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Vision Forum

Theology

a #meninist sums up my childhood in the Biblical Patriarchy movement

[content note for descriptions of physical abuse, extreme misogyny]

If you haven’t heard of the blog We Hunted the Mammoth, you should definitely check it out. Most of the time I don’t have the stomach to pick through the misogynistic underbelly of the internet, but they do all of that for me, putting it in one somewhat-more-manageable post, broken up with entertaining commentary.

I read their “Furious about Furiosa” post, which gathered together the collective outrage of MRAs who are upset about Mad Max: Fury Road. I grew up adoring the post-apocolyptic campiness that were films like Waterworld and Mad Max, so I’ve been keeping track of Fury Road, although I’ll probably just rent it when it comes out. Something that intrigued me was that the producers asked Eve Ensler (who created the Vagina Monlogues) to consult, and she worked with them to make sure the themes and characterization were handled appropriately.

I was laughing, shaking my head at all the vitriolic nonsense, until I got to this:

The only way back is to begin punishing ambition in our daughters and in all female children. They need to be physicall­­y and psychologically disciplined to be servile and deferential and they unfortunately need to have it beaten into them that they should NEVER trust their own judgement and always seek guidance and permission of their male headships.

My daughter would be turned out with nothing but a shirt on her back if she so much as looked at a college website or played with her brother’s educational toys.

She would be belted to the point of being unable to sit if she exhibited confidence in decision making.

I don’t want my wife to step foot out of the house unless her every dime and minute spent can be accounted for and executed in conjuncture with my approval. My daughter will exude obedience and timidity for whoever her future husband is and it’s imperative that all Christian Men demand nothing less within their own homes. Playtime for feminazis and the left is over. This is our world and our heritage to protect. Let the cultural war begin!

I do in fact implement this in my own home and practice what I preach vehemently. I have a daughter and sons and they are being raised to know that they are unequivocally different and 100% not equal. My wife is from a highly devout family and she was cowed long ago into obedience by her powerful, alpha father. I kinda won the life lottery.

That was posted by user “TS77RP1” on the Return of the Kings forum, one of the MRA/red pill hubs, and something you should only google if you are feeling extremely mentally and emotionally prepared.

I couldn’t laugh at that because … that was what I was taught. Oh, TS77RP1 is being for more bluntly and explicitly honest about what the people in the biblical patriarchy/Quiverful/Stay-at-Home-Daughters movements want to accomplish, but that’s all. He’s just being honest. He’s not trying to cloak what people like Michael Farris (of HSLDA and Parental Rights) and Doug Phillips (of now-defunct Vision Forum) teach under a fog of “but the husband is supposed to love his wife as Christ loved the church.” The velvet glove came off at this particular forum, but this is the end game.

You hand this over to John Piper and Wayne Grudem and Douglas Wilson and they’d be appalled, horrified, and repulsed; there would be much arm-waving over how they’re nothing like TS77RP1. Except… they teach the subordination of women and the headship of men based on nothing except sex. They might not resort to “belting” their daughters, but they do tell wives to stay in abusive marriages. They do tell women to submit to husbands who aren’t loving them “biblically.” They do say that men “conquer” their wives.

Currently I’m researching a project that compares the beliefs and justifications of abusers to the beliefs and justifications of complementarians … and the more I dig, the more horrified I become. There’s more than just the occasional overlap– the justifications for complementarianism and the rationalizations of abusers are the same.

TS77RP1 just said it out loud.

Photo by Amy McTigue
Feminism

The Stay-at-Home-Daughter Movement

miranda the tempest
[The Tempest by Waterhouse]

My freshman year in highschool, I mentioned my dream to become a marine botanist to my best friend, our pastor’s daughter, and she laughed. “Don’t be ridiculous,” she said. “You can’t be a scientist. You have to be a keeper at home.”

Keeper at home.

It’s a phrase from the King James translation of Titus 2, and we interpreted it to mean that it was against God’s laws for women to be employed. Our church, however, took it one step further: if all a woman was allowed to be was a “keeper at home,” then it was utterly pointless for her to try to be anything else. Pursuing an education, or longing for a career, could do nothing but harm her with shattered dreams. For that reason, young women in our church were asked to be “stay-at-home daughters.”

I gave up my dreams. I sacrificed them on the altar of biblical womanhood, fervently believing that the only way I could be blessed by God was to follow the clear guidelines laid out in Scripture. I was committed to remaining at home until I was married, when my father would transfer his ownership of me to my husband, giving me away at the altar with his blessing after a brief, paternally-guided courtship.

Occasionally, a snatch of a dream would intrude. No, Samantha. My inner voice would be harsh, echoing my Sunday school teachers and pastor’s wife. Do not be tempted. That’s just the Devil trying to trick you away from God’s plan.

A few weeks ago, Rachel Held Evans asked if I’d be interested in writing about my experiences with the Stay-at-Home Daughter movement and how I eventually decided to go to college against everything I’d ever been taught. I agreed, and put together a post for her blog. You can read the rest here.

Feminism

Fascinating Womanhood Review: Happiness

mother

So, it’s been a little while since we’ve delved into Helen Andelin’s world. We’re about halfway through the book, and we’ve reached the point where we’re going to start seeing a lot more ridiculous statements. On one hand, it makes it easier for me to demonstrate the absurdity of her beliefs– at times, all I’d have to do is quote what she says and even the most die-hard Vision Forum devotee would roll their eyes– but on the other hand, that makes it seem that what Helen’s promoting is so outdated that no one accepts it anymore.

That is, unfortunately, not true.

Helen might say it much more directly than Mary Kassian or Dannah Gresh or Stasi Eldredge probably would, but all these conservative women are advocating for the same principles and in very much the same way that Helen does. They ignore the same types of people that Helen does, they dismiss the realities of many women’s lived experiences like Helen does, and it all results in a set of teachings that condemn at least 40% of the American population– and that’s just America! Forget about the global church– if you’re not at least an upper-middle-class white evangelical stay-at-home mother . . . well, you might not even be a  Christian, so there. The principles and the message haven’t really changed that much. Whether it’s a Mormon woman writing in the 1960s, or an evangelical woman writing in 2005, we’re still hearing the same things.

~~~~~~~~~~

First off, she tells us what happiness is, taking an approach of defining by negation. She has a hard time explaining what happiness is, so she talks mostly about what unhappiness is and what happiness isn’t. First of all, unhappiness is totally our fault. Unhappiness “arises from a failure within–weakness of character, sin . . . We are unhappy when we are doing something wrong.”

That is a statement I am familiar with. I grew up in fundamentalism, and the appeal of fundamentalism could probably be wrapped up in the promise “follow all our our rules and you’ll be happy!” Which made the converse true: “not following all of our rules makes you miserable!” Happiness became totally defined by whether or not we were following the rules, period. Even if we thought we were happy, if we weren’t following the rules, we were mistaken.

She then moves on to setting up a false dichotomy between happiness and pleasure. I don’t think I’ve ever heard an argument for conflating these two, but she makes the argument that good little rule-followers are happy, and people who don’t care about “eternal laws” can’t possibly be happy. They can find pleasure, and they are so ignorant they mistake that for happiness. It’s the same sort of statement that she made on the first page– “You may think you are happy, but in reality you are not.”

Then comes the bulk of the chapter: what you need to do in order to be happy. Since happiness is “earned,” there are specific things we can do to make ourselves happy. Some of these things are pretty solid ideas– she encourages charitable volunteering, which some researchers have connected to happiness. She also tells us to “accept ourselves” (although she limits that to “don’t rip yourself to pieces for burning dinner or breaking something” which doesn’t really fall into the typical understanding of self-acceptance), and to “appreciate simple pleasures.” I’m all for appreciating the simple things; however, even while telling us to be rose-smellers, she takes the time to demonize many women.

I’m one of those women that jewelers like to say have “exceptional taste.” I like the sound of a silver fork tapping the side of a crystal water goblet. I think London blue topaz stones are some of the most gorgeous things I’ve ever seen. The feel of angora, the luxury of silk . . . the  enthralling moments of a Puccini opera threatening to burst through the ceiling of the Kennedy Center. . . those are all amazing, glorious things. That doesn’t mean I also don’t appreciate snuggling up in my polyester blanket in my sweatpants with a cup of tea I microwaved in the $1 glass mug I bought at Wal-Mart, but I think it’s totally fine if you appreciate both. That’s not permissible in Helen’s world, though. While there’s something to be said for the cost of “keeping up with the Joneses,” that’s not what Helen is saying here. Enjoying and appreciating nice things is the opposite of enjoying and appreciating “simple” things, and enjoying the luxuries renders you incapable of enjoying the “simple” things.

So, once again, even when the basic idea (“accept yourself!”) is a good one, she obliterates it in a wave of vitriol.

But most of what she argues will guarantees happiness is– do I even have to say it?– horrifying.

The first one, surprise surprise, is “fulfill your domestic role.” You have to do this “wholeheartedly,” or you’re a failure, and you’ll be miserable. If you break the “eternal laws” of not playing out patriarchal, Victorian gender roles, “you must suffer the consequences.” And since you’re a woman, if you don’t adhere to 150-year-old stereotypes, you are “failing in life.” And not only that, if you do not “succeed in all three duties– wife, mother, homemaker,” you are a failure.

This is one of those times when Helen is completely ignoring a whole spectrum of people. Today, almost 40% of women are the primary breadwinners in their households– and that doesn’t even count how many women aren’t “homemakers,” but work outside of the home either part-time or full-time. They’re all failures, according to Helen. And, many women never marry, so they’re failures, too. And even for women who are married, they might be infertile– or their husband might be. Failures, failures, failures, all of them.

That isn’t that far off from the message I’ve heard in dozens of evangelical churches all over the country. Not a wife? Well, what’s wrong with you? You’re too selfish, that must be it. You’re one of those bra-burning feminists who values a career more than what GOD wants for you. Not a mother? Or, you’ve been trying to have children for years and haven’t been able to? Have you prayed for God to reveal hidden sin in your life? And, sometimes, the message isn’t that direct, but every Mother’s Day you’re sitting there without a rose while all the mothers are exalted and praised while you’re completely ignored.

And, on top of all of that, she throws in this: “You must fist find happiness before your husband can love you. Men all over the country are turning from their wives to someone else because their wives are unhappy.” So, if you suffer from clinical depression (which “sinfulness leads to depression and mental illness”– also a dominant message in American evangelicalism), guess what, you’re husband is going to cheat on you unless you do exactly what Helen says.

If you don’t do what I say, your husband will cheat on you, unfortunately, is such a common threat. Debi Pearl’s book is laced with it, and I’ve heard, seen, and read Nancy Leigh DeMoss and Mary Kassian make similar threats. It’s troubling to me that this is the way evangelicalism seems to have unanimously decided is the best way to make sure women toe the line. Instead of saying “y’know what, if your husband cheats on you, he’s an ass,” women are taught that if our husbands cheat on us, we should immediately start looking for all the ways we’re responsible for it and he’s not.

This is why feminism is such a necessary conversation to introduce to American evangelicalism. Because feminism makes people responsible for their own actions. Feminism takes away the need to control women with threats. Feminism removes the ability for men not to face their own problems head-on. Feminism removes all the false guilt and shame that women bear for the sins of their husbands. Feminism means that we do not show favoritism.