Utah Mormons-The Single Story

After looking around on the internet for a few minutes, I quickly learned that there are a plethora of different groups of people that are stereotyped by other groups of people. I could have chosen from a variety of groups that are seen by the world as "weird" or "funny" or all kinds of other things. I, however, chose to talk about a group that I, personally and recently, have ignorantly single-storied. Not the Mormons (although I could talk on and on about how the world sees us) but more specifically, the Utah Mormons.

Growing up in Arizona for my entire life, having never been to Utah but hearing much about it and about the people who lived there, I thought that I knew exactly what they were like. Everyone knows exactly what I am talking about when I say "Utah Mormons" (also known as Molly Mormons). I thought that I knew exactly how they all were. They were the people who didn't seem to have a limit on the number of children they could have. They all drove mini vans (or giant vans for that matter). They wore tennis shoes with jeans and polos. They said things like "bottoms" instead of "butts." All they did all day was read. They never drank anything with caffeine in it, and the only thing on their ipods was music from EFY and A Capella groups. I could go on and on, but you get the picture.

So then 2013 came, and there I was, a freshman at BYU....in Utah. It just so happened that all of my roommates were Utah Mormons themselves, so I thought I knew all about them after meeting them for the first time. After about a week, we all went shopping together. When my roommate from South Jordan bought a twelve-pack of Dr. Pepper, I was shocked. Slowly time passed and I began meeting more and more people from Utah. People who were nothing like what I thought. They knew styles, they knew about the popular bands, and they knew how to have fun dance parties. Yes, I will admit that I was far from accurate on how these people actually were. Now, obviously growing up I didn't know anyone who was actually from Utah and lived there, but I had heard these things from other people. From friends, from the media, the internet, and so on. And so it is with many stereotypes- we as human beings become far too trusting of others and tend to believe something just because someone says so. I have learned that it is very important to meet a variety of people and be open to knowing about how people truly are, before you single story them.