anti-mormonism on my mind

It's like a train wreck--I can't look away. Every time there is something about Mormons in the news (which has been a lot since the Romney campaign started) I have to read it, though it often pains me.

For me and some of my close friends, it reached a fever pitch when my good friend Emily, who does reviews for a Bay Area website, went to see a certain well-known comedian who went on a seemingly hateful tirade against Mormons in his act. She decided to say something about it in her review, and unleashed a tidal wave of anti-Mormon vitriol. The comedian himself commented on the website and joined the fray; it quickly became one of the most-read (and commented) articles ever on the site. Fuelling the whole bruehaha was a surprising number of people with strong feelings against the LDS faith.

I was stunned. I went to work that day with a pit in my stomach. I was the only Mormon in my department at a very liberal University. Would my friends and co-workers say those things about Mormons? Would they respond in the same way? I had only been treated with respect. But I wondered.

I wondered because some of the same authors and intellecuals I had my students read started making anti-Mormon comments. Christopher Hitchens, for example, called Mormonism a "mad cult" on Slate.com. I started to notice things, like the fact that there are a few persistent (though bedraggled and unenthusiastic) picketers in front of my church every Sunday. I was invited to dinner with one of my friends' families, well-educated Bostonians, who surmised that Romney had flip-flopped on the issues because "Joe Smith must've told him to be a fascist."

I've long noticed that people say and publish statements about Mormons that would be utterly unacceptable if the word "Mormon" were replaced with "black," "Jewish," "gay" or "Muslim." I am thankful that our society offers protection to minority groups--and wonder why Mormons are exempt. Several years ago, my favorite radio show (produced by Ira Glass, a personal hero) aired an essay by one of its regular contributors about how much he hates Mormons. The writer sits in his dentist's chair (his dentist is Mormon) and seethes with disgust for the faith while listening to his dentist talk to his assistant about his mission call. "Why?" I wanted to write This American Life. "Why is this okay, considered entertaining, when if you wrote this way about almost any other group it would be outrageous bigotry?" I was just out of college, had moved to the big city, and I was jarred by that essay--it made me feel more than confused. It made me feel vaguely...threatened.

All of these things piqued my paranoia that anti-Mormonism is more rampant than I had realized, and that the media's non-PC and sometimes harsh treatment of Mormons has sent the message to individuals that they could do the same. I felt somewhat validated when I saw this Wall Street Journal article this week titled "Mormons Dismayed by Harsh Spotlight." One quote reads, "I don't think that any of us had any idea how much anti-Mormon stuff was out there," said Armand Mauss, a Mormon sociologist who has written extensively about church culture, in an interview last week. "The Romney campaign has given the church a wake-up call. There is the equivalent of anti-Semitism still out there." I'm not sure if this should make me feel better because the problem is being taken seriously, or just freaked-out.

I've spoken to many friends who have noticed this, too. But everyone seems to have a different take on it. People who I respect fall on both sides of the camp--those who want to take a more aggressive approach and would like to see something like an Anti-defamation league, and those who are pacifist. There are also those who don't think there is a problem at all, but even the media is starting to confirm what many of us have sensed.

I take it all so personally, I actually feel kind of paralyzed. I have no idea what to do. Unfortunately, I think one solution for myself is the one that makes me most uncomfortable--outting myself often and openly. Confession: I sometimes avoid divulging that I'm Mormon if it's convenient, and I can get away with it. For example, I never divulge to my students that I'm LDS if I can help it. I figure, it opens a whole can of worms that have nothing to do with our course work, so why make it complicated? Especially in a a competitive academic environment in which background and education are often weighed and measured, it seems like a hassle if not a professional hazard.

Even as I write this, I know that it's incredibly cowardly and silly. There are lot of people with much more exposure and a lot more to lose than I do, who handle this all without breaking a sweat. And, of course, The fact that I'm Mormon might have something to do with what I'm teaching, afterall. I try to choose readings that make my students (and myself) think hard about pre-conceived notions and biases. Why should I shy away from my own (sometimes controversial) faith? Besides, I might learn something myself, even if it's just learning to respond better or getting a tougher skin. I might also be surprised that what I sometimes take for a negative response to my faith might just be naivety or surprise.

A few months ago, I went to see a play one of my former students put on. She was one of my star students, and we have kept in touch. She eagerly introduced me to her parents. They asked where I did my undergrad, and when I responded that I went to BYU, there was an awkward pause. I assumed they were thinking, "We paid all this money to have our daughter taught by a BYU grad?" and that their opinion of me slid just a little. Or, maybe they were just caught off-guard, or maybe they had indigestion. But who's to say maybe their expectations or ideas about Mormons didn't shift just a little for the better? I don't know. But I do know that when I hide my faith, that last scenario can't happen. And isn't that what I'm hoping for here, afterall?