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The Mountain Meadows Massacre (What the Conspiracy?)
40 Plays1 year ago
Inspired by Steve Clarke's talk "When Conspiracy Theorists Win", M and Josh introduce an unsuspecting Georgia to the unpleasant tale of the Mountain Meadows Massacre - if she's lucky, she'll live to regret it. Alternate titles for this episode include "When Mormons Attack!", "Transmormons: Mormons in Disguise" and "That's Too Much Strychnine!"
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Transcript
Racist Implications and Hypotheticals
00:00:00
Speaker
Is it racist to dress up as a Native American? Yes. Also, why? No reason. Is it racist, though, if you're Mormon and you dress up as a Native American?
00:00:12
Speaker
It depends. Is the hypothetical Mormon... Is the hypothetical Mormon in the situation themselves a Native American? No. Then, yes, it's racist. Right. Is it racist if the Mormon... The hypothetical Mormon. Same. Is it racist if they hire Native Americans to kill other Native Americans? Yes, I mean, I guess it depends on the context. Good to know.
00:00:41
Speaker
What is this about? Nothing. Certainly not about to engage in a land grab. That is a weird thing to say. Yes it is. Yes it is.
Introductions and Quirky Product Talk
00:01:09
Speaker
Hello, and welcome to the podcaster's guide to the conspiracy. In Auckland, New Zealand, I am Josh Addison, and sitting right next to me, close enough that I can feel the wind when they blink, it's Dr. N.R.Xdented. That's quite a good question. I need some eye oil, I think, and we have in the room, direct from Wellington. It is the one, the only, Georgie Carson. Hello. Hello. I'm still distracted by the eye oil statement, is that a...
00:01:38
Speaker
legitimate product that you use. I've never heard of it. Moiks drone sells it on his website. Oh, of course. Along with the pig urine. He does do a lot of advertising on the show and buy proxy somehow. Sneaks is broadcasted. We should try some of those. No, just you being on the pig piss. What's it like? How's it working for you? You do seem
00:02:00
Speaker
Quite golden at the moment. Yes. And slightly sloshing when I walk. But maybe the next episode is better, yeah. Because you always need to fix that, not make it worse. Well, there we go. I've been cheated out of my money yet again. It's true. Now, we've got a special
What the Conspiracy? - Location Guessing
00:02:16
Speaker
episode. We do. All kinds of special episodes. This was not meant to be a What The Conspiracy episode. Because we're not supposed to be doing What The Conspiracy episodes anymore. Well, no, no. We can still do it. We can do it from time to time. As surprises. But as a regular thing. As a treat. As a treat, yep.
00:02:29
Speaker
We had the victim this week and we thought we've got something which we would have done as a what the conspiracy. But due to Steve Clark, we both now know about the topic in question. But we suspect Georgia does not. So we are about to play what the conspiracy. Josh, play that sting. It's time to play what the conspiracy.
00:03:07
Speaker
So the rules of what the conspiracy are quite simple, even though they're actually quite complicated. We need from you a when the conspiracy, a where the conspiracy, and a why the conspiracy. A what the conspiracy. Well, I mean, that gives us the what the conspiracy is. Generally what it's about. Yes, if I remember rightly, it's when, where, and what. Or why. Or like the topic.
00:03:36
Speaker
Anyway, give us a where. Where do you think this conspiracy that we think you've never heard of occurred? Where in the world? And it is in the world. Okay, so it's not a moon, but it's a conspiracy. In or on the world. In, in the world. In or on. In the core.
00:03:58
Speaker
on or about the world. On or about the world. Somewhere in the atmosphere. It's within the gravitational field of the planet. Oh, okay. So it could still be up in the air, but okay. History was up in the air for quite a bit. The story.
00:04:15
Speaker
Okay. My logic is going to be that if it was Eastern European, you would have heard of it. So I'm going to say not Eastern European. Interesting. Deduction, I like. But then I don't really have any reason to eliminate them. So now you've excised Eastern Europe from the world. What's left? And I mean, as Eastern Europeans would say, what is left when you remove Eastern Europe from the world? Probably not much. Not much.
00:04:41
Speaker
I'm going to show my ignorance. Was Steve Clark Australian or have I definitely been to Australia? He is still Australian. Sorry Steve, if you're listening. OK, well, I'm going to guess Australia. Maybe it's some sort of local conspiracy that happened down the road from him. And that's why he thinks that you really heard of it. Australia, that's noted down. All right. I think the when. I am going to have to take a wild punt. He is older than you, right?
00:05:10
Speaker
I believe so. It is always rude to ask a man his age. So I'm going to ask Steve Clark his age. Okay. Well, maybe between 1964 and 1967. 1964? Specificity. Okay, so Post-Space Race World. And I think it is probably a meat-based conspiracy because that is another reason that you as a vegan would not have heard of it.
00:05:37
Speaker
Interesting. All right, so maybe cows in Western Australia in the 60s, some sort of conspiracy around that. Late middle, last century, and it's all about me. Josh, how well has Georgia scored? Well not, I wouldn't give
Mormon History: Visions, Polygamy, and Conflict
00:05:51
Speaker
it a zero out of ten. Oh, okay. It's fairly close.
00:05:54
Speaker
The place is Utah. Utah, America. The time is the 1850s, so you're out by 100 years, which is not the worst anyone's been wrong playing this game. Meat is involved. Human meat. There is meat, but I mean, it's a human-based conspiracy. There's always meat in a human-based conspiracy. I'm going to take that as a win because I expected them to be all be wrong.
00:06:20
Speaker
Well, there you go. Well, there you go. Happy days. One out of ten. Congratulations. Hey, there's meat left, let's say. Yeah.
00:06:26
Speaker
So what we're going to talk to you about today, unfortunately, it's not a super pleasant, not a cheery topic. When are they ever? Well, sometimes. We want to talk about the mountain meadows massacre. Have you heard of the mountains meadows massacre? Also, can you say mountains meadows massacre three times fast? Mountain meadows massacre, mountain meadows massacre, mountain meadows massacre. It's not very fast. It's pretty fast. What more do you want? Come on. OK, sorry.
00:06:54
Speaker
Yes, no, the Malton Meadows massacre, the MMM, which is sort of like RRR. Have you seen MMB? Sorry to do the pop culture digression immediately, but have you seen RRR? I have. I thought it was good, but not great. M won't watch it with me.
00:07:13
Speaker
I'm pretty sure you did say it. We have not watched it. I watched it. And I told you about it and you said, I'm not interested. Definitely has the best musical number of any volume I've ever seen. I've seen clips, I'd like to see. No, no, no, no, no. Sorry, I interrupted you. Exactly. Continue. Anyway, so you're quite familiar with RRR. I am. The Mountain Meadows Massacre is nothing like that. Okay. In any way, pretty much has none of it. Although it does involve me. Are there any tigers in it?
00:07:40
Speaker
no no just livestock yeah i think yep uh so i mean utarian hikers could be a kind of cattle probably not no i think you just made that up i think you did but um i feel i feel good about it i feel good about it so we're talking about mormons how much you know about about mormonism
00:08:01
Speaker
Not a lot. I haven't even seen the Book of Mormon. The South Park Arts one. Or the actual book. I think if you go to base your view of Mormonism upon a satirical... I mean, New Zealander has never been to the US. If I was going to know anything about Mormonism, it might be from that, but I haven't even seen that. I just know it's... they're very, very religious. What kind of religion is more Mormonism? A sort of Christian flavour? Correct!
00:08:30
Speaker
It's famous for golden tablets and golden spectacles, but we will not be talking about tablets nor spectacles. Not really, no. We won't really be talking about Joseph Smith, because we'll be talking about his sister Brigham Young. Yeah, so I mean the short version is Joseph Smith claimed to have been visited by an angel who gave him magical... Sorry, is Joseph Smith the leader of
00:08:58
Speaker
founder he's the founder okay see i know as little as like i didn't quite catch that okay so he he he claimed to have what he had visions of an angel who gave him magical stones that when he stuck them in a hat and it was a very strange but basically apparently he he claimed to have been given a third testament of jesus christ a brand new book of the moment on a golden tablet with gold with golden spectacles yep and this
00:09:26
Speaker
And he also really, really, really liked getting married. He loved getting married. Oh yes, they do do that a lot, don't they? And indeed, that's going to be important. Yes, so the... I mean, that is technically heresy, right? Saying you've got a new testament of the Bible. Oh yeah, most Christians don't like the idea of adding books to the Bible. Actual heresy, plus the fact that, yes, he was very keen on the polygamy. Yeah, yeah. I mean, Mormons were not well-liked in the US.
00:09:54
Speaker
Is that why they're all sort of Utah? Basically, yes. Things got actually quite violent. Joseph Smith was killed by a mob in Illinois. He was killed by a mob in Illinois and then subsequently executed by that mob in Illinois.
00:10:13
Speaker
Because after he died falling out of a window, they still strung his corpse up and shot it just to be sure. It's hard because he'd been arrested. He kind of died in the act of fleeing mob justice from the jail.
00:10:30
Speaker
and the people who really wanted him to be arranged for his crimes. That's not good enough. I mean, he didn't die in the right way. We now need to execute him again. I guess it's always good to be absolutely sure, just in case you have another respiration. I mean, the last thing you want is a zombie, Joseph Smith, wandering the countryside, having sex with your wife. Definitely sure. So we're interested in the guy who came next. Apparently there was a period of, you know, a bit of vying for control over the church. We see years of there being a succession crisis.
00:10:59
Speaker
leading to an eventual council of apostles being set up, of which Brigham Young ended up being the kind of de facto successor and eventual leader of Mormonism. But there was an interim, and it wasn't a good time to be a Mormon, even if you were amongst other Mormons.
00:11:17
Speaker
Yeah, it sounds like there's always been a bit of infighting amongst the Mormons. But yes, so Brigham Young is now in charge of Mormonism and he decides, okay, there's too much anti-Mormon sentiment here. For example, my boss got killed in Illinois by a mob. We are going to move to Mexico. Oh, that's not Utah. Well, it was at the time.
00:11:44
Speaker
At the time,
The 1857 Massacre: Trickery and Aftermath
00:11:45
Speaker
the states... Had they not bought it or something? Yeah. So it was Mexico and then the year after they moved... So the year after they left the US... Mexico sent it to... to escape US-style mob justice. Mexico gives the area the Mormons are living in to the US. Was that unfortunate? That was unfortunate. Well, for the Mormons, it was very unfortunate because they had left a country which treated them as heretics and wanted them dead to a country which didn't really care.
00:12:12
Speaker
and suddenly by just staying in the same place they were back in the country quite interesting they didn't then say okay well we'll just move further south then well except that claims are trying to make sure that things are going to be okay the US gave Brigham Young the role of superintendent where the role of superintendent was look
00:12:36
Speaker
Is that like a sheriff? Well, we won't bother you as long as you look after the Native American population in Utah. More than that, he was also the governor, the first governor of Utah. But yes, superintendent of Native American officials. When you say look after, is that as they would say, like Julie Andrews or?
00:12:54
Speaker
population control. Keep them in line. So basically because Native Americans would often be moving from one part of the territory to another part of the territory, one of his jobs was to make sure that when the Native Americans engaged in their migratory habits, they didn't get in the way of any white people who happened to be
00:13:16
Speaker
kind of in their power. So he was... The white people don't get in the way of the Native Americans. No, it wasn't the way that the American state thought about things at the time or this current day. So basically he was a traffic cop by going, yeah, go around that homestead, past that town, maybe up that river beyond that family there. Yeah, just make sure you don't bump into anyone on your way.
00:13:44
Speaker
But Brigham Young, he had granted designs. So he was the governor of Utah, which is all well and good, but he really wanted to secede. He wanted Utah, I didn't actually write it down. What was the name of the kingdom he wanted to be? The kingdom of Deseret. Deseret, but spelled D-E-S-E-R-E-T. I assume that's a biblical name, one of the things from the Book of Mormon.
00:14:08
Speaker
So he wanted Utah to succeed, or if that wasn't going to work out, he at least wanted Utah to be sort of special, like a more independent state than any of the other states were or something. The most Mormon state of the most Mormon states. And he apparently sort of started to suggest, well, look, if I don't get my way, maybe I'm not going to be so thorough. Maybe some of the Native Americans might just want to enter your host there, guys. Maybe I'll just let them do whatever they want then.
00:14:36
Speaker
I've got a really bad feeling about this. Oh, you are correct. That thing's going to get worse. Hold on to that feeling. So, yes. So, in the 1850s, the Baker Venture Party was migrating west across the US. Headed for California, I think. So, I... Is that like Oregon Trail stuff? Yeah, yeah. I know that. I know that.
00:14:58
Speaker
So I can't remember, they started at Arkansas, I think. They'd gone over the Rockies and they were on their way through Utah, eventually heading to California. Now, the US didn't like the Mormons much, and so as a result, the Mormons did not like the rest of the US very much.
00:15:18
Speaker
We're going to see a lot of Western cliches popping up, I think, as the story goes on. The first one being that the Mormons didn't take kindly to strangers around these parts. And it got to the point where eventually, so as word got out that they called them Americans, the Utah's referred to people from the rest of the country as Americans are coming into our land. And as we're coming out, there's a party of Americans around 140 something-ish people.
00:15:45
Speaker
We're heading through, they eventually stopped, like they refused to serve them, to give them supplies, anything like that. We weren't too happy about having them there. But they were told by someone, why don't you go down to Mountain Meadows, which was an area, sort of pastures where they could rest their cattle and graze them. And it was a decent place to stop and rest. I remember, this is called the Mountain Meadows Massacre. I got that, thank you.
00:16:12
Speaker
So yes, while they were camping at Mountain Meadows, they were attacked on the 7th of September 1857. They were attacked by a group of Mormons who dressed themselves as Native Americans, as well as some actual Native Americans. But they hide and they kind of flesh out their numbers. Authentic kind of vibes. Is this a false flag?
00:16:38
Speaker
It really is. It totally is. I have been listening to this podcast for quite some time. I know a false flag when I see one. Yeah, so the Paiute, we're apparently the local tribe, and some of them were involved as well. So yeah, I mean, you can't sugarcoat it. It was not a nice affair. They literally circled the wagons. We'll get there. They circled the wagons. They like packed them with dirt to protect from boat shot and so on. And they were able to like,
00:17:05
Speaker
to shelter within the wagon circle for several days, whereas I think the Mormons had hoped they could just go in, wipe you run out and get away. That turned into a siege. On September 11, a wonderful date, they were basically out of supplies and ammunition by that stage. The Mormon, or the attackers,
00:17:27
Speaker
Basically they called a truce they came down with a white flag and said okay look we'll let you guys go we'll escort you out of here as long as you leave all your stuff behind right you leave all your stuff for the Paiute and just just get the hell out of here and we'll let you go and that was a lie as soon as they all left they were all just gunned down on the spot with the exception of
00:17:51
Speaker
They were all under the age of seven. And they were only allowed to live because they were thought to be too young to be good witnesses. Yeah, so basically it seemed like the Mormons had worked, that they had worked out that the party had worked out that they were being attacked by Mormons, not Native Americans. Okay, well the game's up. We just can't leave any witnesses. It's like that Black Mirror episode where they end up killing everyone. Does anyone say no? Okay.
00:18:18
Speaker
crocodile or guinea pig memories. So that was it. So a thoroughly unpleasant affair around the children. The children were taken in by local Mormon families or apparently were not treated particularly well and were all eventually the authorities came and got them back at gunpoint in some cases apparently. So
00:18:42
Speaker
That's the actual incident, which is conspiratorial to begin with because this was a planned, as you say, false flag incident. And then things get cover-up afterwards. Well, yes, because the official theory was that the party had been massacred by the pirates in revenge for the party in question. So that's the
00:19:06
Speaker
Baker Fancher Party, poisoning their springs and livestock. Did they do that? Well, it said the person who investigated the incident, one Brigham Young, that was his conclusion upon investigating this particular issue. Or conducting an investigation and reporting it. It was definitely the Paiute, and it was a revenge attack.
00:19:34
Speaker
I was just gonna say it's not really an impartial investigation if it was him. I mean, he was the guy in charge of the state, so it kind of made sense for him to be doing it, but yes, no, definitely not impartial.
Investigations and Emergence of Truth
00:19:45
Speaker
You would go to the person in charge of Native American affairs and go, look, there's been a massacre which seems to involve Native Americans, and you're in charge of that group, Brigham. You've got to investigate. And he went, yep, I certainly have no conflicts of interest here. I'm going to get investigating right now.
00:20:04
Speaker
Now, it was interesting, the way Steve presented the story, he made it sound like they'd said that the party had poisoned the Paiute's land and stuff, and so they were killing them purely out of revenge, whereas other things I've read made it sound more like the poisoning was just brought up to say these were bad people, they were necessarily, they were poisoning all over the place. So somehow they deserved it. Yeah, essentially, they were bad people who got what they deserved.
00:20:31
Speaker
So that was the official story. But the official story was questioned from fairly early on in the correspondence because the first issue was this was the first large-scale massacre committed by supposedly Americans.
00:20:50
Speaker
Yes. Well, sorry. If you believe the official story. The theory was true. This was the first large scale massacre by Native Americans. Can I say that I'm surprised that that was the first? Well, yes, sorry. I need to give you the number. 120 people, they think, between 120, maybe as high as 140. Yes, while there had been attacks on settlers and wagon trains, what have you, by Native Americans, nothing, nothing of that scale.
00:21:18
Speaker
And the other issue is, and this is disturbing, normally when there were attacks, Native Americans killed the children, but kept the woman hostages. And in this case, the woman were killed and the children were kept hostage. So people were going, A, we've never seen a massacre like this before, and also B, it doesn't fit the MO of previous Native American attacks we know have occurred.
00:21:50
Speaker
Also, why were the Baker Fentures carrying poison in the first time? They were carrying poison. What was the poison? Sorry, scientists are meaning to ask. Strychnine was mentioned now. Which is maybe sand and poison for those days.
00:22:07
Speaker
So yeah, so A, why were they carrying poison, and B, why were they going around randomly poisoning whales and... Yes, certainly maybe you'd want some for pest control or whatever you use that for, but enough to poison a bunch of whales and a bunch of cattle. That's a lot of poison. Josh, they bought it in a discount, and you buy the discount, you go to use it. I'm pretty sure the Oregon Trail was mostly about traveling and keeping your people and yourself alive. Not dying of dysentery. Not dying of dysentery. If you can achieve that, then you're sweet.
00:22:37
Speaker
So where would poison have come into that? I'll say it was on sale and once you buy some poison, you've got to find use for it. It's like, check off scum. She's poisoning the first strand. You've got to then use it by the end of the play. It applies to fiction, not to real life. Doesn't it though? That might say something about the official story then.
00:22:58
Speaker
down yeah yeah it was yes there's this sort of stuff why like why would they be poisoning things in the first place you know let alone why would they have had enough to so yeah so the behavior of both parties is a bit weird the native americans are committing a massacre on the scale that no one's seen before and also they've changed the MO for this one-off special occasion and also the white folk are not acting in a way that white folk tend to act
00:23:26
Speaker
And people are going, none of this story makes any sense. Can I ask, were there any people in particular that were bringing up these sort of objections to the official theory? I don't know specific instances, but I think it was in the newspapers. Yeah, people were going, this is a really unusual story.
00:23:47
Speaker
We've never seen a massacre of this kind before. Normally when these massacres occurred, this is what happened and it didn't happen this time. And also the behavior of the baker fence just seems really weird.
00:24:00
Speaker
And as the years went by, more claims that Mormons were involved started popping up. A couple of years later, once the children had been retrieved, some of them were actually old enough to remember and testify that they had seen white people dressed as Native Americans and the people who massacred their families. You're definitely implanting memories by age of seven. You also had apostate Mormons. So remember that all that infighting we talked about? Apostate. Apostate.
00:24:30
Speaker
apostate Mormonism all that infighting we talked about there were ways to get offside in Mormonism and once you got offside with Mormonism you were basically kind of exiled from the Mormon community like most religions which then led to a situation where maybe if you were involved in a massacre and you were no longer being given your Jew in Mormon society you might then decide to actually whistle blow and go hey I was one of those
00:24:58
Speaker
non-Payute Indians who was involved in the massacre. Did anyone do that? Yeah, but somewhat self-servingly from what I hear, they were sort of like, oh yeah, I was involved in the massacre, now I didn't kill anyone. I was there, but I was just the lookout. My back was turned during the massacre of 140 people.
00:25:19
Speaker
Oh yeah, I stepped on a rock and fell asleep during the massacres. I was definitely there, but I didn't kill anyone. So yes, you had ex-mormons saying, giving their account of it. And apparently the Pyute at one point basically complained that they hadn't, you know, they'd been promised, you'll get all the, you know, you help us with this massacre and you'll get to keep their stuff. And they weren't allowed to keep as much of the stuff as they had been promised. So they were a bit annoyed that they weren't actually paid properly.
00:25:46
Speaker
So they apparently went to the local U.S. Army and said, hey, look, I think, I think just kind of. I wasn't compensated adequately for this massacre. I think it sounded a little bit like, again, sort of whistleblowing. OK, we didn't get the you know, we were the deal was we would get the stuff and we'd keep our mouths shut. Well, we didn't get the stuff. So now we're going to put you guys, drop you guys. And we shut up.
00:26:10
Speaker
So this was enough for them to alter the official story. Which is to say that some bad Mormons were involved in the mountains, Medo-Massica. But you know, there were some bad Mormons who weren't acting on the church's behalf.
00:26:27
Speaker
They were simply... Certainly wasn't their idea. They were going to hide guns. They were working for the pyre. They were giving some kind of strategic or tactical support. And they even got someone to actually admit to his role in the massacre.
00:26:44
Speaker
was also saying the church was definitely not involved in organizing the massacre, didn't they, Josh? Yeah, there were, I think, four people were charged, but only one of them ended up being convicted. So a man called John D. Lee was found guilty of involvement in the massacre and was eventually executed. But he later was a bit sort of, you know, he basically said, I've been made a scapegoat. You know, they've got my head and that I'm the one who's
00:27:14
Speaker
Who's taking the blame for everything when in fact, I wasn't the only one involved So so they you know that they went from oh it was all the Paiute to where's the Paiute with a few Mormons involved? But the official story essentially stayed intact because a lot of it, you know Who's gonna take the word of children in the 1860s? Who's gonna take the word of Native Americans? Who's gonna take the word of bitter Apostle apostates? In Utah who's going to take the word of an apostate Mormon?
00:27:42
Speaker
In fact, I think, yeah, there was also some issue around the fact that they, for some of the crimes, the prosecutors were like, well, we can't bring them to trial in Utah because the jury is going to be all Mormons and they're not going to convict another Mormon. So there was, yeah, not a lot went on. So it wasn't until the 20th century, 100 years later, essentially, that the conspiracy theory became the official theory. And you know who pushed?
00:28:12
Speaker
to make the conspiracy very official.
Conspiracy Acceptance and Church Stance
00:28:16
Speaker
Ronald Reagan? The Mormons. Sorry. I just randomly guessed. The Mormons. Why? Because they were more interested than anyone in their own history. They were interested in looking at the history of the mountain meadows massacre and they were the ones who were going
00:28:35
Speaker
The more we look at the archives and the more we bring the documentary evidence up, the more it looks like it was ordered by elders within the Mormon Church. But crucially, Brigham Young had no idea what was going on. So the official line by the Mormon churches. The massacre was organized by the Mormons. But Brigham Young, if he knew about it, was not involved in the organization of that massacre. He's out of it.
00:29:04
Speaker
Yes, so in 1950, a Mormon historian called Juanita Brooks published a book called The Mountain Meadows Massacre, and she basically concluded that Mormons had led to the massacre. They were actually responsible for it. And then within a couple of decades, most Mormon historians accepted this as the true version of this. So the conspiracy theory became the official theory.
00:29:30
Speaker
self reflective like I'm sort of comparing it in my mind to you know pedophile priests and stuff and it sort of feels like Catholic saying yes no whoops it wasn't just a few bad apples you know it's systemic and having that kind of reckoning which I don't know I just I guess I find that surprising that they
00:29:50
Speaker
I mean, it does help the events by this time were over a hundred years ago. Yeah, okay. I suppose maybe that makes a difference. Well, so the problem with the pedophile priest thing in a lot of Christian churches is it's still going on now.
00:30:04
Speaker
Yeah, now, in terms of the involvement of Brigham Young, I think when listening to Steve's talk, he definitely gave the impression that Brigham Young was like behind it. Like he had said, if you guys don't let me run Utah the way I want, bad things are going to happen. I'm not going to keep the Native Americans in line. And who knows what's going to happen? Oh, look at that. 120 people got massacred.
00:30:27
Speaker
But I hadn't, like reading up on it, I haven't seen that particular angle mentioned anywhere else. I started at Wikipedia and there is a surprising amount about the Mountain Meadows massacre in Wikipedia. There's like, you know, there's the main page and then there's war hysteria leading up to the Mountain Meadows massacre. Media reaction to the Mountain Meadows, there's a lot. Possibly all the more than, well, that's what I kind of thought, yes. Possibly, yeah. Possibly because there's Brigham Young University.
00:30:57
Speaker
Yes, I was trying to think where I'd heard of that. Yeah, no, of course. So, yeah, it's possible. A lot of the information in Wikipedia was written by Mormons, but that's certainly there they didn't push. I had a bit of a Google as well, and most of the websites mentioning it were associated with the Mormons. But even things like that, I think there was a Britannica or something website that didn't bring that up.
00:31:20
Speaker
They talk a lot about the fact that the Mormon leaders had sort of been hyping their congregations up for violence. There was a prominent Mormon had been murdered somewhere else not too long before. There was a lot of talk of sort of vengeance and blood vengeance and stuff, and the idea that these people needed to be avenged.
00:31:44
Speaker
And then there was also a lot of talk about the idea that they were convinced that war was coming, that America was going to go to war with Utah, which they kind of did. There was a Utah war at some point. But so they were basically they were primed for violence, the whole sort of woman community. So this was
00:32:01
Speaker
this was something that was almost bound to happen. In fact, I did copy from Wikipedia the line, there is a consensus among historians that Brigham Young played a role in provoking the massacre, at least unwittingly, and in concealing its evidence after the fact. Which means that even if you think
00:32:21
Speaker
that Brigham Young was not an astronomer. He's still culpable. He's still culpable by that leadership. He did lead the investigation that when the Mormons were not involved, and presumably as someone leading the investigation, he'd be going, ah, the Mormons were definitely involved, but I'm going to say that. If you're a leader at some point, even if you didn't directly do something, you do have to take charge of that and say, hey, I didn't lead effectively. You should tell that to Chris Veluxa.
00:32:49
Speaker
Well, I was thinking more about Trump and the insurrection, it sounds as though it was a similar sort of role, in that you didn't directly say, okay, go out and do this, but maybe... Or didn't you? Well, I don't know. You probably followed it more, but I feel like he's still culpable.
00:33:05
Speaker
There is supposedly there are letters that show Brigham Young heard that the massacre was being planned and sent off a letter saying, no, no, don't kill all of those people. That would be a bad thing. But it arrived too late. The massacre had already happened.
00:33:22
Speaker
and there's other stuff that supposedly he was he was distraught and utterly, utterly heartbroken when he found out that this is happening. Some of this may be self-serving after the fact stuff, so it's not quite apparent. It sounded like there was some debate as to whether or not these letters were actually genuine or if they'd been
00:33:39
Speaker
ginned up after the fact to make him look good or not. But yeah, I think like you say, he may not have actually ordered this massacre specifically, but he has a lot of responsibility for engineering the situation in which some sort of a massacre was almost inevitable. And also managing the information about the massacre. Yes, definitely responsible for the cover-up. Yeah.
00:34:04
Speaker
Yeah, like you say, the Trump stuff, it reminds me of when they talk about stochastic terrorism these days. You don't actually have to say, you go out and kill them. You can just say, those people are really, really bad and it would shed no tears if something bad happens to them. Just like the years of constant violent rhetoric and then all of a sudden it just needs a spark and it doesn't necessarily have to be for you. It's like when Alex Jones goes, you know, I can understand why people might want to go out on the streets and shoot those terrible trans people because
00:34:37
Speaker
Yeah, so that's the unpleasant story of the Mountain Meadows Massacre. Of course, Steve Clark is a philosopher of conspiracy theories, not a historian of conspiracy theories, so although he did spend about half his talk going over the history of the Mountain Meadows Massacre, it was in service to a
Conspiracies vs. Official Narratives
00:34:53
Speaker
greater point. What was his point?
00:34:55
Speaker
That is a good question, Josh. Let me rewind the mental tapes here. So Steve's point basically is that one of the issues we have with the discussion about conspiracy theories and the warrant of conspiracy theories
00:35:11
Speaker
is that a lot of the examples we use are conspiracy theories which are relatively quickly uncovered. So Watergate about three years, QAnon about three or four days, COVID-19 conspiracy theories, they kind of get refuted within the first year or so. He wanted to look at an example of a conspiracy theory which persists for a really long time.
00:35:38
Speaker
and ends up being warranted because people just keep on prodding at it, even though the advocates of the official theory keep on going, no, no, but the official theory is. And the conspiracy theorists who were proven right, and Steve's talk was called When Conspiracy Theorists Win, end up going, well, look, actually, we have to now accept the conspiracy theory is the official theory. And sometimes this change can happen really quickly,
00:36:06
Speaker
Or it can take 100 years or more. I don't know a lot about it, but the fact that it took 100 years, was that due to a lack of searching? Is there any particular reason? If that historian, Juanita, whoever had come along,
00:36:24
Speaker
Would it still be the official story? It sounds like there wasn't a big movement of people investigating it throughout that whole hundred years. Steve argues people kept on questioning the story in the years and decades after the story came out.
00:36:42
Speaker
because you kept on getting this trickle of new information. And that was fairly sort of... The apostate Mormons, the new investigation, the scapegoat recanting his confession, basically in front of a firing squad, because there's an entire section in Steve's talk about the way in which you can be absolved for your sins in Mormonism, which requires blood be spilt on the ground, which means that Mormons
00:37:11
Speaker
often always request a firing squad for execution because they need to make sure that blood is spilled and land on the ground when they die.
00:37:21
Speaker
there's all these things that just keep on occurring. And so that would have been like decades afterwards? Yeah, that would have been a few decades afterwards. But I think, I mean, yeah, there must have been enough interest carrying on into the next century for people to, for historians to be looking into it. But I think, yeah, I mean, it sounds like here was the official story. And while there were doubts around it, it managed to stay the official story for a long, long time, which
00:37:46
Speaker
Yeah, I think, especially if you're the sort of person who thinks that conspiracy theories are naturally opposed to official theories, and never the twain shall meet. And then people say, well, hang on, look at Watergate. It started as a conspiracy, but then it became the official theory. And they're able to say, well, it was so quick. It never really, doesn't really count as a conspiracy theory because it became the official theory so fast. And so Steve will say, OK, well, here's one where it took 100 years. So you can't call that trick. And Steve is not a fan of this distinction between official theories and conspiracy theories.
00:38:16
Speaker
theories, he wants to point out there's nothing wrong with an official theory being conspiratorial. For the reasons that you've talked about previously. And also he wanted to have a go at some generalists, and also some particularists, who have misconstrued his work. But that's another part of his studies. There was a bunch more of it after that. So that's the mountain meadows massacre. Do you feel like a better person for knowing about it?
00:38:45
Speaker
no do you feel i can't imagine you feel like a happier person not happier not better potentially a little bit more well informed about mormons inspired to go see the book of mormon there's probably a takeaway from it of what all the pages have inspired is wanting you to watch the musical the book of mormon is probably not the takeaway message
00:39:09
Speaker
Well, I'm sorry. I apologize. What was the show with Bill Paxton? Big Love, wasn't it? Oh, he was a moment of that. Anyway, sorry. No, not me either. Not my couple, too. We just recommend that people watch the show. We only recommend it because Bill Paxton... Because Bill Paxton. That's a pretty good... That's not a bad reason. Yeah, Bill Paxton's great.
00:39:36
Speaker
Can you think of it just before I forget and you go all the way down the pop culture road? Is there any other conspiracy theories either you can think of that is anything close to that amount of time before?
00:39:48
Speaker
conspiracy theory was proven, right? Or is this far and away probably the longest? I mean, maybe the donation of Constantine, which is a document the Roman Catholic Church forged to say that they were given the power to make kings and emperors, which they claimed was written by Constantine just before he died. And it was an ongoing
00:40:14
Speaker
discussion slash scandal slash dispute during the Middle Ages as to whether the document was legitimate or illegitimate and at some point it was and at some point it was clearly fake and it really was it was one of it was an ongoing debate as to whether it was real or fake so maybe maybe it's another example of a long-term conspiracy
00:40:39
Speaker
But the problem with that was that even the Catholic Church kept on changing its mind about the logismacy of the donation of Constantine. When it was convenient for it to be authentic, it was. And when it didn't really matter that it was clearly a forgery. How long did it take the Moscow Hill Show trials to come out? Obviously 100 years. That was 20 years. A couple of decades at least. Becomes official with Khrushchev.
00:41:09
Speaker
in 1959, I think. Yeah. So that's decades, which is still a long time to be considered a conspiracy theorist by both the Russian state and the global West. Well, there you go. So I think that's the end of the episode. So now we need to record a bonus episode. What are we going to talk about in the bonus episode? I have no idea because I've got no content this week for the bonus episode, Josh. I haven't seen anything online.
00:41:39
Speaker
No. Maybe we'll have to talk more about the conference or something. Maybe. Maybe we can also talk about whether we're going to move ourselves to threads. Which, yeah. Wasn't that the show about everyone dying in the UK? That's what I was just going to say. I've heard things. The traumatic radiation thing. But it causes PTSD amongst anyone who was alive in Britain in the 80s. Never seen threads. But maybe we should leave that conversation.
00:42:01
Speaker
indeed also we have to record the intro to this episode as well because the world's gone topsy-turvy because the intro mind of gives the game away a little so we're going to record the intro now then we'll record a bonus episode the world's gone mad it has and i'm here for it
00:42:20
Speaker
Right. Well, that's it. So thank you, Georgia, for providing a little color to what would have otherwise just sort of been a back and forth. Now we've got to revisit a favorite old format. I'm glad my ignorance was useful. Ignorance is always useful. It is very useful, except for it's not.
00:42:38
Speaker
Yeah. Yep, that'll do. Anything else? Nothing else. Do you have, I should say for, in terms of upcoming episodes, do you have more interviews that we will do? Yes, we have an interview for next week. Right, there we go. And then we should have an interview for two weeks after that. And then maybe, maybe an interview for two weeks after that two weeks. I'll also look out for that. But for now, I think we're done. So I'm just going to say goodbye. Goodbye. Later.
00:43:09
Speaker
The podcast's guide to the conspiracy stars Josh Addison and myself, associate professor M.R.X. Stentors. Our show's cons... sorry, producers are Tom and Philip, plus another mysterious anonymous donor. You can contact Josh and myself at podcastconspiracyatgmail.com, and please do consider joining our Patreon. And remember, Soylent Green is meeples.