Racism in the LDS Church--Does it continue today?

[_moksha]

On the other thread from Jon's finding, Stemelbow brought up the point that group stereotypes are not applicable as much as individual characteristics, since the young Aaronic Priesthood holders will eventually marry individuals.

I hope the Church eventually stops teaching this.

[_cafe crema]

It's depressing, but the simple answer is that the Curriculum Department reprinted the Aaronic Priesthood lessons from the 1970s verbatim, so that crap about interracial marriage was left in. Since it was a reprint, I doubt Correlation took a good look at it.

I think you may be right. Racism in the church is still around and probably on par with the rest of society that members live around. Rural areas tend to be more racist then urban areas. Older generations are more racist then younger generations, so we should see a slow decline in racism to continue into the future.

As long as other segments of society don't put their crap about interracial marriage in teaching manuals for children I don't see how it can be on par. Is there another group that requires all of it's little boys to read these types of teachings?

[_Doctor CamNC4Me]

Hello,

This is an excellent question.

As of 1992, when I returned from my mission to Peru, my devout Mormon father was exhibiting racist tendencies. I had, apparently caught the eye of a beautiful young Peruvian girl, who had moved to Utah with her family that very year. She sleuthed out my phone number, called me and we proceeded to have a wonderful conversation. She was heartfelt, open, and made clear her intentions with me.

I was delighted!

I relayed the good news to my parents who reacted, well, shall we say with less than an enthusiastic repartee. My father simply said, with a bit of a frown on his face, "You ready to have brown eyed and brown haired kids?"

I was shocked. I hadn't even framed my burgeoning relationship in those kinds of terms.

Needless to say, my parents told me that if I ever take another phone call from that Latina then I'd have to pay all long-distance costs. Short on money, and fat with other local love interests my interest in my Peruvian paramore quickly fizzled out.

White and delightsome? Sigh...

V/R
Dr. Cameron

[_consiglieri]

On the other thread from Jon's finding, Stemelbow brought up the point that group stereotypes are not applicable as much as individual characteristics, since the young Aaronic Priesthood holders will eventually marry individuals.

I hope the Church eventually stops teaching this.

As do I.

Under the heading of it's a small world, I happened upon a conversation in church yesterday between a young men's leader and a member of the bishopric where the young men's leader was complaining that the Aaronic Priesthood Manuals had not been updated in the past 20-years.

His complaint was how difficult this was to correlate with the newer Duty to God award, but I took the opportunity to buttress his argument with this particular example.

All the Best!

--Consiglieri

[_The Nehor]

The Church of Lucretia publishes counsel to its young people to not marry Mormons. Of course, we really just want them to avoid those with tea party/pro-polygamy/LGT attitudes. We know not all Mormons are afflicted with those diseases. So you wouldn't call us bigots, would you?

I would not.

[_lostindc]

Hello,

This is an excellent question.

As of 1992, when I returned from my mission to Peru, my devout Mormon father was exhibiting racist tendencies. I had, apparently caught the eye of a beautiful young Peruvian girl, who had moved to Utah with her family that very year. She sleuthed out my phone number, called me and we proceeded to have a wonderful conversation. She was heartfelt, open, and made clear her intentions with me.

I was delighted!

I relayed the good news to my parents who reacted, well, shall we say with less than an enthusiastic repartee. My father simply said, with a bit of a frown on his face, "You ready to have brown eyed and brown haired kids?"

I was shocked. I hadn't even framed my burgeoning relationship in those kinds of terms.

Needless to say, my parents told me that if I ever take another phone call from that Latina then I'd have to pay all long-distance costs. Short on money, and fat with other local love interests my interest in my Peruvian paramore quickly fizzled out.

White and delightsome? Sigh...

V/R
Dr. Cameron

Geeze good Dr. that must have been pretty damn difficult to deal with especially since the incident occurred in the 90s when the Church was supposedly far past these issues. What a terrible thing for him to say.

[_Doctor CamNC4Me]

Geeze good Dr. that must have been pretty damn difficult to deal with especially since the incident occurred in the 90s when the Church was supposedly far past these issues. What a terrible thing for him to say.

Hello,

My Father would have gotten along, very well in fact, with Mr. Droopy. Read into that what you will.

V/R
Dr. Cameron

[_Wisdom Seeker]

I think you may be right. Racism in the church is still around and probably on par with the rest of society that members live around. Rural areas tend to be more racist then urban areas. Older generations are more racist then younger generations, so we should see a slow decline in racism to continue into the future.

Remember all those troubles at Alta high school (Utah). While some YM presidencies, teachers and Bishops recognized a problem years ago and tried to help in reducing the racism and hatred that some of these boys have, some parents and leaders promoted it. What also might have started as a hatred for our president by some extreme conservatives have also conditioned some young boys to distrust and hate someone who may have been born out side of our country, someone's religion that may not be based upon Christianity and someone who does not have white skin. I have been appalled by some of the hateful things I have heard and seen from some young men. It may be impossible to purge racism out of younger generations who live in tight-knit all-white religious communities unless parents and leaders can recognize their own bigotry.

[_consiglieri]

Well, it didn't take long for the mirror thread to get shut down on the other board.

All the Best!

--Consiglieri

http://www.mormondialogue.org/topic/543 ... e__st__160

[_MsJack]

consigilieri ~ Let me share with you a story.

In the late summer/early fall of 2004, when I was starting my final year at BYU, I was contacted by a reporter for the Daily Universe who wanted to do a story about me, my husband, and interfaith marriage. We agreed to it. She came, she interviewed us both, she seemed excited about the topic. In a day or two, she called me to tell me to check the paper the next day, the story was about to run.

The next day came and I looked through the paper. No story. I called the reporter to ask what had happened, had the story been pushed back another day or what? She sounded distressed. She'd obviously been crying. She said there had been a last-minute decision to cancel the story because it would be seen as endorsing marriage outside of the temple. This had been very abrupt and the reporter had been too heartbroken to call us and tell us the story was canceled. I felt awful for her; I knew she'd worked hard on it, and someone had clearly okay'ed the subject ahead of time, so the last-minute cancellation had come from somewhere and someone else, seemingly out of nowhere.

In talking with the reporter, I pointed out that it had been earlier that year that the DU had run a story about interracial marriage on campus. I recall that it was a very tame little piece. It had an interview with a white female student who was married to (I think) a black male student. It mentioned at least one person who had told them that their marriage was a sin. Surely an interfaith marriage story couldn't be much more controversial than that, I said.

She replied that the interracial marriage story had been extremely controversial, that the paper had gotten all kinds of backlash over it, and that they weren't eager to have a similar incident. She said they still got complaints about it sometimes (this was months after it had run). I was stunned. I couldn't believe that, in the year 2004, a little puff piece about interracial marriage on a college campus could make so many people angry.

So, to answer your question: yes, racism in the LDS church still continues today.