Ok everyone, back up. I'm gonna rant and I don't want to get any of it on you...
I've homeschooled my kids my kids since the late 90s, when the internet was young and there weren't a lot of websites out there for people keeping their kids home. So, even though I'm not a fundamental Christian, I have a lot of friends in the community and I've traveled the same "news circles" as it were.
Because of this, I've been aware of the Duggar family and the Quiverful Movement since she was on kid 15 or so. For anyone not aware, members of the Quiverful Movement believe that all children are a blessing and families should take no measures to prevent them. That sounds a little crazy in today's world, but other faiths have the same belief, so it's not like they're alone in that idea.
They also believe in chaste courtship (no kissing until after marriage) and extremely modest dress, and other ideas that in and of themselves have worked at different times or in other places, and may even work well for some people now, but they are certainly not the norm. It's nothing most people would choose, but it would be hard to find something you could point to and say "This practice is objectively abusive, by anyone's standards." For example, they don't practice female circumcision, or marry underage girls off by the handful to creepy old men, or sacrifice children to volcanoes to appease the gods of the harvest.
If you think of them sort of like Amish people with technology and no Rumspringa, you might be getting close. Or Catholics with really, really strict parents, but Post-Vatican II enough to eat meat on Fridays and during Lent. I may just be making this worse....
From their perspective, they are using Biblical principles to raise their children in a world that's ever more out of balance and scary. They avoid most media, because in their minds it is just a way to invite filth into their home, and they instead focus on ideas and materials they consider uplifting and morally correct. Their hope is to raise a generation of righteous leaders who will bring more faith and goodness into the world.
***Please note: I am explaining this the best I can from my interactions with people who hold these beliefs, and I hope I am doing so correctly. If anyone knows more about this than I do, please feel free to fill in gaps or fix any mistakes I've made.***
Personally, I have no beef with another person's religious beliefs. I've been in the homeschooling movement long enough to be concerned for kids from families that "protect them from the evil world" by keeping them unaware of what's out there, because I've seen it go bad enough times to know where that road leads. (But that's a post for another day.)
But I do have an issue with the Duggars, and I've often wondered when the kids grew up and moved away, how long it would take for the "tell-all" books to start hitting the market. Not because they're religious, or because there are a lot of them, but because they are so invested in appearing to be a uniform and perfect product.
19 kids, their names all start with "J." Sweet mother of Abraham Lincoln! And when you see them the girls are all in matching dresses, the boys in matching shirts and pants. Perfectly ironed and unsullied from their hair bows to their toes. If anyone asks, each kid says everything is great, and they never show a messy room or one kid smacking another upside the head with a bowl of Cheerios.
This is not how normal families behave.
Every child is different. And there is no way you can birth 19 kids in a row who will be compliant at the levels those kids appeared to be every time we saw them. There was some serious "discipline" going on in that house. I don't think we've heard the last of the scandals from the Duggar Tribe, not by far.
I give the dad credit for trying to tell somebody what happened when he found out. But then he dropped the ball. Hard. God forbid he take any action, like bring the girls to see a therapist, or keeping the son in some kind of ongoing program. When the first time someone tries to get help for your molested daughters, it's freaking OPRAH, you're a screw up. Plain and simple.
I suspect they didn't want the world to find out that their stair step, matchy matchy, reality show family wasn't perfect, when that's what they were trying to sell us all the whole time. "Sure you think we're crazy, but you'll see. When our kids all turn out perfect, everyone will have to admit we've been right!"
And I'm sure they didn't want to see it, either. No parent does. But that's how parenting is, you keep your eyes open and do your best to help guide your kids, even if that means you have to swim right up "I'm a sh!t parent" creek when the world is watching.
I don't care what they believe. I don't care if they keep having kids until the last one comes out wearing her uterus for a hat. But I do have problems when they care more about what we (the public) think about their family than they do about what their kids need.
Rant over.
