I asked this on another thread but I don't want to hijack so I'll ask again here. Why are the TBMs in Utah still pushing everyone around? Why do they get away with bullying and judging and dominating the culture? As I do the math, Utah is not 100 percent LDS. I'm not sure the state-wide average but isn't it around 65 percent? And say the inactivity rate is 50 percent ... doesn't that mean TBMS, even temple Mormons, are maybe around 35 percent, even in Utah? So why are they setting the liquor laws, pushing people around, making non-LDS kids feel inferior, and generally giving Mormonism a bad name? Why don't the non-LDS and inactives just stand up and tell them where to go?

Is it because many of the inactives secretly believe or have been trained to think they are simply not up to Mormon standards? Or because the non-LDS can't be bothered mixing it up with hillbilly Mormons and bullies? Are the less Mormon people in Utah just better Christians when it comes to turning the other cheek? I know the least TBM people in my ward here are the ones who have been the nicest and most understanding when in comes to me and my inactivity. Can anybody give me any insight into why pushy Mormons are so successful at shoving their agenda down so many non-Mo throats.

It's probably a lot of things. A lot of that 35 percent that have no affiliation with the church are probably various types of Christians who are going to side with the Mormons on various social issues. Where I am from, in East Tennessee, there is a county called Loudon County, which is a dry county. It's kind of infamous, because the night the fundi churches got liquor banned, there were several rowdy parties that had to be broken up by the police, as they got drunk celebrating their victory. Fundi Christians have a funny way of thinking.

Because that 65(ish)% majority yeilds a disproportionately Mormon-heavy legislature. It's the downside of democracy; tyranny of the majority. Unless we sneak in an LDS moderate (like we did with Huntsman), not much will change for a while.

I'm salivating for the day that Senator Valentine retires, as he is the gatekeeper for all alcohol laws in Utah...and he is unbending on the issue.

The noble Senator bent for the olympics.

I was thinking about this same thing the other day. Why don't exmos,nevermos,and Jackmos speak up more? The church controls us because they can. They do it because they know they can get away with it.

I'm not just talking about politics. Mormons are controlling in Utah at every level. Mormons are allowed to get away with pushy, invasive, behaviors that would never be tolerated anywhere else.

The problem is that the exmos, nevermos, etc, are not collectively organized into a group that would give them more power and more of a voice.

We as a group of non believers have to stand up for ourselves or the Mormon "Bully Cult" will just continue its horrible behavior.

I know a lot of us have no problem standing up for ourselves, but other are scared of retribution.

CA girl I'm glad you posted this. We all need to think...why is it allowed to happen and how can we stop it?

+100

This is exactly what I'm talking about. And on a social level too - next time some snooty TBM in Utah county sneers at a woman with a Starbucks cup in one hand and a tank top on her back, why doesn't the non-Mo call her on her behavior? Besides the fact non-Mos have better manners than Mormons, I mean. Something like what I always say - tell them "See - this is why people don't respect Mormons." Or, "You know, nobody cares if you disapprove - you Mormons just aren't that important."

Mormons only bully to feel tough and superior, like any bullies. If you make the experience unrewarding for them, it seems like they'd stop their overt bad behavior, although I'm sure they'd cry crocodile tears about "persecution" amongst themselves.

Ok, you are really asking why the Utah elected officials are overwhelmingly LDS. And just because they are Mormon does not mean they are TBM. Huntsman wasn't, but I'll grant you that most of them are.

Poli Sci 101, you don't need a 51% voting block to win most elections. Ten percent is often enough to decide an election. If the other 90% split their votes about equally, then the 10% will give a landslide victory to whoever they vote for. In Utah, the Mormon voting bloc is 20% to 50% or above, depending on the part of the state. That gives a Mormon candidate a huge built in advantage.

Incidentally, while elected officials in Utah have always been mostly LDS, they have not always been mostly of the R persuasion. That did not happen until the 1970s, the same time the South, which had been solidly D for over a century, switched. I think the causes were largely the same. The Civil Rights and Women's Rights movements of the 1960s.

Gerrymandering is also a big problem in Utah.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 09/09/2013 10:19PM by transylvania.

I think there are a number of reasons, and I'll throw out some thoughts in no particular order.

1. Mormonism is not just a religion, it is a culture and lifestyle. Even for those that have left or inactive, most were raised conservative/Republican.

2. I think something like 90% of TBMs are Republican (if I'm remembering studies correctly). 60% in UT (in name mormon); half active = 30%; 90% of 30% = 27% of votes to start with are Republican TBM. Let's say the remaining 40% are 1/3 R, 1/3 D, 1/3 Independent. That leaves R with about 27 + 13 or 40% to start with.

3. Gerrymandering. Not only does it happen for dividing up for the House of Reps, where being in suburbs south of SLC I did have the one Utah D for a Rep., they gerrymandered me into being with Provo/Orem, so now I have the wackadoodle J. C. for a Rep. It happens with districts for State and House Reps., too. Gerrymander to increase your power. A few non-R can win in local elections, but not enough to make a big difference. See the map for the U.S. House where they have gerrymandered to divide up (more liberal) SLC area by putting parts with strong Republican areas (1, 2, 3).
http://elections.utah.gov/map/district-maps

4. There are two parties in Utah. Conservative Republican, and moderate Republican [Democrat]. A moderate Democrat, or liberal Democrat has little hope of winning. [See #1]

5. Get out of the big cities, and some areas (although small) are 90%+ mormon. A few years ago I remember there was one small UT county that had only one registered Dem. Look at all the areas that get representatives in the UT Senate:
http://www.utahsenate.org/mapold.shtml
I count 9 of 29 where you can read numbers that are almost guaranteed Republican. They dilute anything that may be coming from more liberal areas around SLC.

The state was founded by Mormons as a theocracy. Although an influx of nons into the state has decreased the Mormon majority in recent years, Mormons have dominated the state's power systems for over 150 years. It's going to take a long, long time for the political, judicial, and legal landscape to change appreciably.

From the day the wagons rolled into the Salt Lake Valley, Mormons have viewed Utah as THEIR special place, so they feel entitled to run it however they want.

Mormons are experts in passive-aggressive control, bullying, and domination because their own church does it to them from cradle to grave. Not only that, they are masters of the double-standard, the sense of entitlement that comes from being a god-in-training, and the entrenched worldview that they are the smartest, most righteous, generous, kind, Christlike, special, wonderful, inspired people in the entire universe and they have ALL THE ANSWERS, d@mmit!

It does no good to call them out on their behavior, because they will only deny what they are doing (kind of like they denied polygamy while they were doing it). Then they will turn around and blame you, the non-Mormon, for not being smart enough or super speshul spirtchal enough to join their church and be just like them.

So they get away with it. However, they cannot stem the tide of Starbucks and other coffee shops popping up everywhere, the rising number of businesses open on Sundays, the amount of people roaming the state in tank tops, short shorts, bikinis, and sundresses, and the flood of internet attention concerning their crazy laws and insane cultural biases.

Eventually, more "normal" social standards will prevail in Utah, too, whether the Mormons like it or not.

I don't think that CA girl was posting about Mormon politics specifically. Utah Mormon Politics sucks, but we are not going to change that today, next month, or even next year.

For those who live in Utah who are not able to escape this state anytime soon, what can we do to stand up for ourselves in our communities, our neighborhoods, on our streets, in our kids schools?

This exactly. The stories of Mormons being rude to other adults and worse, kids in the schools who don't believe as they do make me so mad. They seem to just ride roughshod over non-TBMs, but it seems like all the inactives, jackmos, non-LDS in Utah could just stand together and say "Knock it off - you believe what you want but don't be so snotty to those who don't agree with you ... because there are more of us than there are of you." The comment someone made about it being a cultural thing makes more sense but you'd think everyone would just get fed up.

The activity rate might be higher in Utah than outside.

http://www.sltrib.com/ci_2886596

The BIG kicker is that 75% of the Utah voters identified as Mormon in 2008 exit polls.

http://fivethirtyeight.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/07/09/utah-very-republican-but-not-as-conservative-as-it-appears/



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 09/09/2013 08:18PM by crom.

There is an easy answer to this:

Largely they don't push people around. Not anymore. We probably see it more on here because this forum is focused on recovery and the topic is more likely to come up here.

Now, you are right about the numbers all across Utah. In the Salt Lake Valley more often than not the numbers are more like 25% of the people are active Mormons.

Contrary to popular belief, not even our state lawmakers are very Mormon:

http://www.ncsl.org/legislatures-elections/legisdata/legislator-demographic-map.aspx

**Click on the Utah graphic and the religion tab. You'll see that only 26% of the state legislature is Mormon.

The reason why not very many lawmakers are Mormon is because it is really easy for a Republican to get elected. Many Republican politicians from other states (non-Mormons) come to Utah to find an easy start to their political careers. Utah isn't the only state where this is true either.

Mormons don't push others around any more?? Where do you live? Scratch just below the surface, Mormon bullying is still there and roaring it's ugly head. Do you have kids? Do you know what the schools in are like?

Well, consider the options here. Is it more likely that 25-33% of the population bullies the entirety of the remaining 67 - 75% of the population or that the incidences of bullying are the minority of incidences?

Of course everybody's experience with their own circle of family and friends are going to be different. Also, different locations are going to give you different results. I am not questioning your experience either. However, the numbers indicate that the latter possibility (i.e., less incidences of bullying) is at least more likely.

Also, I was an exmo public school teacher in the Salt Lake Valley for years and years in heavily Mormon populated areas as well as less heavily Mormon populated urban areas.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 09/09/2013 09:36PM by snb.

snb Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Well, consider the options here. Is it more
> likely that 25-33% of the population bullies the
> entirety of the remaining 67 - 75% of the
> population

Yes - actually that's usually exactly how it happens. A small percentage of the people who are arrogant, pushy, self-absorbed etc. do end up pushing everyone around. Think high school, think the U.S. government, think skinny people who hate and mock overweight people (who are now a majority). It happens all the time. It's usually small group of driven people who terrorize a larger group of more laid back people. The Salt Lake Valley, I'll agree, has a different dynamic than Utah or Davis county but look at all those stories on that thread a while back about wacko stuff happening in Davis county. There is some serious entitlement and arrogance going on out there in Utah.

The fact that 75 percent of people, active or not, self-identify as Mormons may answer my question though - because it means they are more willing to put up with Mormon crap, even if they aren't the offenders.

About 90% of Utah legislators are LDS. I have no idea where whoever did that graph got their data. Mine comes from the Hinckley Institute of Politics at the UofU via the SLTrib.

edit: 69% of the legislators did not specify their religion in that graphic. I bet 65% of them were LDS. 65 + 26 = 91%. Close enough.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 09/09/2013 10:10PM by Brother Of Jerry.

I think that is plausible. Seemed reputable, maybe it isn't though.

When someone is bullied enough they can either choose to remain an outcast or they can conform. I think many never mo`s conform unknowingly just to be able to survive. TBM culture is brutel, fake, and I can`t stand the high pitched,squeeky sweet voices they talk with.