A new TV show from HBO called Big Love tells the story of a polygamist family in Salt Lake City, an upsetting concept to the Mormon Church because of its potential among other things to confuse viewers.
Some members of the Mormon church practiced polygamy after its founding, but its practice was discontinued in 1890. Since then, no polygamist can be a member of the Church. So called “fundamentalist Mormons” that practice polygamy aren’t actually Mormons. Setting a TV show about polygamy in Salt Lake City seems sloppy on the part of HBO since (non-Mormon) polygamists today are most likely to be in rural Utah, Arizona, or Texas. And it’s a bit irreponsible since it perpetuates myths about Mormonism.
The Church has released at least one press release about Big Love, mentioning three concerns:
- Concern for abuse victims
- Confusion over the continued practice of polygamy
- Concern over the moral standards of television entertainment
My favorite part of the press release touched not only on Big Love, but the general “unhealthy preoccupation with sex, coarse humor and foul language”:
Big Love, like so much other television programming, is essentially lazy and indulgent entertainment that does nothing for our society and will never nourish great minds. Parents who are casual about their viewing habits ought not to be surprised if teaching moral choices and civic values to their children becomes harder as a result.
Mormons, however, may have little to worry about since the show appears to be a flop:
From what I can tell, the goal of [Big Love] is to prove that life can be just as mundane, colorless and boring with three spouses as it can with one or none. Mission accomplished…. Nothing [the actors] do breathes life into these characters or their problems, most of which seem to center on the inherent difficulty of scheduling three intertwined households. (USA Today)
