Since its restoration, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter–day Saints and its members have been depicted in a variety of media. From haunting political cartoons of the 1880s to the sing-song, happy-go-lucky missionaries of the “Book of Mormon” musical, stereotypes of the Church are still prevalent. Students and a communications professor shared how stereotypes form because of fear or lack of understanding and how incorrect perceptions have personally affected them.
Merriam-Webster Dictionary defines a stereotype as “a standardized mental picture held in common by members of a group, and that represents an oversimplified opinion, prejudiced attitude or uncritical judgment.”
Brent Yergensen, an associate professor of Communications, pulled up several political cartoons from the late nineteenth century that mocked the Church and presented it in a terrifying manner. One cartoon in particular, he explained, was of destitute-looking women and children walking into a gaping skull labeled “Utah.” The cartoon was inspired by the Church’s practice of plural marriage and rumors that women were coerced into becoming unwilling wives and enslaved to Church leaders.
In the late 1800s, sensationalized cartoons such as the one Yergensen used as an example, were the rest of the world’s only look at the Church as most of the members were isolated in the Utah Territory.
Yergensen explained how most stereotypes come from a need to mock something other than what is known. The propagation of stereotypes, according to Yergensen, is, unfortunately, a symptom of democratic free speech.
“We live in a democracy where free speech is enabled. We, as human beings, have a need to vilify something different than us.” Yergensen pointed to a book among his extensive collection by Kenneth Burke, a famed literary theorist. “Burke said we as human beings have a need to scapegoat. A scapegoat can be anything that- is different from ourselves.
“Religion is always mocked because religion puts really high standards on people. When someone says things should be controlled, anger develops very quickly. I always tell my class people are fighting over resources, and one side can make another group look ridiculous, faulty, or wrong.”
Personal experiences
Makeila Ha, a junior from Washington majoring in anthropology, shared her experiences with the stereotype, as she attended a high school with few members of the Church. Ha defined the “Mormon” stereotype as the happy-go-lucky singing missionaries. Another stereotype she described was an upper-middle-class, home-schooled girl from Utah with many siblings and long blonde hair who could only talk about church-related topics and nothing else.
She explained, “These stereotypes are created because we in the Church are taught to be chaste, appropriate, and clean in our language and actions. Since we have these standards, members of the Church give off the appearance of being a goody-two-shoes.
“I’ve heard a lot of people are afraid to be friends with kids who are members because they think the kids and other Church members just want to convert them. They might think LDS kids are only being friends for the ulterior motive of converting.”
Ha shared how she would encounter people who had a preconception of the Church and judged her before they even got to know her. “I was ‘Makeila the Mormon’ before I was Makeila the person. Friends who got to know me and then found out about my faith didn’t see me as weird because they already knew me as a person.”
Michael Kraft, a sophomore from Washington, D.C., majoring in communications, said the stereotype of members of the Church personally affected him. As he traveled around the world due to his father being in the military, he said he became aware of how the world perceived Church members.
When Kraft, of African-American descent, was living in Korea as a teenager, he shared he and several friends in the English-speaking ward were at a playground. Some other children of soldiers on a military base, not of their faith, asked what religion they all were. When the group responded they were members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, the children inquiring about their faith were taken back because they did not believe Kraft could be a member.
“I said ‘Yeah, I’m Mormon,’ and he said ‘No, you’re not.’ I responded, ‘Yeah, I’m pretty sure.’ This kid was visibly confused, not even trying to be rude. He said, ‘You can’t be Mormon. Mormons are white. I thought they don’t let black people join your church.’ I assured him this was not the case.”
Kraft added how, in the future, he hopes the stereotype of the Church’s members will change. “I feel like the Church is actively fighting against the stereotype and actively changing the narrative. It is more than just a white Utah church. It is an international church with people from every race and background and accepting of anyone.”
Yergensen added the fear of religion is driven by how it is pinned against science as if a person cannot believe in both God and science. “A lot of mockery of religion comes not from scientists but from quasi-scientists. You usually don’t see scientists throw a fit about religion. It’s usually someone who took a philosophy class or two or saw a YouTube video, who then ended up with thousands of subscribers.
“There’s a constant use of fallacies to frame religion against science. The simpler a person can make something look wrong, the more they make themselves look right.”
The main tool used to generate stereotypes, particularly of religion, is fear, according to Yergensen. The absence of information allows the human mind to “go wild.” When human beings are presented with anything foreign or strange to what they are used to, they go straight to fear.
“If we are a publisher or artist, we can make money off the fears of the people.” According to him, there are more horror movies produced and distributed than any other film genre.
“They don’t make more money than other genres. It would seem as human beings we are scared, and we come to know we can make money based on fear. What we don’t consider is the problem that will arise when we write something about another group we do not fully understand.”
Nowadays, the use of all-out fear to stereotype the Church has changed to mockery and satire, according to Yergensen, exhibited in the “Book of Mormon” musical. Written by the creators of "South Park," the musical follows missionaries who are depicted as being unable to think critically or be culturally aware.
Looking back to the political cartoon, Yergensen added how stereotyping moved away from using fear as a tactic and instead used mockery. “Because we’re so aware of media now, and so media-literate, really hard effects of fear don’t matter. We see a documentary for what it is. We see a horror movie for what it is. Only children get truly frightened by things.”
Kraft noted, “[My] experience really opened my eyes to more of the way the world perceives the Church. I understand the stereotype of members of the Church only being white people comes from the restriction on the priesthood, which ended in 1978.”
He added he understood the historical context behind the priesthood restriction but also understood how the general public viewed historical events and why someone might think only white people could be members of the Church. As the information had been simplified and sensationalized through the media, Kraft explained, it was no fault of the person who asked him about his faith.
Yergensen added, “I think a mediated age has hijacked the idea of hyperbole, image, and sarcasm. If hyperbole and sarcasm are used, it’s always to show something negatively. In mass media, we don’t need to wait forever to get information from the internet, so the political cartoons depicting the Church in such a fearful light don’t have the same impact now as they would a century ago.”
Yergensen added a way to break down stereotypes and promote understanding among different religions was mutual respect. “Very much it’s about the establishment of credibility. Human beings trust credibility more than anything. We will respect someone who shows us respect.”
In the past, Yergensen said he worked with atheists who were militant against him because of his faith. It was not until he read and visited with more atheists and their perspectives, he said, that his views changed. “I think atheists have a very strong respect for religion. Not all, of course, but many do have a respect for it. Even then, our similarities with other faiths are just phenomenal. In knowing Catholics, I have a deep love for Catholicism. Whatever credibility we present, that’s what will be returned to us.”