If you are suggesting that somehow Mormons are more whacked out than other religions, or that they have done more harm to the social fabric of mankind, I think you are making a losing argument. With a few exceptions (such as Unitarian), almost all religions are based on highly imaginative dogma that makes people engage in behavior ranging from fracturing relationships through the organized murder of warfare.

Having said that, I appreciate the cartoon version of Mormonism because although I've had lengthy conversations with some of the "elders", none of them has ever gone into the dogma to that detail. It reminds me of South Park's description of Scientology.

Regarding whether Mitt will be happy about this cartoon, he probably wouldn't be happy about it because it depicts the more bizarre parts of Mormon dogma. But I put it to you that you could make a similar deprecating cartoon out of the Old Testament, the Koran, the Gita, or any other religious work.

It's all a bunch of hooey. Thank Thor I've found true superstition in my life.

-Wexler

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Didn't Alternet already do a story on this cartoon????

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if this cartoon is accurate (and I don't personally think that cartoons are the best medium to get such things across, especially since – in this country – cartoons are generally directed at children, which may also be the case here as well) then Mormonism is not unlike Scientology in it's silliness and downright creepiness.

It's seems really patriarchal as well (which would make it little different than any other organized religion) because you'll notice that the gods are all male and women seems to exists as – literally – vessels for men.

Though in all fairness I couldn't get though it all because it was just too out there (pardon the pun).

This is why (again, assuming the film to be accurate) that religion of any sort need to be kept way separate from government because, let's be honest, some of them are a little nutty.

Notice that I don't attack people's right to believe loony beliefs, or any belief for that matter; only that there is a place for them, and government isn't it.

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Truly amazing to me how much we humans tend to want someone to direct our lives so that we don't have to take responsibility for them ourselves. The myths perpetrated by churches (e.g. The Latter Day Saints ... the name alone tells you a lot about their beliefs) have been the belief systems that have caused events like the Holocaust, the Inquisition, countless wars and lies and murders over the centuries. Christianity, Judaism, Islam are just major examples of what mind-control can take place over human lives. Interestingly enough, however, the mystics of these tribal religions have been denigrated, tortured, and murdered for the truth they speak: freedom!

To elect a man who believes he is superior to all others is really sick and pathologically ill. We already have a pathological liar in office now. Have we notlearned anything?!

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That was more entertaining than 98.9% of what is seen on television these days.
If Mitt becomes president perhaps it will become cool and chic to walk around
in togas. Reenactments of the indian-israelites versus the roman-atlantens will
be the norm at your local renaissance dinner theater.

All happening at a near future date when Tim Burton releases Land of the Lost
the motion picture. "No everyone Skate backwards or leave the rink".

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the 'Bible' or any other religious tract.

I'd love to see similar treatments on Judaism/Christianity/Islam.

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Although I think all religions are beliefs in imaginary beings which can be easily disproved, the theology behind this cartoon doesn’t have a consensus among all Mormons. Although it is close. Having sifted through countless discussions and arguments of Mormon doctrine from the church fathers, the issues become even more obfuscated and complex which is probable how they like it. The more complex and scholarly doctrine becomes, the more it goes beyond the layman’s understanding and requires high priests to interpret. Just how they like it. Problem is, all religious doctrines are based on revelations and divinely inspired messages from invisible gods. You just have to take their word for it and ignore how stories about gods evolved and adapted as people became more sophisticated. The cartoon may be interesting to watch, from the perspective of an anthropologist, I suppose, to see how primitive religions like this still manage to survive. That it does attests to man’s willingness to be deluded and the stupidity of its followers so willing to be hypnotized. The stories that have been spun are more fantastic than Jack and the Beanstalk, and only small children believe that. Someday all churches will become museums.

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I agree that all religions should give us pause for the fantasies they promote and the intolerance that they teach. I am more concerned however about the biggest fantasy of all times that has destroyed lives, instituted horrific foreign policies, caused us to become what we abhor, and made private armies rape and murder, while extremely wealthy war mongors thrive...that fantasy is The 9/11 Commission Report and it's sequel The Patriot Act! Almost all of our leaders with the exception of a few with common sense and moral clarity, are complicit in that farce. And you can count your media gate keepers in that sorry lot too!

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I've known Mormons. A Mormon I trust told me the story of her religion years ago. She never told me any of this outer-galactic material, or that Jesus had wives and children. What is the authoritative source for the story in the video?

(I'm a liberal Methodist. I believe in freedom of religion and respect for the religion of others. I suspect the video is an unfair, inaccurate and disrespectful depiction.)

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This cartoon is simplified, but accurate. I wouldn't be surprised if it were made by the LDS church, because of its quality and accuracy. Mormons learn about these teachings when they receive their "endowments" in the Temple, and most of it is in Doctrine and Covenants.

Mormonism is highly patriarchal. Men advance through the Aaronic priesthood into the Melchizek priesthood, in other words, all Mormon men are priests. Women cannot be priests. It is true that women exist (theoretically) mainly as vessels of men, both in the cartoon and in Mormon doctrine. However, Mormonism is really a religion of belonging, not believing, so many Mormons are unaware of the details of their church's teaching. In Mormonism, salvation comes from belonging to the church, not from believing correct doctrine. Mormon theology has never been systematized, so even apologists run into trouble with church authorities. Mormon missionaries are given surprisingly little training before they are set out.

One Mormon told me the rule, "If prophecies conflict, you take the later one."

In my view, this is a ridiculous religion, but its members are exemplary people. No matter how ridiculous a belief system is, we should tolerate it.

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Yeah, no doubt this propagandistic cartoon could give significant pause to evangelical and mainstream Protestant and Catholic voters. But, as Wexler said above, all religions are rife with similar peculiar superstitions and dogmas, and it's only the Planet Krypton like backstory here that sounds bizarre.

And yeah, the idea that you not only get to be a intergalactic God in the afterlife if you pass muster instead of the somewhat boring Heaven concept of mainline xians is alluring, heck their afterlife sounds kind of racy, with lots of SEX, even. Sounds good to me, actually! Only thing that's missing is some rock and roll and drugs. (Just like that eternity with the 72 virgins thing that we slag the jihadis with...nothing like sex and religion all mixed up in a positive way to get the attention of the buttoned up western religionists. Would eternity with 72 MILFS or something like that sound more plausible to our ears? Isn't that all just another religious shell game that if you keep your trousers buttoned up in this life and do some other gratification-delaying things, we'll make it up to you in the next life? But I digress).

Anyway, this cartoon thing really made me wonder who made it, since there are no credits (who would you actually "credit" that nasty piece of work to?). I call it nasty because you could make a similar hatchet job with a dripping-with-sarcasm voice over intoning adjectives like "supposedly" quite easily on any kind of mainstream dogma, such as, uh, the story of xmas or Easter. If this thing was put together by anyone other than a lapsed ex-Mormon who's upset about his ex-spouse being raptured away by someone more spiritually worthy in the eyes of the Mormon church, it's an evil piece of hate speech.

Although, back OT, I can't see a Mormon being elected President. That's too fringy for snake-handling, babbling-in-tongues, Southern Baptist evangelicals.

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The comments above on the relative weirdness of all religions is spot-on; that is, they're all weird and counter to reality.

However, let me point out, as a secular atheist, that I was under the impression that a person's faith, no matter what I may think of it, is irrelevant. What is relevant is what a person has done and is likely to do in the public sphere, no matter what is driving it.

On that score, alone, Romney is a bad choice. Sure, I think Mormonism is wacky. Probably more so -- in its authoritarian nature -- than more established sillinesses. But perhaps not: ever try to discuss Israel with a religious Jew? Being culturally Jewish, I can tell you that families break up over such dissent, and also over intermarriage with less-chosen races.

Finally, who made this trash video anyway? Some other wacko fundy church? A source would have been nice.

Look, MLK believed the Christ fantasy story. So what? He did a lot of good. Ditto, in a different way, Gandhi, who had fairly insane, Robertson-like views on the human-moral causation of natural disasters. Tagore ripped him a new on over that. But, as Orwell rightly said, no other early-20th-C politician "smelled quite as clean," if I have the quote right.

Actions matter. Statements, less so. Faith -- of whatever kind -- even less so. And, on a slightly different topic, I'm tired of secular/atheist/lefty types (they don't always go together, of course) alienating progressive liberal folks. Suicidal, but that's what the left is best at in this country: splitting the potential coalitions.

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The cartoon is accurate according to Mormon publications, Doctrine and Covenants, and the book "Gospel Principles" for new converts. Other sources of my information include Mormons and ex-Mormons.

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"AlterNet will not tolerate . . . hateful language."

This "cartoon" is a hateful piece of anti-Mormon propaganda, directed at the immature minds of those who are too lazy to go to the spring and are content to drink downstream from the feed-lot.

What's next, Mr. Willis? A link to a cartoon based on the "Protocols of the Elders of Zion" to "explain" Judaism?

An anti-Mormon is just an anti-Semite in training.

Tracy Hall Jr
hthalljr'gmail'com

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Good entertainment! I watched the "Ten Commandmemts" with Charlton Heston some 50 years ago and I would say that this is just about as good. No more wackier that any other religion. It's when you place the metaphors and allegories into facts you get into real trouble. Could even start some wars.

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of course Mormonism is utterly dependent on a suspension of rationality in service of blind faith. that's no more ludicrous or cult-like than any other religion out there.

you think the faiths that Jimmy Carter, George W. Bush, Sen. Joseph Lieberman, Rep. Keith Ellison or or Rep. Mazie Hirono worship are any more believable? why? nobody is freaking out that George W. Bush worships someone who supposedly walked on water, or because Sen. Lieberman believes you can't eat a cheeseburger because of some archaic biblical passage that commands that jews shouldn't cook a baby lamb in its mother's milk.

and why is it we don't notice anyone here freaking out that the Senate Majority Leader, Sen. Harry Reid, a loyal Democrat, is a Mormon, too - the highest Congressional role ever attained by an LDS?

i'm just wondering...

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My niece converted to Mormonism as an adult when she got married. I was visiting my parents, and I found the book "Gospel Principles" which the Mormon church was using as her textbook. It contained the same material as the cartoon and more. My mother was sitting in the room. Periodically I looked up and said things like, "Mom, did you know that Mormons believe that the Holy Spirit has a body?" and each time she said, "You should not say such horrible things about Mormonism." So I said, "It says that right here," and I took the book over to her and showed her.

"Gospel Principles" is a very interesting book, Mormon beliefs do sound ridiculous to people who have not grown up with Mormonism, and the cartoon really is accurate.

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. . . with one of the previous commenters.

All religions are just as stupid as this, if not stupider.

So . . . ummmm . . . this Jesus . . . was born to a virgin, rose from the dead, and is simultaneously the father AND the son AND the holy spirit? Suuuuure. Whatever you say.

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I have a only a very cursory understanding of the religion (I'm not Mormon) but much of what is in the video seems accurate.

(I just finished reading "Under the Banner of Heaven" by Jon Krakauer - by no means an authoritative text on the LDS but I trust Krakaurer's credentials as an honest and thorough journalist)

Anyway, I didn't know about the celestial stuff, or the vote in heaven pitting Jesus against Lucifer (did the OSCE have election monitors there?) but I know that Joseph Smith supposedly was visited by an angel (Moroni) who told him where to unearth some ancient texts on gold pages under a hill in upstate New York

And these ancient texts - the Book of Mormon - told the story of the righteous, light-skinned Nephites, descendents of ancient Israelites who fled Jerusalem for North America 600 years before the birth of Christ, and their battles in North America with their former bretheren, the Lamanites, who were cursed with dark-skin because of their impiety against god (who, it is explained, are the ancestors of the modern American Indians).

All of that to say - it's still damned shocking and deplorable that Alternet would let this video be posted and promoted on its daily e-mail without demanding that the author at least do his own fact-checking and tell us where the video came from.

The fact that it's all done in a nudge-nudge, wink-wink manner that seems to suggest that Mormons - and Mitt Romney (who, I should add, is a fraud for other altogether legitimate political reasons) - should be ridiculed for these beliefs. But as I said in my previous post - why are their beliefs any more or less ridiculous than any other religious story??

They are not.

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We'll find a video discussing the absurdity of Judaism also. Oh, that would be Anti-Semitic. How about Scientology? Oh, they sue your ass off.

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There have many great arguements here that Mormonism is no more bizzare than other religions. I agree.

Christianity is so pervasive in this country that one has to often feel guilty if not a member. I've read the entire Bible and it is no more fantastic a story than this one and while I've not read the Book of Mormon (I tried), I've found the God of the Bible to be capricious, mean and unfair. The Bible also contradicts itself on every issue I could come up with.

Yet I know many Christians who are really good folks both with their families and in their communities. Same goes for Mormons. (I lived in Utah for 11 months).

Check Mitt Romney's website and read what he has to say under 'issues'. I believe he's downright scary, but I have no doubt that the more paranoid and short-sighted Americans would agree with him. However you believe religiously (or not), I think the issues are where to start when deciding on a candidate. If you then think his association with a particular religion will accentuate or diminish his effectiveness, it's fair to consider.

To me the scariest thing about Romney is that I don't think he will lie as much as Bush, but he will be even more convinced that the US should eradicate every Muslim country. And I believe this policy DOES jive with the Mormon objective. Also, like many Fundamentalist Christians, he obviously thinks Global Warming is a hoax and is in favor of a few mega corps in collusion with the government being in control of all the energy. The rest of his policies are just as Fascistic and Draconian.

From my own perspective, Romney would be much more effective than Bush at moving this country toward Fascism, something that Bush has already accomplished very well.

It is not a good thing to generalize about the behavior of certain people in certain religions without valid statistical research and I don't know of any on Mormonism. However, my own experience was that I did not meet a single practicing Mormon who was not extremely business savvy, industrious and well connected. Most of them were also very truthful, from their own perspective.

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great laugh over this cartoon. i tend to agree that it is reminiscent of a southpark cartoon. fact is every religion on the planet could be put to cartoon figures and explanation and any SANE person would laugh their tails off at the absurdity of it all.

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While I agree that there sure are some weird aspects of the LDS, this video reminds me of those christian movies they'd show in say a southern Baptist church explaining the rapture. The music in the background, and those interview pieces with "real" people- is this from the 80s?? It's clearly an anti-Mormon propaganda piece from some fundie Christian group.

What is Alternet trying to prove- that the GOP is eating its young right now?

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Yesterday I read about the 'Endtime' believers and watched a documentary about them and their loony desire to bring about the end of the world. Today I read articles about Blackwater mercenaries patrolling the streets of New Orleans and concentration camps being built all over the States.

And now I find a video about some cult of crazies that believes black people are cursed, white blonds are blessed, Jesus came to speak to the Indians and America will rule the world!!!

Are they putting LSD in the water supply there or something?

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I would like to know what the name and author of the books are that tell what the Mormons really believe--and please do not direct me to anything written by the Mormons and their 'church'.

I have copy of the Mormon bible but it is so absurd as to be ridiculous.

Other churches believe similar strange things it is just that they happened so long ago that it is not as easy to refute and the really weird stuff has had it's edges rounded through eons of time, just as flowing water can round sharp-edged stone--but the Morman beliefs seem particularly weird--science fiction even--and while they are constantly receiving 'new revelations' changing some of the truly bad ones--polygamy and racism for example, time has yet to round off the others. Maybe a few thousand years might do it.

The Catholic Church, as a good example of what time has not yet eroded, today believes in Transubstantiation, the literal changing of wine and bread into the blood and body of Jesus--making us vampires and ghouls I suppose. Anyone have any idea how this strange view came about? Anybody care?

Their misogynystic beliefs in chastity had their origin in fear of women and menstruation and temptation (just like Islam), while having priests be chaste was all about money a 1000 years ago, and views on artificial contraception and abortion was and still is all about getting more Catholics.

None of this is in the Bible, by the way--not that it matters much.

As I have always said, when we elect a lesbian atheist black women, we will, at long last be free from the demons that have now taken over the Republican Party--but I am not exactly holding my breath.

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Interesting to start a story with a confession of not knowing whether what's being proffered is accurate or not. Maybe before posting the information it should be checked for accuracy, whether it's about Mormon theology or anything else. This sort of "journalism" is irresponsible. I don't know if the video accurately portrays anything, but I do know that it would be easy enough to find out before posting it on Alternet. 500,000 viewers on YouTube tells us nothing except that YouTube gets a lot of viewers, though the author is correct that it can't do Romney any good. Alternet could do some good with a better vetting process.

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And as such, it's history and theology sound ridiculous and fanciful to most people.

I thought the cartoon was amusing.

Yes, it is probably correct that you can take any religion and turn it's history and theology into a relatively amusing cartoon. I think it is good to poke fun at everything, especially doctrine or ideology that purports to be utterly serious, such as most religions and governments. To those who attack the cartoon as attacking mormonism or attacking their right to not have to read anything attacking anything, I say relax. Your belief system is perfectly fine, whatever you believe is fine. God doesn't really care about any of this foolishness anyway. The entire history of civilization is merely a blink of his/her/it/whatever's eye! Blink! Everything human centered is over with, another ice age to nap through for God!

I'm amazed at how varied the human imagination is.

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