September Dawn: Mormons Portrayed as Religious Zealots Bent on Revenge

I thought that the frenzied speeches and the wild accusations the Mormon bishop used to stir up anger and hatred against the wagon train really made Mormons look like crazy wild-eyed terrorists, (and the Micah character didn't help either). But, as much as I disagree with the portrayal of Mormons as blood-thirsty vengeance seeking bastards, I have to stop myself and ask the questions:

What would it have taken to stir up the Mormons to do such a hateful, vile thing if it wasn't the frenzied speeches of their leaders and their call to duty to perform the acts of vengeance they covenanted to do in the temple?

Does anyone really believe that they calmly sat around a campfire sipping Ovaltine and discussing the pros and cons? Did they spend three days and nights praying in the temple, waiting for a vision from God and a confirmation that this is what they were to do?

Mormons no doubt would like us to believe that this was just an isolated group of religious zealots who had blood lust and were just looking for an excuse to show the rest of the U.S. not to mess with the Mormon Empire. After all, weren't the U.S. troops supposedly on their way to start a war with the Mormons? One wouldn't have to look very far into the history books to discover why that is, yet Mormons would have everyone thinking that they were only protecting themselves from a first strike. They want us to believe that they have been unfairly persecuted and cast out from their homes everywhere they settled, but a closer look would uncover the true facts of why they were treated harshly. Polygamy, claiming absolute authority of God, marching about proclaiming that all they see will eventually belong to them because they are God's chosen people, Joseph Smith boasting himself as the new Mohammed and claiming that no other man ever did such a great work as he did; these are the reasons the Mormons were driven out of Ohio, out of Missouri, and eventually out of Illinois, not "religious persecution" but 'religious zealousness".

The "poor me" attitude only get them so far. Those of us who care to really look into the history surrounding Joseph's Kirtland Banking business in Ohio, his Zion's camp activities and pompousness in Missouri, the development and deployment of the Danites, his self-grandiose stylings as General of the Nauvoo Legion and presidential candidate of the Mormons, (even to the extent of being proclaimed King) is what brought persecution on the heads of the Mormons. Not wearing funny underwear and abstaining from coffee.

Imagine how it would feel if we had a Muslim family move into your all-white Christian neighborhood, and told everyone they met that eventually everything they owned and all their land would belong to them, because God was coming to restore his kingdom on earth right in your backyard. How long would it take before that family was run out of town? Likewise, imagine a single Christian family in a Taliban state. Would it be wise for them to walk about preaching superiority and denouncing all others apostates?

I would love to hear some staunch Mormon explain ANY OTHER WAY these men could have been stirred up in such a way as to kill women and children who obviously would not have been involved (directly or indirectly) with the murder of Joseph Smith, or any of the attacks on the Mormon people in Missouri or Illinois. Whether or not they were the spouses or children of the men who perpetrated the crimes, THEY did not need to be slaughtered to atone for those sins in any case. EVEN IF it could be proved that the Fancher-Baker party had the original gun that killed Joseph Smith, where was the trial by jury? Where was the evidence, or the eye-witness accounts? And why would the women and children be just as guilty, and in just as much need of 'blood atonement'?

The only logical answer to that is that they would be witnesses to THIS CRIME and needed to be permanently silenced. If the Mormons had been justified in their murderous acts, the women and children could have been spared. Instead they were 'done away with' and butchered on the prairie. And the Mormons kept the 'spoils of war': the wagons, horses, cattle, gold, weapons, clothing and furniture, and even the personal jewelry of the slain. And the babies were adopted into 'proper' Mormon homes, away from the evil influences of their 'gentile' birth.

Can any Mormon faithful man or woman please explain it to me so that my eyes can see the hand of God in this dastardly, cowardly act of vengence?