Interesting article about a young woman raised in the same church but who left it.
And I consider having children at 14, 15,16, without the benefit of a second parent (usually a dad), then leaving the care of those children to the State, the schools or hey…the streets and having THOSE kids have kids at 14,15,16 who then also don’t have a second parent and are left to the State and the schools or the streets to be nothing short of abuse. I consider popping out numerous generations of kids incapable of fending for themselves and leaving the young women at the mercy of predatory gentlemen who assist in continuing the cycle…and then have NO education (oh for the grace of having any parent willing to spend time paying attention to schooling of any sort) to be nothing short of abuse.
If the Duggers were…say…wiccan…or polyamorist would the response be so vehement?
So what’s your point other than a clearly vocalized disdain for certain family constellations?
…And yet we have shows like 16 and Pregnant to show how it can be done and how romatical it all is. And the ever lovely Polyamory which had the 5 year old child hanging out with numerous interchangeable and entwined parents who made their lifestyle (and names) known to anyone with a TV set.
If the Duggers were…say…wiccan…or polyamorist would the response be so vehement?So what’s your point other than a clearly vocalized disdain for certain family constellations?
What happened is wrong, it’s needs to be addressed, it needs to be brought to light (but again, Josh was a minor…) and it needs to STOP and it needs to not generate any more money for those involved. But…let’s be clear…it’s the Christian thing that really gets the anger going.
If it’s the Christian thing which gets the anger going, why are so many of us self-professed Christians also angry?
Say what, dietz? We dealt with the Christianity concerns early in this long thread. The objection is to any particular religion that advocates or accepts abuses like molestation, whipping, utter conformity, etc. It so happens the Duggar grounding is in religious offshoots that allow for these, *in writing. *
Sheesh. You missed a lot.
My daughter watched 16 and Pregnant when she was 16, and it was the best possible antidote to the romantic illusion of motherhood for a high school age student. And apparently it had a similar effect on others:
http://www.cnn.com/2014/01/13/health/16-pregnant-teens-childbirth/
Beat me to it, oldmom. There’s more than one study showing that 16 and pregnant DISCOURAGES teen pregnancy.
But who needs facts when you have rhetoric?
I’ve seen a few of those shows, and it wasn’t remotely presented as “romantical.” Maybe by some huge coincidence the only shows I saw just happened to be the only ones that portrayed the lives of these teen parents as pretty awful.
@dietz199 - If you consider only extreme conservative evangelicals to be the only Christians, then yeah, I guess you would be right. What people were criticizing is the Duggars portraying themselves as this example of Christian living, while in the meantime basically ignoring child abuse and claiming how Jesus fixed the whole thing, while not even trying to get the girls help. Whether Josh was a minor or not doesn’t matter, what he did was non consensual sexual activity which is by definition sexual abuse.
As far as whether people would criticize Wiccans or a Polyamorist (funny how you mix things up, Wicca is a faith tradition, polyamory is a lifestyle), if abuse was involved and they covered it it, I doubt few on here would spare them any grief either, that is quite frankly the card that everyone from the Catholic Church hierarchy on down to evangelical leaders caught with their pants down, that they are being criticized for things other groups are not,church leaders said no one criticizes schools for covering up for teachers accused of molestation, etc, etc…
And if it had been Wiccans or a polyamorous couple, do you want to know what the ‘good christians’ would be saying? They would be saying the Wiccan who did this were devil worshippers who are sexual perverts, they would say that polyamorists are sinful hedonists who are proof of what happens when you don’t follow “God’s law” and all that (which is kind of funny, if you think about it, in Genesis they love to cite, it says marriage is between a man and one or more women). Anytime someone who is gay is accused of sexual molestation or the like, the holy chorus uses that to ‘prove’ their point that gays are all pedophiles and so forth, you name it, I see a heck of a lot more judgement from these so called 'true Christians" , including the Duggars, then what they get back.
BTW, I don’t know too many of us darn liberals who are out to get Christians who think teen pregnancy is a good thing, it is one of the reasons unlike the religious, we support things like sex ed to try and prevent it, and i also don’t know too many who promote the idea that teens having babies is a good thing, whether married or not, and certainly don’t make it appear romantic, far from it. One of the biggest liberals out there, Pat Moynihan, got skewered when almost 60 years ago he pointed out the disaster of kids being born out of wedlock to teen age mothers, he got hammered by liberals for daring to speak to the truth, and by conservatives for pointing out that their finger pointing and moral judgement might be better served looking at how their policies didn’t help things, either. A lot of the people posting in this thread at Christian, and are tired of the in your face Christians like the Duggars who turn out , despite all their claims of being holier than thou and so forth, have feet of lead.
I wish I could give you multiple likes, @musicprnt
The difference is, these people aren’t conspiring to produce a TV show that glamorizes their lifestyle and promote their lifestyle as the one and only way to be happy. They aren’t thinking, "Well, God is giving me this opportunity to prove to everyone what great decisions I make based on my faith (whatever that faith is; the Duggars just happen to identify with a sect of Southern Baptist). I don’t know a teenager out there who has watched Teen Mom and walked away thinking, “Hey, they’ve got it made. I think I’ll adopt that lifestyle.” They see these kids struggle, sacrifice, compromise, suffer, etc. These TV teen moms have never said, “Look at me and how great my life is.” They show the real pain and loss these teenagers experience when they make a choice to have a child at 16. The only ‘glamour’ these teens have going for them by doing this show is perhaps a small stipend which maybe helps them make ends meet, and the makeup artist they get prior to shooting every scene.
I know I’ve read studies that show teen birth rates are going down. Some studies have actually credited shows like Teen Mom, as well as better availability of birth control. What you fail to see is the majority of Christians are appalled at this behavior; it’s just a few vocal ones who are quick to forgive and forget. It’s all about hypocrisy, plain as the nose on your face. And I’d go so far as to say, if these people did identify as Wiccan or some other non-traditional mainline denomination, you’d bet the majority of the country would be quick to call them a cult. The only reason they’re getting some leniency on that front at this point is because they are self-identifying as Southern Baptist. My bet is that the mainline Southern Baptist denomination is trying to distance themselves from the Duggars as far as possible.
I don’t think the Duggar’s show has ever pretended “their lifestyle was the one and only way to be happy”. Jim-Bob and TLC are far too savvy for that. The show has never been about evangelism. They are very matter of fact about what works for them without ever implying that other people are damned to hell. Who would watch that show? It’s very much an easy-going, slice of life type thing, for arm-chair anthropologists. Initially they wore prairie girl type dresses and lived in a plain, tiny house. It had a certain freak show value as wow, these people are really far, far out from mainstream society. Over time, they hit it big and made a lot of money and the girls updated their style to modern modest, wore makeup, and seemed a lot more worldly. This show is about making money and gaining political capital, not spreading the faith.
Well, we now know they aren’t completely trustworthy. But they have said they see the show as their “family mission.”
Sidebar, but my DS#1 said after one summer working as a camp counselor in a bunk full of 10 yr old boys that it was the best birth control he ever had!
And I recall seeing a client once who was 35 yrs old, and a grandmother…twice. At 35 I had a 2 year old at home and was not yet pregnant with my second son.
OK, Back to the Duggars. I’ve never watched any of that kind of stuff (Duggars, Honey Boo Boo, 16 and pregnant, etc). Smacks to me of voyeurism.
Oh, I’m sure they believe if they spread their faith as they feel God has called them to do, money and political capital will come their way. I would bet money on it. Their theology has a tone of prosperity theology - be good enough and have a faith that’s strong enough, and good things will come your way; if they don’t, then you haven’t been faithful enough.
My post was referring to one other particular post(er) whose rhetoric and angry outbursts against the Christian portion extends beyond the posts seen here.
Nuff said.
I haven’t seen any angry outbursts here against “Christians” in general; just against those who happen to be ultra-sanctimonious, judgmental hypocrites who live in glass houses and seem to spend all their time throwing stones! Please cite some support for your contention.
Also, since when does “Christian” = only an extremely narrow set of fundamentalist and/or evangelical denominations? Members of “liberal” denominations don’t count? Roman Catholics don’t count?
Yes, DonnaL it appears that the fundies have coopted the word “Christian.” The rest of us Christians are not living up to their standards. Since they set the standard.
Revelations states - in laymans terms - we should not add or subtract - from the bible. Seems to me this church of Duggar added a whole lot in their legalism. And in other laymans interpretations - Jesus was actually a big supporter of women. By the time the NT times came along women didn’t have many rights left. He had them traveling with them and talked about quite a bit - Martha and Mary, talking to the Samaritan woman, his mom Mary, Mary Magdalene (who wasn’t a prostitute) Personally I think of myself as a “hippie” Christian - lol I think once you make an organization of rules and laws you can stamp out the message of love and tolerance and respect and turn it into blind rule following.
Duggars are legalistic to the extreme who take a kernel of something and turn it into “law” and who is holier than someone else. A real example of ignoring the log in my own eye while pointing out the splinter in yours.
What scares many of us about the middle east suppression of women seems to be alive and well in some of these sects as well.
I started watching the Duggars years back just out of curiosity of how does a family with so many kids work? Was probably “14 and counting” about that time. I was curious how they worked the homeschooling, how the house was run, etc. I didn’t tune in for the religious aspect though it became clear that that was a premise of the show. I started watching when they were having shows on the building of the new house which I believe Josh kind of narrated and was the featured family member. It was kind of interesting seeing this large family cook, shop, and do activities together.
Over time, I realized many things.
- Michelle relied on these kids to do EVERYTHING. They were the hands on people. The cleaners, cookers, teachers, packers (have you seen the shows where they go on vacation? A couple of the kids are in charge of packing for all 20+ family members). She seemed to purely be the supervisor and job-giver.
- JB doles out the outside/manual labor jobs to the boys. He is by far the dominant person/personality in the family. But honestly, he doesn’t always seem like the brightest star on the planet.
It was when the courtships started that things really seemed to get weird. Not Anna so much (though I don’t remember so much of that story). But him befriending Derrick online (I think?) and JB almost courting Derrick first and then assigning him to court Jill. Accompanying her on a trip to Nepal to meet Derrick - because we needed to rush and couldn’t wait for Derrick to come back to the states???! And once Jessa started courting with Ben - they had only been courting a short time - JB invited Ben to come live on their property so he could get to know/see Jessa better, quicker. WHAT?! What’s the hurry JB?! And then, housing Ben in a spare room in the garage and assigning Ben task after task on the property to “earn his keep”. That just seemed odd on so many fronts.
Thank you, Donna, for reminding that fundamentalist is not the same as evangelical. That’s something that many on CC over the years have not known, understood or remembered. Some of the evangelical denominations are as liberal as liberal can be.