The earliest Mormons were people who had a certain personality deficiency that made them feel inferior in the regular world. They also posessed unusually strong character traits. This combination of weak vs. strong characteristics made life frustrating for them. Mormonism made them feel better. As Mormons, they didn't feel bad about their deficiencies, and their strong qualities were able to blossom.

Their decendants inherited the same mixture of traits, which were passed to each successive generation. Converts were attracted to the Church because they had the same traits.

Think about it. Early Mormons could have headed out west to San Francisco and gotten very wealthy. They could have stayed back east and established dynasties in New York City. They didn't. They didn't quite have what it takes to do stuff like that. The rich people now living on the coasts give off a different vibe than the Mormons. Making money is easy for them, but a lot of other things don't come naturally to them. I actually think that Mormons have a certain humanity, a certain earnestness, that a lot of California/New York people don't have. This earnestness was exploited by Joseph Smith, but it is still a good quality.

Mormonism can be viewed as a way by which people with similar qualities get together and strengthen each other. The religious doctrine is just the vehicle by which these kinds of people get together.

As an unbeliever, I have not found any other religious group to identify with. Protestants seem different. They seem foreign, different from me. Protestant Churches attracted people with a different set of qualities, so, of course they would seem foreign.

So what about me? I am a "peculiar person", like my ancestors, but this "peculiarity" has shown so strongly in me that it is too peculiar even for the Mormons. That is why I don't fit in. But I am also peculiar to the outside world, which makes things difficult. Mormons have difficulty finding new groups to belong to because it is the nature of Mormons to not really fit in with the outside world.

I have the same experience of feeling a little out-of-place in Protestant churches. I don't know if this has more to do with my personality or my Mormonism experience / indoctrination and its impact on my conceptualization of religion.

I don't think Mormons have personality deficiencies, though. I do agree with you that the church attracts certain types of people as converts.. and in general, converts to any cult tend to have similar personality traits and/or life situations / vulnerabilities. I know I fit the mold to a T, pretty much. :/ I was definitely an easy target, and if it wasn't the LDS Church that picked me up, some other group might have done so just as easily.

well said...

our ancestors' influence on us is understated...

yes we're a peculiar people. we're ex-cultists who, more often than not, left the cult in a quest for the truth, in spite of the consequences.

Ironically, Mormons are the ones who threw away their traditions in droves. We are the descendents of people who tossed out their family religion like yesterday's garbage. When we act the same way we're shunned for it. Even though we may have a genetic proclivity for doing so.

Stupid machine.

>>>"Ironically, Mormons are the ones who threw away their traditions in droves. We are the descendents of people who tossed out their family religion like yesterday's garbage. When we act the same way we're shunned for it. Even though we may have a genetic proclivity for doing so."<<<

This is exactly how I feel about my ancestors, now that I know the truth about them. They were JS's neighbors, and among the very first Mormon converts. They abandoned the religion of their forefathers to join their neighbor's polygamous cult.

THEY are the apostates--not us!

We have returned to the Christian church of my ancestors, and I am proud of us for restoring sanity in our family line, at last. We feel welcome and very much at home in most of the Christian churches--much more at home than I felt in the Mormon church, that was just crazy and uncomfortable to us.

People that can fall victim to cults are not necessarily weak individuals.

The article and website "HowCultsWork" states;

[quote]
"Many cult members are very intelligent, attractive and skilled. The reality is that all sorts of people are involved in cults. One of the few common denominators is that they were often recruited at a low point in their life ..."
[unquote]

It covers a lot of keys aspects. Most of the people I have observed that have become exMo seem to have independent thinking and free spirits.

The lowest point in my life... infancy.

I couldn't walk, talk, or feed myself. I couldn't even surf the www.

partymxman Wrote:
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> One of the
> few common denominators is that they were often
> recruited at a low point in their life ..."

That was certainly the case with a lot of my convert ancestors. I noticed in my genealogical research that a good number of them had lost a close family member, like a mother or eldest son, in the years leading up to joining Mormonism. They were also very poor and often illiterate.

When I was a missionary, I used to wonder why it was only the misfits of society living in council estates who would even listen to us. Normal people who bathed and owned cars would shut the door on us. I think it's always been that way. Mormonism is a crackpot belief system and people have to be very broken to consider such a thing.

This is something I've pondered on a lot. What is it about the people that convert... Is it certain vulnerable aspects of their personality? Like my FIL who converted while away from home in the military...

I think it's oversimplifying to emphasize personality too much. Mormons and other cults deliberately focus on young people away from home for the first time (which is why you can always find cults near college campuses), and on people who are lonely or going through something that makes them vulnerable. A situation may make an otherwise stable person vulnerable to cult recruitment.

Yes, I suppose this is true. I guess that's why TBMs always say the person needs to have a 'humble heart', which in reality means vulnerable.

And always remember, "most Mormons" are exmos, or at least inactive.

What you say may have been true early on, but over the past 20 years, Mormonism has become a full blown, materialistic prosperity gospel. The poor are despised as lazy, while the rich, like Romney are adored as more virtuous. Intellectual pursuits are deprecated in favor of material gain, and self worth measured by property, not piety or charity.

axeldc Wrote:
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> What you say may have been true early on, but over
> the past 20 years, Mormonism has become a full
> blown, materialistic prosperity gospel. The poor
> are despised as lazy, while the rich, like Romney
> are adored as more virtuous. Intellectual
> pursuits are deprecated in favor of material gain,
> and self worth measured by property, not piety or
> charity.

Nothing proves that more than "pay your tithing before anything else" ... even if that means, so far as this nevermo is able to tell, going without food, etc. :-/

Mormonism may well attract a certain kind of person, with qualities that were exploited by Joseph Smith and each of his successors. As for your other statements that aren't just about you, please tell your ass it needs to back that shit up.

Yikes! Sweeping generalize much?

Mormon missionaries definitely prey on the vulnerable. I converted with my mother when we just moved to a new city. We needed help meeting people, etc. and the church provided that.

I'm like you, but I prefer to call it "eccentric". That sounds better than saying "I'm wierd!". (Hubby says we don't have enough money for me to be eccentric, but there you have it.) If you want to find a Christian group, you might try Unitarian Universalists. They have a lot of Christian eccentrics. If you want to try something else, you might get with your local Pagan community. We are ALL TYPES of eccentric! But, I do hope you find somewhere that feels like a better version of "home".

This is a theory I've always had. Joseph Smith was a man who thought very highly of himself in a society that saw his family as poor, white trash screw-ups. He knew exactly how to form a doctrine that played to the pride and egos of those marginalized on one level or another by society. If you are a nobody factory worker in England in the 1800s and someone tells you that you are special, chosen by God and oh, by the way, we can give you your own farm out in Utah if you join God's Army ... that would be an easy thing to fall for. Especially if you didn't accept the role society had put you in.

Like others have said, the same thing applies today. Mormons target those who are going through a tough time or are in a tough life situation and lay on the flattery, tell them they are special, make them feel "chosen" by working them to death with all the Mormon busy work then praising them for their slavery. My mom was baptized almost exactly a year after her mom died. Since my grandma was a single parent for half her marriage and my mom was an only child, that was a devastating loss for my mom - the whole foundation of her life went missing. She fell for all that mystic Mormon stuff trying to establish a new foundation for herself, especially since my dad was an 80 hour a week attorney. Mom had nothing else and Mormons were there to jump into that void.

I think many generational Mormons have inherited that interesting mix of feeling inferior and knowing they are better than what society sees them as. Confidence and insecurity mixed. That's why image is so obscenely important to TBMs. Because they aren't sure enough of who they are that they feel they can be loved for themselves so they opt into an image their society dictates - a safe mask to wear. They don't realize how most genuine people can see through the mask. It reminds me of Rosanne Barr when she became rich through her work but couldn't manage to pull off any sort of class that helped her fit in with other successful people. Of course, I didn't see her trying. Mormonism tries and fails because they think image is enough and character is secondary.

CA girl,love what you said. So many gems!
"He [JS] knew exactly how to form a doctrine that played to the pride and egos of those marginalized on one level or another by society."
"Mormonism tries and fails because they think image is enough and character is secondary."
Exactly!

"...that interesting mix of feeling inferior and knowing they are better than what society sees them as."

Very astute observation CA girl. This is what leads people to take chances, to grab whatever brass ring they are offered or even take a blind leap of faith. I do think this is why my ancestors became Mormons and came to Utah from Europe. And now I feel like I have completed the cycle--by leaving, and, I did take a blind leap of faith ... in myself.

Is it because I identify so strongly with your summation that I was the only one who left the church? ...the only one to wriggle out of the strangle-hold? I did know on a very deep level that there was more...more to life, to all of it. I was suffocated by the limitations of Moronism. It was truly spirit prison for me.

I would say, I think we sometimes forget to remember the power of the individual sets of genes each one of us comes into this world with. Our ancestors gave us a lot. Sometimes its a gift and sometimes you are just stuck with it.

Good ideas. I would add that Joseph's family wasn't exactly white trash. He parents were middle class (probably lower middle class) farmers who had bad luck finding a decent farm to grow things on. They kept ending up with barren farms. Joseph Smith Senior got into the money digging business to make up for his failure in farming. His son did what his father did and also got into money digging.

Well, financially they struggled but so did a lot of people. But they weren't respected in their efforts either. One of Lucy Smith's biggest insecurities were what people thought of her - that people looked down on them. That's what caused them to overextend on their one house and lose the whole farm. Lucy felt the locals didn't respect them and was trying to buy her way into something better.

It repels a certain kind of person too... like me. I had a lifetime of opportunity to meld with the Mormons, the religion of my culture. It just never seemed to fit. I don't need the social connections it afforded, can't stand the authoritarianism, and see through the mythology offered as truth. It just never clicked.

I believe that a lot of people need religion because they can't think for themselves. Consequently, a religion with a prophet is very attractive. Pile on top of that the concept of eternal families and a lot of people will throw out all critical thinking and fall for the lie.