes manifested in violence, but mostly manifested in all-encompassing othering of members of the church.

I’ve grown up with Romney, “Sister Wives,” “The Book of Mormon,” and now La Mora. When I’m asked what I believe, I shouldn’t be forced to justify decisions made in 1890, let alone face jeers and smirks for continuous gross mischaracterization. Understanding and normalization of a church that tries desperately to be understood and accepted starts with the reportage, with headlines.

Jackson Deakins is originally from Los Angeles and in his final year studying journalism and political science at the University of Colorado at Boulder.

https://www.denverpost.com/2019/11/20/guest-commentary-reporting-on-the-la-mora-massacre-has-harmed-efforts-to-normalize-latter-day-saints/

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