LDS in the USA

Mormonism and the Making of American Culture

Lee Trepanier,Lynita K. Newswander

• Publisher: Baylor University Press
• Year: 2016
• ISBN:
  9781602586543
• Topic: Social Sciences
• Subtopic: Sociology of Religion
• Index: Social Sciences

From the politics of Glenn Beck to reality television's Big Love and the hit Broadway show The Book of Mormon, Mormons have become a recognizable staple of mainstream popular culture. And while most Americans are well aware of the existence of Mormonism--and some of the often exaggerated myths about Mormonism--the religion's public influence has been sorely understudied.

Lee Trepanier and Lynita K. Newswander move beyond clichéd and stereotypical portrayals of Mormonism to unpack the significant and sometimes surprising roles Mormons have played in the building of modern America. Moving from popular culture to politics to the Mormon influence in social controversies, LDS in the USA reveals Mormonism to be quintessentially American--both firmly rooted in American tradition and free to engage in the public square.

Trepanier and Newswander examine the intersection of the tension between the nation's sometimes bizarre understanding of Mormon belief and the suspicious acceptance of the most well known Mormons into the American public identity. Readers are consistently challenged to abandon popular perceptions in order to embrace more fully the fascinating importance of this American religion.

1

MORMONS IN THE AMERICAN IMAGINATION

The Janus Face of Television

The portrayal of Mormons in American mainstream popular culture has followed two extremes: they are seen either as the epitome of all-American and wholesome values of family, clean living, and material success or as secretive, strange, and suspicious, with sacred temple rites, special garments, and a murky past that includes polygamy. The first set of values is personified in shows like 1970s Donny & Marie, while the second set is spelled out in the more recent show Big Love. These inconsistent portrayals of Mormons in the popular media may be entertaining, but they also confuse the reality and leave the public wondering what the true face of Mormonism really looks like.

In this sense, Mormons are both familiar and unfamiliar to the American public imagination. On the one hand, Mormons are the successful, helpful, and courteous neighbors that Americans want to have next door, while on the other they are the ones who have secretive temples and strange Bibles and talk in a coded language. These disconcerting depictions are reflected in Mormons’ own desire to be accepted by mainstream American society while at the same time adhering to beliefs and practices that run counter to it. This tension within Mormonism and in the popular portrayals of it embodies a tension within American popular culture: a simultaneous affirmation and critique of American values. By both asserting and questioning American values, Mormons have become a key voice in the ever-shifting conversation regarding just what it is that the American people stand for.

Donny and Marie Osmond were the first Mormons to break into American mainstream popular culture who were consistent with the all-American values of family, civility, and success. Donny emerged from the Osmond Brothers as a teen idol in the early 1970s with songs that became pop hits, such as “Go Away Little Girl” and “Puppy Love.”¹ He and his sister, Marie, who was a country singer, had a variety show in 1976—79 called Donny & Marie that featured songs performed by the two. At that time, they were the youngest entertainers in television history to host their own variety show. When the show was canceled, Donny admitted that his public image was damaged because he was perceived by the public as “unhip” and as a “boy scout.”² His clean-cut, all-American image was so damaging to his future career that one professional publicist even suggested that he should purposefully get arrested for drug possession in order to change it.³

Both Donny and Marie would have later success in their careers, although it never would reach the level of fame they achieved in the late 1970s. There would be other famous Mormon public figures—Gladys Knight, Steve Young, Johnny Miller—who offered differing portrayals of the LDS faith, some more positive than others. For most, acceptance would come at the cost of being connected with a conservative America. Those in popular culture who were secular and liberal would portray Mormons differently.

In fact, except for Donny and Marie Osmond, positive portrayals of Mormons in American popular culture are rare. A good example of negative representation is HBO’s television series Big Love, which depicts a contemporary polygamist who lives in Salt Lake City with his three wives and seven children. Although the LDS Church renounced the practice of polygamy in the late nineteenth century, the family is described as Mormon,⁴ leading the LDS Church to release an official statement about the show:

The Church has long been concerned about the continued illegal practice of polygamy in some communities, and, in particular about persistent reports of emotional and physical child and wife abuse emanating from them. It will be regrettable if this program, by making polygamy the subject of entertainment, minimizes the seriousness of the problem … placing the series in Salt Lake City, the international headquarters of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, is enough to blur the line between the modern Church and the program’s subject matter, and to reinforce old and long-outdated stereotypes…. Big Love, like so much other television programming, is essentially lazy and indulgent entertainment that does nothing for our society and will never nourish great minds.⁵

In response, Carolyn Strauss, president of HBO Entertainment, stated, “It is interesting how many people are ignorant about the Mormon church and think that it [the LDS Church] actually does condone polygamy. So in an odd way, the show is sort of beneficial in drawing that distinction.”⁶ HBO also assured the LDS Church the show would not be about Mormons of the LDS Church. Whether such a distinction is made by viewers is unclear. However, both the LDS Church and HBO recognize the negative association in the American public mind between polygamy and Mormonism irrespective of the contemporary truth.

Big Love continued to create controversy when in 2009 the show recreated a temple ceremony, which Mormons consider sacred and therefore secret to non-Mormons. The creators justified their decision as being “a very important part of the story” and issued an apology in case they had offended anyone. As Mormon themes became more woven into the show, the LDS Church was placed in a difficult position. On the one hand, if it were to call for a boycott, unwanted media attention would be directed at the show and possibly raise Mormons’ past association with polygamy. On the other hand, to ignore the show could be construed as condoning it. What the LDS Church opted for was to express continual disapproval of the show for being vulgar (rather than for being anti-Mormon) and to hope that the negative depictions of Mormons would not have any long-term harmful effect on the Church. It also suggested that individual members who were offended at the misrepresentation of the temple ceremony could boycott the show.⁷ The LDS Church’s response was similar to other religious organizations’ reactions to negative portrayals of their beliefs and practices: issue a condemnation not on religious grounds but on grounds of poor taste, reaffirm the strength of one’s organization, and encourage its members to protest it as Americans rather than as specific religious believers.

Other television shows like Cold Case and Law and Order also have represented Mormons poorly. In the Cold Case episode “Creatures of the Night,” a serial killer, known as the “Mormon Kid,” hears God in his head; his aunt dismisses the idea that he is crazy, saying, “Joseph Smith heard an avenging voice, so did Brigham Young.”⁸ The show also treats the Mormon sacred garments disrespectfully: they are referred to derogatorily as “gamies,” and the protagonist fails to honor them properly. In spite of the warning that the show is fictional and does not depict any actual persons or events, the equation is clear: Mormons are strange people because of their beliefs and practices.

This same equation is also used in the Law and Order episode “Lost Boys,” where (again with the warning that the show is fictional) the Mormon characters are portrayed as polygamists. Lighthearted but still insensitive to Mormons was Boston Legal’s running gag that one of the show’s main characters will receive letters, presumably from angry viewers, when he mocks a female character by asking whether Mitt Romney ever wanted her for one of his wives.⁹ In these and other fictional shows, Mormons are misrepresented as practicing polygamy and holding strange and bizarre beliefs. The all-American and wholesome values of Donny and Marie are discarded for the strange and sensational.

Interestingly, more balanced portrayals of Mormons have come in reality television series like American Idol, The Real World, The Biggest Loser, America’s Next Top Model, Dancing with the Stars, Survivor, and others. Here Mormons are shown as friendly, courteous, and hardworking people who have beliefs and practices characteristic of conservative and religious America. An example of conservative values sticking out in a secular culture can be found on the show Survivor, where the participant Neleh Dennis brought her scriptures as her luxury item to the island and another participant, Ashlee Ashby, woke up at 5 o’clock in the morning every day to drive thirty minutes to church to study the Bible prior to the show.¹⁰ In some parts of the country, these women would be viewed as role models; in others, they would be objects of ridicule. The clash between religious and secular values not only creates conflict on television, but it also reflects the political and cultural conversation that is taking place in the United States today. When Julie Stoffer in The Real World had to explain and justify her Mormon religion to her roommates, she became the central character of the series as the lone conservative and religious voice in a liberal and secular America.¹¹

The advantage of having Mormons in reality television series is that they are able to represent an America that is both familiar and strange: conservative and religious but not well known or understood. As Julie Stoffer said, “One of the good things that will come out of this is that it’s getting people talking about Mormonism…. If it takes a couple kids going on ‘American Idol’ to make that happen, well, damn it, good!”¹² This not only allows a natural conflict of religious and secular values, but it also invites a curious viewers to ask what constitutes Mormonism and, more broadly, what constitutes America.

The overrepresentation of Mormons in reality television series may strike some as extraordinary, especially given their history of persecution and oppression by their fellow Americans. Some have speculated that because Mormons come from large families, it makes them natural competitors in group dynamic situations, which are what reality television shows are based on. Others have suggested that their culture cultivates an openness and confidence that makes them attractive candidates on television. Finally, there are those who have pointed out that the Mormon practice of Family Home Evenings on Monday nights creates a natural built-in audience, especially when one of the contestants is “one of their own.”¹³

But what may be more remarkable than the sizable number of Mormon contestants in reality television series is their acceptance by mainstream American popular culture and their ability to maintain their religious identity. Ken Jennings, who holds the longest winning streak on the U.S. syndicated game show Jeopardy, was so well received by mainstream popular culture that corporations like Microsoft, Cingular Wireless, and Allstate Insurance sought his public endorsement.¹⁴ Jennings did not hide the fact that he was Mormon—he stated that he would donate some of his three million dollars in earnings to the LDS Church (as well as to National Public Radio)—but he did not make it the defining issue for his public persona.

Still, some in the mass media depicted Jennings as a Mormon, as opposed to a successful American. Jennings himself addressed this issue directly when he wrote an article in the New York Daily News asking the public to stop slandering his Mormon faith, especially in light of Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney’s run for the 2008 Republican presidential nomination.¹⁵ Thinking that his religion had been “effectively mainstreamed” (“Being a Mormon was like being Canadian, or a vegetarian, or a unicyclist,” he said), Jennings was surprised to see the biased coverage Mormons received in the mass media, such as “Lawrence O’Donnell’s bizarre anti-Mormon explosion on ‘The McLaughlin Group’” or “Christopher Hitchens, who called [his] church ‘an officially racist organization.’” Finding himself, like many Mormons, a target of unfair stereotypes from the mainstream media, Jennings concluded with a plea for tolerance and civility, as well as a clarification of the LDS Church’s positions on blacks and polygamy.

However, there are some portrayals of Mormons in mainstream American popular culture that are more positive, though not as traditional as the Donny and Marie model. For example, in the South Park episode “All about Mormons,” the Mormon characters, particularly Joseph Smith Jr., are lampooned but in a good-natured manner, with the Mormon Harrison family depicted as polite, family-oriented, and successful. Although the story questions the religious origins of Mormonism, the Harrison family, particularly their children, are cast in a sympathetic light as victims of religious bigotry by the story’s main characters. In another episode, “Super Best Friends,” Joseph Smith, along with other religious founders like Buddha and Moses, joins forces with Jesus to fight David Blaine, a street magician who has superpowers. In fact, in the South Park world, it is only the Mormons who have predicted the afterlife correctly, with members of the other religions condemned to hell. Of all the characters portrayed in the series, it is only the Mormons who are consistently represented as “compassionate, or even courteous.”¹⁶

Finally, there is the television series franchise Battlestar Galactica, which derives elements of its science fiction plot from the Mormon beliefs of its creator, Glen A. Larson.¹⁷ For example, in both the 1978 and 2003 series, the planet Kobol is the ancient and far-away home world of humanity. In Mormon scripture, Kolob is a celestial body identified in the Book of Abraham (3:2) as being near the home of God.¹⁸ Other instances of the Mormon influence infused into the series are the show’s governing council, the Quorum of Twelve, which parallels the LDS Church’s Quorum, and the characters’ beliefs in marriage as eternal and in the gods as more perfected humans. Simply put, the show’s plot—the search for a lost tribe and planet—and the religious beliefs that surround it, although placed in a science fiction world, are heavily borrowed from the beliefs of Mormonism.

In the 2003 series, the conflict between humanity and the Cylons is primarily theological, with the former as polytheists and the latter as monotheists. Although the Mormons consider themselves monotheists, they have been accused of actually being polytheists.¹⁹ This monotheism-versus-polytheism debate is mirrored in the plot of Battlestar Galactica, where viewers’ sympathy alternates between the humans and Cylons. Although Mormonis...