homeschool

Here’s the Perfect Example of Doug Wilson Minimizing Steven Sitler’s Abuse

HA Editorial Team11 Comments

By R.L. Stollar, HA Community Coordinator

Content warning: descriptions of child sexual abuse and abuse minimization.

In one of his many, many self-defensive blog posts, Doug Wilson provides us the perfect example of how he has minimized (and continues to minimize) the child sexual abuse perpetrated by Steven Sitler, the homeschool alumnus who attended Wilson’s New Saint Andrews College. The blog post is titled, “The Only Kind of Gospel There Is”, and was published Thursday, September 10, 2015. Wilson writes,

The twittermob has been circulating numerous untruths, among them that Steven Sitler is a child rapist. He was actually convicted of one count of Lewd Conduct with a Minor under 16 years of age (Idaho Code 18-1508).

Yes, of all the actually important and relevant aspects of the current dialogue about child molesters Steven Sitler and Jamin C. Wight, Wilson chooses to focus on this. The fact that Steven Sitler was not convicted of “Child Rape” but rather “Lewd Conduct With a Minor,” the implication of which is, of course, that “Lewd Conduct” is somehow less egregious. Thus these evil twittermobs are the real abusers, falsely accusing poor Sitler of something he never did.

Well, yes, Steven Sitler was never convicted of Child Rape. Yes, Sitler was convicted of Lewd Conduct With a Minor. And yes, in Idaho, those two charges are distinct (though advocacy groups and other states like Washington State consider them the same). But let’s look at the Idaho statute Wilson cites to determine what Lewd Conduct with a Minor actually is. This is from Idaho Code 18-1508:

LEWD CONDUCT WITH MINOR CHILD UNDER SIXTEEN. Any person who shall commit any lewd or lascivious act or acts upon or with the body or any part or member thereof of a minor child under the age of sixteen (16) years, including but not limited to, genital-genital contact, oral-genital contact, anal-genital contact, oral-anal contact, manual-anal contact, or manual-genital contact, whether between persons of the same or opposite sex, or who shall involve such minor child in any act of bestiality or sado-masochism as defined in section 18-1507, Idaho Code, when any of such acts are done with the intent of arousing, appealing to, or gratifying the lust or passions or sexual desires of such person, such minor child, or third party, shall be guilty of a felony and shall be imprisoned in the state prison for a term of not more than life.

Wilson wants us to believe, in other words, that Steven Sitler isn’t as bad as a rapist. No, all Sitler did was force a young child to engage in all sorts of other sex acts that are… “better”? “Less bad”?

And we do not have to guess as to what Sitler actually did. Because the father of one of Sitler’s abuse victims did tell the Idaho court what Sitler did to his child. This is a September 7, 2005 letter written by a victim’s family to Idaho Judge Stegner. ** Content warning for explicit description of child sexual abuse. ** Click the image to enlarge:

Private_Letter

In other words, Steven Sitler lured a 2 year old child into an isolated area and forced that toddler to perform oral sex on him.

And somehow this is important to Wilson to clarify… why? Why is it only important to Wilson that he wins these little semantic games with people bringing sincere and heartfelt concerns to him regarding his and his church’s actions? So he wins on this technicality. So what? What does Doug Wilson want? Does he want us to give him a round of applause for having the courage to say what no one else did: that poor Steven Sitler is falsely accused? That Sitler never raped a child? That Sitler instead only forced a 2 year old to perform oral sex on him? That somehow that’s a relief? That somehow that makes Wilson a courageous champion of truth?

If Wilson actually cares about the God he claims to love, he should set aside his pride and his desire to play games of technicality. Because at the end of the day, it really doesn’t matter to anyone except the Idaho court system whether Sitler “raped” a child or “forced oral sex” on a child. You know why? Because both are egregious cases of child abuse, for God’s sake!

I’d like to conclude with an excerpt from Mike Sloan and Beth Hart’s important article, “Doug Wilson’s Failure to Safeguard Children,” which I highly recommend you read here. Sloan and Hart write,

Where are the voices of the leaders of Reformed churches and Reformed networks who can gain a hearing from Doug Wilson and influence thousands of other pastors in their denominations and circles of influence? Where are the voices from The Gospel Coalition? Crossway, why are you giving a voice to a man who will not use his voice for voiceless? Who is asking Wilson, “Where is your grieving heart for this baby and the other victims? What child protection training are you putting in place or experts are you consulting so this does not happen again?”

Where indeed.

*****

UPDATE, September 12, 2015, 2 pm PT:

Doug Wilson has issued a clarification on his post. An image and the text of the clarification follow:

Screen Shot 2015-09-12 at 2.00.15 PM

Text is,

Important clarification: When I say above that Steven was convicted of one count, I was not meaning that this was his only offense, and neither was I seeking to minimize the egregiousness of his behavior in those other instances. That is why I argued, just below this, that the father in Texas who killed the molester he walked in on was fully justified. I should have made my meaning more clear than I did, which I could have done by putting the Texas paragraph first, and linking it expressly to Steven’s offenses. My apologies to any friends who missed my meaning here, and who thought I was trying to trim and be cute on Steven’s behalf. Such a misreading would be my responsibility. I believe there was at least one scenario where Steven could have been killed on the spot, and no injustice done.

I Can’t Save My Siblings

HA Editorial Team6 Comments

CC image courtesy of Flickr, Eduardo Sánchez

 

HA note: The following is reprinted with permission from Eleanor Skelton’s blog, The Girl Who Once Lived in a Box. It was originally published on Sept. 1st, 2015.

by Eleanor Skelton, HA editorial team

 

Growing up homeschooled means you get a lot more time with your siblings than other kids. As an older sibling, it also means you have much more responsibility for them.

My parents told me I didn’t need friends, I had my siblings. They also told me I was the example for them, the prototype.

This set the pattern for some unhealthy dynamics. My first counselor after moving out said my dad’s insisting our only friends being immediate family members was incredibly codependent. Libby Anne writes about being an older child instructed to spank her younger siblings.

Parents expecting more of older siblings is typical in secular culture, but not usually with the same connotations like in fundamentalist homeschooling. As the oldest in my family, I heard things like:

A good older sibling sets the example for their younger brothers and sisters. Even if you don’t think they look up to you, they do. They watch your every move, and often, they’ll try to walk in your footsteps. So it’s important that you behave in ways that set a good example for them. Just like we look to Jesus to be our example, that we look to live how he lived and behave like he behaved, our younger siblings often look to us that way, too. —Taken from Christian Teen About

Statements like this put an excessive amount of pressure on older children.

We’re not just expected to protect younger siblings from danger, we’re responsible for their eternal salvation. And fundamentalist parents often manipulate this idea to check rebellion. To squash any behavior they didn’t like.

I couldn’t get angry if Dad was controlling and demanding, because that wasn’t having a meek and quiet spirit. Suffering without complaint was more like Christ, I was told, and a better example.

If I wore a fitted sweater, I was not being an example of modesty to my sister.

When I asked to have a curfew of midnight instead of 7:30 p.m. in college, I was not demonstrating submission to authority for my siblings.

My mom often said: “What will your little brother and sister think? They are always watching you. You know what Jesus said about those who lead little children astray. It would be better for you to have a millstone tied around your neck.”

So when Dad said things that hurt, when the house felt like a cage, when I thought of running away in the middle of the night, I didn’t. Because of my siblings. I was responsible for them.

When I thought my parents punished my brother and sister unfairly, I’d try to anger them into spanking me instead.

Junior year of college, I moved out because my parents said the alternative would be transferring to Bob Jones University. I went back and forth, uncertain what my decision would mean for my brother and sister. I’d be the first to leave home.

I told my professors that I wanted to be a good example for my siblings, that I didn’t want to run away or rebel if it would hurt them, that I’d go to Bob Jones if I had to, even if it killed me.

They told me that I could be a good example by moving out, that I could show my siblings that freedom was possible.

But I worried. I knew I couldn’t live at home anymore, but I still wanted to be a good big sister. That fall, I struggled to set limits as my parents barraged me with visits and phone calls, begging me to reconsider.

A couple of classmates, both named Cynthia, asked me what was wrong after one of our Saturday writers’ group meetings.

I gave my fears a voice. I didn’t understand taking care of yourself before helping other people. Fundamentalism taught me the reverse: don’t be selfish, sacrifice everything for others. Shouldn’t I just put up with my parents’ behavior for the sake of my siblings?

One of the Cynthias looked at me and the other Cynthia. She said, “Are you familiar with New Life’s teaching about confronting lies that you’ve believed? You identify the lie, you replace it with truth, and you pray against the power of the lie. You don’t have to sacrifice yourself for your siblings. You’re free to make your own choices.”

They each laid hands on me, praying with me that I’d heal and live in freedom.

I can’t save my siblings. All I can do is be a good human.

My little sister is going to BJU, and my little brother is a serious, quiet teenage boy. I lost contact with them for two years after leaving, so I can’t just speak my truth to them openly.

All I can do is be there and listen.

“Homeschool Got Me Into Harvard”: The Missing Facts

HA Editorial Team22 Comments

HA note: The following is reprinted with permission from Libby Anne’s blog Love Joy Feminism. It was originally published on Patheos on September 2, 2015.

The September 2015 cover of Boston Magazine features a smiling young woman wearing a Harvard University sweater with the caption “Homeschool got me into Harvard” in front of her. As a homeschool graduate myself, this cover caught my eye. As I looked at it, I puzzled over its intent. Homeschool graduates have been attending Harvard for decades now, so it’s not exactly news that a homeschooler was admitted. Yet homeschool graduates make up far less than 1% of the students at Harvard, despite the fact that as of 2011, 3.4% of students were homeschooled.

I read through Samburg’s article, which focuses on Harvard-bound homeschool graduate Claire Dickson and includes interviews with other homeschooling families, to determine whether it mentions just how unusual Claire’s case is. In answer, I found this paragraph:

And what about Milva McDonald’s daughter, Claire, who’s headed to Harvard? Is that a one-in-a-million shot, or have McDonald and her allies discovered a new path to the Ivy League—one that runs right through their living room? To find out what elite academic institutions think, I call Matt McGann, director of admissions at MIT. He’s entirely optimistic: “The homeschooled students in our population are a great addition to the MIT community. They are students who are more likely to have designed their own education curriculum, and they may be more independently motivated to learn,” he says. “I think as the nature of homeschooling has evolved, colleges are seeing more and more homeschooling applicants who are appropriate for this environment.”

Samburg could have contacted Harvard to ask for their admission statistics, or simply looked online for their annual class profiles, but she didn’t. As a result, her article masks the reality that homeschool graduates are severely underrepresented at Harvard and other Ivy League schools. She quotes the director of admissions at MIT saying positive things about homeschool graduates, but she does not note that only 1% of students entering MIT this fall are homeschool graduates. She also never mentions that only 0.3% of the 2014 freshman class at Harvard were homeschool graduates.

Why does this matter, you may wonder?

It matters because articles like this mask the dark underside of homeschooling and present an overly rosy picture of the practice.

Yes, it is true that children can benefit from homeschooling, and that absolutely should be talked about. In some cases, homeschooling can allow children to pursue their educational interests in innovative ways and engage in learning that would be impossible in a formal school setting. It can also offer students struggling with bullying or a school structure that does not fit them a safe space and the room they need to express themselves as individuals.

But homeschooling, by itself, does not get a child into Harvard. Samburg writes that Claire Dickson was involved in a theater group, a creative writing club, and a math group, and that she took “supplementary classes at the Harvard Extension School and Bunker Hill Community College.” In a blog post, Claire’s mother writes more about her approach: they are unschoolers who place a priority on supporting their children’s interests and finding resources to facilitate their learning. They worked hard—very hard—to get Claire where she is today, and while Claire’s mother insists on her blog that Claire got herself into college, Claire could not have done that without the resources and rich educational environment her mother provided her.

I know this because I know homeschool graduates who did not have these resources or this environment, and their stories are far, far different from Claire’s. Alumni-run organizations like Homeschool Alumni Reaching Out (HARO) and the Coalition for Responsible Home Education (CRHE) point to cases of homeschool failure and urge communities to do better by the homeschooled children in their midst. HARO focuses on child abuse awareness and prevention and on providing community and support for graduates of bad homeschool environments while CRHE focuses on providing information on homeschooling and advocating for more effective oversight.

HARO and CRHE point to the reality that homeschooling fails some children colossally. This is because homeschooling is only as good as the parents it relies on, and the resources those parents have to offer. In the hands of parents like Claire’s, homeschooling can be a powerful tool promoting children’s wellbeing. In the hands of parents who lack the resources or knowledge to provide an education, on the other hand, homeschooling can leave children with severe educational deficiencies. And in the hands of controlling or abusive parents, well, the story may be far, far worse.

In a recent Slate article, Jessica Huseman noted the following:

If social workers are particularly interested in home-schooling families, it’s not because they assume those parents are predisposed to be abusive, said Barbara Knox, a University of Wisconsin pediatrician who specializes in child abuse. It’s because parents who do have a pattern of abuse often pull their children from school under the guise of home schooling in order to avoid scrutiny. A 2014 study conducted by Knox and five colleagues looked at 38 cases of severe child abuse and found that nearly 50 percent of parents had either removed their children from public school or never enrolled them, telling their respective states they were home schooling.

“This is a pattern all of us see over and over and over again,” Knox said. “Certainly there are wonderful home-schooling families. But the lack of regulation for this population makes it easier to disenroll children from public school to further isolate them and escalate abuse to the point of reaching torture.”

Homeschooling is not a magic bullet.

Homeschooling is an educational method that places a great deal of power in the hands of a child’s parents, nothing more, nothing less. In the hands of well educated parents with access to resources, the result can be extremely positive. In the hands of parents too overwhelmed trying to provide for a large family to pay much attention to academics, the results can be devastating. And in the hands of abusive parents? In the hands of abusive parents the results are sometimes so tragic they are difficult to read.

I am all for telling positive stories of homeschooling, and I am by no means saying that Samburg’s article should not have been written. But to write it without noting that homeschooled children are far less likely to attend a school like Harvard than students educated via other methods is misleading and, frankly, irresponsible. Any article spotlighting a homeschooled student’s admission to an Ivy League school should at least note that homeschooled students are much less likely than other students to attend places like Harvard or MIT, and, ideally, also ask why this is and whether it is a problem here that needs addressing.

Please, media, I’m asking you as a homeschool graduate—get this right.

Statement by HARO’s Executive Director on ProPublica/Slate’s “Homeschooling Regulation” Article

HA Editorial Team

August 27, 2015 Statement by R.L. Stollar, Executive Director of Homeschool Alumni Reaching Out:

I am extraordinarily grateful to Jessica Huseman for the opportunity to be interviewed for her impressively researched ProPublica article, “Small Group Goes to Great Lengths to Block Homeschooling Regulation” (also republished by Slate as “The Frightening Power of the Home-Schooling Lobby”). As someone who was homeschooled from kindergarten through high school graduation and has spent the last two and a half years working to bring abuse and neglect within homeschooling to light, I appreciate Jessica, ProPublica, and Slate’s willingness to highlight these important matters.

I do, however, grieve the statements made by HSLDA and its founder, Michael Farris, in the article. Jessica writes, “When I spoke to Farris, he dismissed both organizations [HARO and the Coalition for Responsible Home Education, (CRHE)] outright, calling them ‘a group of bitter young people’ who are ‘fighting against homeschooling … to work out their own issues with their parents.'” It saddens me that Farris has not only resorted to personal insults, but insults he knows well are entirely false, simply to dismiss and ignore the growing numbers of voices from the movement he helped build. Several board members of HARO had personal relationships with Farris due to the homeschool speech and debate league he created through HSLDA. My father was even president of the league while Farris was on the league’s board.

My experience with homeschooling was positive and my relationship with my parents is better than it’s ever been. My parents (as well as many other homeschooling parents) support the work HARO does. And it is because of my positive homeschooling experience that I do the work I do — because I hope that every single future homeschooled child will have a positive experience like I did. Farris should be ashamed to knowingly spread falsehoods, and HSLDA and its other attorneys should demand more honesty from him.

Furthermore, HARO has attempted on several occasions to reach out to HSLDA only have doors slammed in our faces. It is HSLDA, not HARO, that refuses to help move the homeschooling movement forward in more healing, productive ways. It is HSLDA attorneys, not HARO board members, who engage in mockery. Thus when Farris says that HARO “will ‘say the opposite, no matter what we say,'” he is willfully misleading. He knows full well that HARO has offered to set aside our differences and partner with HSLDA; it is HSLDA that opposes HARO, no matter what we say.

A final important point of clarification regarding Jessica’s article: HARO advocates neither for nor against increased legislative oversight of homeschooling. On several occasions, Jessica’s article makes it sound as if part of HARO’s work involves promoting more homeschool regulations. This is untrue. That is the work of the Coalition for Responsible Home Education (CRHE), not the work of HARO. While both organizations were created by homeschool alumni, CRHE and HARO are distinct and separate. They share only one board member in common (me). CRHE advocates greater legislative oversight; HARO advocates for the wellbeing of homeschool students and improves homeschooling communities through awareness, peer support, and resource development.

HARO’s advocacy involves three strategies:

  1. Launching awareness and education campaigns within homeschooling communities on recognizing and addressing child abuse, mental illness, self-injury, and LGBT* students’ needs
  2. Building peer-support networks between homeschool students and homeschool graduates
  3. By developing resources for therapy, life coaching, education assistance, and financial support.

True to our organization’s vision of “Renewing and transforming homeschooling from within,” we promote changes from within homeschooling rather than changes from without (such as regulation). You can read more about HARO’s vision and mission here. HARO’s FAQs page also makes this clear: “HARO does not advocate for or against public policy. HARO advocates for awareness and education, peer support, and resource development from within homeschooling.”

My Church Tarnished Homeschooling: Leigh’s Story

HA Editorial Team2 Comments

CC image courtesy of Flickr, James Lee.

HA note: The author’s name has been changed to ensure anonymity. “Leigh” is a pseudonym.

My home schooling education started in high school, but even before that I was raised in a church that believed it was the best form of education. All of my close friends were home schooled; my pastor regularly preached on the subject.

About how good it was to home school, how the government was using the school to warp our minds.  My home was like any conservative Christian home: God came first. Democrats were bad, gays were bad, and anything that was not agreeing with the Bible was wrong.

Anything to do with traditional white America was good.

When it came to homeschooling itself it first started online, which made me happy. I could do the work how I wanted to- history first, and the rest later. Then my mother was handed used books from my closest friend’s mother. Instead of learning about the Civil War, or World War 2, everything related to the Bible.

I truthfully wasn’t upset; I planned on going to my church’s Bible school, which considering I was the daughter of a single mother I would have gone to for free.

I lost myself in it. I stopped speaking to the few non church-going friends I had.

I regularly stated I would court instead of date. For the only boyfriend I had ever had, it upset him. He himself was a conservative Christian, but he began to state that I was no longer myself. I only wanted to be a good Christian wife and mother. It upset him to the point until I left the church, we stopped speaking. His last conversation before me leaving the church was, “he wanted his future wife to be more than a wife, more than a mother, he wanted a equal, and I wanted to be less.” The friend’s mother who was teaching me stated this was for the best. That boy is not good. And she muttered something in relation to his Spanish heritage.

As I look back, I don’t know how I could have been that person.

I was raised in Florida, not some odd Midwestern state. I wore jeans, boots, and these things did not change.

My mother was a high school dropout, while my teacher was a military wife. A college-educated woman. When I would question why she made that statement, she said “because I don’t want you to make the mistakes I did.” And when this former nurse saw and was told the mental health problems I was having, I was given vitamins, and told that I needed to ask God to take it away.

I went to what can simply be called fundamentalist Pentecostal church. We believed in healing, and crying and laughter in the spirit.

I don’t know how much was real, and how much was fake.

I am isolated from my family because of what I now believe. I am still a Christian, but I still question things. I want to still learn about science. I don’t believe our president is a Muslim, nor do I feel the world is ending. Something that my former church holds onto firmly.

Homeschooling, and what it could have been, was tarnished for me because of my former church. The isolation, not getting my formative years, other opinions. I was raised to believe “hate the sin not the sinner,” but when it is someone who is gay, or another religion, or anything the church rejects, it’s “hate the sinner not the sin.”

We went out soul winning, as it was called, many times instead of school work.

My church was called a cult by many from the town I am from.

Before I woke up, I wondered how someone could be a member of Jim Jones’s church. The fact is, what many don’t understand, when you are a part of a controlling church you don’t see what it could be.

You see the healings, the hope, and even the love of God. I was the frog put in the pot and then someone started to boil the water. If I would have been put in at the end I would have ran, but like many I was given time to get used to it. Healing a woman, a man claiming that he, after being prayed for, finally feels the love of God?

What would be so wrong about that? Nothing, but when the same pastor states he has a witch in his church? Would that cause many on their first day to run? I would have.

He has talked about farms, K through 12 schools, and even building apartments.

The only reason I think I am out is because a former friend told me about a school involving horses. Because while I didn’t end up staying, it gave me some time to see there was a world out there. Where I could be anything I wanted to be.

Josh Duggar Checks Into Treatment Center After Porn Star Details “Very Traumatic” and “Terrifying” Sexual Encounter

HA Editorial Team37 Comments

By R.L. Stollar, HA Community Coordinator

Increasingly disturbing revelations continue to surface in the tragic circumstances surrounding the Duggars, the former TLC celebrity family of “19 Kids and Counting.”

This last May it came to light that Josh Duggar, the oldest son of Jim Bob and Michelle Duggar and the now-disgraced former executive of the Family Research Council’s legislative action arm, had molested five children when he was a teenager, including members of his own family. Other celebrities from the Religious Right immediately stepped up to defend Josh and minimize the horrors of child molestation, including: Rick Boyer, board member of the Home Educators Association of Virginia (HEAV); Matt Walsh, viral blogger and popular homeschool speaker at the Great Homeschool Conventions; Mike Huckabee, Republican Presidential hopeful endorsed by HSLDA’s Michael Farris; Ray Comfort, a popular New Zealand Christian evangelist; and Kevin Swanson, director of Generations with Vision and former executive director of the Christian Home Educators of Colorado.

Then a week ago, Gawker broke the story that Josh had paid almost $1,000 for a “guaranteed” affair via the adultery-promoting website Ashley Madison. This led Josh to publicly confess to cheating on his wife, though in his statement he appeared to blame a “pornography addiction” for leading him to that point. Josh said,

I have been the biggest hypocrite ever. While espousing faith and family values, I have secretly over the last several years been viewing pornography on the internet and this became a secret addiction and I became unfaithful to my wife.

 

Ironically, it was then adultery — rather than the far more chilling and actual crime of molesting children — that led several of Josh’s previous defenders to finally realize the absolute seriousness of Josh’s situation. Rick Boyer said in a public Facebook post that he “was wrong” that Josh was currently living “an exemplary life.” However, Boyer also qualified that by saying he “was right in all that” regarding child molestation, namely, that Josh’s “poor sisters had been abused far more by the buzzard-like media than they ever were by Josh” (image archived here).  Similarly, Matt Walsh said in a public Facebook post that he “was wrong about the Duggar situation” (image archived here). But unlike Boyer, who had the gall to say the media “abused” molested children more than their actual molester, Walsh realized what we homeschool alumni have been saying all along: that the Duggars should never have paraded around their family on TV right after their son molested five children, including siblings. Walsh said,

The more I think about this, I realized I was too easy on the the Duggar parents as well. Jim Bob and Michelle knew that their oldest son was struggling with severe sexual sin, they knew their daughters had been abused, they knew their family was in the midst of moral and spiritual turmoil, yet they STILL decided to put themselves and their children on TV for ten years.

Of course, back in May, Walsh just dismissed people saying this very thing in the flippant way he always treats people with different opinions than his own.

After Josh’s Ashley Madison account became public, secret profiles of Josh’s on Facebook and OKCupid also surfaced. These profiles revealed his private online relationships with strippers and porn stars, including a relatively new porn star named Danica Dillon.

Today Danica revealed the full extent of her relationship with Josh — namely, that while Josh’s wife Anna was pregnant with their fourth child, Josh allegedly forced Danica into having “very traumatic” and “terrifying” rough sex without the use of protection. Though Danica is taking pains to claim the sex was “consensual,” the fact that Josh exchanged money for sex that Danica clearly was not comfortable with — considering both her fear of his use of force as well as his unwillingness to use protection — indicates very clearly full and enthusiastic consent wasn’t important to Josh. Danica says that Josh was “basically tossing me around like I was a rag doll.”

Furthermore, Josh’s unwillingness to use protection clearly puts not only himself and Danica in danger of sexually transmitted diseases, but also Josh’s wife Anna – who was completely oblivious to Josh’s extraordinarily risky and abusive sexual actions.

My heart continues to break for Anna and I really hope she can receive help if she wants it.

Anna was raised in a conservative Christian homeschooling environment that promoted sexual purity until marriage at all costs. Purity was guaranteed as the sure-fire way to stay safe from romantic heartbreak and sexual diseases. Yet now Anna has to deal with the potential devastation of those very things despite following the purity script. At this point we have no idea how many sex workers Josh forced into having unprotected sex with him and thus potentially exposed Anna to any resulting diseases.

This is yet another tragic example of why we need to rethink how homeschooling parents teach their child about “purity”: Sexuality and sexual health are far more complicated than the white picket fence and white wedding dress fantasies of purity culture. When two young people engage in betrothal or courtship and hardly get the opportunity to have personal, private, one-on-one conversations with each other, they have no idea if their spouse, for example, experienced sexual abuse as a child. So even if your spouse never engaged in willing, premarital sex, you don’t know if your spouse is STD-free. That’s something couples need to talk about, even couples who grew up “pure.” And if your spouse cheats on you like Josh did, he might not think about the importance of protection, and thereby place you at risk for STDs — without you even knowing about it. This is why realism in sex and relationship education is desperately important — and potentially life-saving.

In the wake of Danica Dillon’s allegations, Michelle Duggar today wrote on her blog that, “Yesterday Josh checked himself into a long-term treatment center.” An image of her full statement follows:

Screen Shot 2015-08-26 at 11.24.19 AM

Text is:

We are so thankful for the outpouring of love, care and prayers for our family during this most difficult situation with Josh. As parents we are so deeply grieved by our son’s decisions and actions. His wrong choices have deeply hurt his precious wife and children and have negatively affected so many others. He has also brought great insult to the values and faith we hold dear. Yesterday Josh checked himself into a long-term treatment center. For him it will be a long journey toward wholeness and recovery. We pray that in this he comes to complete repentance and sincere change. In the meantime, we will be offering our love, care and devoted support to Anna and our grandchildren as she also receives counsel and help for her own heart and future. During this time we continue to look to God—He is our rock and comfort. We ask for your continued prayers for our entire family.

When it became public several months ago that Josh had molested five children, Jim Bob and Michelle Duggar originally claimed that they had sent him to a “faith-based” treatment center run by Bill Gothard, whose sexual abuse counseling material blames victims for their own abuse and discourages wives from leaving husbands who molest their children. Similarly, it is rumored that Josh has again been sent to a “faith-based” treatment center, this time Reformers Unanimous (RU). RU, which offers treatment for pornography addiction and sex addiction, is run by Paul Kingsbury. Kingsbury has zero academic credentials in counseling, medicine, or therapy. Though he calls himself a “Doctor” due to two honorary degrees, his highest actual level of education is a Bachelor of Arts from Hyles-Anderson College, an unaccredited Independent Fundamentalist Baptist college. Kingsbury was mentored in his career by Dr. Jack Hyles, who infamously defended child molestors in the church he founded, First Baptist Church of Hammond.

However, as of the time of publication, the Duggar family has yet to officially confirm where Josh checked himself into.

Forest For The Trees: J’s Story

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CC image courtesy of Flickr, Jens Schott Knudsen.

HA Note: “J” is a pseudonym. The following is reprinted with permission from J’s blog Teapots and Tesseracts. It was originally published as “Lightbulb Moment: Forest for the Trees” on June 30, 2014 and slightly modified for HA.

Crowded into a packed auditorium at the local bastion for Christian education, the “go to” first choice for homeschool graduates and members of my youth group, I considered where I should sit and rapidly selected the seat next to my brother and his wife. Squeezed in between mom, dad, the oldest brother and the littlest brother, I shrank into my seat to avoid my dad’s snide remarks. I had ducked into a stairwell before the ceremony and lit up a cigarette on a tobacco free campus and could suddenly smell the burning garbage scent on my nice lavender shirt.

Turning red and feeling the anxiety grip my chest, I steeled myself for the shaming remarks encased as jokes directed at me by my father.

A golden child who presented with mom at homeschool conferences (a la Josh Harris), enrolled in a local community college at 15, coached debate my first year after graduating high school, and active in ministry at my church, who answered the altar call to missions abroad at 18, my life had taken a very sharp turn shortly after I stood on the dais at another church with ten other graduates of our homeschool association.

“Now, please, bow your heads with me as we ask for His blessing on these proceedings.”

Accepted to a top ten university at 17 halfway across the country, I was on my way to becoming a biomedical engineer, dreaming of my senior research project, graduate school, becoming a doctor. I continued to be lauded for my intelligence, motivation and godliness for seeking to study medicine so I could serve the Lord in a third world country.

“Father God.”

After admitting I had a boyfriend at 18, after being caught in a lie, when I had just stuttered out the truth to my mother’s glaring and wounded face about who exactly “Michael” was, I was summarily lectured about my moral failings, threatened with permanent separation from God, and eventually thrown out of my house two hours later when I defiantly refused to repent.

“Our Father, thank you for shining your light on these young excellent minds, your servants”

The golden child status was gone, overnight. A cold reversal of the invitation to coach debate, ugly stares and plaintive tear-soaked pleads from members of church I ran into at the grocery store, multiple comparisons by haughty homeschool mothers I saw out and about (who just six months before, and even my entire twelve grades of homeschooling, said they wished their children were like me) of my “lifestyle” to sins like alcoholism and pedophilia, all made it clear the penny had dropped.

“All rise”.

Taking deep breaths, I stood up and  watched yet another brother and sister ascend the dais as we rose to “Pomp and Circumstance” and clapped and called out their names. With fifty-four graduates, they were the largest class in six counties. The brother next to me was in the very first fifteen years ago, and there were only six graduates then.

The commencement speaker was new…the same one for years was a local conservative Republican sheriff who talked about how integrity was a gift from God. This one was a Republican politician, aiming for Congress.

“God will protect you from this day before and cover you in His blessings if you follow in the way He has set in His Holy Word”.

The anxiety rapidly turned to rage and my stomach churned. Abandoned by family, church and homeschool association, my only networks during eighteen very sheltered years, I wanted to scream and cry simultaneously at the speaker for his lies.

“Observe those who have honored God, their fathers and their mothers by making the journey to receiving their high school diploma.”

Three years later after my summary dismissal from home, a phone call turned my world upside down.

Sniffling, my mother, who I had little to no contact with besides three intrusive appearances at a table in my section at area restaurants I served at, and my father, who had completely pretended I didn’t exist (seeing my face caused him “such pain and grief” explained my mother, that I should feel bad for inflicting him with such Job-like woes), passed the phone back and forth to beg me to come home, and hatch a plan to rescue me from an abusive relationship.

Three years with Stephen, and I was an emotionally and mentally unstable survivor of his abuse. My realization that I was no longer allowed to talk to once-close friends or even to know my neighbors had sunk in just the day before.

“Our graduates have gone on to become homemakers, mothers, fathers, missionaries, military service members, scientists, teachers, and many continue the homeschooling tradition with the next generation.”

“We wish God’s blessings on these students as they go forth into the world, using their God given talents to embark on new careers.”

Mandatory church attendance was required, at 21, after my return and I was once again hailed and praised, this time for becoming saved and healed from drug addiction and the homosexual lifestyle.

I had moved out on my own after two years stuck with no car or license due to a DUI in my patriarch’s house, stuffed the memories of a traumatizing rape and Stephen’s abuse, I could only feel the rage and sorrow and shrieking in my nightmares.

“Ladies in the graduating class, I urge you to remember such qualities as modesty, of headship of your father, the Lord, and your future husband as you embark into the world.”

My sister on my left couldn’t cut her hair or wear pants until age ten. We were all beaten viciously by a mentally ill, narcissist patriarch until our tenth birthday. Graduating today, she wanted to be a flight nurse in the Army. A year later I would find out my parents were seeking to marry her to a much older man so my father, in his words, would be rid of her and have some much needed peace and quiet, and room to focus on his hobbies.

Several of the women graduating weren’t old enough to vote, but ecstatically planned quiet weddings and bought white simple sundresses for early fall weddings, just months after graduating.

“Now let us bow our heads and pray for these graduates”.

“This is a Christian nation….look at those who serve His Holy Name”.

I wanted to shriek, so very loudly, at him, because most of what I heard in the ceremony made no sense, was so erasing of my existence. I did everything right until after graduation, and then I voiced my own opinion and everything fell apart.

Run away, I wanted to say, Run away. Grab that diploma and run as fast as you can. Because everything you remembered today will be shown as nothing but lies years from now. You will one day realize how the real world was sold as a carnal zoo filled with sin-flame breathing monsters.

I had made it a cumulative zero steps in five years, right back where I started.

Someone lied somewhere, and seeing how I got erased from my family and communities for several years, I don’t think it was me. I was truthful once about how I felt and lost everything. The gilded words of the charismatic speaker infuriated me.

Turning to my brother on my right, I whispered: “I don’t remember my graduation ceremony being this creepy. Or yours, for that matter.”

Thrown out of the house six years before me for rebellion, to bounce aimlessly between London and Pittsburgh with his absentee birth father, I could see his jaw set and eyes glare. He felt the same way I did.

Slightly tilting his head towards me he whispered back:

“Perhaps you couldn’t see the forest for the trees.”

When We Tell Our Stories

HA Editorial Team8 Comments

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by Darcy. Photo by Darcy, used with permission.

The other day, Homeschoolers Anonymous shared an article on their Facebook page. It was one homeschool alumna’s statement about how her experiences with being homeschooled made her unwilling to homeschool her own children.

As is to be expected, homeschool apologists came out of the woodwork with the belief that her sharing her experiences was somehow an attack against homeschooling as a pedagogical method. I want to address this phenomenon as a fellow homeschool alumna.

The thing nobody seemed to notice in the discussion that happened was that homeschooling wasn’t under attack.

The author wasn’t crying “down with homeschooling!” or “all homeschoolers are evil brainwashed minions!” She was merely telling her story and explaining how it influenced her current choices. But the No True Homeschooler brigade was right on schedule. Which was rather baffling considering that the article itself was just one person’s story and a pretty benign one at that.

Why is it when someone says “here is my story, this is why I’ve made the current choice I have”, so many people feel the need to pick their story apart, try to analyze how the story isn’t correct, then claim their choice is faulty because their story is faulty? No one is judging you for your story and your choices. They’re just telling their own. If you’re threatened by that, perhaps it’s time for some introspection and reevaluating your own story and choices instead of trying to tear down someone else’s to make yourself feel better, feel justified, feel right.

For instance, if someone tells me “I had a horrible time in public school, I’m homeschooling my own kids and we’re doing great”, I don’t try to make them understand that public school wasn’t the problem and thus their current choice to homeschool isn’t valid. I don’t jump to the defense of public school. I nod and show empathy and understanding. I acknowledge that some people had terrible experiences in school.

It’s their story. It doesn’t threaten me. It’s not even about me.

A homeschooler who says “I had a terrible experience so I’m not going to homeschool” is not about YOU, current homeschoolers. Stop trying to make this about you and thus miss the entire point.

Someone tried to tell me that the uproar was because the author said homeschooling was a cultural problem. Actually, she didn’t. Here is what she said in the article:

“But homeschooling is part of a larger cultural problem — it’s the mental equivalent of trench warfare. Instead of engaging on the battlefield, we dig in, draw our lines and refuse to budge. American society is embroiled in conversations of racism and sexism that permeate the fabric of our cultural institutions. Donald Trump, the most polarizing (and arguably sexist) Republican candidate for president is the most popular. Police are shooting and killing black men, women and children at an alarming rate. The problems need to be engaged. Yet, instead of engaging, Americans are choosing to entrench themselves further in their ideologies.”

But people weren’t arguing about this part. They were arguing about her experiences. They were saying her parents just didn’t do it right. They were trying to negate her story and prove that their stories are actually the “right” ones and hers is wrong. They were trying to find any possible hole in her story to prove that this wasn’t True Homeschooling™ and thereby dismiss her. We’ve seen this happen thousands of times as alumni. Someone posts something about their negative experience as a homeschooled child, and the apologists jump down their throats, making all kinds of excuses, and defending homeschooling while dismissing the author’s painful experience as some fluke that shouldn’t be spoken of. With their protests, they show they care more about the reputation of homeschooling than the people that were affected by it. It’s an image to be held up at all costs, even if one of those costs are throwing broken, hurting people to the curb. Honestly, it’s getting old.

By all means, let’s have a reasonable discussion about the rather interesting idea put forth in that part I quoted. About different facets of homeschoolings, the pros and the cons, how to prevent abuse, and how to make the experience better for children and parents. About the authors claim that homeschooling can easily hide abuse. Let’s discuss those things. But people need to stop with the dismissing, the invalidating of others and their stories. If they don’t, they run the risk of being the perfect example of those the author said have dug a trench to defend their ideologies to the detriment of everything else.

When Your Parents Stalk You

HA Editorial Team7 Comments

 CC image courtesy of Flickr, Tobias Leeger.

By Eleanor Skelton, HA Editorial Board

Eleanor Skelton blogs at eleanorskelton.com. The following was originally published on Eleanor’s blog on March 2, 2015, and is reprinted with permission.

Stalking is usually applied to a romantic relationship gone bad.

This is why people hesitate to believe me when I say I’ve been stalked by my parents.

After I moved out, my parents showed up unannounced at work or on campus, asking me to reconsider and go to Bob Jones University. The first time it happened, I was walking down the sidewalk to visit a new church since I had no car.  A car drove up behind me honking, my family rolled down the windows, shouting, “Just remember, Bob Jones is still available!”

They often bring gifts: sandwiches, keychains, homemade soup. They seem to think this proves they are good parents. They say this is how they show me they love me.   The professor who was my supervisor when I tutored on campus saw them do this. He said their behavior was abnormal, intended to wear me down and make me give in.

I’m not the only one. Other homeschool alum have had parents drop off identifying documents at work without asking, another told me her mom found her between classes and gave her a gift card and sent a sheet and towel to her apartment. She hadn’t told her mom her class schedule or her address.

I don’t know what their motivation is.

Maybe it’s guilt. Maybe they think I’ll be brought back into the fold with organic baked goods.

This is how my parents demonstrate that they love me.

My first apartment was unfortunately near the church that shunned me. My parents drove by often to look for my car, texting me “did you sleep at your apartment last night?” I explained my roommate and her boyfriend invited me for a movie night and I slept there. My mom told me it was inappropriate to sleep at a single guy’s place. Never mind that we had a couple of drinks during the movie and I wasn’t safe to drive.

Being honest and open about my decisions only provoked criticism. And they wondered why I stopped telling them things.

In summer 2013, my dad parked outside the nearest stop sign when he knew I would get off work. When I drove by, he jumped out in front of my car so I had to stop. He wanted to change the air filter in my car. He didn’t understand I was startled and angry, that I was afraid I could have hit him.

My parents barged into the middle of a staff meeting for the student newspaper in fall 2013, handing me a parking permit. My dad didn’t wait for me to buy one myself.

I told them I thought their actions were inappropriate in group counseling.

I wrote, “If anyone else who I wasn’t related to followed me around the way you guys do (leaving me random sermon CDs in my bicycle bag when I’m in class, etc), it would be considered really creepy and stalking. Think about it.”

My mom replied, “I do not think it is creepy if we are coming by UCCS from a doctor’s appt., and leave a gift for you in your bicycle sidebag. Sorry you took it that way. We are not checking up on you.”

Last October, my dad showed up at my apartment around 7:30 am, calling me over and over during an exam. He was upset that I didn’t answer right away. He wanted to trade out cars because he was afraid I wouldn’t get maintenance done, even though I’d asked him to let me learn how to take care of my car myself.

And they showed up at my work again last weekend, asked a coworker on his smoke break to bring me a package.

They don’t understand acting like this makes me feel incapacitated.

Fundamentalism doesn’t teach consent, it teaches you to respect authority. Control is normal, so you should be grateful for what they do, even if they don’t respect your wishes.

I don’t feel like an adult when my parents do this. I start to feel like a powerless small child whose parents are always going to check up on her, like all my independence has been taken away from me.

They think this is how to show me that they love me, but I just feel the walls close in.

And I don’t think this is love.

Are You My Enemy?

HA Editorial Team5 Comments

HA note: The following is reprinted with permission from Olivia Greenpine-Wood’s blog, When Settles The Dust. It was originally published on July 17th, 2015.

Imagine that you are growing up in a culture that believes it is fighting a war. From infancy you are taught the dangers of the enemy. You are taught what you must look out for and what you must say. You are taught what you must be aware of and from a child you are taught to be a good soldier. You are taught to be brave and to fight the good fight. You are taught that if need be you should even be willing to die for your cause. You are taught that all outsiders are against your cause. That those who don’t believe as you do would seek to overthrow all you hold dear and do great harm to all of you. Your culture must be defended at all costs.

Time goes on and you grow older. You prepare yourself for battle and you dream of your first encounter. Oh, how you will vanquish your foes when you finally meet in glorious combat! Oh, the acclaim you will win for the cause! And finally you venture forth shakily brandishing your rhetoric only to find that no army awaits. You try to convince yourself that a few encounters with strangers were skirmishes but as time goes on you realize that the most hostile participant was yourself. You are stymied. You expected to find an army in grand array but instead you found a civilization of people. People who loved and laughed and cried and lived freely.

And after sometime you begin to accept that this is real. And you begin to wonder and hope. Maybe you, too, can live this free life. Maybe you can lay down your weapons. Maybe you can live without fear of attack. Your spirits lift. You begin to feel joy. You want to rush home and tell your family and friends and community the wonderful news. There is no war. You don’t have to fight. You can be free. But if you tell them suddenly you become everything they have prepared all their lives to defend themselves from. You become the outsider who would tear them down and who seeks to destroy them.

You become the enemy.

But all you wanted for them was freedom and the peace of knowing that they don’t have to fight.

Can you imagine this? If you can then maybe you can understand a little bit of what it is like to convert to atheism (or simply relax your views a bit more than is “acceptable”) after growing up in a conservative religious environment. Maybe you can understand the nausea and pain and fear of those who leave their faiths but cannot retain relationships with those they love and care about. Some persons who leave behind a deeply religious faith face actual physical danger. Others face only the opposition of attitude and perception but don’t underestimate the power of attitude.

It hurts to realize that you are now the nightmare about which people tell their children.

It hurts to realize that suddenly your point of view has become invalid because you disagree on theology. Suddenly you are a non-entity. Everything you do or say has become suspect. Your actions will be judged based on the new perception that you are enemy and no longer based on who you are.

It hurts.

If there were a Hell this is what it would feel like.