Here is why I get bothered by those who try to discuss the depredations against Mormons. We are talking about the murder of a baby that you admit is an atrocity. Then you go on to intellectually say it would be worse if the baby's throat was slit. I contend there is not much difference. The outcome was the same. I am guessing if you had an infant killed in either way you would not be so quick to try and intellectualize the argument.
Your basic stance has not changed even in light of the fact that Joseph's baby was murdered. You go on to try to justify the "frontier justice" of the murderers involved. So baby killers are allowed a little "Frontier Justice" but the MMM group is not. Your argument is contradictory. It can't be ok for atrocities on one side and not the other. I say it is wrong for both sides to commit atrocities. Why do you seek to downplay the atrocities committed by one side?
I fully admit MMM was an atrocity and should never have happened. However, I also admit that the murders against Mormons were an atrocity that should have never happened.
If I have been unclear, I apologize. Of course atrocities committed by both sides are by definition unacceptable.
My comments with regard to the death of the baby were not intended to downplay the tragedy of the event, but were rather with reference to the fact that the accounts do not indicate that anybody ever intended a baby to die, or indeed that any of the attackers were necessarily aware that a baby was present or in danger. That is quite a different thing from intentional and premeditated murder as was committed at MM.
I’ll try to sum up my viewpoint so we can both get back to our lives:
You seem to be very interested in assigning moral equivalency for the two groups of actions, the mob attacks on Mormons and MM. My entire point is that MM was worse, both in number of deaths and in the cold-blooded and treacherous way it was carried out. While there was much hollering about “extermination” by both sides in MO, the relatively low number of people actually killed indicates that both sides shrank back from actually attempting any such thing. At MM, OTOH, the attackers did indeed exterminate the wagon train.
You, of course, have every right to disagree with this conclusion. And the fact that MM was to some extent a revenge attack, as opposed to being unprovoked, does put some weight on your side.
I have also tried to point out that some unknown percentage of the attacks on Mormons such as Joseph Smith and Parley Pratt are quite understandable based on their known actions and the morality of the time, leaving religion completely out of the issue. IOW, religious bigotry or persecution is not necessary to explain them, since messing about with another man’s wife or daughter was a dangerous activity for any man at the time.
Yet these attacks are generally portrayed by Mormons as motivated entirely or primarily by religious bigotry and hatred.