From Government Raids to Polygamy Rights Marches: Class, Media, and Status Elevation for Mormon Fundamentalists

• In Event: 3520 - Section on Race, Gender, and Class Refereed Roundtables
  In Refereed Roundtable 60min: 5. Family and Religion

Abstract

The advent of polygamy reality television shows has come with a rush of polygamy rights activism in Salt Lake City. News media have also heated up now that there are recognizable reality television celebrities among the advocates. Since the start of television show "Sister Wives" and, further so, since Obergefell v. Hodges (marriage equality victory), increasing liberal news media have sympathized with Mormon polygamists as an oppressed group whose civil rights are being violated. The presentation of Mormon polygamists upholding white, middle-class values has enabled liberal journalists (often also white and middle-class) to sympathize with the population and “see” their issues as relevant to the issues recently fought for by more accepted sexual minorities. The media image of Mormon polygamy has been effectively changed towards the positive because of the racial, socioeconomic, cultural image put forth in reality television and American media’s bias towards this racial, socioeconomic, cultural image. This paper analyzes reality television polygamists' assertions of middle-class status and concludes that middle-class values are used in discursive ways to advance the cause of polygamy rights. This work contributes to communication studies, sociology of religion, and gender and sexuality studies.

Author

• Michelle Mueller, Santa Clara University