A very interesting piece for sure! I study religion, and as such my Instagram is FILLED with religious “influencers” from everything from Mormonism to Orthodox Judaism to greek orthodoxy to deconstructing evangelicals to the rather bizarre “nation of Islam.” I’m constantly interested with and engaging with people who are showing their religious lifestyle online, and I have thought lots about how interesting it is that these Mormon influencer women are often less blatant or upfront about it— seemingly trying to portray their lives as simple, beautiful, traditional homemakers, with only a slight caption reference to Jesus or one video every so often of “grwm for church”. Other religious women influencers have content like Miriam Ezagui (who I LOVE) who starts every video with an audience-asked or common question/misconception and then says “hi, I’m Miriam, and I’m an orthodox Jewish woman sharing my daily life” and then proceeds to answer the question. Her religion and many others’ is quite upfront rather than more hidden as a backbone of her aesthetic, like it is in ballerinafarm (which I have also followed for several years).
Interestingly, just yesterday I met with 2 LDS missionaries. I have a project of trying to visit new types of churches each week to learn more (yeah, I’m a nerd, I’m obsessed with religion), and when I asked in an online form for my local LDS church what I could expect from a service, they reached out to meet up. I had a really good time talking to these two “elders” (a 22 year old boy and an 18 year old boy) and I didn’t pull any punches— asking hard questions about gender and women’s role in the church, the problem of evil, ethics of missionary work especially when it aids in erasure of indigenous or local religion and goes hand in hand with colonialism, and lots of other things. I was upfront that I didn’t think I would ever convert but liked learning, and they appreciated my attentiveness, note taking, curiosity about their lives, and my hard questions which one said “he’d never thought about before.” They generally answered the questions well and though I disagreed with a lot I also learned a lot.
Anyway, I thought your piece was very interesting, as the trend of these homemaker women influencers being Mormon is something I’ve noticed and thought about for a long time. I also follow several Messianic Jew women homemaker influencers, and it’s quite interesting to see them interacting online with some Mormon or evangelical women influencers. These women follow each other, comment on each others posts, or even meetup. They’re all particular (somewhat extreme or abnormal to me) strains of Christianity, with particularly enforced ideas of womanhood that have influenced how all of them show their own womanhood and which relate them together in their homemaker-for-Christ roles.
I have seen Miriam’s content as well and am very fascinated by it!! I wonder why Mormon influencers are less upfront about their views in their content - perhaps it’s because of the stigma they often catch in mainstream media. I think it would be interesting to do a more fleshed out version of this piece where actual Mormons are interviewed about their perception of influencers like Ballerina Farm. Your conversation with the elders sounds fascinating. Religious expression and religion and spirituality in general are so interesting, I understand why it’s your area of study :)
Interviewing other Mormons about ballerina farm would indeed be interesting! I did have some intriguing conversations/hear some anecdotes from the missionaries about what it’s like to try to spread a religion that has SUCH negative connotations and reputation in the media, and heard about the variety of methods they use/how they deal with hate and rejection. Makes me want to ask them more questions abt that and ballerina farm if I meet with them again
I'm an exmormon and this is such an interesting piece! There's something to be said about the fact that there's a lot of performance in Mormon culture. People notice if you miss church and visit you, you're taught to be a good example to others so they become curious about the church, you're taught to "avoid the appearance of evil" by not publicly consuming anything that looks remotely like alcohol or coffee, etc. I also think it's interesting that while these influencers you've mentioned have ties to Mormonism, within Mormon culture they're pretty much "disowned" and not considered faithful Mormons because many of them clearly do not wear the Mormon garment/underwear which is another metric by which Mormons are judged if they are faithful/worthy. Just a quick note too: the former president to the church you mentioned is Ezra Taft Benson, not Ezra Taft.
I’m so glad you found the piece interesting!! Very fascinating that influencers are often looked down upon in the church - runs counter to some of the research I came across. But I think that just speaks to the nuances across religions. And thank you for the note on Ezra Taft Benson!! I’m gonna correct that - that was referenced incorrectly across some of my sources
Thank you Madison for writing this, I could read about Mormon influencers all day! This piece made me reflect on how social media influencers represent a new vanguard of proselytizing, which is a benchmark of Mormonism but was usually carried out through missionary work. Although as spens pointed out, these influencers are not considered to be particularly faithful. I wonder how effective (if it all) this "passive proselytization" is in converting young people to Mormonism, and whether or not the Mormon Church would ever encourage and institutionalize Mormon social media influencing to the extent it has mission work.
Thank you Ted! I found conflicting thoughts on this across my research. My thoughts are that it’s likely ineffective in converting as most non-LDS ppl likely find Mormon influencing to be purely entertainment. How the Church itself views it likely varies - I would think it could differ from person to person.
same hahaha, the nymphet alumni one is interesting bc it talks a bit about the fashion aspects n how they have always kinda been the one behind trends but anyways brilliant post <3
I recently read Jennette McCurdy’s ‘I’m Glad My Mom Died’ and this has provided a really fascinating exterior parallel to her account of a girl/young woman’s life from within Mormonism - I really appreciate how you’ve brought the convo into the territory of capitalism, such an important relationship to engage with and ties together discussions of religion, gender, colonialism and class, or rather, highlights how they’re interweft . Love love love
A very interesting piece for sure! I study religion, and as such my Instagram is FILLED with religious “influencers” from everything from Mormonism to Orthodox Judaism to greek orthodoxy to deconstructing evangelicals to the rather bizarre “nation of Islam.” I’m constantly interested with and engaging with people who are showing their religious lifestyle online, and I have thought lots about how interesting it is that these Mormon influencer women are often less blatant or upfront about it— seemingly trying to portray their lives as simple, beautiful, traditional homemakers, with only a slight caption reference to Jesus or one video every so often of “grwm for church”. Other religious women influencers have content like Miriam Ezagui (who I LOVE) who starts every video with an audience-asked or common question/misconception and then says “hi, I’m Miriam, and I’m an orthodox Jewish woman sharing my daily life” and then proceeds to answer the question. Her religion and many others’ is quite upfront rather than more hidden as a backbone of her aesthetic, like it is in ballerinafarm (which I have also followed for several years).
Interestingly, just yesterday I met with 2 LDS missionaries. I have a project of trying to visit new types of churches each week to learn more (yeah, I’m a nerd, I’m obsessed with religion), and when I asked in an online form for my local LDS church what I could expect from a service, they reached out to meet up. I had a really good time talking to these two “elders” (a 22 year old boy and an 18 year old boy) and I didn’t pull any punches— asking hard questions about gender and women’s role in the church, the problem of evil, ethics of missionary work especially when it aids in erasure of indigenous or local religion and goes hand in hand with colonialism, and lots of other things. I was upfront that I didn’t think I would ever convert but liked learning, and they appreciated my attentiveness, note taking, curiosity about their lives, and my hard questions which one said “he’d never thought about before.” They generally answered the questions well and though I disagreed with a lot I also learned a lot.
Anyway, I thought your piece was very interesting, as the trend of these homemaker women influencers being Mormon is something I’ve noticed and thought about for a long time. I also follow several Messianic Jew women homemaker influencers, and it’s quite interesting to see them interacting online with some Mormon or evangelical women influencers. These women follow each other, comment on each others posts, or even meetup. They’re all particular (somewhat extreme or abnormal to me) strains of Christianity, with particularly enforced ideas of womanhood that have influenced how all of them show their own womanhood and which relate them together in their homemaker-for-Christ roles.
I have seen Miriam’s content as well and am very fascinated by it!! I wonder why Mormon influencers are less upfront about their views in their content - perhaps it’s because of the stigma they often catch in mainstream media. I think it would be interesting to do a more fleshed out version of this piece where actual Mormons are interviewed about their perception of influencers like Ballerina Farm. Your conversation with the elders sounds fascinating. Religious expression and religion and spirituality in general are so interesting, I understand why it’s your area of study :)
Interviewing other Mormons about ballerina farm would indeed be interesting! I did have some intriguing conversations/hear some anecdotes from the missionaries about what it’s like to try to spread a religion that has SUCH negative connotations and reputation in the media, and heard about the variety of methods they use/how they deal with hate and rejection. Makes me want to ask them more questions abt that and ballerina farm if I meet with them again
I'm an exmormon and this is such an interesting piece! There's something to be said about the fact that there's a lot of performance in Mormon culture. People notice if you miss church and visit you, you're taught to be a good example to others so they become curious about the church, you're taught to "avoid the appearance of evil" by not publicly consuming anything that looks remotely like alcohol or coffee, etc. I also think it's interesting that while these influencers you've mentioned have ties to Mormonism, within Mormon culture they're pretty much "disowned" and not considered faithful Mormons because many of them clearly do not wear the Mormon garment/underwear which is another metric by which Mormons are judged if they are faithful/worthy. Just a quick note too: the former president to the church you mentioned is Ezra Taft Benson, not Ezra Taft.
I’m so glad you found the piece interesting!! Very fascinating that influencers are often looked down upon in the church - runs counter to some of the research I came across. But I think that just speaks to the nuances across religions. And thank you for the note on Ezra Taft Benson!! I’m gonna correct that - that was referenced incorrectly across some of my sources
This is going straight in my dissertation references!! Love x
Thank you!! So glad u got something from it!
Smart !
Thank you Madison for writing this, I could read about Mormon influencers all day! This piece made me reflect on how social media influencers represent a new vanguard of proselytizing, which is a benchmark of Mormonism but was usually carried out through missionary work. Although as spens pointed out, these influencers are not considered to be particularly faithful. I wonder how effective (if it all) this "passive proselytization" is in converting young people to Mormonism, and whether or not the Mormon Church would ever encourage and institutionalize Mormon social media influencing to the extent it has mission work.
Thank you Ted! I found conflicting thoughts on this across my research. My thoughts are that it’s likely ineffective in converting as most non-LDS ppl likely find Mormon influencing to be purely entertainment. How the Church itself views it likely varies - I would think it could differ from person to person.
So interesting and well written
binchtopia n nymphet alumni both did episodes on mormonism that you may like!
I loved the Binchtopia one!! They put Ballerina Farm on my radar lolol
same hahaha, the nymphet alumni one is interesting bc it talks a bit about the fashion aspects n how they have always kinda been the one behind trends but anyways brilliant post <3
Thank youuu! I’m interested in checking that out - fashion isn’t an area I explored for this one
I recently read Jennette McCurdy’s ‘I’m Glad My Mom Died’ and this has provided a really fascinating exterior parallel to her account of a girl/young woman’s life from within Mormonism - I really appreciate how you’ve brought the convo into the territory of capitalism, such an important relationship to engage with and ties together discussions of religion, gender, colonialism and class, or rather, highlights how they’re interweft . Love love love