{"id":1568,"date":"2004-11-08T14:37:47","date_gmt":"2004-11-08T18:37:47","guid":{"rendered":"\/?p=1568"},"modified":"2004-11-08T14:41:20","modified_gmt":"2004-11-08T18:41:20","slug":"are-we-really-a-peculiar-people-or-are-we-just-a-bunch-of-odd-ducks","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/2004\/11\/are-we-really-a-peculiar-people-or-are-we-just-a-bunch-of-odd-ducks\/","title":{"rendered":"Are We Really a Peculiar People, or are we Just a Bunch of Odd Ducks?"},"content":{"rendered":"

We LDS like to refer to ourselves as a peculiar people. This formulation can be traced back to the scriptures, of course. I sometimes hear it invoked in the political context. For example, church members may refer to the need to guard against the values of \u00e2\u20ac\u0153the world.\u00e2\u20ac? The chasm between our own (persecuted, underrepresented, peculiar<\/em>) ideals and the (popular, widely shared, unpeculiar) beliefs of \u00e2\u20ac\u0153the world\u00e2\u20ac? — it is argued — is exactly what makes us a peculiar people. And we are told that this chasm indeed exists: \u00e2\u20ac\u0153the world\u00e2\u20ac? wants to approve of gay marriage, but we must as a peculiar people fight that trend; \u00e2\u20ac\u0153the world\u00e2\u20ac? wants to approve abortion, but be must as a peculiar people fight that trend; and so forth. From the frequency of our self-characterization, one might be excused in thinking that Mormons were political pariahs, alone in a barren political landscape. And we certainly are alone. Alone, isolated, iconoclast, forlorn, and peculiar<\/em> — a solitary eagle in his eyrie, silhouetted against the friendless sky — with no companions on which to call who might share our desolate beliefs or support our (peculiar) goals . . .<\/p>\n

. . . except for the, oh, 59,459,765 people (a majority of 51%) who voted for the presidential candidate who was overwhelmingly supported by Mormons. And the (growing) majorities in both houses of Congress who come from a political party overwhelmingly supported by Mormons. And the majorities in every state to vote on the issue<\/em> that approved same-sex marriage bans that church leaders have supported. <\/p>\n

Other than those inconsequential allies, we’re all alone and lonely, and we’re certainly still peculiar. After all, can’t we be firmly within the political majority, wield (vast?) political power, hold mainstream political views, and still be peculiar? <\/p>\n

Let’s face it — our self-characterization of peculiarity begins to look a bit peculiar itself on even the most casual glance at the political landscape. We oppose gay marriage because we are a peculiar people? Well, so does the vast majority of the electorate. We\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re so damn peculiar<\/em> that we agree with 75% of the country on this issue! Looking at other key issues like abortion or the Iraq war, the position of most Mormons is again peculiar only in its striking non-peculiarity. Our position is exactly the same as that of mainstream social-conservative and evangelical political groups, which happen to be the most politically powerful groups in the country. How peculiar! It looks like we may actually be a peculiarity among peculiar peoples — a peculiar people that isn’t actually peculiar! <\/p>\n

Of course, the time was once that we were truly a peculiar people. When Utah was a polygamous state, alone against the union, our peculiarity was strong. Joseph Smith’s presidential platform was incredibly peculiar, as was the theocratic government of the early church. But we lost our peculiarity somewhere along the way to becoming a mainstream church. And now, we\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re increasingly looking just like the rest of the social-conservative right, and their friends who control the White House and both houses of Congress. We\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ve become carbon copies of the evangelical voters, minus the political clout. <\/p>\n

A reflexive move away from the evengelical position, and towards the left, will not recover our lost peculiarity. After all, our liberal lioness Kristine, for all her lovable quirkiness, isn’t really all that peculiar either — she’s mostly an everyday Democrat, and they’re so peculiar that they pulled in 48% of the presidential vote. As for me, I’m a left-leaning centrist — again, not much peculiarity there. The honest assessment is that Kris and I — and all of those wingnuts over at BCC — are really as unpeculiar as Matt or Adam, our resident conservatives. In fact, I think that Russell Arben Fox, our communitarian conservative (to the extent that his views can be summarized in two words), is probably the only truly peculiar person on this blog. <\/p>\n

Is the loss of our peculiarity something that we should be concerned with? Do we, as a church and as a people, lose something important when we lose our peculiarity? Should we all lay down our existing political allegiances and line up behind Russell, to champion a new communitarian future? (And if we did, would Russell’s unique position then lose its own peculiarity?) Considering the changes the church has undergone to this point, does it make much of a difference if we’re really a peculiar people anymore? After all, even if we’re no longer a peculiar people, we’re certainly still a bunch of odd ducks.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

We LDS like to refer to ourselves as a peculiar people.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1568","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-corn"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1568","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1568"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1568\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1568"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1568"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1568"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}