What A 19th Century Campaign To Declare Mormons ‘Non-White’ Tells Us About Modern Islamophobia

I find this argument to be very farfetched. I'd like to hear from some historians on the matter, but my general impression is that Reeve is taking some very obscure elements of the history and applying them out of context, making them appear more prevalent and significant than they actually were.

Like this Mormon Elder-Berry cartoon. There is no explanation provided for this, so it's a lot of speculation as to what meaning the artist was actually going for. Either way one cartoon in a random magazine hardly establishes a pattern. By comparison we see political cartoons all around us. This past week for example major newspapers ran articles and cartoons characterizing GOP voters as "mindless zombies" and "racists."

Democrats and Republicans are calling each other "racists" all the time. Does that make the characterization true? Does it mean the target of the characterization accepts the label as being true, that it influences their behavior? No. It might, but I don't see very many Republicans being all too concerned with what Democrats think of them. In fact, the very act of calling GOP voters "racist" seems to have the opposite effect, making them want to vote for someone like Trump even more just to give Democrats the finger.

Reverse racism is a kind of polemical and rhetorical tactic. And I tend to think that's all this really is. Reeve has identified a relative handful of examples where such tactics were employed against Mormons, but I don't find the argument compelling that these examples represent the widespread culture.

Humans by nature are tribal. We form into all kinds of groups, ethnic, cultural, religious, political, whatever. Mormons in the 19th century, even still today, were very insular. Like a bull in a china shop they rolled into areas and took them over. Nauvoo went from this sparely populated rural community to a city larger than Chicago overnight. The people native to the area were not happy to be suddenly overrun like that. And can one blame them?

Mormons essentially did to 19th century Americans what the American frontiersmen did to the Native Americans. In the church is this attitude that early mormons were innocent victims of persecution, but when I read the raw history of the early mormons I see a different picture. Yes, there are some examples that seem to fit that characterization of innocence, but on the whole, Mormons had it coming. They were like a 19th century American version of ISIS.

Founder Joseph Smith famously ran for president of the United States in 1844 as a way to help legitimize the views of his people

What an absurd misrepresentation of that history. Joseph Smith declared himself to be king of the world and formed an army (nauvoo legion) that was 1/3 the size of the US Army at the time that he appointed himself the "Lieutenant General" of. He rode around wearing a gaudy military uniform, etc. When you look at what he did in context he looks like a total nut job with literally insane delusions of grandeur.

He wasn't trying to wage a 19th century version of the sappy "I'm a mormon" media campaign, he was no-joke trying to take over the country. There was talk of secession and all sorts of cray cray. He was exploring the idea of moving to Texas and forming a Mormon Republic there. Brigham Young wanted to join up with the confederates but didn't when Lincoln threatened to go after him over polygamy. Lincoln essentially agreed to allow polygamy in exchange for the mormons remaining neutral in the civil war.

/r/mormon Thread Link - thinkprogress.org