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The 1857 Utah War

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Re: The 1857 Utah War

#51

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I’m an exmormon living in Utah and it is really not that bad… Mormon culture here is the dominant culture but not anything like the parent comment describes it as. I explicitly left the church which is significantly more ostracizing than just not being a member, and I still don’t feel like an outsider.

Re: The 1857 Utah War

#52
post #27

Quoted post unavailable.

This hot take is a little extreme but not too far from the truth. You'll only understand the depths to which the LDS church controls the state and enforces it's social and moral code if you've lived in Utah for an extended period as an outsider. It's pretty fucking weird. - Hard liquor only sold by State Liquor stores, where they digitally record your ID. Only open a few hours a day, and on certain days. Additional s…

I’m an exmormon in suburban Utah and it is definitely nowhere near 80-90% active Mormon. Maybe 50-60%, which is still really high for a single demographic, but also not too dissimilar in group think qualities of other populations

Re: The 1857 Utah War

#53
I don’t know much about this incident but I am dubious about this retelling.

There are a lot of florid adjectives, with one side being villainous and dastardly, the other side noble (that being said, Buchanan was a disgrace).

And the level of privation described here as being inflicted on the US is not consistent with the force being able to press on. It had to have been exaggerated else they would have been forced to retreat.

Finally, the part about being “neutral” in the US a civil war, well, that is certainly nothing to be proud of for an ostensibly, moral organization, though completely consistent with their “children of Ham” doctrine that banned blacks from ordination, mixed marriages etc until the end of the 1970s.

Re: The 1857 Utah War

#54
post #20

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I wasn't sure why you were being downvoted so I googled "utah population" and "utah mormon church member count". 2.2M divided by 3.2M --> 70% LDS seems to at least be a dominating factor in that state.

The LDS church is known to inflate their membership numbers significantly. They count anyone who was ever baptized at age 8 regardless of how active they currently are.

> Independent Latter-day Saint demographer Matt Martinich has estimated that about 40 percent of Latter-day Saints in the United States are “active,” and he guesses that roughly half of Salt Lake County’s members go to church, or roughly 24 percent of the county’s population.

Apostasy among young people has grown extreme in the last couple of decades by the church's own admission.

Re: The 1857 Utah War

#55
post #2

The article is an interesting take on the time period For one example, I think Porter Rockwell is less considered a lawman, and more of a hitman or enforcer. He's suspected of having a body count somewhere in the 150 range edit: It also completely leaves out the entire Mountain Meadows Massacre incident, where Mormons slaughtered around 120 men women and children in a wagon train headed to California in September of…

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Re: The 1857 Utah War

#56
post #52
post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This hot take is a little extreme but not too far from the truth. You'll only understand the depths to which the LDS church controls the state and enforces it's social and moral code if you've lived in Utah for an extended period as an outsider. It's pretty fucking weird. - Hard liquor only sold by State Liquor stores, where they digitally record your ID. Only open a few hours a day, and on certain days. Additional s…

I’m an exmormon in suburban Utah and it is definitely nowhere near 80-90% active Mormon. Maybe 50-60%, which is still really high for a single demographic, but also not too dissimilar in group think qualities of other populations

Sure, it's hard to define whay "active" even means. If you go by the churches numbers, at least 60% of the entire state is composed of "active" members.

Re: The 1857 Utah War

#57
post #33

Between Buchanan's questionable sexuality, and the Mormons and Slavery, it is little wonder the Civil War was not far away.

Pretty much every US president from about Fillmore through Andrew Johnson (with the notable and obvious exception of Abraham Lincoln) is widely regarded as being on the short list for worst US president. Admittedly every president in the pre-Civil War period was arguably dealt a pretty bad hand but none of them seriously tried to change course--and, of course, many of them wouldn't have been elected had they tried.

True, but had Lincoln not changed the course, there would have been no office to which to be elected. It makes a pretty good point for people, as a popular democracy, not necessarily knowing what they need to have a country.

Re: The 1857 Utah War

#58

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"all career advancement and social status is dependent on your position with the church" -- this is bullshit, at least in my experience.

I lived there 2012-2017, never had an issue with dating/making friends/getting promotions at work. There were of course many women that would only date mormon men, but the non-mormon population was big enough that I didn't think about it much.

I worked for multiple tech companies there, had plenty of non-mormon co-workers (and bosses!), and while people did talk about mormon things sometimes in social settings, it was never pushed on me, nor did anyone make a big deal that I wasn't mormon.

I should mention I lived in downtown SLC, which is arguably more liberal/secular, and I worked for companies both in and outside the city.

Re: The 1857 Utah War

#59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nah, there are plenty of cities with high LDS populations north of SLC. Bountiful, Centerville, Kaysville are like in the 80-90% ranges. It's when you get into Layton with Hill Air Force Base and Ogden where the population seems to dwindle. North of Ogden, you have Brigham City where the population again is very high.

Yeah no doubt about high percentages in northern utah (I'm originally from Ogden fwiw). Was mostly commenting that it would make sense if Young used this war as a means to migrate people to the true valley (Provo/Orem/etc). Those towns are easily 90%+ LDS. I vaguely remember learning about this in Utah history but it was not characterized in the same light.

It could explain places like Provo/Lindon/Orem which are most likely 99%.

Re: The 1857 Utah War

#60
post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

While I'm sure some of that does occur some places in the region, my experience in the Utah/Idaho region is very much the opposite. Friendly and very merit oriented work environments.

Quoted post unavailable.

I don't have the moral fortitude to defend Mormonism as a religion, but based on the model of organized religion as a theocratic social insurance program (which it has been since, at least, Leviticus), your complaints don't seem entirely unreasonable:

> membership costs 10% of all you earn

10% is less than I currently pay into my state's social safety net programs.

> If you are in dire straights as a member and require assistance, the program is geared to get you off their assistance ASAP.

Shouldn't "returning people to self-sufficiency" be the goal of any social safety net? As far as I can tell, when you build classes of people whose lives are exclusively and indefinitely supported by welfare, things don't go well (especially when the people who fund the social welfare system get a bit strapped for cash).

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