Akphi is well known for his comments against an entire region of the US and I have called him out on it many times, this is not an isolated incident. He never responds, I wish that he would, it really makes him look small with these hit and run comments. Evidently economics is not the only topic he shows his ignorance
I was just making an exaggerated comment like many posters do here. Just doesn't surprise me that another group of conservatives that they use to represent their moral superior families is not that moral and their "close family friend" who they went to for consultation on kiddie touching was also pedo. Really gross stuff.
When it happens dozens of time I call it out. I from New England but have lived in Va and NC for 15 years. If there's a poster constantly calling out northerners or mid-westerners rest assured they would be called out.
You may have a valid point though because it always irritates me when a pseudo-intellect like akphi slams an entire region to make themselves feel superior. Akphi does make himself an easy target so you may have a point.
[h=1]The 5 most appalling “Christian” defenses of the Duggars[/h] [h=2]One creationist activist points to bags of molecules, while The Blaze somehow argues progressives made Josh do it[/h] Michael Arria, AlterNet
This article originally appeared on AlterNet.
Since it was revealed that Josh Duggar had been accused of molestation and his reality-show star parents did little in response, there has been an expected backlash. However, some people have made some pretty strange arguments about Duggar’s behavior, often invoking religion in the process. Here are 5 terrible Duggar rants.
1.) Jessa Duggar’s father-in-law said that the Duggar parents should be “commended” for the way they handled the situation:
Jessa Duggar’s father-in law, Michael Seewald, published a long blog post in support of the Duggar family and argued that Josh’s parents did exactly what they should have. Josh “attested to the reality of his repentance and faith by living above reproach In their efforts to salvage the wreckage that these transgressions brought, and bring healing to all involved,” Seewald explained. “Jim Bob and Michelle [the Duggar parents] are to be commended.”
Here’s the “commendable” behavior of the Duggar parents: They didn’t alert the authorities to Josh’s crimes for months, instead sending him to a “counseling program” that turned out to be a family friend’s home remodeling business. The family has been criticized for attempting to cover up the charges.
2.) In a Facebook rant Carrie Hurd, wife of Heritage Covenant Church Pastor Patrick Hurd, said Josh Duggar was just “playing doctor” and wondered what the big deal was:
Carrie Hurd might have made the most disturbing defense of Duggar when she took to Facebook in an attempt to normalize his behavior. “When I was a kid, it was often called ‘playing doctor’, there were just as many girls initiating this kind of behavior as boys. Most of those never went on to perp horrible things,” wrote Hurd. Why or how this scenario is comparable to Duggar molesting multiple girls is unclear, but Hurd is part of the same Quiverfull Christian movement as the Duggars which eschews all forms of birth control and promotes patriarchal gender norms.
3.)“Creationist Activist” Eric Hovind Blamed Duggar’s actions on evolution: “If evolution is true, then there is no absolute right and wrong. If evolution is true Josh should not have admitted his faults over a decade ago because what one evolved bag of molecules does to another bag of molecules just doesn’t really matter,” explained Hovind.
Eric is the son of creationist theme park creator Kent Hovind, who is currently in jail for conspiracy and mail fraud. What does Hovind believe Duggar’s punishment, for molestation, should be? “We should force him to get a job at the Family Research Counsel (whose) mission is ‘to advance faith, family and freedom in public policy and the culture from a Christian worldview.’
That would be a great punishment!”
4.) Mike Huckabee said that there was no purpose in trying to discredit Josh Duggar: The former Arkansas Governor took to Facebook to defend the Duggars quickly: “He and his family dealt with it and were honest and open about it with the victims and the authorities. No purpose whatsoever is served by those who are now trying to discredit Josh or his family by sensationalizing the story. Good people make mistakes and do regrettable and even disgusting things,” wrote Huckabee,”The reason that the law protects disclosure of many actions on the part of a minor is that the society has traditionally understood something that today’s blood-thirsty media does not understand—that being a minor means that one’s judgement is not mature.”
Huckabee may have expected his fans to agree with his message, but the post led to vast backlash from supporters.
5.) Blaze Blogger Matt Walsh somehow manages to blame progressives:
The Duggar story is so disturbing that it’s hard to imagine right-wingers using the moment to push any sort of agenda. There were some who vaguely suggested that the attacks on Duggar were hypocritical, but few tried to establish an argument that steered the focus toward progressives. Matt Walsh, a blogger at The Blaze was one of these few. “It’s always interesting to watch progressives discover sexual morality just in time to denounce a right winger, only to shed the pretense as soon as the next liberal pervert comes out of the woodwork,” wrote Walsh, “ They are moral opportunists. They are the actual hypocrites. This outrage is a charade. A circus. A show. A political ploy.”
Sounds legit.
http://www.salon.com/2015/05/27/the...ner/?utm_source=twitter&utm_medium=socialflow
This article originally appeared on AlterNet.
Since it was revealed that Josh Duggar had been accused of molestation and his reality-show star parents did little in response, there has been an expected backlash. However, some people have made some pretty strange arguments about Duggar’s behavior, often invoking religion in the process. Here are 5 terrible Duggar rants.1.) Jessa Duggar’s father-in-law said that the Duggar parents should be “commended” for the way they handled the situation:
Jessa Duggar’s father-in law, Michael Seewald, published a long blog post in support of the Duggar family and argued that Josh’s parents did exactly what they should have. Josh “attested to the reality of his repentance and faith by living above reproach In their efforts to salvage the wreckage that these transgressions brought, and bring healing to all involved,” Seewald explained. “Jim Bob and Michelle [the Duggar parents] are to be commended.”
Here’s the “commendable” behavior of the Duggar parents: They didn’t alert the authorities to Josh’s crimes for months, instead sending him to a “counseling program” that turned out to be a family friend’s home remodeling business. The family has been criticized for attempting to cover up the charges.
2.) In a Facebook rant Carrie Hurd, wife of Heritage Covenant Church Pastor Patrick Hurd, said Josh Duggar was just “playing doctor” and wondered what the big deal was:
Carrie Hurd might have made the most disturbing defense of Duggar when she took to Facebook in an attempt to normalize his behavior. “When I was a kid, it was often called ‘playing doctor’, there were just as many girls initiating this kind of behavior as boys. Most of those never went on to perp horrible things,” wrote Hurd. Why or how this scenario is comparable to Duggar molesting multiple girls is unclear, but Hurd is part of the same Quiverfull Christian movement as the Duggars which eschews all forms of birth control and promotes patriarchal gender norms.
3.)“Creationist Activist” Eric Hovind Blamed Duggar’s actions on evolution: “If evolution is true, then there is no absolute right and wrong. If evolution is true Josh should not have admitted his faults over a decade ago because what one evolved bag of molecules does to another bag of molecules just doesn’t really matter,” explained Hovind.
Eric is the son of creationist theme park creator Kent Hovind, who is currently in jail for conspiracy and mail fraud. What does Hovind believe Duggar’s punishment, for molestation, should be? “We should force him to get a job at the Family Research Counsel (whose) mission is ‘to advance faith, family and freedom in public policy and the culture from a Christian worldview.’
That would be a great punishment!”
4.) Mike Huckabee said that there was no purpose in trying to discredit Josh Duggar: The former Arkansas Governor took to Facebook to defend the Duggars quickly: “He and his family dealt with it and were honest and open about it with the victims and the authorities. No purpose whatsoever is served by those who are now trying to discredit Josh or his family by sensationalizing the story. Good people make mistakes and do regrettable and even disgusting things,” wrote Huckabee,”The reason that the law protects disclosure of many actions on the part of a minor is that the society has traditionally understood something that today’s blood-thirsty media does not understand—that being a minor means that one’s judgement is not mature.”
Huckabee may have expected his fans to agree with his message, but the post led to vast backlash from supporters.
5.) Blaze Blogger Matt Walsh somehow manages to blame progressives:
The Duggar story is so disturbing that it’s hard to imagine right-wingers using the moment to push any sort of agenda. There were some who vaguely suggested that the attacks on Duggar were hypocritical, but few tried to establish an argument that steered the focus toward progressives. Matt Walsh, a blogger at The Blaze was one of these few. “It’s always interesting to watch progressives discover sexual morality just in time to denounce a right winger, only to shed the pretense as soon as the next liberal pervert comes out of the woodwork,” wrote Walsh, “ They are moral opportunists. They are the actual hypocrites. This outrage is a charade. A circus. A show. A political ploy.”
Sounds legit.
http://www.salon.com/2015/05/27/the...ner/?utm_source=twitter&utm_medium=socialflow
Thursday, May 28, 2015 11:36 AM EST [h=1]I could’ve been a Duggar wife: I grew up in the same church, and the abuse scandal doesn’t shock me[/h] [h=2]Like a real-life Kimmy Schmidt, I fled the exploitative and abusive sect into a culture I couldn't fully understand[/h] Brooke Arnold
Jim Bob and Michelle Duggar (Credit: Reuters/Chris Keane)
Unlike most of the writers covering the Duggar sex scandal, I was raised in Advanced Training Institute (ATI), the fundamentalist Christian organization with which the family is affiliated. Joshua Duggar’s confession of sexually molesting young girls in his family’s home when he was a teenager didn’t surprise me, nor should it surprise anyone with any intimate knowledge about this organization, because ATI’s theological beliefs and practices cultivate an environment where women and children are more vulnerable to rape and sexual abuse. Ironically, the same theological beliefs and practices at the heart of this scandal are the same beliefs that created the Duggars as a media phenomenon, and drew viewers and fans to their TLC show “19 Kids and Counting.”
Non-mainstream religious sects have certainly been enjoying a cultural moment on television: “The Following,” “Sister Wives,” “Breaking Amish.”Netflix’s dark comedy “The Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt” explores the media hype around religious cult survivors in satirical detail. For me, though, that show should have come with a trigger warning, because in many ways, I am a real Kimmy Schmidt — a woman who spent her adolescence trapped inside a metaphorical bunker, and then was thrust into a world that she had never been prepared to be a part of.
The Duggars didn’t emerge from a subterranean bunker, though. They’ve been on TV promoting the fundamentalist Christian theology of ATI since their first special in 2004 (“14 Children and Pregnant Again!”). ATI is a Christian homeschool organization that hosts seminars worldwide, provides homeschooling curriculum, and even runs its own paramilitary training center. At one point, it was strongly affiliated with a Christian correspondence course law school. Its members are not concentrated in one area, and yet they maintain insular groups and often form churches in which all members are affiliated with ATI and/or follow its basic principles. Referred to as “Gothardism” within fundamentalist Christian circles, the teachings of ATI form an ideological system of practices based on the extremely strict, fundamentalist, and idiosyncratic Biblical interpretations of the organization’s founder, Bill Gothard – a man who, in 2014, stepped down as head of ATI following allegations of sexual misconduct with young girls.
The allegations against “Mr. Gothard” (as he is respectfully and worshipfully referred to by his acolytes) were an open secret among group members for many years. As a friend who worked at ATI headquarters once said to me with a wink: “The prettiest girls are always chosen to work the closest with Mr Gothard.”
ATI’s teachings trickle down into every single part of its members’ lives. This is not just a homeschool curriculum, it is a fully institutionalized religious sect with incredibly strict demands to conformity — rules that, in my experience, more often reflect Gothard’s personal preferences than actual Biblical teachings. Have you ever wondered why every Duggar woman perms her hair? It’s because Gothard taught us that curly hair brings out a woman’s natural beauty. Other ATI beliefs that I learned range from utterly bizarre to downright barbaric, like the creator of Cabbage Patch Kid dolls is actually a Satanic wizard who implants demons into the dolls that then sneak into children’s bodies while they are sleeping — along with the old standard that rock music is inherently sinful. One boy from our church would walk around supermarkets with his fingers plugged into his ears to prevent himself from hearing it.
And then there are the beliefs that are more central to the portrayal of ATI on TV through the Duggar family, which are also shared throughout the church’s teachings: the antiquated dress codes (especially for girls and women), the required homeschooling, the prohibition on birth control, the strictly gendered division of labor and the absolute and unquestioned authority of the father within the home.
One key difference worth noting between the “reality” show of “19 Kids and Counting” and the actual reality of ATI, though, is the relative affluence of the Duggars compared to most ATI families. The Duggars live in a spacious Discovery Networks-funded home, but it was not unusual, in my church, for two parents and ten children to live packed into a singlewide trailer. These children usually wear threadbare hand-me-downs already passed through several rounds of siblings. Many of them look malnourished due to the abundance of starchy meals necessary on a lean one-parent income. Women and mothers working outside of the home is absolutely forbidden in ATI no matter what the financial situation of the family. Some women are even required to get permission from their husbands if they want to obtain a driver’s license.
That affluence makes the constant growth of the Duggar family — their wildly exaggerated version of a large family upon which their TV fame is built — possible. The foundation of the Duggars’ fame is the fecundity of Michelle Duggar. Even the name of the show changes as she gives birth again and again and again. Each child is another notch on Jim Bob’s headboard, walking and talking proofs of his masculine virility. Despite this fascination with Michelle’s fertility, there is a critical question that no one ever seems to be ask on camera: just how fragile is the boundary between the loss of a woman’s reproductive control over her body and the loss of her sexual control over her body? From my experience in the ATI culture, it is very, very slim.
A cornerstone belief of ATI is that God appoints husbands in an “umbrella of authority” over their wives, who are mandated by God to obey their husbands completely. That includes absolute sexual and reproductive submission. The inevitable result of such a demand is the tacit sanctioning of spousal rape — if a woman’s body belongs to God and to her husband before it belongs to her, then her consent becomes irrelevant.
Women aren’t allowed ownership of their thoughts, either. At annual ATI conferences, married women are separated from everyone else and asked if they are having thoughts about using birth control, or if they feel resentment about having so many children. Answer “yes” to this and someone might tell you that those thoughts come from demons whispering into their ears. Many women in our church looked slumped over from constant exhaustion. My close friend’s mother even refused treatment for breast cancer because she saw the disease as God saving her from her abusive husband, and the burden of caring for her many children.
Like any system of abuse, ATI relies on control to maintain its power, and a critical component of that power is the total indoctrination of its members through its homeschool curriculum. The so-called “Wisdom Booklets” that form the backbone of ATI children’s educations contain more Bible verses than they do information. Particularly lacking, in a religious sect so obsessed with reproduction, is any kind of sex education. This is especially true for young women, who receive very little sex education because the church teaches us that women do not have sex drives. However, the opposite is believed of men: ATI teaches that men have nearly uncontrollable sex drives ready to erupt at the mere sight of a pant leg or a perm. To illustrate this point: ATI families are encouraged to maintain a “no computer” rule for their sons, but not their daughters. Gothard also encouraged men to turn toward the wall when dining at restaurants so as not to be “tempted” by a waitress or a stray attractive woman.
Not that our supposed lack of sex drive absolved us from sexual responsibility. ATI taught us that it is our job to keep men’s desires from erupting into lust or sexual activity. We were taught that it was our sin if we “cause a man to lust after us.” I spent many nights as an early-developed teenager crying and begging God to take away my large breasts, because I noticed men’s eyes had begun to linger on me during church. Modesty wasn’t only about dress, it was also about behavior. Women were taught from a very young age that they are to be submissive in all things: allowing men to open doors for us (even to get out of a car), never initiating conversation with a man and never correcting a man when he was wrong. Essentially, a good ATI woman is sweet, silent, and obedient.
This combination of zero sexual knowledge and deeply-ingrained submissiveness left many young girls in our church especially vulnerable to sexual abuse. As a teenager, I became aware that several of my friends were being molested by their older brothers or fathers. They would start stilted conversations with me about it, but none of us actually understood the concept of sex or rape or molestation enough to actually discuss it, so it stayed on the level of furtively whispered hints.
That vulnerability to abuse increases through the isolation of homeschool. There are no teachers or school counselors for abused children to confide in, so for most of them, the abuse would continue for their entire adolescence. The only hope of escape for young women was through courtship and marriage to a man, who would attempt to immediately impregnate her and to whom she would then relinquish all sexual control.
I didn’t become the victim of sexual exploitation until after I had left my home and the church. Growing up in such an isolated environment, I had only a vague idea of what the world beyond our church would be like. Fortunately, I was both brave enough and naïve enough to try and find out. Most of the people that I grew up with were never that lucky. I try, even now, to figure out how I could have abandoned everyone and everything I had ever known. The only thing that makes sense is this: I believed that there had to be something better than the life I had been raised to have. I believed that there had to be something better than courtship and marriage to a man my father (and “God”) selected for me, followed by a quiverfull of children of my own.
I was both right and very, very wrong.
After I left, I found myself suddenly thrust into a world that I was totally unprepared to navigate. Like Kimmy Schmidt fleeing from her bunker into the sunlight, I suddenly found myself surrounded by people and events that I had never been prepared for. It was nothing like the comically magical larger world that Kimmy Schmidt finds herself in. There were no handsome rich men, no forgiving landlords, no fabulous roommates, and certainly no sacks of cash. I entered a world full of things that I did not understand and a world full of people whose ill intentions I could not interpret or comprehend.
The same sexual ignorance that had made my friends vulnerable while in the church haunted me after I left. The first time I had sex, I didn’t fully understand what was happening to me. When it was over, I noticed that I was bleeding, and I became convinced that God was going to kill me for my sin of causing lust in a man. I lay on the dirty floor of my cheap apartment’s bathroom begging for God’s forgiveness, begging to start over again, and begging for my family’s love, which I knew had now been forever forfeited by my sin. At that point, I had no frame of reference to understand that someone had taken sexual advantage of me, because the concept of date rape wasn’t part of ATI’s “Umbrella of Authority.”
My decision to leave the church caused a permanent wedge between me and my family, who believe that I’m sinful for pursuing an education, for living with my boyfriend, and for everything that I’m proud that I’ve accomplished. Compared to most of the people that I grew up with, I usually think of myself as one of the lucky ones. But I lost 17 years of my life to ATI. And because I was homeschooled, I have to check the GED box on job applications. I feel immodest when I wear a tank top. I still get confused when someone mentions “the ninth grade,” “homecoming” or some movie that everyone my age grew up watching. I’ve spent years desperately trying to put it all behind me, and yet, I still feel like an outsider. I probably always will.
The past week has been incredibly difficult, as I’ve seen my most personal trauma mocked and exploited in the media. I hope this latest religion and sex scandal teaches that religious extremism isn’t entertainment. It is abuse. It is abuse when it is used to manipulate, control and victimize those who are rendered helpless within its confines. We should examine how we allow the most vulnerable members of our society to become prey for power-hungry religious leaders and sexual predators. Yes, the family is to blame. Yes, ATI is to blame. But so are we, for spending the past decade pointing and laughing along.
Brooke Arnold is a writer and a stand-up comic who lives in New York. She is currently writing a comic memoir called "Growing Up Fundie" about her experience growing up in a fundamentalist Christian church. You can find out more about this book and her other projects on her website.
Jim Bob and Michelle Duggar (Credit: Reuters/Chris Keane)Unlike most of the writers covering the Duggar sex scandal, I was raised in Advanced Training Institute (ATI), the fundamentalist Christian organization with which the family is affiliated. Joshua Duggar’s confession of sexually molesting young girls in his family’s home when he was a teenager didn’t surprise me, nor should it surprise anyone with any intimate knowledge about this organization, because ATI’s theological beliefs and practices cultivate an environment where women and children are more vulnerable to rape and sexual abuse. Ironically, the same theological beliefs and practices at the heart of this scandal are the same beliefs that created the Duggars as a media phenomenon, and drew viewers and fans to their TLC show “19 Kids and Counting.”
Non-mainstream religious sects have certainly been enjoying a cultural moment on television: “The Following,” “Sister Wives,” “Breaking Amish.”Netflix’s dark comedy “The Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt” explores the media hype around religious cult survivors in satirical detail. For me, though, that show should have come with a trigger warning, because in many ways, I am a real Kimmy Schmidt — a woman who spent her adolescence trapped inside a metaphorical bunker, and then was thrust into a world that she had never been prepared to be a part of.
The Duggars didn’t emerge from a subterranean bunker, though. They’ve been on TV promoting the fundamentalist Christian theology of ATI since their first special in 2004 (“14 Children and Pregnant Again!”). ATI is a Christian homeschool organization that hosts seminars worldwide, provides homeschooling curriculum, and even runs its own paramilitary training center. At one point, it was strongly affiliated with a Christian correspondence course law school. Its members are not concentrated in one area, and yet they maintain insular groups and often form churches in which all members are affiliated with ATI and/or follow its basic principles. Referred to as “Gothardism” within fundamentalist Christian circles, the teachings of ATI form an ideological system of practices based on the extremely strict, fundamentalist, and idiosyncratic Biblical interpretations of the organization’s founder, Bill Gothard – a man who, in 2014, stepped down as head of ATI following allegations of sexual misconduct with young girls.
The allegations against “Mr. Gothard” (as he is respectfully and worshipfully referred to by his acolytes) were an open secret among group members for many years. As a friend who worked at ATI headquarters once said to me with a wink: “The prettiest girls are always chosen to work the closest with Mr Gothard.”
ATI’s teachings trickle down into every single part of its members’ lives. This is not just a homeschool curriculum, it is a fully institutionalized religious sect with incredibly strict demands to conformity — rules that, in my experience, more often reflect Gothard’s personal preferences than actual Biblical teachings. Have you ever wondered why every Duggar woman perms her hair? It’s because Gothard taught us that curly hair brings out a woman’s natural beauty. Other ATI beliefs that I learned range from utterly bizarre to downright barbaric, like the creator of Cabbage Patch Kid dolls is actually a Satanic wizard who implants demons into the dolls that then sneak into children’s bodies while they are sleeping — along with the old standard that rock music is inherently sinful. One boy from our church would walk around supermarkets with his fingers plugged into his ears to prevent himself from hearing it.
And then there are the beliefs that are more central to the portrayal of ATI on TV through the Duggar family, which are also shared throughout the church’s teachings: the antiquated dress codes (especially for girls and women), the required homeschooling, the prohibition on birth control, the strictly gendered division of labor and the absolute and unquestioned authority of the father within the home.
One key difference worth noting between the “reality” show of “19 Kids and Counting” and the actual reality of ATI, though, is the relative affluence of the Duggars compared to most ATI families. The Duggars live in a spacious Discovery Networks-funded home, but it was not unusual, in my church, for two parents and ten children to live packed into a singlewide trailer. These children usually wear threadbare hand-me-downs already passed through several rounds of siblings. Many of them look malnourished due to the abundance of starchy meals necessary on a lean one-parent income. Women and mothers working outside of the home is absolutely forbidden in ATI no matter what the financial situation of the family. Some women are even required to get permission from their husbands if they want to obtain a driver’s license.
That affluence makes the constant growth of the Duggar family — their wildly exaggerated version of a large family upon which their TV fame is built — possible. The foundation of the Duggars’ fame is the fecundity of Michelle Duggar. Even the name of the show changes as she gives birth again and again and again. Each child is another notch on Jim Bob’s headboard, walking and talking proofs of his masculine virility. Despite this fascination with Michelle’s fertility, there is a critical question that no one ever seems to be ask on camera: just how fragile is the boundary between the loss of a woman’s reproductive control over her body and the loss of her sexual control over her body? From my experience in the ATI culture, it is very, very slim.
A cornerstone belief of ATI is that God appoints husbands in an “umbrella of authority” over their wives, who are mandated by God to obey their husbands completely. That includes absolute sexual and reproductive submission. The inevitable result of such a demand is the tacit sanctioning of spousal rape — if a woman’s body belongs to God and to her husband before it belongs to her, then her consent becomes irrelevant.
Women aren’t allowed ownership of their thoughts, either. At annual ATI conferences, married women are separated from everyone else and asked if they are having thoughts about using birth control, or if they feel resentment about having so many children. Answer “yes” to this and someone might tell you that those thoughts come from demons whispering into their ears. Many women in our church looked slumped over from constant exhaustion. My close friend’s mother even refused treatment for breast cancer because she saw the disease as God saving her from her abusive husband, and the burden of caring for her many children.
Like any system of abuse, ATI relies on control to maintain its power, and a critical component of that power is the total indoctrination of its members through its homeschool curriculum. The so-called “Wisdom Booklets” that form the backbone of ATI children’s educations contain more Bible verses than they do information. Particularly lacking, in a religious sect so obsessed with reproduction, is any kind of sex education. This is especially true for young women, who receive very little sex education because the church teaches us that women do not have sex drives. However, the opposite is believed of men: ATI teaches that men have nearly uncontrollable sex drives ready to erupt at the mere sight of a pant leg or a perm. To illustrate this point: ATI families are encouraged to maintain a “no computer” rule for their sons, but not their daughters. Gothard also encouraged men to turn toward the wall when dining at restaurants so as not to be “tempted” by a waitress or a stray attractive woman.
Not that our supposed lack of sex drive absolved us from sexual responsibility. ATI taught us that it is our job to keep men’s desires from erupting into lust or sexual activity. We were taught that it was our sin if we “cause a man to lust after us.” I spent many nights as an early-developed teenager crying and begging God to take away my large breasts, because I noticed men’s eyes had begun to linger on me during church. Modesty wasn’t only about dress, it was also about behavior. Women were taught from a very young age that they are to be submissive in all things: allowing men to open doors for us (even to get out of a car), never initiating conversation with a man and never correcting a man when he was wrong. Essentially, a good ATI woman is sweet, silent, and obedient.
This combination of zero sexual knowledge and deeply-ingrained submissiveness left many young girls in our church especially vulnerable to sexual abuse. As a teenager, I became aware that several of my friends were being molested by their older brothers or fathers. They would start stilted conversations with me about it, but none of us actually understood the concept of sex or rape or molestation enough to actually discuss it, so it stayed on the level of furtively whispered hints.
That vulnerability to abuse increases through the isolation of homeschool. There are no teachers or school counselors for abused children to confide in, so for most of them, the abuse would continue for their entire adolescence. The only hope of escape for young women was through courtship and marriage to a man, who would attempt to immediately impregnate her and to whom she would then relinquish all sexual control.
I didn’t become the victim of sexual exploitation until after I had left my home and the church. Growing up in such an isolated environment, I had only a vague idea of what the world beyond our church would be like. Fortunately, I was both brave enough and naïve enough to try and find out. Most of the people that I grew up with were never that lucky. I try, even now, to figure out how I could have abandoned everyone and everything I had ever known. The only thing that makes sense is this: I believed that there had to be something better than the life I had been raised to have. I believed that there had to be something better than courtship and marriage to a man my father (and “God”) selected for me, followed by a quiverfull of children of my own.
I was both right and very, very wrong.
After I left, I found myself suddenly thrust into a world that I was totally unprepared to navigate. Like Kimmy Schmidt fleeing from her bunker into the sunlight, I suddenly found myself surrounded by people and events that I had never been prepared for. It was nothing like the comically magical larger world that Kimmy Schmidt finds herself in. There were no handsome rich men, no forgiving landlords, no fabulous roommates, and certainly no sacks of cash. I entered a world full of things that I did not understand and a world full of people whose ill intentions I could not interpret or comprehend.
The same sexual ignorance that had made my friends vulnerable while in the church haunted me after I left. The first time I had sex, I didn’t fully understand what was happening to me. When it was over, I noticed that I was bleeding, and I became convinced that God was going to kill me for my sin of causing lust in a man. I lay on the dirty floor of my cheap apartment’s bathroom begging for God’s forgiveness, begging to start over again, and begging for my family’s love, which I knew had now been forever forfeited by my sin. At that point, I had no frame of reference to understand that someone had taken sexual advantage of me, because the concept of date rape wasn’t part of ATI’s “Umbrella of Authority.”
My decision to leave the church caused a permanent wedge between me and my family, who believe that I’m sinful for pursuing an education, for living with my boyfriend, and for everything that I’m proud that I’ve accomplished. Compared to most of the people that I grew up with, I usually think of myself as one of the lucky ones. But I lost 17 years of my life to ATI. And because I was homeschooled, I have to check the GED box on job applications. I feel immodest when I wear a tank top. I still get confused when someone mentions “the ninth grade,” “homecoming” or some movie that everyone my age grew up watching. I’ve spent years desperately trying to put it all behind me, and yet, I still feel like an outsider. I probably always will.
The past week has been incredibly difficult, as I’ve seen my most personal trauma mocked and exploited in the media. I hope this latest religion and sex scandal teaches that religious extremism isn’t entertainment. It is abuse. It is abuse when it is used to manipulate, control and victimize those who are rendered helpless within its confines. We should examine how we allow the most vulnerable members of our society to become prey for power-hungry religious leaders and sexual predators. Yes, the family is to blame. Yes, ATI is to blame. But so are we, for spending the past decade pointing and laughing along.
Brooke Arnold is a writer and a stand-up comic who lives in New York. She is currently writing a comic memoir called "Growing Up Fundie" about her experience growing up in a fundamentalist Christian church. You can find out more about this book and her other projects on her website.
Thursday, May 28, 2015 04:00 AM EST [h=1]Josh Duggar and the Christian right’s purity lie[/h] [h=2]The Duggars have long marketed themselves as exemplars of wholesome, biblical living. It was always a bill of goods VIDEO[/h] Sarah Posner,
In this Aug. 2, 2007 photo, Michelle Duggar is surrounded by her then only 17 children, and husband Jim Bob. (Credit: AP/Beth Hall)
This article originally appeared on Religion Dispatches.
Josh Duggar, the oldest son of Jim Bob and Michelle Duggar, stars of “reality” TV and the real life conservative movement, has resigned his position as executive director of FRC Action, the political action arm of the Family Research Council, after In Touch magazine reported that he sexually abused young girls, including, apparently, his sisters, as a teenager.
In a statement to People magazine, Duggar, now 27, said:
According to the police report, Jim Bob and Michelle, paragons of parenting, hid Josh’s crimes from the police and the public. In Touch reports, based on the police report it obtained via a Freedom of Information Act request, that:
But the Duggars and their supporters have very deliberately marketed them as a perfect family—or if not perfect, at least pure, and in particular, sexually pure.
The first episode of their “reality” television show aired in 2008, two years after the police interviewed family members about the sexual assaults that had taken place in 2002 and 2003; the statute of limitations had already run and the police could not pursue charges.
In 2010, the Family Research Council, Josh’s future employer, gave Jim Bob and Michelle the “Pro-Family Entertainment” award, describing the family as “outspoken ambassadors for Christian values in a secular world.”
On their television program in 2009, Josh Duggar was portrayed as devoting himself to a “courtship” with his future wife Anna, rather than dating, which was derided as part of the “divorce culture:”
Tonight, Anna described her husband to People as “someone who had gone down a wrong path and had humbled himself before God and those whom he had offended.”
This week, a recap of their television show on their blog discussed how Jim Bob and Michelle “encourage their kids to take a chaperone along on all their dates so they have someone to keep them accountable and ensure that they stick to their courtship standards.” In their family, they police sex outside of marriage. In politics they police sex between consenting adults, sex between people of the same sex; they are “pure” and “godly” because they police and condemn other people’s sexual lives. But now the public knows that this family which enforces “purity” has covered up the sexual predations—against children, even their own children— of their star son.
The Duggars haven’t shied away from “protecting” children in other contexts. As Right Wing Watch reports, last year Josh Duggar “led a successful campaign to defeat a LGBT nondiscrimination measure in Fayetteville, Arkansas, which he said jeopardized the safety of children,” and that his mother “also ran a robocall pushing for the repeal of the city’s nondiscrimination ordinance, which she warned would empower ‘child predators’ to threaten ‘the safety and innocence of a child.’”
The Duggars are no ordinary spokespeople for the religious right; they are super-spokespeople. For years, they have been held up as exemplars of biblical living, of devotion to Christ, and of, especially, homespun honest living and sexual purity. It’s long been obvious to many that this is a product of marketing and packaging, not reality. But now no one can pretend anymore.
Sarah Posner is the senior editor of Religion Dispatches, where she writes about politics. She is also the author of God's Profits: Faith, Fraud, and the Republican Crusade for Values Voters" (PoliPoint Press, 2008).
In this Aug. 2, 2007 photo, Michelle Duggar is surrounded by her then only 17 children, and husband Jim Bob. (Credit: AP/Beth Hall)This article originally appeared on Religion Dispatches.
Josh Duggar, the oldest son of Jim Bob and Michelle Duggar, stars of “reality” TV and the real life conservative movement, has resigned his position as executive director of FRC Action, the political action arm of the Family Research Council, after In Touch magazine reported that he sexually abused young girls, including, apparently, his sisters, as a teenager.In a statement to People magazine, Duggar, now 27, said:
Twelve years ago, as a young teenager, I acted inexcusably for which I am extremely sorry and deeply regret. I hurt others, including my family and close friends. . . . I confessed this to my parents who took several steps to help me address the situation. We spoke with the authorities where I confessed my wrongdoing, and my parents arranged for me and those affected by my actions to receive counseling. I understood that if I continued down this wrong road that I would end up ruining my life.
Ruining his life.
According to the police report, Jim Bob and Michelle, paragons of parenting, hid Josh’s crimes from the police and the public. In Touch reports, based on the police report it obtained via a Freedom of Information Act request, that:
Josh Duggar was investigated for multiple sex offenses — including forcible fondling — against five minors. Some of the alleged offenses investigated were felonies. Jim Bob and Michelle Duggar were interview [sic] by the Springdale Police department on Dec. 12, 2006. The report says that James told police he was alerted in March, 2002 by a female minor that Josh — who turned 14-years-old that month — had been touching her breasts and genitals while she slept. This allegedly happened on multiple occasions. In 2006, Jim Bob told police that in July, 2002 Josh admitted to fondling a minor’s breasts while she slept. “James said that they disciplined (redacted, Josh) after this incident.” The family did not alert authorities.
The police report reveals that Jim Bob Duggar “met with the elders of his church and told them what was going on” rather than contacting law enforcement. Josh was then sent to “Christian counseling” for three months, which, according to his mother’s admission, was not any sort of licensed counseling facility:
Asked about the training center that Jim Bob said Josh was sent to, Michelle told police, according to the report, “it was not really a training center. Det. [Darrell] Hignite asked if the guy [redacted, Josh] talked to was a certified counselor. She said no. She said it was a guy they know in Little Rock that is remodeling a building. Det. Hignite asked if the guy was more of a mentor. She said “kind of.”
In their own statement to People, Jim Bob and Michelle say that “when Josh was a young teenager, he made some very bad mistakes, and we were shocked. We had tried to teach him right from wrong,” that “each one of our family members drew closer to God,” and that they “pray that as people watch our lives they see that we are not a perfect family.”
But the Duggars and their supporters have very deliberately marketed them as a perfect family—or if not perfect, at least pure, and in particular, sexually pure.
The first episode of their “reality” television show aired in 2008, two years after the police interviewed family members about the sexual assaults that had taken place in 2002 and 2003; the statute of limitations had already run and the police could not pursue charges.
In 2010, the Family Research Council, Josh’s future employer, gave Jim Bob and Michelle the “Pro-Family Entertainment” award, describing the family as “outspoken ambassadors for Christian values in a secular world.”
On their television program in 2009, Josh Duggar was portrayed as devoting himself to a “courtship” with his future wife Anna, rather than dating, which was derided as part of the “divorce culture:”
Tonight, Anna described her husband to People as “someone who had gone down a wrong path and had humbled himself before God and those whom he had offended.”
This week, a recap of their television show on their blog discussed how Jim Bob and Michelle “encourage their kids to take a chaperone along on all their dates so they have someone to keep them accountable and ensure that they stick to their courtship standards.” In their family, they police sex outside of marriage. In politics they police sex between consenting adults, sex between people of the same sex; they are “pure” and “godly” because they police and condemn other people’s sexual lives. But now the public knows that this family which enforces “purity” has covered up the sexual predations—against children, even their own children— of their star son.
The Duggars haven’t shied away from “protecting” children in other contexts. As Right Wing Watch reports, last year Josh Duggar “led a successful campaign to defeat a LGBT nondiscrimination measure in Fayetteville, Arkansas, which he said jeopardized the safety of children,” and that his mother “also ran a robocall pushing for the repeal of the city’s nondiscrimination ordinance, which she warned would empower ‘child predators’ to threaten ‘the safety and innocence of a child.’”
The Duggars are no ordinary spokespeople for the religious right; they are super-spokespeople. For years, they have been held up as exemplars of biblical living, of devotion to Christ, and of, especially, homespun honest living and sexual purity. It’s long been obvious to many that this is a product of marketing and packaging, not reality. But now no one can pretend anymore.
Sarah Posner is the senior editor of Religion Dispatches, where she writes about politics. She is also the author of God's Profits: Faith, Fraud, and the Republican Crusade for Values Voters" (PoliPoint Press, 2008).
Megan Kelly did an extensive interview with the Duggars re this subject, tonight.
After hearing that interview it is clear that this thread is laced with inaccuracies from posters, including but not limited to the OP, and littered with bullshit yellow dog pieces brought here to support the same inaccurate and downright slanderous thesis.
How could there be an honest discussion on this subject when the "facts" and innuendo are all skewed?
After hearing that interview it is clear that this thread is laced with inaccuracies from posters, including but not limited to the OP, and littered with bullshit yellow dog pieces brought here to support the same inaccurate and downright slanderous thesis.
How could there be an honest discussion on this subject when the "facts" and innuendo are all skewed?
A few did have their facts wrong....he molested two of his sisters....not one but Jim Bob had a solid defense for Josh.....said the girls were sleeping.I'm sure the Duggars answered every Question Honestly, and without regard to any self interest. Because they're G-d Fearing, Bible Thumping, Republican good, down home folk.hno:
Geez Michaelangelo you're in the dave007 ballpark with this stuff.
Once again Vit hits a home run and Michaelangelo still trying to find the stadium
