This evening, Jim Bob and Michelle Duggar reversed their commitment from earlier today and withdrew from speaking at the upcoming Rocky Mountain Super Conference on the Family.
The Super Conference is a homeschool conference put on by the Christian Home Educators of Colorado (CHEC), the largest statewide homeschool organization in Colorado (reaching over 10,000 families). Earlier in the day, the CHEC board announced that Jim Bob and Michelle would not be withdrawing from the conference despite recent revelations concerning their troubling handling of child sexual abuse allegedly perpetrated by their son, Josh Duggar. The board issued a public statement that said, “Jim Bob and Michelle Duggar will be joining us on Friday evening of the conference. They humbly desire that the evening be focused on how the Gospel has penetrated their lives and given them hope in the trials that Christian families face.” You can view the CHEC board’s original statement here.
Tonight, however, the CHEC board revised their statement and informed conference goers that the Duggars had withdrawn due to “recent and increased attacks and pressure on the family.” You can view the new statement as an archived PDF here. An image and full text follow:
Text is,
A Note from the CHEC Board on the Duggars
Updated statement as of Wednesday, 5/10/15 at 7:15 pm
By God’s Providence, CHEC just received word that Jim Bob and Michelle Duggar have decided not to come and address the 2015 Rocky Mountain Super Conference on the Family. This latest change comes in light of recent and increased attacks and pressure on the family. They have graciously requested to withdraw entirely from speaking at this year’s conference and therefore will not be appearing at the Friday evening event on June 19th.
We thank you for your patience as we have interacted closely with Jim Bob the last several days. Please be in prayer for the Duggar family during this difficult time.Thank you for your support of CHEC and the Rocky Mountain Super Conference.
The CHEC Board of Directors
About CHEC and the Rocky Mountain Super Conference on the Family
According to their website, CHEC’s upcoming Super Conference on the Family “will explore ways to build stronger families, churches, and governments through SERVANT LEADERSHIP.” The conference features educational tracks on homeschooling, leadership, Christian worldview studies, relationships, and Christian discipleship. It is being held next week, June 18-20, 2015, at the Denver Mart in Denver, Colorado. In addition to the Duggars, conference speakers include R.C. Sproul, Jr. (a defrocked pastor who advocates extreme patriarchy), S.M. Davis (speaker and writer for Bill Gothard’s IBLP and ATI programs), and others.
HA note: The following is written by Kathi and reprinted with permission from Julie Anne Smith’s blog Spiritual Sounding Board. It was originally published on June 4, 2015 with the title “Kevin Swanson talks (or doesn’t talk) about the Duggars on his radio show.”
On May 28, 2015, Kevin Swanson entered the foray of folks talking about the revelation of Josh Duggar sexually molesting several little girls when he was a teen. His radio show, “The Duggars – Why the Media Storm” starts off with the vague assertion that no matter what Christians may say about the Duggars, the world will attack because the world hates the Duggars because they don’t take birth control. Right.
“The liberals have hated the Duggars from the very beginning and they will admit that. . . .The reason they hated the Duggars was because the Duggars did not take birth control. That’s a simple explanation for why they hate the Duggars. They hate the Duggars because the world is into killing babies and they kill a lot of them.”
Instead of focusing on the issue at hand, here is what Swanson was not going to say:
Christians aren’t perfect, just forgiven.
Incest is worse than homosexuality. HUH?? Steve Vaughn chimes in saying, “They’re about the same.” To which he offers hearty laugh.
Humble, repentant sinners will go home justified rather than the proud, unrepentant homosexuals.
Most children sin, or that all children sin, or that all of us sin, or that some teens commit fornication, or that a lot of teens commit fornication.
Incest is a capital crime in some cases, and we’re not going to tell you which cases incest is a capital crime as defined by scripture.
The Duggars shoulda, shoulda, shoulda, shoulda, reported the problem to a different police officer, different judge, different church elders, and, and, and, and, and, and, and…
The Duggars can be more real now after all their sins are out there for the public to see and that’s going to make for a better reality show.
The whole sexual revolution with all of its millions manifestations was a really good idea.
American conservative Christianity is in really solid shape. (Really, this is such a long, drawn out rabbit trail that makes absolutely no sense.)
Whew! Am I glad that Swanson saved us all from listening to an uncomfortable conversation about the real issues surrounding the Duggar situation. So what did Swanson manage to talk about?
Well, he did manage to state that his radio show, Generations With Vision, is a part of the parent organization Christian Home Educators of Colorado (CHEC). And, he did manage to mention that the Duggars have been invited to the Rocky Mountain Super Conference on the Family. He also mentioned that while the Duggars have not been asked to withdraw from the CHEC conference, the Duggars also have not informed CHEC that they will not be upholding their speaking engagement. So, as far as we know, the Duggars will still be making their appearance at this “super” conference. You know, all of this information would have made for a great disclaimer at the beginning of the show.
So why has CHEC not revoked their invitation to the Duggars for this upcoming conference? It’s all about forgiveness. And, praying and loving the Duggars. And because sin is bad (because God said so), but Jesus went to the cross for that sin so who are we to judge? I think we all just got Jesus-juked.
If it’s all about forgiveness and not judging, then I want to know when the Duggars asked CHEC and Kevin Swanson to forgive them of their sins. When did Josh Duggar approach the organization and confess what he did and ask for forgiveness? When did Michelle and Jim Bob approach the organization and Kevin Swanson and confess how they manipulated the system to hide what their son had done and ask for forgiveness? Why does Kevin Swanson pull the forgiveness card so easily when he was not the one who was wronged? Why is he so quick to forgive and forget? Honestly, it is my opinion that Kevin Swanson views victims of sexual abuse as bitter and he has very little empathy toward victims of abuse.
Co-host, Steve Vaughn, summarizes this attitude by quoting Ephesians 4:31-32, “Get rid of all bitterness, rage and anger, brawling and slander, along with every form of malice. Be kind and compassionate to one another, forgiving each other, just as in Christ God forgave you.” With this comes the call for all Christians to put it all away. Stop being bitter and slanderous toward the Duggars. Be tender-hearted and compassionate. Because that is what the gospel of Jesus Christ is all about.
To which I reply, “Shame on you!”
Shame on you, Steve Vaughn, for callously laughing at victims of incest. And for saying that homosexuality is the same as incest.
Shame on you, Kevin Swanson, for not taking seriously the issues that have been exposed about how the Duggars mishandled Josh’s sexual molesting of young children.
And, shame on you Kevin Swanson for the appearance of not addressing the issue because it may impact your parent organization’s “super” conference. Because, if the Duggars don’t show up, then you need to take out “We’ve Got the Duggars” on your banner and then people may not be as interested in attending.
Starting in May, I began uploading my collection of ATI’s Wisdom Booklet homeschooling curriculum to our website. I will add links here as they go up. These versions are NOT intended for educational use, but for journalists and researchers who want to investigate the teachings of ATI in primary sources. Any interested parties are highly encouraged to read through our Inside ATI series and the growing collection of information on Recovering Grace.
Please let me know if you would like to see a specific volume – scanning them page-by-page is a time consuming and tedious process, so it will take months to put all 50+ volumes and parent guides online. The galleries can be difficult to read, so I’ve included compressed PDF versions as well. If you would like full-res versions of the PDFs (usually around 70 MB), email us at HomeschoolersAnonymous@gmail[dot]com.
Discerning God’s Will in Every Decision and Appendix on the Place of Old Testament Law in the Life of New Testament Believers (pamphlet included with Wisdom Booklet package) [PDF]
This post has been a long time coming, and with the Duggar scandal all over the news, it’s been on my mind again. First off, let me say that what Josh Duggar did was wrong, and how the media has handled this story has been pretty awful too. Tabloids have been flippant about sharing police documents with the victims’ names on them, and since the Duggar family has been very vocally against LGBTQ people, who they claim are child-molesters, there are a lot of people eager to point out the hypocrisy of covering up the deeds of a child molester in their midst. I think there is plenty out there on what happened and how it was “handled”, I want to talk about the why. So many people are shocked and horrified that this happened in a “good christian family” like the Duggars, but it didn’t surprise me at all. I grew up in this movement, along with 10 siblings.
Sibling incest is not young, similarly aged siblings curiously looking at each others’ genitals. It is initiated by one sibling, and there is usually a 3 (or more) year age gap. Risk factorsfor sibling incest include power imbalances, parentalized siblings, lack of sex education, and other forms of abuse already occurring in the home. Judging by the general information we have about the Duggars, a lot of these factors are present. The sheer amount of children dictates that the older children care for the younger ones. And in the police report interviews none of the children interviewed even knew the correct names for the human anatomy when it came to genitals.
In a large homeschooling family, older siblings are often in charge of the younger ones. Younger children are expected to obey their older siblings as they would a parent and may face punishment from the parents or even the siblings if they do not obey. This creates a hierarchy where the younger children are basically powerless and have already come to expect that they do not have a say in how they are treated. Sexual actions initiated by the older sibling are not likely to be resisted or talked about in this sort of relationship.
If a parent is physically or emotionally largely unavailable, such as would be the case for anyone with 19 children, parenting younger children can often fall to the older ones. The older child is often experiencing the parental neglect as well, and since they are not emotionally mature enough to handle being a parent, they end up relying on the younger child for whom they have parental responsibilities for emotional fulfillment. Sometimes this leads to sexual actions as well. Other abuse existing in the home greatly increases the likelihood of sexual abuse occurring. If children are used to being emotionally abused or physically abused, they do not have healthy boundaries or understandings of their rights as a human being.
In the conservative christian homeschool worldview sex ed is extremely lacking. We are talking about no knowledge of what sex is, human anatomy, etc. I grew up in this movement. My parents did not allow books in the house with such information. I remember when an art book from my grandparents included a nude sketch, my parents stapled several thick sheets of paper over it. I was told when I was 10 about menstruation and that babies grow in a womb inside a woman’s belly with help from a seed from her husband. I was at several of my siblings’ home births. But that was it. When I was 17, I found a book in the library filled with pictures of fetal development; on one page it showed 2 thermal images of a penis showing how flaccid = cool, and erect/engorged = warm. This was the first time I was aware of the fact that erections were a part of (penis-in-vagina) sex. I went to a different section and found “Seventeen magazine’s girls guide to sex”, and I put it inside of a large history book so no one could see what I was really reading and sat in the back corner on the floor reading as fast as a could. This was how I finally figured out that sex (the thing that only married people were supposed to do when they love each other very much, and was sinful and dirty otherwise) did not magically happen while 2 people slept in the same bed, and I was 17. I was 20 and married before I learned what a clitoris was. I had several children before I finally heard of the concept of “consent”.
This sheltering did not keep me from being a sexual person; it just left me with a complete lack information about it. I had no understanding of boundaries, or consent or even that masturbating was a sexual (albeit normal) act. My point is that it is entirely possible to be a teenage, conservative, homeschooled kid, and have no idea what is sexual and what is not, or what is appropriate and what is not.
So no, given the circumstances of the home, combined with their belief system, I am not surprised by sibling incest. In fact, I think this happens in large conservative families far more than anyone thinks it does. What is truly horrifying is that after setting their kids up for this to happen, Josh Duggar’s parents pushed it under the rug, kept things in house, and didn’t get help for either the molester or the children who were molested. Several of the headlines have claimed that Josh was turned in by his dad; this wasn’t true either. The investigation did not occur until over 3 years after and only because an outsider got wind of it and called the abuse hotline. Jim Bob and Michelle did their best to cover up and move on. They claim because of god’s grace the slate is wiped clean, as if it never happened. Except it did. It happens precisely because of the family system that has been paraded on TV for too long.
And it isn’t just the Duggars; this is basically the tip of the ice berg of what is out there in the conservative christian homeschooling movement. Despite the smiling wholesome-looking exterior, ignorance and repression and isolation creates this kind of set up again and again. When a system teaches that the victim is to blame, refuses to educate on or even talk about sex, treats children as property with no rights, and requires unquestioning obedience, it is not surprising when dysfunction comes to light.
I recently received a set of first edition Advanced Training Institute Wisdom Booklets – thanks to the generous scrounging of an HA community member. I distinctly remembered a volume of the WBs (Wisdom Booklets) that dealt with sexuality, lust, and immoral sexual activity. At the time, it left me more confused than anything. I thought married couples literally could not catch or spread a venereal disease. My sexual education from the WBs did not include anything on consent or rape, and it placed much of the burden of lustful thoughts on the seductive powers of scantily clad women. While I cannot say with any certainty that the Duggars received the same sexual education I did, our shared curriculum in the WBs and Bill Gothard’s teachings were at least our shared base line for “sexual education.” Ironically, it was the coverage of President Clinton’s affair with Monica Lewinsky that prompted me to ask “what is rape?” and not a concept I learned from my sexual education.
A foundational point in ATI and Gothard’s sexual ethic is a lack of agency for men and women as a powerful temptation.Women were saddled with the majority of the responsibly for men’s “lustful” thoughts. Gothard’s characterization of women meant that their immodesty compelled men to sexualize, harass, or assault them.
One of Gothard’s big things was for families to have “bible time” in the mornings, which consisted of reading a Proverb each day of the month, then a handful of Psalms. Proverbs 7 (KJV was what ATI mandated) was always emphasized by my parents, and it describes a young man being tempted and literally led down a dark alley to have sex with a woman of the night. The woman is described aswearing “the attire of an harlot.” Her participation in the public sphere is key to her function as a temptation, and “her feet abide not in her house: Now is she without, now in the streets, and lieth in wait at every corner.” The chapter constantly emphasizes the woman “catching” the man, convincing him to “take our fill of love… with her fair speech.” Despite the highly sensual details provided by the author, the consequences of participating in such actions are clear:
He goeth after her straightway, as an ox goeth to the slaughter… Many strong men have been slain by her. Her house is the way to hell, going down to the chambers of death.
Let not thine heart decline to her ways, go not astray in her paths.
Intro section of WB24 echoing Proverbs 7
The message of Proverbs 7 is echoed by ATI’s Wisdom Booklet #24, which focuses on lust, temptation, and provided the basics for sexual education for thousands of ATI students.
A full copy of the volume is included at the bottom of this post, and I will discuss excerpts. ATI and Gothard always encouraged families to apply their WB lessons to everyday life. My parents decided the teachings of this volume meant I shouldn’t play rec-league soccer on a team with girls (I was 16). Wisdom Booklet 24 focused on Matthew 5:27-28, which reads:
“Ye have heard that it was said by them of old time, Thou shalt not commit adultery: but I say unto you, That whosoever looketh on a woman to lust after her hath committed adultery with her already in his heart.”
Much like Proverbs 7, this WB wanted to emphasize the physical dangers that can come from lusting. However, in typical Gothard fashion, the WB claimed that envisioning an act three times had the same effect on your body and soul as doing the action. Not only can imaginative lusting equal fornication, but the WB claims that lusting can actually make you a violent criminal. “As a result [of lusting], the glands and other bodily functions are activated, and the level of testosterone increases. Recent studies revealed a significant correlation between high testosterone levels and those who commit violent crimes.” I’m not here to say I know what was going on in Josh Duggar’s mind all those years ago, but I can tell you what I felt when I was taught these things as a teenager.
This teaching really messed me up. I assumed I was no better than a sex criminal because I had sexual thoughts. If I wanted to be with a girl, I was no better than a violent rapist. Sexual thoughts are natural for pubescent teens, and making them feel their life and soul are in literal danger by even thinking these thoughts fucks you up. How is it productive sex education to tell young people that they might as well commit the act if they are going to think about it three times?
Another glaring error in the text is the lack of any discussion of consent. In the chapter where we translated the original Greek and made all sorts of assumptions about God, called “How Does the Greek Confirm the Dangers of Partners’ Defiling Their Marriage By Lust?,” there are a number of terms defined, including: honorable, undefiled, fornicator, adulterer, judge, lewdness, lechery, lust, prolifigacy, abandonment, depravity, perversion, dissipation, dissolution, vice, and profanity (all terms defined in the context of marriage). But where is consent? Where is “marital rape” in this list of terms? Michelle Duggar is outspoken about her beliefs on a wife’s subservient role and need to be sexually available to her husband. ATI’s curriculum would have taught no different.
And just to make sure you are grasping the slippery slope put forth by the text – thinking about immorality three times is just as bad as doing it. Immorality is entirely defined by scripture verses and does not address things like consent or marital rape. The Wisdom Booklet’s “History Resource” profiled Hilter, Socrates, Plato, Aristotle, Karl Marx, and Nietzsche. You guessed it, each one of these people were characterized by how their immorality led them astray or ended up with genocide. Next in history, we learned about how immorality led to the collapse of the Maya, Incas, Ancient Greece, and the Roman Empire. In the Math section, we learned how to “visualize the consequences of lust” with visual graphs.
The “Science Resource” chapter further emphasized the role of women as active “trappers.” The chapter is entirely on different kinds of traps used animal trappers and it begins with “How Do Trappers Illustrate the Enticements Which Satan Uses to Appeal to our Lusts?” This language is borrowed directly from Proverbs 7, which says the seductress “perfumed [her] bed with myrrh, aloes, and cinnamon.” Throughout this volume, men are the presumed focus of the lust and women are the dangerous seducing forces that can lead to the collapse of civilizations.
As Wende discussed yesterday, many of Gothard’s teachings explain that victims of sexual abuse may be at fault for being abused. This image has been making the rounds through mainstream media. Its horribly offensive and damaging message are reiterated in other information like this that redirects responsibility for assault to “immodest” victims. Wisdom Book 24 covers this very topic on page 1130. “God’s Laws on Nakedness Begin with Modesty in the Home” begins the section:
The requirement for modesty among family members is given in Leviticus 18. Twenty-four times in this chapter, God’s people are commanded not to “uncover their nakedness” to those near of kin. Whether this refers to an incestuous relationship or nakedness alone, the fact is clear that indecency as well as immorality is forbidden.
Gothard’s insistence on a literal interpretation of Levitical law informs his sexual ethic. Deuteronomy 22:23-24 also advocates stoning raped women “because she cried not.”
If a damsel that is a virgin be betrothed unto an husband, and a man find her in the city, and lie with her; Then ye shall bring them both out unto the gate of that city, and ye shall stone them with stones that they die; the damsel, because she cried not, being in the city; and the man, because he hath humbled his neighbour’s wife: so thou shalt put away evil from among you
Right on queue, WB24 throws in a graphic image of someone being stoned “for incestuous relationships.” It’s no stretch to say that ATI and Gothard continually pushed the idea that victims were, at least partially, at fault for their abuse.
The closest WB24 gets to actual sex education is the medical section on venereal diseases. However, even this led to very basic confusion about how one can acquire a VD.
Venereal diseases are transmitted primarily by a corruption of God’s design for love. When man violates God’s design for marriage and follows his own lustful desires, he suffers grave consequences to his own health.
The section, and WB24, ends with an admonition to “identify the medical consequences of lust,” once again equating mental fantasies with physical consequences. The supposed impacts are VDs, and each sub-heading of the chapter is matched to the appropriate Bible verse.
The distortions of the idea of appropriate sexual relations and consent by WB24 are inexcusable. Men are characterized as dominated by fleeting lust, which are irresistibly stoked by the dress of girls or women. Even family members not excused from discussion by ATI, thus family members are subsumed into the “seductress” category. If a father molests his children, perhaps they are to blame. Such is the thinking proposed by Gothard. Looking back, it’s easy to see how this philosophy can lead to serial sexual abuse because men are relieved of much of their responsibility for their actions, while just lusting is as bad as actually doing the act. Leading many men to think they are beyond help, consumed by their desires. So instead of dealing with them, they repress them, and it only makes it more difficult to deal with what may have begun as natural sexual urges.
I can see just in my own life how this thinking impacted my sexual ethic and ideas of consent at a young age. It made me think that masturbating made me as perverse as sex criminals. I talked with a friend of mine and we would confess our “sins of lust”, and I saw us as struggling with similar burdens. His burden meant he took advantage of underage girls, mine was masturbating in my bed. ATI and Bill Gothard taught me those things were just as bad.
In my many conversations with ATI survivors, sexual abuse is too often a topic of discussion. One woman I talked with was abused as a child, and her family not only blamed her for it, but held exorcisms. They convinced her the demons inside her were “making” men abuse her. Agency and responsibility are replaced by pseudoscience and utterly incomprehensible logic about sex and sexual desire. Gothard used this system to groom his victims, to shame them into silence, to make them afraid to speak up. Why? Because they might have been responsible for the abuse.
HA note: The following is reprinted with permission from Libby Anne’s blog Love Joy Feminism. It was originally published on Patheos on May 21, 2015.
When I first saw rumors circulating yesterday I didn’t pay any attention, because the accusations were vague and felt rehashed. Remember when the tabloids reported that Jessa Duggar had sex at the church immediately after her wedding, based on a word of an obviously satirical blogger who claimed to have been there? Yeah, I remember that too. There have been rumors circulating for years about Jim Bob blaming Josh for the loss of a political campaign, based on “sin in the camp,” so I thought it was probably just those rumors being rehashed in the way tabloids do.
What happened exactly? Answering this question is sensitive because of the need to protect the identity Josh’s victims. According to TMZ, one of Josh’s victims has asked to have the unredacted police documents destroyed to protect her identity—and even the redacted police report gives more than enough information to guess at the victims’ identities. This is a problem.
I’ve gone back and forth about whether I should blog about this. This is not a gossip blog. I blog about weighty issues, and when I do blog about scandals like this I try to do so in a way that makes larger points, rather than just scoring cheap shots. That said, I’ve decided to go ahead and blog about this for several reasons. For one thing, I want you to have a reliable place to get good information (there’s still incorrect information circling out there). For another thing, I do think there are larger points to be made here. I’ll start by summarizing the police report.
I was reading an article about the Duggars this morning. People were commenting about how “happy” the children were and how that was evidence of a healthy, well-balanced upbringing. It reminded me of my own upbringing and how “happy” we always looked…to outsiders.
This was because we followed one of the cardinal rules of Godly Christians (as defined by Mr. LaQuiere). You may not know this rule, because, poor you, you probably grew up without the benefit of Mr. LaQuiere’s Super-Christianity, so I’ll just tell you right now what it is: ALWAYS SMILE! This is because the only godly facial expression is a smile. It’s true that there are multiple godly emotions… happiness… gratefulness… sorrow over your sin… but they can pretty much be covered with the one facial expression (some lenience can be given for the “sorrow” category, but only if it’s the right kind of sorrow).
Not only is a smile important because it portrays our proper gratefulness to God for all our blessings, and because it provides a “good witness” for God, and our parents, and godly large families, and homeschoolers, all of whom we represent…but it’s a way to change how you feel on the inside!
I’ll show you what I mean. The following was written by the mom of the K family I mentioned earlier, who has her own website (www.raisinggodlytomatoes.com) and book about raising godly children (it’s not a gardening book, though gardening can also be a godly activity, if done correctly):
THE OUTSIDE REFLECTS THE INSIDE
One cherished, but highly erroneous belief is that a parent should not correct a child for displaying a wrong emotion, because the child will “suppress” the emotion rather than change it. Experience convinces me otherwise. Require young children to display the right emotions outwardly and their hearts will change, producing the right attitudes and emotions inwardly as well.
Of course you can’t simply order your children to “be happy”. If the child is small, it works much better to tell him to “smile” or “straighten up your face.” If the child is very young, I’ll cheerfully say, “Let’s see a smile now”, or “Where is your smile?”
The child may initially resist, but when he finally obeys, the resulting smile will often break into a radiant grin, accompanied by sincere laughter and other expressions of genuine joy. It is hard for a small child to hide his true feelings. It is equally difficult for him to display an emotion that he does not really feel. Get him to smile on the outside and invariably he will smile on the inside.
A joyful heart makes a cheerful face, but when the heart is sad, the spirit is broken. Proverbs 15:13
So, to recap, in order to avoid showing the “wrong” emotions, if you require your small children (and the rest of them too) to “smile on the outside”, you will change their hearts and get them to have the “right” emotions and attitudes instead. Also notice the verse at the bottom, which clinches it: if you have a joyful heart, you’ll have a joyful face! (This may sound somewhat different from the lesson “if you have a joyful face, you’ll have a joyful heart”, but that’s just semantics. Don’t be so nit-picky, for gosh sakes!)
You can easily see that smiling is the first line of defense against all attitude problems.
Smiling will change your heart – smiling will make you happy – smiling will help you be godly!
This necessity to smile was tacked on to most requirements: instant obedience…with a smile! Do your chores… with a smile! Finish being spanked… now smile!
You can see how “smiling” and “looking happy” becomes the necessary mask that all children raised in this belief system must wear. (The Duggars also follow this, by the way – read up on Bill Gothard’s ATI character-training program, which they are a part of, and you’ll find plenty about having a “bright countenance”, and how looking unhappy is publicly shaming your parents/authorities.) It’s not a choice, and it has nothing to do with how ‘happy’ they really are or aren’t.
The main problem I have with this type of training is that it not only separates all emotion into two categories of “good” or “bad” – but it also teaches children from the earliest possible ages to stuff their emotions.
This happened to me (to be fair, it was already happening to me to some extent before I met Mr. LaQuiere, because my dad was very anti-emotion…but it was reinforced and drilled home by the training I received from Mr. LaQuiere all through my formative years). I learned that not only should I not ever express negative emotions like anger, or disappointment, or unhappiness, because they were sinful (unless it was, say, “righteous anger” – but somehow only our dads ever managed to feel this one, while disciplining us, go figure), but I learned how not to feel those negative emotions, disassociating myself from them for years. This latter part wasn’t expressly taught to me, but being a smart kid, I figured it out on my own. I taught myself to “think my way out of feeling”. Any bad feeling I had, I thought through logically, analyzing it, until the feeling faded, and only the analysis remained. I also discovered that if I held my breath, the overwhelming emotion would fade. I trained myself to stay calm and not cry, or get angry this way. I got so good at this that it became second-nature.
Anytime something bad happened that would trigger a negative emotion, part of me would just “shut down” all by itself, and I felt…nothing.
Not happiness, not sadness, not anger…nothing at all. It was like being in an alternate reality where no emotions existed.
I’ll touch more on this later, specifically on the journey God had to bring me through to learn to feel things again, but I’ll just say now that living emotion-free is not healthy for anyone, and especially for a child. Emotions are sign-posts of what is going on beneath the surface. Emotions tell us to look deeper and see what need is being missed. Telling a child who you’ve just severely punished to smile…as tears stream down his face…does not teach him to have a joyful heart.
It teaches him to hide, even from himself, what he really feels, and who he really is.
If you don’t know what you really feel anymore, you lose your God-given signposts meant to alert you to danger. Instead of a built-in-warning-system for unmet needs, or dangers to be avoided, you learn rigid control over your outward expressions, and you start to live on the surface only, without even realizing it. But it makes it easier for parents to avoid difficult situations with their children…to avoid dealing with difficult emotions their children are experiencing…it makes parenting easy, because you only have to enforce a one-size-fits-all set of rules, not deal with the complexities of childhood and individual needs. This is why I was told there was “nothing to be sad about” when I watched my brother being severely beaten, and told not to cry when Baby J was being suffocated in couch cushions. I was taught to ignore my strong emotions that told me this was bad and wrong, and to put blind trust in my authorities instead, who told me it was right and good. In retrospect, it’s little wonder I learned it was safer to divorce myself from emotions entirely.
I don’t smile as much today as I did back then, but when I do, at least it’s genuine! And my children? They cry, or feel grumpy, or are happy, without having their emotions prescribed for them and enforced through threats and punishment.
We’re working on learning parenting techniques together that affirm them for who they are, and address their needs, instead of placing their only value in being a “happy” advertisement for me or God.
I love when they smile! But I will never tell them to.
I’ve said it before on social media and I’ll say it again here. The mocking of Duggar children is not something I can get behind. Criticize the Duggar parents for what they’re doing to their children, criticize Jim Bob, Michelle, and Josh for their anti-LGBT activism, that’s fair game. Mocking the kids isn’t.
Kids like the Duggars, who aren’t being given a real education (you don’t get a real education from ATI Wisdom Booklets), who aren’t allowed college, and who aren’t even allowed a single private conversation with someone of the opposite sex until they’re married, are the ones I’m trying to help.
TLC may put a pretty face on it, but make no mistake, the Duggars are part of a high-control, authoritarian cult. ATI creates an alternate reality, complete with their own version of history and science, and a theology that seems, on the surface, to be orthodox Christianity but is anything but. ATI even redefines language, Scientology-stype.
This is but one small example of the way that ATI indoctrinates its members, but check out their definitions of the character qualities that Bill Gothard decided were important. I’ve included a few of those character qualities below. Notice how most of those definitions are nothing like the dictionary definitions of those words?
When I was a kid some ATI friends gave us the “Character Clues” game, which was supposed to teach you those traits by having you match traits to definitions. Apart from being the world’s most boring game, we gave up on it quickly because the whole thing was redefining words. We could give up on the game because learning Gothard-approved definitions of words was dull, but for people who are part of the ATI cult, learning an entirely new vocabulary is a step in the cult indoctrination process. A process the kids have no say in.
The Duggar kids’ entire version of reality, down to the meaning of the words they use, is the one created by being raised in the cult. Unlike Jim Bob and Michelle, who lived lives outside of the cult before joining, the Duggar kids have nothing to compare anything to. Their entire reality is shaped by the cult and everything they see in the rest of the world they’re seeing through the lens of the cult. TLC gives them a broader set of experiences than most ATI kids have, but they’re still experiencing it through the filter Bill Gothard created. That’s all they know.
Mocking the kids for doing the only things they’ve ever known isn’t doing anything other than entertaining yourself at the expense of kids being raised in an extremely controlling, if not outright abusive, home. That’s cruel. It needs to stop.
HA note: The following is reprinted with permission from Libby Anne’s blog Love Joy Feminism. It was originally published on Patheos on November 21, 2014.
I recently received the following email:
Hi Libby Anne,
I’m a long-time reader of your blog, so I know you occasionally write about the Duggar family. Well, recently I heard about a fairly popular petition to get the show “19 Kids and Counting” cancelled. Maybe you have also heard this, but if not, here is one news story about it:
Supposedly, this was due to comments they made against gay marriage. Perhaps you were already planning on doing a post about it. Either way, I (and probably others) would be curious to know: what do you think about this? Should TLC cancel the show? Are people calling for its cancelation for the right reasons? Is this a good opportunity to bring other harmful ideas promoted by the family to light?
Best,
—Curious
Curious asks some very good questions, questions that have been percolating since I first heard about the petition a few days ago. So let me walk you through my current thought process.
Yes, the Duggars are homophobic. They are also incredibly sexist, carefully limiting and curtailing their daughters’ dreams. The Duggars have long supported cult-like organizations run by men who sexually harassed and molested teenage and young adult girls in their employ (Doug Phillips and Bill Gothard). Actually, the Duggars continue to support and promote one of these organizations (ATI), which has jettisoned its founder (Bill Gothard) but is run by the same leadership that spent decades covering up his sexual offenses.
The Duggars have for years promoted child rearing books that require parents to “break” their children’s wills and to shun “rebellious” adult children. They don’t allow their adult children to so much as go shopping without an “accountability buddy,” and don’t allow their adult daughters to text significant others without having a parent in on the conversation. And lest you think the adult children opt into this system entirely out of their own free will, did I mention the shunning “rebellious” children bit? That would be what this is about.
And have I even gotten to the question of what the Jim Bob and Michelle are doing with all of the money they get from TLC? They certainly don’t appear to be putting it in accounts for their children, whom they continually insist they cannot afford to send to college.
In your marriage there will be times you’re going to be very exhausted. Your hubby comes home after a hard day’s work, you get the baby to bed, and he is going to be looking forward to that time with you. Be available. Anyone can fix him lunch, but only one person can meet that physical need of love that he has, and you always need to be available when he calls.
In the Duggars’ world, women are not allowed to say “no” to sex. A wife’s duty is to always “be available when he calls.” Also part of the Duggars’ world is the belief that wives must submit to their husbands. You better believe that Jill and Jessa, both recently married, fully believe that they must obey their new husbands. They believe this because that is what their parents spared no pains to teach them. That’s how this works.
So I am at a loss as to why, out of all of this, it is only now and only with regards to their homophobia that people have a serious problem with the Duggars. It’s not even like this is the first time the Duggars have combined their opposition to gay rights with their politics—in 2012 they campaigned for Rick Santorum, emphasizing his opposition to marriage equality. Don’t get me wrong, I find the Duggars’ views abhorrent. But why this issue and this moment, and not other issues or earlier moments?
The petition itself was actually started months ago, when Michelle recorded her transphobic robocall, but didn’t gain much traction. It only began making real progress toward gaining signature last week, when the Jim Bob and Michelle posted a photo of themselves kissing and invited other married couples to post their own photos. When gay and lesbian couples became posting their own kissing photos, the person running the Duggar facebook page deleted them. And that, dear readers, is what actually caused the current outrage against the Duggars’ homophobia.
So let’s get this straight. The Duggars support an extreme version of patriarchy that holds that wives must be constantly sexually available for their husbands, and no one bats an eye. The Duggars promote child rearing practices that involve spanking infants and punishing children for frowning, and no one cares. The Duggars don’t allow their adult children to be unchaperoned or to text their beaus without daddy reading over their shoulders, and everyone smiles and calls it quaint. The Duggars support a sexual predator and continue supporting his ministry even after his actions are made public, and everyone yawns. Michelle Duggar records a transphobic robocall and most people just shrug. But the Duggars delete pictures of gay and lesbian couples kissing from their personal facebook page, and that is enough to bring a hundred thousand people out of the woodwork to demand TLC to pull the show.
Now for the million dollar question: Do I think the petition is a good idea? Would I like to see TLC pull 19 Kids and Counting?
Here is what I would like to see: I would like to see TLC be honest in its portrayal of the Duggars. I would like them to be clear about the fact that their star family supports the ministry of a serial sexual predator. I would like them to be clear that the girls are not given any semblance of true choice when it comes to leaving home or going out with a boy. I would like to see them be honest about the child rearing practices the Duggars support, rather than allowing the Duggars to smile and hedge every time someone asks them about spanking. I would like to see them be brutally and painfully honest about what Michelle and Jim Bob are teaching their daughters about their role in life, as women. I would also like to see more attention paid to the quality of education the children are receiving, and why none of them have attended college.
The problem I have with TLC is not so much the fact that they run the Duggar’s show as it is the fact that they portray the family as all cutesy and happy and sweet, covering over the horrible things the parents believe and support and the impact these things have on their children. I grew up in a family like the Duggars. I was the oldest of twelve children, homeschooled, courtship, the whole thing. There is so much there that the TLC crew doesn’t even touch on as they fall all over themselves giving the family a happy friendly smiling glaze.
I don’t think we should require families on TV reality shows to support gay rights. I do think we should demand that the networks that air reality shows be honest about their subjects. And while we’re at it, let’s demand that TLC set up accounts for each of the children rather than simply handing the cash over to their parents. But where’s the outrage pushing that cause?
Members of the Duggar family with Bill Gothard at one of Gothard’s IBLP programs, “Journey to the Heart,” where children are taught to “identify blind spots or secret sins that are keeping them from completely surrendering to God.”
By Shaney Lee, HARO Board Member
The Duggars have made the news again—but this time, it’s not because of another pregnancy, engagement, or wedding.
This time, family matriarch Michelle Duggar has made the news for a robocall made to citizens of Fayetteville, Arkansas, warning them about a new bill being considered by the city. The bill “protect citizens against discrimination in employment, housing, and public accommodations on the basis of their sexual orientation, gender identity, socioeconomic background, marital status, or veteran status,” according to the website ThinkProgress. Michelle’s concerns (or at least, the concerns of the Arkansas Family Council as expressed by Michelle) have to do with granting trans women access to public accommodations for females, such as restrooms and changing areas.
In the robocall, Michelle Duggar urges Fayetteville citizens to vote against the bill so that “men,” particularly “males with past child predator convictions” would not have a legal right to enter spaces designated for “women and children.” (Despite her effort, the bill passed in the early morning hours on Wednesday, 6-2.)
Much has already been written about the transphobic nature of Michelle’s call. While that in and of itself is concerning (especially since the attitude Michelle is promoting is the exact attitude behind the high rates of violence towards trans* individuals), there’s another aspect to this that major media outlets have failed to pick up.
To put it bluntly, Michelle Duggar is a hypocrite.
She supposedly cares about keeping women and children safe from sexual predators, yet her family continues to be associated with a known sexual predator: Bill Gothard.
Nearly every ad on the right hand side of the Duggar Family’s website is to one of Bill Gothard’s programs.
The Duggars have long been huge supporters of Bill Gothard and his ministry, Institute of Basic Life Principles. They have long used ATI curriculum in their homeschool and promoted it on their website. Their website currently has links to Advanced Training Institute, Oak Brook College of Law (another organization started by Bill Gothard), and has prominent advertisements for the ALERT academy (again, another organization related to IBLP and started by Bill Gothard). Gothard’s Advanced Seminar Textbook was influential in the Duggars’ decision to not use birth control. Photos on the official Duggar family website include an album from an ATI conference in 2010, including a picture of Jim Bob with Bill Gothard himself. Jim Bob and Michelle are listed as IBLP conference speakers for this year.
Bill Gothard resigned from IBLP and all its affiliates back in March of this year when over 30 women accused him of sexual harassment. The stories of some of these women are well-documented on the website Recovering Grace. And yet, in the face of overwhelming evidence showing Gothard to be a sexual predator, the Duggars have said nothing. In fact, they continue to profit from promoting ATI and IBLP.
(The Duggars have also been connected with sexual predator Doug Phillips of Vision Forum. They have similarly been silent about him, though all links to Vision Forum seem to be scrubbed from their website.)
In addition to showing a lack of personal integrity, Michelle’s call reinforces that common misconception that sexual predators are strangers. This is simply not the case–particularly when it comes to children. In the majority of sexual assault and abuse cases, the perpetrator was someone the victim knew. While this does not make sexual assault by strangers “rare” by any means, the narrative surrounding who sexual predators are and how they operate allow people respected by the community and in leadership positions to continue to sexually abuse people for years before anyone will speak up.
It allows people like Bill Gothard to get away with their abuse.
Michelle Duggar is more than willing to throw trans* people, who are no more likely to be sexual predators than anyone else, under the bus, while refusing to do the uncomfortable work of publicly denouncing a known predator whom she has supported and promoted for years.
Furthermore, trans* people are actually more like to be the victims of sexual assault or physical violence:
“Most studies reveal that approximately 50% of transgender people experience sexual violence at some point in their lifetime.” (Source)
“People who identify as transgender were 28% more likely to experience physical violence than those who are gender normative.” (Source)
This is unacceptable. If the Duggars want to have any credibility in speaking out against sexual predators, they must sever all ties with IBLP and publicly speak out against Gothard, as well as apologize for contributing to the bigoted attitudes that put trans* people at risk.
Homeschoolers Anonymous 
