So I was talking to my TBM friend who doesn't know I'm closet-exmo and she says that the 'killing of Native Americans was justified by Heavenly Father because they were Lamanites.'

I was honestly flabbergasted, because she's such an intelligent and kind person. Of course, I probably would've thought the same had I known the church thought the Native Americans were Lamanites. But I was done before I even figured that out.

While I would not be here without the fact many Native Americans lost nearly everything to the Europeans, that does not justify Europeans. I suppose history is history, but evil is still evil.

Just needed to get that off my chest, thank you.

~Pianoforte

To all those who get upset when I say how harmful religion is...

^that.

Why would the fact that a person was Lamanite justify them being killed? Or is the same old white supremacy argument that underpinned a lot of colonisation?

It is SO understandable that you needed to get if off your chest, pianoforte! I think we all like to think we have come WAY beyond that sort of thinking, but obviously this lady hasn,t. She will feel bad one day when she realises what she has said. How sick!

This was recently taught by a 20-something Sunday School teacher to youth in the ward I was in -- added in that it was part of the lords manifest destiny plan. Person taught a lot of other crazy stuff -- oh yeah, forgot that all this kind of stuff was not so crazy in the 60's and 70's.

Thank you for sharing your thoughts. Individual LDS members are influenced with harmful and damaging ideas because of the Book of Mormon.

I saw a Mormon post this disgusting statement -

"God knows that it is better to remove an infection than let it spread"
https://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20130929171513AAllH3V

that happens when one culture, civilization, people, or nation subdues another.

Don't get me wrong: I'm NOT saying "sh*t happens." But whether it is the ancient Egyptians conquoring the Ethiopians, the Assyrians annihilating the Ten Tribes (of Northern Israel), the Imperial Japanese raping Nanking, the Communist Chinese ruining the Tibetans, the Soviets starving the Ukranians into submission...

All are done with the backing of some ideology: religion, "Dialectic Materialism," "Master Race," Manifest Destiny, and so many others. Perhaps the Neanderthals had a rationale for obliterating the Cro-Magnons: "We're more evolved than you blokes!"

Whenever a "perfect society" with perfect peace, justice and equality, somebody will try to get a leg up on the rest, by artifice or perhaps by force. Same with large political entities. Maybe it's not a case of "sh*t happens," but Mark Twain opined, "The one thing empirically provable about Christianity is original sin."