The Internet Comment That Made Me Spiral

Thoughts on culture, curiosity, and escape.

A little background: I produce the podcast Not For Everyone, where I’ve become somewhat of a side character to listeners. The hosts, my friends Caroline Winkler and Jess Debakey, refer to me as “Prince Abi” and encourage me to add my thoughts in post-production when there’s a silly opportunity to do so. For episode 69, Caroline and Jess picked a sexy theme and asked me to join as a guest host. We had a great time and I felt—and currently feel—totally out of my depth when it comes to anything sex-related. As I was raised in the Mormon church, which has strict purity standards, I’ve only ever been with one man, my husband of nine years. 

We didn’t touch on my Mormon upbringing in the podcast, but Caroline did mention that I had been married for almost a decade. I read the comments—never read the comments—and most were really kind and supportive. There was one that has stayed with me, though: 

I’ve been writing a book that touches on deeper cultural interests within the Mormon community rather than just answering questions like “Is it a cult?!” and “How could you possibly stay for so long?!” So, I’ve been thinking a lot about how to show the power an institution holds over people in smaller ways. In our language. In our rules. In the timeline of our prescribed lives. And how, when you’re on the inside, these things don’t feel as restrictive and eerie as others might assume.

Something I’ve learned from moving to DC and talking to people from all over the world is that we’re not so different. Everyone is raised in some sort of cultural bubble that, whether they realize it or not, places specific lenses over their worldview. Friends have compared leaving the Mormon church to coming out to their families about being somewhere on the LGBTQIA+ spectrum. I’ve talked with many people about how religious rules crossover between Mormonism and Islam. Some have even compared how announcing they are more liberal or conservative to their families feels a lot like leaving religion, in that they’re leaving behind a specific school of thought. Kind souls who weren’t raised in any religion at all say my essays resonate with them because they touch on a universal human experience that just happens to be set in unfamiliar confines. 

We’re all raised to see the world a particular way. And we all have to decide, at some point, whether we want to continue seeing the world that way. Some stay, and some go.

The YouTube comment lingered with me, not because it’s necessarily unkind, but because of the blame it puts on me. @jrr4475, whoever you are, says “F-ing cult members…” as if people born into a religion are mindless robots, which is just a small-minded way to look at the world. I am most tempted to reply to ignorance rather than rudeness, which is why I’m writing this out today. 

When looking into any culture, I find it best to approach with a mindset of what we can learn about the human condition rather than how we can judge it. You may have read the essay “Body Ritual Among the Nacirema,” by anthropologist Horace Miner that covers cultural aspects of a North American group of people. He cites the Nacirema’s fascination and devotion to their mouths: “The ritual consists of inserting a small bundle of hog hairs into the mouth, along with certain magical powders, and then moving the bundle in a highly formalized series of gestures” among other rituals, shrines and beliefs.

The kicker—spoiler alert—is that Miner is writing about American culture in a way that sensationalizes our daily practices. The quote I inserted above is simply about us brushing our teeth. Miner did this on purpose, because he started to notice that anthropologists had a propensity to view other people in different cultures as if they are spectacles, not just people who do unfamiliar things. And by “unfamiliar things” I mean that if we present them as matter-of-fact instead of as strange and incomprehensible acts, we’ll find they’re not so unfamiliar at all. 

For instance, people outside Mormonism might think it’s weird that we drink 44 oz sodas mixed with creams and flavored syrups, and Mormons might think it’s weird that people outside Mormonism drink alcoholic beverages. We’re both hurting ourselves, just with different substances. You might think it’s weird that I thought my pioneer ancestors were looking out for me throughout my life, and I might think it’s weird that you are really into astrology and feel a closeness to “the other side.” We’re both hopeful about some plane of existence beyond our own, we just go about it differently. 

To @jrr4475’s point, I did get married young, at a fresh 22 years old. So did a lot of people, regardless of religion. My old boss, for example, who never even gave a second thought to Mormonism, was married at 21. I’ve questioned my decision, had long talks with my husband about if this is what we really want on the other side of Mormonism, and even deconstructed the idea of marriage itself. There are definitely things I did to fit in with the status quo when I was part of the church—like going on a mission—but I did it with complex feelings of dread, doubt, excitement, faithfulness, and a whole lot of wondering what I’d be doing at that age if I wasn’t raised in the religion. 

I don’t know of many people who are just content with everything about their lives. Sure, there’s levels to being stuck in certain thought structures and belief systems, but I think in many ways we’re all “F-ing cult members” trying to figure it out. Not to sound like I’m yelling at you, but for real: When was the last time you challenged your mind about the school of thought you were raised in? How did it go? 

To be clear, I don’t necessarily think the Mormon church is a cult. I think it has cult-ish tendencies with its psychological abuse for sure. But if we’re comparing it to real-life cults, like Jonestown or the Waco tragedy—no, we were not all sitting in a room together, drinking poison, waiting for Jesus to take us to heaven in a big group sacrifice. I learned from the book Cultish by Amanda Montell that any cult-ish society—from Soul Cycle lovers to full-on cults—gets people to stay by employing thought-terminating cliches (“Doubt your doubts before you doubt your faith”), love-bombing (“You’re a part of the chosen generation”), and in-group thinking (reading anything outside your organization’s approved materials is dangerous). I could be swayed either way in the argument, especially because leaving the church was one of the hardest things I’ve ever done, partly because changing my beliefs—which should be a personal decision—felt very tied up in how disappointed my culture would be in me, and the eternal spiritual consequences it threatened.

And yet, it seems easy for people on the outside, like @jrr4475, to assume they’d have been smarter than me, seen all the signs from the very beginning, and left the church right away. Just try to imagine that: a kid who somehow has full autonomy over their beliefs and schedule, who can ignore what the people who raise them are saying, who can understand the world and all its context and feel a-okay with being the only one who doesn’t think the same way as their family and their close group of friends.

Sure, easy.

I had deep, troubling questions about Mormonism as a teenager. But there was no way in hell I was doing anything about them while living in Davis County, a 90% Mormon community.

Part of the deeper message of the book I’m writing is really wrapped up in nostalgia. Once, after I read part of an essay at a literary salon, an audience member asked, “Do you ever miss being a part of that community?” The answer, of course, is yes. I’ve felt betrayed and angered by it at different points of my faith journey, too, and it can be lonely on the other side. So few seem to understand this process, which is why I want to shed some light on it here. I’ll always get along most with the people who see religion and culture as a collective human experience, even if we’re not from the same group. Of course there are lines—like, don’t tell me what to do based on your belief system, politically or otherwise—but I do think, at the heart of it, we’re all trying in our own ways to fill some hole inside of us. 

From my deep well of longing to yours,

Abi

P.S. Remember the podcast I’m producing that I told you about in this post? It’s called “The Opportunist” and the first three episodes are live, and the fourth is coming out tomorrow! Check it out here.