
How Mormons built a startup ecosystem in Utah - simonebrunozzi
https://marker.medium.com/how-mormons-built-the-next-silicon-valley-while-no-one-was-looking-c50add577478
======
npunt
I've been really impressed with SLC when I visit, and my brother recently
moved there from LA. It's got a lot going for it and is quite appealing for
tech, giving housing prices, a culture of reasonable working hours, and access
to nature. SLC is also becoming more cosmopolitan, and the region seems like
it is generally run quite well.

Unfortunately, there's also bad pollution. The valley makes SLC prone to
pollution and especially inversion layers in the winter and ozone in summer.
You'd expect mountain air and you get that sometimes, but other times it's as
bad as or worse than major cities elsewhere.

One of the downsides of being a red state is less will to address
environmental concerns like this. It's been slowly getting better due to car
emissions standards (which Utah has no active involvement in), but there's
still a lot of pollution sources that need addressing. There's an active
refinery in town, at least one big mine across the valley, tons of trucks and
trains passing through the region, and the airport is being expanded.

Given the air is also extremely dry in the winter, I can't see myself moving
there, despite it hitting a lot of my criteria for places to live. Were they
to get their environmental house in order I'd say it's one of the best places
to live. I hope someday SLC realizes its just not geographically destined to
be an industrial hub, and makes responsible choices to shift away from that.

[http://www.stateoftheair.org/city-
rankings/states/utah/salt-...](http://www.stateoftheair.org/city-
rankings/states/utah/salt-lake.html)

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Air_quality_in_Utah](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Air_quality_in_Utah)

[https://www.sltrib.com/news/environment/2020/01/28/salt-
lake...](https://www.sltrib.com/news/environment/2020/01/28/salt-lake-citys-
air/)

~~~
remarkEon
>Unfortunately, there's also bad pollution. The valley makes SLC prone to
pollution and especially inversion layers in the winter and ozone in summer.
You'd expect mountain air and you get that sometimes, but other times it's as
bad as or worse than major cities elsewhere.

I had no idea about this, wow. What causes it? Just the fact that it's in a
valley? I've been to SLC only once to visit some friends, but I guess I didn't
really notice (was only driving through).

~~~
eco
Yeah, it's just the geography that causes it. It's enclosed on three sides by
the Wasatch, Traverse, and Oquirrh mountains which causes cold air to be
trapped there. The Salt Lake metro area isn't much different from other cities
of similar size and makeup when it comes to actual emissions. It's just that
those emissions stick around sometimes during a couple of weeks in the winter.
Because of this, Utah meets all the annual mean PM 2.5 EPA requirements but
fails the 24-hour limits (we have occasional very bad days but most days are
good).

~~~
jakebol
Unfortunately "its just geography" is kind of one of the talking points for
not really addressing the problem. Although true, concerted reductions in
pollution have happened when there was political will to make it happen
(mostly through the federal gov. / EPA clean air regulations).

Ogden and Provo are some of the worst offenders for per household air
pollution emissions. Like many western cities they have longish commutes
(everywhere) in large cars (trucks / suv's) with a high number of cars /
household and almost non-functional public transport system. For the Salt Lake
Metro area, per capita carbon emissions doubled between 1980 and 2015 because
of increasing sprawl. Air regulations here are spotty for personal vehicles
and I'm guessing almost non-existent for commercial vehicles. Oh and the state
governments solution to this is to push a publicly subsidized "inland port"
that will bring increased truck and rail traffic to the valley. The leaders of
these tech companies are starting to point out that terrible air pollution for
parts of the year is hurting recruitment so it seems like as the money flows
into this sector maybe there will be political will on the state and local
side to address some of these issues.

------
jdhn
I find it interesting how so much of the article was concerned about
diversity. It seems like SLC is punching above its weight class when it comes
to startups even though it's not as diverse as the writer would like it to be,
which raises the question as to whether diversity is necessary in order to
succeed and grow even larger.

~~~
throwaway894345
The thing that strikes me as especially interesting about our drive for
diversity is that it’s based on the premise that if you hire people who look
different, then you will very likely get people with heterogeneous viewpoints,
which will make an organization stronger. I think this absolutely makes sense
provided you sample evenly from all races, genders, etc; however, what I
suspect is happening is that organizations that sort of worship diversity end
up selecting from each race, gender, etc only those people who are similarly
obsessive about diversity, and this selection bias erodes much of the
purported benefit of diversity.

Notably, institutions like academia and media increasingly consider viewpoint
homogeneity something akin to moral purity, and consequently they end up with
lots of racial and gender diversity but minimal viewpoint diversity (of course
the degree of homogeneity is not uniform across these institutions, but this
doesn’t detract from my point).

~~~
dragonwriter
> The thing that strikes me as especially interesting about our drive for
> diversity is that it’s based on the premise that if you hire people who look
> different, then you will very likely get people with heterogeneous
> viewpoints

No, it's not. It's about social justice and corporate citizenship. Viewpoint
heterogenity and other arguments of private benefit have always been secondary
arguments.

> Notably, institutions like academia and media increasingly consider
> viewpoint homogeneity something akin to moral purity

AFAICT this isn't increasingly true of either, though it's perhaps slightly
increasingly true (with different favored viewpoints) within individual media
firms rather than the media as a whole. The argument that it is increasingly
true tends to come from supporters of what was, until recently, the dominant
ideology in those institutions and all of society, and is more about that
viewpoint no longer being as strongly favored than increasing homogeneity.

~~~
alicemaz
>It's about social justice and corporate citizenship. Viewpoint heterogenity
and other arguments of private benefit have always been secondary arguments.

it's more akin to a sales tactic

compare the shift in preeminence from "free software" to "open source." the
pioneers make a moral/ideological argument why doing such-and-such thing is an
imperative, get visibility and carve out a niche, but don't achieve mass
adoption. bit later, the strivers show up and argue such-and-such actually
just makes good business sense, and this proves interesting and palatable
enough to get fully institutionalized

or, say, the shift from "gay liberation" to "gay rights." the argument in the
60s and 70s was that we're inherently subversive entities whose lifestyles by
their very nature go against the status quo. by the 00s the dominant line is
if only we had these and those legal rights, the final obstacles to our
complete willing assimilation into the status quo!

as "diversity" continues its transition from ideal championed by believers to
administrative function served by a professional class, it will continue to
mutate in a way that benefits those who implement it

------
hpoe
So I live in Utah been here for most of my life and been involved in the Utah
start up scene, and quite frankly I've been wondering why Utah has been at the
top of more tech hub lists. The fact of the matter is you have a very edicated
population with two major universities a younger population and a government
that looks favorably on business. I'm surprised it took anyone this long to
notice. I think there are two factors that work against the traditional SV
perception in Utah.

Both of them stem from teachings of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day
Saints ( of which I am a member) the first is the emphasis on families. A
commonly heard refrain is "no success can compensate for failure in the home",
this emphasis on family doesn't always meld well with eh working 80-100 hours
a week, FAANG obsession mentality that is caricatured as part of being an SV
startup.

The second is also another teaching of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter
Day Saints that counsels it's memebers to avoid excessive debt. Whereas the
entire SV startup mentality is get as much VC as you can and blow through it
as quick as you can to fuel growth hopong you can claw your way out later. As
data point on this until a while back I was working at ones of Utah's biggest,
hottest most profitable startups as one of the first employees. The CEO didn't
take out a bunch of business loans or get VC, he had owned quite a bit of
property and liquidated it all to start the company.

Now the objection will be that everyone in Utah isn't a member of the Church
of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, however the culture still is pretty
pervasive.

That being said there are exceptions to every rule and things are changing.
But most importantly.

There are too dang many of you coming to Utah and filling up my mountains and
desert stay out find somewhere else live.

~~~
sbrother
Totally agree with this as a non-Mormon living in Utah. The culture is
pervasive -- largely in a good way IMO. We moved here from California (ahem,
sorry for filling up your mountains and desert) and love it. It's totally
normal to have a family in your twenties, head out of the office at 5:00
sharp, and make friends hanging out with the kids in the mountains. Even as an
ex-coastal democrat I am totally fine with the Mormon "compassionate
Republicans" like Romney, Huntsman, and Cox. Wouldn't want to live anywhere
else at this point. Now if we can just figure out traffic in the
Cottonwoods.....

~~~
609venezia
> Now if we can just figure out traffic in the Cottonwoods.....

This problem is actually the main reason I haven't moved to SLC yet. So much
of the draw there is about being able to get up into (and out of) the
mountains quickly, and during ski season (as you know but other readers might
not) it can get really terrible. Like worse than I-70 west of Denver terrible

I have tried the ski bus approach, but had a frightening experience of being
on one of the last buses down on a crowded day when LCC went into an
interlodge event. I have heard a lot of proposals for solving the problem,
from gondola to restricting car access and pushing people toward the buses,
but so far I think there is no end in sight?

~~~
2trill2spill
The traffic in the Cottonwoods is not that bad as long as you avoid the
weekends particularly powder days and holidays. But if you head up to any of
the cottonwood resorts midweek there's not really any traffic. I often ride
Park city on busy weekends instead of in the Cottonwoods because Park city is
better able to handle the crowds. But if your trying to do a weekend day in
the Cottonwoods get up and in the canyon early before the conga line starts.

------
jboggan
Good article for the most part. I was amazed when I moved here from Santa
Monica a.k.a. Silicon Beach at how much startup and VC activity there is. Even
down in Provo which I'd probably call the southern terminus of Silicon Slopes
I overheard VC pitches at the next table in the restaurants every day at
lunch. There is a lot of hustle and prosperity going on out here. Provo is
also a very Mormon town in a Mormon state, containing BYU and also their
missionary training center. Despite that I haven't found the cultural shift
too jarring, though I will say the liquor selection in the state-run stores is
a little lacking. Overall it seems like a very healthy and industrious
community and I don't doubt it will continue to grow as the previous centers
of tech innovation in America start to run into some very hard limits in terms
of housing, cost of living, density of young well-educated workers, and
overall lifestyle quality.

~~~
AnimalMuppet
Housing: The problem is that Provo and Salt Lake both sit in valleys with
pretty steep mountains around them. There's not that much more room left to
build more houses on. (Provo has some, south of it, and the Salt Lake Valley
has some on the southwest quadrant, but they're getting somewhat close to
maxed out.) So housing prices, while currently not that bad by the standards
of the rest of the tech hubs, may not stay that way for long.

~~~
dougmwne
Only in America could a person consider Salt Lake City "full" or too dense.
The area is an enormous sprawl with almost no density. It's true that there
are some mountain ranges, but there are plentiful passes that lead into
adjacent large valleys. They only way you run out of room is if everyone needs
a suburban McMansion.

~~~
AnimalMuppet
True on both counts. But to build dense apartments,you'd have to tear down
existing stuff (for the most part). That's not an impossible obstacle, of
course, but it would take rezoning. I don't know how easy that is to do here.

And yes, there are other valleys. Summit County isn't great, though, partly
because it's very expensive (ski resort country), and partly because the
valleys are very small. There's Tooele Valley to the west, but access is a
problem (the valley is west of the Salt Lake Valley, and runs north-south, but
the only connection is at the north end). There's the valley Nephi is in,
south of Provo. (Maybe 10 years ago I considered buying some land on the
northern side of this valley, on the idea that it would eventually become
subdivisions.) I wouldn't want to live there and work anywhere north of Provo,
though. And Utah doesn't (yet) have the mindset to accept two-hour commutes.

So yes, you're right. And yet... it's going to take either zoning changes or
long commute times, and I'm not sure what the appetite here is for either.

~~~
TulliusCicero
> That's not an impossible obstacle, of course, but it would take rezoning. I
> don't know how easy that is to do here.

Depends on what dimension you're measuring. Technically? Easy, at one point
most of the US didn't have strict zoning, and most peer nations have nothing
like this, it's hardly necessary. And usually these cities allow for
apartments _somewhere_ in the city, even if it's a small strip of land, it's
not some unknown concept.

Politically? Hoo boy, that's a hard one. Because most Americans who live in
these areas _hate_ anything other than super low housing density.

------
steelframe
Full disclosure: I graduated from BYU, but I left Mormonism over 15 years ago.
I still have a lot of active Mormon in-laws in the area, so I still visit SLC
at least once a year. I know several people working in the tech industry
there.

There was no shortage of talent at BYU, but the lack of diversity on every
front in the engineering programs was stark. Engineering programs were almost
entirely composed of white men. In the hallways and labs of the Clyde
Building, I heard a lot of sexist jokes. For example, "I'm dating someone
who's going for her EE -- Elementary Education!"

Looking back, I now realize it was really quite hostile toward female
students. They often weren't taken seriously since the graduation rate for
women at BYU was (and still is) horrible, and they were constantly asked out
on dates by their classmates. Saying "no" too often would get them a
"reputation," and I know of at least a couple who got a talking to by their
bishops (male Mormon religious leaders) about the importance of dating so they
could get married and start a family.

Of course BYU itself is almost entirely Mormon. The only engineering students
I knew who weren't Mormon were graduate students from oversees who probably
didn't fully understand what kind of environment they were getting into when
they accepted their scholarship for whatever program they were getting into.

Since I visit Salt Lake fairly often I have a few contacts in the area who,
shall we say, don't quite "fit the mold" for the kind of people you usually
see there. It's really a chronic challenge for them to always be hit with
microaggressions, both personally and professionally. You don't even have to
look really that different for it to happen. A male wearing an earring, a
visible tattoo, or something a bit flamboyant about your clothing can impact
your ability to be included. And gods help you if you aren't religious and
find yourself in a company primarily headed by active Mormon leadership. You
can expect to be courted and invited to join at first, but once you make it
clear that you aren't gonna convert, you're going to have an uphill battle in
the inclusion front from that point on.

That said, when I'm ready to start a tech business of my own, I'd really
really like to be able to do it in the Salt Lake area. The problem is that I'd
want a healthy amount of diversity among my co-workers, and the easiest way to
go about doing that is to hire at a place where the diversity already exists.

~~~
KingMachiavelli
Does SLC have an some advantage over the Denver metro area? It seems like both
are pretty comparable yet the Denver has more room to grow; pollution is a
huge problem in SLC. SLC may be a bit cheaper but I think it's catching up
fast due and Denver is quite a bit more diverse and has a lot of cheaper
suburbs.

Perhaps I'm comparing Apples to Oranges but I've just always been surprised by
the relative interest in SLC compared to the Denver area, at least by HN
metrics.

------
dmode
Can we just stop calling every place with a few startups, the next Silicon
Valley ? Just as the article said, Utah startups didn’t even raise combined
$1bn in 2017, where SV companies routinely raise 30-40bn every year. It is
just another bit player to write some articles about

~~~
adventured
It's a fair point, nobody should be confusing the Salt Lake City area for
Silicon Valley. Trajectory matters though, Utah is obviously doing well. Their
annual venture capital raised has increased by roughly 300% in ten years and
is likely to continue climbing.

To put $1 billion into perspective, it's more VC than these countries have per
year:

Italy, the Netherlands, Ireland, Finland, Portugal, Denmark, Belgium, Russia,
Norway, Austria.

And it nearly matches Sweden. Utah raises more venture capital than Italy and
Russia combined. Utah has three million people.

They'll never have the population to challenge densely populated California.
Can they get to $2-$3 billion in annual VC in the coming decade? Yep.

~~~
biztos
Interesting, I had to look this up but for population density[0]:

* California: #17, 251/sq mile

* Utah: #46, 36/sq mile

I sort of doubt California's population density is the decisive thing here,
but I agree that Utah's performance is impressive. Especially regarding VC, it
would be fascinating to know how much of the money invested in Utah is from
Utahns who made it big outside of Utah. In that it might (I randomly
speculate) be more like some other countries than like other parts of the USA.

[0]:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_states_and_territories...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_states_and_territories_of_the_United_States_by_population_density)

------
jimsparkman
I relocated to SLC recently after taking a new position in my company. It has
been a very positive experience so far. Tech scene is bustling, a number of
interesting meetups. From a geographical perspective, the mountains offer
incredible opportunity for adventure. A mix of desert to high alpine.

I’ve lived numerous places domestic and abroad, and haven’t seen anything
quite like the accessibility to adventure as is found in SLC. Trail/mountain
running, numerous ski resorts, Park City (of Winter Olympics fame), rock
climbing, mountaineering and backcountry skiing, etc. All within 20 minutes
drive.

It’s surprisingly amazing how close to the city you can be and yet feel so far
away. You can get ~6,000 feet above the valley within a few hours run/hike and
see moose, mountain goats, porcupine, etc.

Also interesting is the number of outdoor gear companies that have offices
here. Petzl, Black Diamond, Backcountry, etc.

------
milofeynman
I've interviewed in SLC before and the biggest problem with their startup
scene is the complete lack of diversity. Otherwise it would be amazing to live
near those mountains. I'm just not interested in working at a company with so
literal cultural and racial diversity.

~~~
arxv33
As a person of color and someone who is interested in moving to SLC for more
affordable cost of living I am interested. Can you elaborate more? What is it
that you found negative? I worked at firms with lack of racial diversity where
I was literally the only non white person but didn’t have much problem other
than of course not being able to relate in some off the work conversations and
socializing aspects of it. I thought SLC is now a lot more diverse than it was
10yrs ago partly cause the housing pressure in other big cities.

~~~
phaedryx
Definitely more diverse than it used to be, but not like other large cities;
Hispanic and Pacific Islanders are the two fastest-growing non-white groups,
iirc.

~~~
walrus01
I'm sure it's not a random coincidence that pacific island nations and
Mexico/Central America are also top destinations for Mormon missionaries.

------
telaelit
I work at a tech company in Utah and it really cannot be understated that the
Mormon culture sweeps into literally every aspect of Utah. Not saying that’s
negative, just that it exists. Me and my ex and non- Mormon coworkers had to
beg management to let us have a happy hour for example, they had to change
company policies to even allow us to do it.

But I do love it here

------
arpowers
As a non-mormon Utahn that lives in California; the reason things are so well
in Utah has nothing to do w Mormonism and more to do with a focus on value
creation as opposed to social issues, regulations, and taxes.

California has been working very hard to kill it's golden goose for a long
time. Reasonable people are going to other states.

~~~
0xcde4c3db
> California has been working very hard to kill it's golden goose for a long
> time. Reasonable people are going to other states.

People have been saying that sort of thing since the '90s, if not earlier. If
California has been working so hard for so long to ruin things, why are we
still talking about places being the next Silicon Valley, and not the next
Austin or the next Research Triangle?

~~~
austincheney
Well perhaps it helps to think of it in terms of raw numbers. California is
bleeding about 60,000 people per year just to Texas. My city in Texas is
averaging a growth rate of about 22% decade over decade having doubled since
1990 to surpass San Francisco in population and will likely surpass San Jose
in about 15 years. On pace with the population growth is growth in diversity
and average household income. That means that as the population increases the
wealth distribution and access to purchasing and property increases for more
people than naught.

It’s not all peaches and cream in this fast growing city though. The
tremendous growth results in colossal strain on traffic and infrastructure,
but ownership of a large house with a yard is available to most people. That’s
not such a big deal when you’re single, but it’s huge when you have kids. The
demand for increased economic security likewise dramatically increases when
you have kids.

California is growing in population though, but very slowly and without
equivalent growth in wealth per capita. That is largely a result in personal
wealth primarily tied to home ownership and home ownership declining
generationally in California.

I take from your comment that you are less concerned with raw numbers and more
concerned with vanity labels and trends. If you are a well funded founder
perhaps California remains the place to be, but the numbers indicate it’s no
longer the epicenter of economic growth that it certainly was in prior
decades.

~~~
biztos
> California is bleeding about 60,000 people per year just to Texas.

And yet:

> California is growing in population

So, N people move to California each year, and M move away for M < N, and of
those T move to Texas for T < M, and this is "bleeding?"

I'm not a demographer but this makes no sense.

Could you please explain what you mean here?

~~~
jeffbee
It doesn't make any sense because the "bleeding" that is such a big meme for
the nation's conservatives considers only _domestic_ out-migration. The reason
there is so much of it is because a lot of Americans can't compete
economically with international elites who have been flooding into California.
Net domestic migration has been negative in California since 1991, with the
exception of the year 2000. Net foreign migration, and net overall migration,
has never been negative in recorded history.

~~~
austincheney
> because a lot of Americans can't compete economically

That’s an assumption not directly based on numbers. Yes, the net in migration
to California is largely from non-domestic people. That could be due to
exactly the reason you provided, or it could also be the result of less
movement freedom tied to visa sponsorship, or a variety of other factors. Many
of my tech coworkers in Texas are non-citizens under visa sponsorship who,
given the choice, have stated they prefer the Midwest due to a variety of
economic conditions (not just cost of living).

~~~
jeffbee
True, my statement incorporates facts not in evidence. Net domestic migration
to California is positive for high educational attainment (bachelors and
higher) and positive for high incomes (50k/year+). It's negative for low
educational and lower incomes. Basically the state attracts high earners and
refuses to build housing, so someone has to leave. That's the competition.

Speaking of unsupported anecdotes, it makes sense that the people you meet in
the middle of the country express a preference for being there. That's pure
selection bias. In terms of revealed preference, the states that are getting
more than their per-capita share of California out-migrants are Nevada,
Arizona, Oregon, and Washington.

------
m3kw9
Anyone can sell the crap out of anything not just mormons. This is just one
big brag piece.

------
bluedino
From Almost Perfect:

 _Alan continued to teach at BYU, so he was in a perfect position to recruit
BYU 's best computer science students. He was a tough grader, and anyone
getting an A in one of his classes was a candidate for a job offer. When Alan
found students with exceptional talent, he and Bruce would offer them part-
time jobs and put them to work on one of the programming projects. By the time
they graduated, their work had helped the company grow to the point where we
could afford to offer them good salaries. Eventually we used Alan's old grade
sheets to search for good programmers who had already graduated._

40 years ago Mormons were making startups in Utah.

------
bilater
I'm hearing Boise Idaho is also coming up similarly to Provo.

~~~
xeromal
I actually work remotely for a boise company and they pay me a LA salary.
Boise is getting pretty hot though still small. They have loads of cool
conferences and start up weeks, but of course it's all been shut down this
year.

------
potiuper
So, when did Utah ban non-competes?

~~~
mlinksva
Unfortunately they haven't, but it looks like they may have been limited to 1
year starting in 2016, see [https://www.faircompetitionlaw.com/changing-
landscape-of-tra...](https://www.faircompetitionlaw.com/changing-landscape-of-
trade-secrets-laws-and-noncompete-laws/#:~:text=Utah)

------
ww520
Wasn’t Word Perfect or WordStar based in Utah decades ago? Utah has a long
tradition of producing technology companies.

~~~
nobleach
WordPerfect and Novell. There are several other names that have affiliation
with Utah as well. The University of Utah is Alan Kay's Alma Mater. It's just
a fantastic place for tech.

~~~
virgulino
Clark Development, makers of PCBoard (BBS software), was from Salt Lake City,
I think.
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PCBoard](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PCBoard)

~~~
nobleach
Let's not forget Unisys or Caldera (which ended up owning DR-DOS)

------
onyva
>> “It turns out Catholicism is pretty strong there. You get a lot of
rejection.”

It’s like always astonishing to see how unapologetic/aware Americans are of
their ignorance of the world and other cultures.

------
hymnsfm
I doubt this comment will go over well, but I'll mention this small but
important cultural fact anyway: Members of the Church of Jesus Christ of
Latter-Day Saints no longer refer to themselves as Mormons or Latter-Day
Saints. Only Saints.

It may seem like minutia, but Saints (of whom I am one of them) worship
Christ. Mormon, on the other hand, is one of many mortal prophets from ancient
Americas and also the editor/compiler of the Book of Mormon.

If you know just that alone, it'll probably score you points with the Saints
that you meet. :)

~~~
gjm11
The trouble is that "saints" or "Saints" already _has_ a meaning, which is not
"members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints".

(In fact, it has multiple long-standing meanings, of which that is not one.)

I'm not saying you aren't entitled to call yourself that: of course you are.
But you shouldn't expect other people to go along with it, any more than if
you decided to call yourselves "Good People" or "Scientists" or "Turks".

Of course this problem occurs over and over, because groups of people _love_
to give themselves self-congratulatory names. Sometimes they succeed: consider
"Democrat[ic]" (in US politics) and "Orthodox" (in Christianity and in
Judaism), for instance. But it makes me sad every time.

~~~
desert_boi
Recently LDS was still the endonym. The exonym is almost universal for non-
Mormons.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Exonym_and_endonym](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Exonym_and_endonym)

~~~
hymnsfm
Here's the new style guide for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day
Saints: [https://newsroom.churchofjesuschrist.org/style-
guide](https://newsroom.churchofjesuschrist.org/style-guide)

~~~
gjm11
The style guide says:

> _When referring to Church members, the terms "members of The Church of Jesus
> Christ of Latter-day Saints," "Latter-day Saints,” "members of the Church of
> Jesus Christ" and "members of the restored Church of Jesus Christ" are
> preferred. We ask that the term "Mormons" and "LDS" not be used._

... so in fact "Latter-Day Saints" is apparently perfectly OK, and "Saints"
simpliciter isn't even one of the options they mention.

(But of course this is a guide _for those associated with the CoJCoLDS_ , not
an attempt to legislate what language others should use. I don't think you're
likely to have much luck getting anyone else to refer to the doctrine and
practices of the CoJCoLDS as "the restored gospel of Jesus Christ", for
instance.)

------
sneak
Any place that homogenous has deep racism and sexism waiting for you just
underneath the surface.

For me, this makes it a hard pass.

It’s not even about the benefits of diversity, as I’m a white male and would
fit right in as long as I kept my mouth shut. It’s about the huge downsides to
a culture that values conformity and enforces unwritten, arbitrary rules to
ensure future conformity.

Conformity and homogeneity is gross.

------
grahamburger
Utah and Mormonism are pretty interesting in both good and bad ways socially
and culturally. I grew up as a Mormon in Utah and still live and work here. I
don't really practice the faith anymore (finishing off my coffee as I write
this!) but most of my family including my wife does.

Culturally, Mormons are a bit like the conservative south, except remove
alcohol, add a higher respect for formal education, and crank up that
'protestant work ethic' to 11. Not that southern conservatives are lazy, but I
think there is more of a culture of enjoying some downtime with iced tea in
the shade in the South than there is among Mormons. There's also a bit of a
culture of natural distrust of authority figures in the south - especially
highly educated 'Ivy Leaguers.' There's less of that in Mormonism. Mormons
pride themselves on being highly successful outside the church, whether in
politics, business or academia. This can create huge problems for people who
don't feel like they measure up, especially for women who are expected to be
perfect housewives and homemakers while also supporting their husbands careers
and doing valuable, secular community work. Often while their husbands work
full time and then spend their off days (and all of their disposable cash)
doing an MLM side hustle. Although, as the article notes, Mormon women are
highly involved (dare I say preyed on) by MLMs as well - There are MLMs for
everything from cleaning products to beauty products to sex toys, all aimed
directly at women.[2]

The Mormon church does a pretty good job of teaching it's younger members
(mostly just the boys, unfortunately) some basics of leadership and organizing
group work efforts. These leadership rolls are mostly 'on the rails' \- the
church provides careful instruction of how to organize and lead to make these
responsibilities approachable for the novice. Members are expected to speak in
front of large and small groups from an early age, for example, and to preside
over small groups of others near their own age in youth programs. For that
reason lots of business efforts in Utah can just kind of coast on those same
learned principles. There's already a shared cultural subconscious
understanding of how groups of people 'should' work together, which overall
makes things easier to get off the ground than trying to build these
organizational structures from scratch.

The obvious downside (at least for me, I think some people experience this as
a positive) is that every day at work feels a bit like a day at church. The
people look like same, are often dressed the same, the meetings run in
basically the same format, it's all very homogeneous.

I recently spent three years working for a company based in San Francisco. For
me this was a breath of fresh air - the company was quite diverse among races,
genders, sexual orientation and identity, etc. I didn't feel like I was
sitting in Elder's Quorum meeting during daily standup[1]. I'm back at a Utah
company now and while I don't have any problems with the company overall the
feeling like I'm looking in the mirror at everyone I work with is stifling.

Since stepping away from full activity in the church I've started to realize
that these social structures are the main reason why a lot of people stay in
the church. Somehow that had never really occurred to me, although it seems
obvious now. For whatever reason in my personal life my social circle,
educational and professional prospects, even romantic prospects were never
really rooted in the church. But for many (most?) people who grow up in the
church this is not the case - if they left the church they'd be losing not
only a huge part of their own identity, but severing social ties and souring
important life opportunities. For many people this is the glue that holds
their lives together. I suspect this is true for most religious communities.
(Or even non-religious ones, like the tech community in general, which has
many of it's own problems - and yet we stay!)

The other even more surprising thing I've learned since leaving is that a lot
of people - both those currently in the church and some who have left - say
that one of the main things they enjoy(ed) / value(d) about church attendance
is the music. This is honestly weird to me because the music is about the most
boring, generic, church organ+out of tune singing you can imagine. Even as a
very young child the hymns were among my least favorite parts of church
service. To each their own.

[1] An in-joke for the other Mormons reading this. Elder's Quorum is the men's
group in the Mormon church. This group meets every Sunday during church
service (except during the pandemic, service is still mostly suspended world-
wide). This group is specifically for men aged 18 through ~retirement age,
which in the most populated parts of Utah overlaps with the group of men who
are mostly employed at tech companies. This group is also specifically tasked
with helping others in the community as needed, like helping people move or
helping elderly folks with yardwork, etc. Overall these meetings end up
feeling a lot like corporate meetings and vice-versa IME. The corresponding
women's group is called the Relief Society.

[2] See also the other currently trending article here about Mormons and MLMs.
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23882026](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23882026)

~~~
TulliusCicero
> But for many (most?) people who grow up in the church this is not the case -
> if they left the church they'd be losing not only a huge part of their own
> identity, but severing social ties and souring important life opportunities.

Yeah, a huge reason why I didn't question church teachings earlier in life was
fear of losing those social connections. I knew that to a huge percentage of
my deeper social network, leaving the church would mean becoming one of the
lost, the fallen, the apostate. And the church is very good at getting you to
police your own thoughts, especially if you're a people pleaser on some level.

