DezNat

Not to be confused with State of Deseret.
The correct title of this article is #DezNat. The omission of the # is due to technical restrictions.
Left: A Utah beehive crossed with an Italian fasces.
Right: Original flag of the proposed State of Deseret

Deseret Nationalism, popularized online as #DezNat,[1] is a far-right Mormon nationalist movement in the United States. It originated in 2018 following the Unite the Right rally by Logan Smith, a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.[2] The term originated as a Twitter hashtag, collecting upwards of 114,000 original posts.

Contributors to The Daily Beast and The Daily Utah Chronicle have described DezNat as an extremist alt-right, white nationalist movement.[3][4][5] Journalists at The Guardian consider the group right-wing with elements of the far-right.[6] Supporters of DezNat have insisted that their purpose is to gather orthodox Latter-day Saints and defend the Church. Correspondingly, they see the term “alt-right” as inaccurate and even defamatory.[7] Supporters use Bowie knife imagery as a homage to Brigham Young.

Some within the DezNat community have advocated for the restoration of the historical State of Deseret as an independent state outside of U.S. jurisdiction.[8] As well as the secession of a theocratic Mormon state, some DezNat commentators have suggested this should be a white ethnostate using both neo-Nazi and far-right accelerationist imagery.[8][6] Users of the hashtag reject being labeled as alt-right.[4][9][5] Smith says the hashtag recognizes faithful LDS Church members as "a unique people and should be united spiritually, morally, economically, and politically behind Christ, the prophet, and the church."[3][10][11]

The community has been criticized for promoting harassment against members of the LGBTQ community, ex-Mormons, feminists, abortion-rights advocates, and pornographic film actors.[3] Some within DezNat advocate for violent actions under the pretext of blood atonement for certain sins,[3] a practice the LDS Church leadership has disavowed.[12] [13][14]

Alaskan government investigation of Matthias Cicotte

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In July 2021, investigative journalists at The Guardian identified Matthias Cicotte, an Alaska Assistant Attorney General, as a poster of racist and antisemitic Deseret Nationalist content using the Twitter account @JReubenCIark.[6][a] Following the release of the report, civil rights organizations, including the NAACP, called for the termination of Cicotte from his position and the reopening of his cases. This prompted an investigation from the Alaska Department of Law and Cicotte was removed from his caseload.[15] A Department spokesperson confirmed Cicotte was no longer working for them, stating: "However, although we cannot talk about personnel matters, we do not want the values and policies of the Department of Law to be overshadowed by the conduct of one individual."[16] Shortly thereafter, the deans of J. Reuben Clark Law School, of which both Cicotte and Alaska Attorney General Treg Taylor are graduates, released a statement condemning the "venomous and hateful Twitter messages against a variety of vulnerable groups" from the @JReubenCIark account.[17]

Notes

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  1. ^ J. Reuben Clark was a Mormon lawyer who worked in the Calvin Coolidge administration and is namesake of the law school at Brigham Young University.

References

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  1. ^ "#DezNat users say they're defending the church; those they target say it's not Christ-like". KJZZ. 2021-12-09. Retrieved 2024-07-11.
  2. ^ Paras, Julian (29 September 2021). "ICCU employee no longer works at local branch after being connected to controversial twitter thread". KPVI. Retrieved 2021-10-25.
  3. ^ a b c d Hitt, Tarpley (24 January 2019). "The Cult of #DezNat: Alt-Right Mormons Targeting Porn and the LGBTQ Community". The Daily Beast. Retrieved 9 January 2021.
  4. ^ a b Reeser, Andrew (30 January 2019). "'Deseret Nation': Alt-right Mormon militants or truth defenders?". ABC4 Utah. Retrieved 9 January 2021.
  5. ^ a b Reese, Isaac (10 September 2019). "Reese: The LDS Church has a White Nationalist Problem". The Daily Utah Chronicle. Retrieved 14 January 2021.
  6. ^ a b c "Revealed: assistant attorney general in Alaska posted racist and antisemitic tweets". The Guardian. 21 July 2021. Retrieved 23 July 2021.
  7. ^ "FarRight and Anti-Feminist Red Pill Influences in the #DezNat Twitter Hashtag" (PDF). Archived (PDF) from the original on 2024-07-14.
  8. ^ a b Wilson, Jason (2021-08-09). "New movement of religious extremists push ultra-conservative vision in US". The Guardian. ISSN 0261-3077. Retrieved 2024-07-17.
  9. ^ Clements, Mary (3 February 2021). "'Mormon Land': A deeper look at #DezNat tweeters — who they are, what they want, and why people should, or should not, fear them". Salt Lake Tribune. Retrieved 5 March 2021.
  10. ^ "What is #DezNat?". Twitter. 2018-10-26. Archived from the original on 2019-01-24.
  11. ^ "2-Greenhalgh-Chapman – Journal of the Mormon Social Science Association". Retrieved 2024-07-16.
  12. ^ McConkie, Bruce R. (1978-10-18). "Letter to Thomas B. McAfee". SHIELDS Research.
  13. ^ Mormon Land: A deeper look at #DezNat tweeters | Episode 167, SoundCloud.
  14. ^ ""Come for the memes, stay for defending the faith": Far-right and anti-feminist red pill influences in the #DezNat Twitter hashtag". University of Kentucky. Retrieved 2024-07-11.
  15. ^ Kitchenman, Andrew (July 21, 2021). "The Guardian reports Alaska assistant attorney general behind racist, anti-semitic and homophobic posts". KAKM. Retrieved July 25, 2021.
  16. ^ "Assistant Alaska attorney general investigated for racist social media posts leaves job". Anchorage Daily News. 2021-07-28. Retrieved 2021-07-28.
  17. ^ "Attorney under scrutiny for alleged #DezNat Twitter account is no longer employed by Alaska's Department of Law". Deseret News. July 28, 2021.
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