It has been interesting to see how the Mormons are being portrayed over here in the UK with Mitt's presidency attempt. There has been a lot of media interest in mormonism, and most of it has been quite balanced ( in the normal person sense, probably not the mormon, 'we're being persecuted sense.)

For example a double page Times feature on mormonism included plenty of doctrinal stuff, but also mentioned the MM massacre and had a picture of a couple in their garments.

So I would say the milk is being publicised but so is the meat.

Mormons are so often their own worst enemies. I was listening to a radio programme yesterday which was looking at the influence of religion on the presidential race. They were interviewing a Mormon woman who was claiming that mormons are persecuted in the USA. She backed up her claim by citing the fact that when her predominantly mormon community decided to put halloween a day earlier so it wasn't on the Sunday, people blamed the mormons. They were being persecuted again.


The bit I really enjoyed though was when the interviewer asked her if the USA was ready for a mormon president?

'If the people have a choice between a mormon president and a marxist president, they will vote for the mormon' she claimed.

There was the briefest of silences while,despite it being radio I'll swear you could hear the interviewer blinking in astonishment before he said 'Surely that's a bit extreme?'

Apparently not, according to Sister Nancy Merril of somewhere in the Midwest. She probably thought she was standing for truth and righteousness. Instead she sounded like some ignorant backswoods extremist.

Haha, same here in Holland and Flanders. Traffic to my site has doubled. The church doesn't seem to do very much. There was one radio interview in Belgium where the Mormon guy tried very hard to make the Mormons appear normal.

Two of his remarks stood out from the rest (which was nothing but half-truths and whole lies): he said the Mormon stance on abortion was moderate compared to that of fundamentalist evangelicals. Well, whose isn't, right?

He also said that compared to the Amish, the Mormons are quite integrated in mainstream society. Again, I have to agree but the difference isn't very large...

This has endless possibilities, rt.

Compared to Buddhists, Mormons are quite Christian.

Compared to the KKK, Mormons are quite non-racist.

Etc etc.

Edit: this was posted in the wrong place, should go at the bottom of the thread.

Over here in Holland and Belgium, there is quite extensive coverage of the primaries. Whenever Romney wins, people go to Google to find out more about Mormons. I usually have some 750 visitors/2,500 pageviews per month but this has more than doubled since the primaries started.

Media coverage of Mormonism still barely makes a distinction between LDS Mormons and polygamous ones. Polygamy is my #1 search word. I've put up a brief article explaining that LDS polygamy ended in 1954 (pointing out the Romney-connection), not 1890; that it's still part of the Mormon theology (with a link to D&C 132); and that remnants of polygamy are still found in LDS sealing policies today.

I also have a diagram outlining how the Romney and Huntsman families are intertwined with eachother and the church hierarchy.

The #2 search word that gets people to my site is "cult". I have very extensive and balanced coverage of the Mormon church being a cult, but also a short FAQ-article that explains how LDS is a cult in the theological, sociological and psychological sense of the word.

The church is largely absent from all this. The PR-people over here are just Mormon royalty - lay persons who don't know squat about PR and don't have a clue how Mormons come across to normal people (and hence only confirm their weirdness).

So this is what most Dutch and Belgian people think about the Mormons: nice, upstanding people who belong to a weird polygamous cult.

Most of the time, though, they don't give Mormonism a second thought. Today, there were some Twitter messages complaining about a newspaper that devoted two full pages to Mormonism for what they perceived as "no apparent reason". Mormonism is completely irrelevant in Europe.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 02/08/2012 04:31PM by rt.

Morons like herself have no idea what a marxist is.

Exactly, Dave. For a moment I wondered who the hell she was talking about. Then I realised, of course, that well-known Marxist, Obama.

Dave the Atheist Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Morons like herself have no idea what a marxist
> is.

She was probably thinking of Groucho Marx, Dave...

In today's Times an article about funding for the Republican's presidential nomination campaign (there has to be a shorter way to say that),mentions Romney, but not his Mormonism.....

But at the foot of the article there is another about Kody Brown, 'fundamentalist Mormon' challenging Utah's anti-polygamy laws. Complete with picture of Kody and his four wives. The article also mentions his 16 children.

So even when Romney is being reported non-mormonly, he is being tailed by the less salubrious parts of mormonism.

Hahahaha.....

I love to hear Europe's view and coverage. Thanks for informing me, and the others that don't live there! I would love to read more. Post more as it comes out, please! This is exciting!!

The church is strong in some places over in Europe. A lot of missionaries serve there.

People understanding scientific truths will be able to set the record straight concerning Mormonism. Some of the smartest, most level headed people live in Europe, I feel.(great educational systems, high standards are set there for children)

Mitt running for president could very well be the Mormons own demise. Let the historical facts spill all over the place! Here's to hoping and celebration!

Wish I'd started doing this before, but I wasn't sure if there'd be much interest.

I'll keep you posted as things pop up. there has already been loads about Romney and Mormonism, I'm sure your average Brit now knows a lot more about TSCC than they did before Mitt's campaigning. Not necessarily stuff TBMs would want them to know.

Thanks a lot, European View. As a Brit whose lived abroad for nearly 30 years but whose parents (all of us nevermos, by the way) are constituents of a Mormon MP, in Macclesfield, I'm very interested.

Having been away so long, I can't be arsed to follow everything going on in Blighty ;-) so the résumé is very welcome.

How's the weather down your way?

It's absolutely freezing (-5°C) here in Paris.

Edit to say Hi to Briggy who posted while I was writing. Hope you're OK and WARM !



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 02/07/2012 03:45PM by Soft Machine.

In the Times today, an article about Romney's campaigning in Michigan. Don't think it made an issue of his mormonism.

BUT... another article at the foot of that one about the current scandal about the Weisenthal 'baptisms for the dead'.

Thanks Romney, you know if it wasn't for you I doubt that piece of news would have appeared over here. If it did pre-Romney it would have been one or two lines. Bur you've given it prominence.

Getting the message out about the Mormons, heh heh.

But with Mitt Romney running for the nomination interest has peaked somewhat. I've never encountered so many questions about mormonism from people who would normally never discuss religion, be it their own or religion in general. I suppose there are some levels of nervousness about our traditional links with the US Presidents and how the prospect might impact on that at least.

Oh dear, now I'm getting mental images of Cameron and Romney gladhanding in Utah and seeing Cameron trying to distance himself from the craziness.

Likewise Merkel et al. We could be on the verge of interesting times.

Anyway..... it is worrying a few that I know of for sure, especially with the world stage performing as it is right now.

Briggy

'If the people have a choice between a mormon president and a marxist president, they will vote for the mormon' she claimed.

Why do you think I am supporting Romney! :)

We might all agree on Mormonism being a fraud, but there is no reason we should all be left wing Marxist socialists.

particularly mormons.

Briggy

Don't know how my post appeared up there. Baffled again.

The latest article I've read on Mitt / Mormons from the UK:

http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/timstanley/100138018/mitt-romney-suffers-from-the-weirdo-factor/

"But this story is damaging mostly because it reminds the public of how “odd” Mormonism can seem. On top of the aggressing evangelising, the refusal to drink coffee and the exotic underwear, we now learn that they carry out proxy baptisms."

I have had more people asking me about Mormonism since Romney is in the news here,more in fact that asked me when i was a member or when I resigned,had a conversation with a friend on thursday,she is a member of The Church of Scotland,she was gobsmacked at some things i told her,I did it ina matter of fact way,no hysteria or drama,she laughed about the garments,she said to me " But you are so with it,how did you end up there" well thats what cults do to you I replied,she has a very strong sense of social duty,she is sure Romney would be bad for America.

I noticed another piece about Mitt in the UK news earlier this week......complete with pictures of temple garments.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2100995/Mitt-Romney-shows-strength-faith-wearing-special-Mormon-underwear.html?ito=feeds-newsxml

More about dead dunking from the same newspaper.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2102419/Mitt-Romney-The-Mormon-card-played-Republican-presidential-candidate.html

Mormonism is almost never mentioned in the mainstream media in the UK. Yet, thanks to Mitt, it comes up quite a lot these days, and almost never in a good way.

Even if the additional media coverage in the US due to Romney is a net positive for TSCC in the US, I doubt it will have anything but a negative impact in Europe, if it has an impact at all.