The body count of victims is too high for Josh Duggar to simply walk away.
—
According to People Magazine, Josh Duggar has now admitted to pornography addiction and infidelity. This is in addition to his earlier admission that he molested five young girls including his sisters.
This would come as a bigger shock to Americans had we not already been witness to a parade of conservative evangelical leaders caught with their pants down in the decades since Lee Atwater and Roger Ailes engineered the rise of the conservative evangelical political arm of the GOP over thirty years ago. Millionaire ministers Jimmy Swaggert, Jim Bakker and Ted Haggard, Congressmen Randy Boehning and Ed Schrock, and Senator Larry Craig are only the tip of the iceberg.
Conservative evangelical religious and political leaders have sex in the same ways the rest of us do; homosexual, heterosexual, bi-sexual, gender fluid sex, and all points in between. And god knows they have sex out of wedlock. Why do we know this? Because they keep getting caught doing it. Over and over again.
|
If there is one thing we know by now, conservative evangelical political and religious leaders have sex in the same ways the rest of us do; homosexual, heterosexual, bi-sexual, gender fluid sex, and all points in between. And god knows they have sex out of wedlock. Why do we know this? Because they keep getting caught doing it. Over and over again.
This is no longer up for dispute. This is a fact.
Yet, conservative evangelical leaders insist on publicly condemning the very sexual activities they enjoy in secret. And they don’t simply pass judgement. They pass laws. Laws designed to punish communities that don’t meet their narrow cultural expectations.
And before I go any further, let me point out that there is a vast network of evangelical and non-evangelical Christians who have a long history of supporting LGBT, bi and trans communities. Go have a look at the NALT (Not All Like That) Christians Movement. Its a beautiful thing.
There is a vast network of evangelical and non-evangelical Christians who have a long history of supporting LGBT, bi and trans communities.
|
That said, when leaders of the conservative evangelical movement attack marriage equality, they instruct their followers to view gay sexuality as an immoral choice instead of an authentic expression of human sexuality. Being gay is not a choice. It is something we are born with. By calling anything other than strict heterosexuality a choice, conservative evangelicals give a religious frame to what is, in fact, simple sexual bigotry, framing God’s will as having a heterosexual bias. In doing so, they create a potentially violent binary that “others” the gay community and frames gay people as a threat to their nostalgia tinged retrograde vision of a 1950’s America.
And they do this over and over and over again, across a range of groups and social issues which, not coincidentally, dovetail perfectly with the agendas of conservative Congressional leaders who seek to wrest maximum control over the vast wealth of our national budget.
Meanwhile, those influenced by the darkest side of the conservative evangelical movement, assault or murder those who’s sexual identity they can’t accept. There is an epidemic of bullying and violence by children against children, much of which is triggered by the kind of oppressive gender binaries being taught by conservative evangelicals. In Africa, white American evangelicals are funding a wave of anti-gay hate, including laws that insure the death penalty for simply being gay.
The eight minute New York Times documentary below, entitled Gospel of Intolerance, is an eye-opener, outlining the war American conservative evangelicals are waging against gays in countries like Uganda.
Too many children are growing up on a steady diet of sexual shame, self loathing and self denial, giving rise to yet another generation of closeted, hypocritical demagogues.
|
Too much blood is being spilled. Too many human beings are being marginalized and murdered. Too many children are growing up on a steady diet of sexual shame, self loathing and self denial, giving rise to yet another generation of closeted, hypocritical demagogues.
Which brings me back to Josh Duggar.
People Magazine writes:
Amid reports Josh had signed up with Ashley Madison, a website that specializes in facilitating extramarital affairs, Josh and his parents Jim Bob and Michelle Duggar broke their silence with a statement on the Duggar family website on Thursday, in which Josh says he has been “the biggest hypocrite ever” and confesses to a secret pornography addiction, as well as being unfaithful to his wife.
The article in People Magazine states:
Anna Duggar will likely not be leaving her husband Josh despite his admitted infidelity, a source with ties to the family tells PEOPLE.
Don’t like ads? Become a supporter and enjoy The Good Men Project ad free“Anna will not leave him,” says the source. “As with her in-laws, she is turning more to her faith than ever. She and Josh are probably praying around the clock right now, I would assume.”
Amid reports Josh had signed up with Ashley Madison, a website that specializes in facilitating extramarital affairs, Josh and his parents Jim Bob and Michelle Duggar broke their silence with a statement on the Duggar family website on Thursday, in which Josh says he has been “the biggest hypocrite ever” and confesses to a secret pornography addiction, as well as being unfaithful to his wife.
The source says that from their knowledge of Josh and Anna and the Duggar family, “no way is she leaving him” – adding that it would not come as a surprise if “on some level” Anna tries to “absorb some of the blame.”
The paragraph where a “source with ties to the family” suggests Anna Duggar will “absorb some of the blame” should encourage any thinking person to throw up in their own mouth.
And before you suggest this story in People Magazine is somehow inauthentic, please note that the Duggar family can refute it with a single phone call to the press or a post on Facebook. They have not done so. Its accurate enough, and delivered in the way that political damage control messages are always delivered. Focus grouped. Carefully tailored. Targeted at the base.
“A source with ties to the family” is publishing jargon for a PR hack. The Duggar’s PR handlers are seeding this story of Anna “taking the blame” based on real damage control decisions being made within the family. It is the time honored “stand by your man” spirit killing self immolation political wives have been forced to perform for years. The calculated choice to place for blame for Josh Dugger’s infidelities on his wife gives us a chilling window into the Duggar family’s fundamentalist ideology.
Be it fundamentalist Christians, Muslims or Jews, the poisonous drum beat of original sin rolls on and on. Women tempt men. Women lead men astray. Poor weak men are just following their nature, it is women who need to do better.
|
Because it’s ultimately the woman’s fault, right? Its scripture. Eve gave Adam the apple. Be it fundamentalist Christians, Muslims or Jews, the poisonous drum beat of original sin rolls on and on. Women tempt men. Women lead men astray. Poor weak men are just following their nature, it is women who need to do better. Cover themselves. Be chaste. Take care of their husbands needs.
But Anna failed.
Accordingly, God clearly wants Anna’s humiliation to be splashed across People Magazine. Even though she was simply at home caring for her children, it is Anna Duggar who should also sip the poison of evangelical shaming.
Standing next to their sweating husbands before the glaring lights of the disgrace-hungry media, women like Anna Duggar continue to smile wanly because the money men behind the culture wars have promised she can keep her four bedroom house and her SUV as long as she sticks to the script, leaving fickle news directors no recourse but to herd their crews off to the next 24 hour news cycle disaster.
When the next duly appointed evangelical spokesperson appears, as they always do, the media never seems to ask the obvious question. “Is there a pattern here?”
|
And when the next duly appointed evangelical spokesperson appears, as they always do, the media never seems to ask the obvious question. “Is there a pattern here?”
Just months ago, Josh Duggar was serving as the executive director of FRC Action, the non-profit and tax-exempt legislative action arm of Family Research Council. He was a leading anti same sex marriage voice promoting the sanctity of traditional marriage (i.e.: one man and one woman.)
The Southern Poverty Law Center has this to say about the Family Research Council.
The Family Research Council (FRC) bills itself as “the leading voice for the family in our nation’s halls of power,” but its real specialty is defaming gays and lesbians. The FRC often makes false claims about the LGBT community based on discredited research and junk science. The intention is to denigrate LGBT people in its battles against same-sex marriage, hate crimes laws, anti-bullying programs and the repeal of the military’s “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy.
Now ET Online reports Duggar is officially being thrown under the bus by his former employers at the FRC. Its a time honored strategy. Duggar is suddenly a huge surprise. A shock. He is an aberration. A failed man.
It’s like some poisonous clockwork forever tolling midnight over our collective public square.
|
Josh Duggar is now to be quietly ushered off the public stage? Now you see him, now you don’t? Replaced by the next fresh faced evangelical willing to assume his mantle of pious moral superiority and dish out the coded hate speech of the religious right. It’s like some poisonous clockwork forever tolling midnight over our collective public square.
Meanwhile Josh Duggar will begin his cushy ride on the redemption train, joining evangelicals like Jim Bakker and Jimmy Swaggert on the gentle drift back to televised respectability, washed clean by the sanctified blood of Christ. Or whatever.
How many times are we expected to shrug off these stories of sexual hypocrisy within the leadership of the conservative evangelical movement? How many times are we expected to simply shrug and say, “that’s the way those people are” before we demand some larger assessment? Some final accounting?
How many times will we shrug off these stories of sexual hypocrisy within the leadership of the conservative evangelical movement?
|
How passively we accept the story of Josh Duggar’s fall from grace, will determine how quickly the next homophobic spokesperson will be elevated and set on us.
How about we say this instead: “No, you can’t take Josh Duggar away. You can’t replace him with the next pasty faced hypocrite simply because he or she hides their appetites a bit better. We want to keep Josh Duggar. He’s ours now. We want to keep him front and center. You put him in our face. Now we’re keeping him. Every sweating, shuddering, collapsing, hypocritical inch of him along with every lie he’s ever told. We want him.
Josh Dugger has been attacking gays, lesbians, trans people and the rest of us non-believers for years, and making a fine fat living at it; making money as an architect of a larger cultural narrative which is killing innocent people. Gay and trans people are still fighting and dying for the right to be who they are, and Duggan should stay and watch the world change. In spite of his best efforts to disappear now, Josh Duggar should be kept front and center in the public sphere while we see how this all turns out. Duggar is losing his war against gay people. But he has done a lot of damage. He and his political allies should be held accountable for their actions.
No, you can’t take Josh Duggar away. You can’t replace him with the next pasty faced hypocrite simply because he or she hides their appetites a bit better. We want to keep Josh Duggar.
|
So, lets do this. Let’s not usher Josh Duggar off stage right. Let’s hold him accountable. Not for his real and understandable human needs, but for his role as a spokesperson for shame and hate; for inciting violence. Because in revealing himself as a man who has failed the puritanical expectations of his conservative evangelical community, Josh Duggar has finally provided us the kind of spokesperson we need for organizations like the Family Research Council.
Josh Duggar is our unambiguous symbol of the spiritual rot that lies at the core of the fundamentalist evangelical movement in America. He represents what is evil in any and all expressions of dogmatic religious bigotry. He’s our’s now. Josh Duggar. Our poster boy for the conservative evangelical movement.
Because, we’re done being attacked for our beliefs. We’re done having the people we love assaulted just for being who they are. We’re done having our beautiful innocent children bullied and shamed.
But we’re not done with Josh Duggar.
—
Let’s be honest, the only reason this was written is because they were Christian family that screwed up and people want to make thew world see how they screwed up. I never watched a show of theirs and I’m Christian. I didn’t really know that they were that popular.
Old news ….
I absolutely agree with you Tom. Hypocrisy and unethical behavior can be found across the entire political spectrum. The political left certainly has a long history of corruption, hypocrisy and unethical behavior. Progressives have racked up quite the “body count” as well. The fringes of the left and the right are chock full of disgusting people. If you get right down to it Josh Duggar is a “small potatoes” twerp whose 15 minutes are thankfully up. I’d close with a quote from one of those horrible Christians: “You hypocrite, remove the wooden beam from your eye first; then you will… Read more »
As far as whether we should pile on Josh Duggar. What about
“Ashley Madison suicides: Punishing users for site’s bad security is evil
Judgmental glee over the Ashley Madison disclosure is widespread. But Canadian police reported today that two people outed in the hack have committed suicide.”
http://www.zdnet.com/article/first-ashley-madison-suicides-reported/
We’re holding Duggar accountable for being a hypocrite, not an adulterer. This is the guy who opposed marriage equality based on what he called the sanctity of marriage. I’m sorry for the men who have committed suicide after being found out as adulterers. I do not view adultery as a cardinal sin. I view it as evidence of an unhappy marriage. However, I suspect Duggar’s people WOULD heap shame on those men. Which brings me back to my point. We have to stop shaming human sexuality in the ways conservative evangelicals do across the board. Even as they behave in… Read more »
Mark, I don’t agree with the fundamentalist Christian anti-gay stance. I now a couple born again Christians and you conflate a lot of things. Currently the feeling is love the sinner hate the sin. You talk as if homosexuals wouldn’t be accepted back into the church if they repented bad behavior like Josh Duggar. (Note: I’m not saying that their behavior is bad.). It’s not hypocrisy though regardless of what Duggar said. It’s hypocrisy if Duggar said well it was OK for me, but he accepts that he’s wrong. It’s only hypocrisy if Duggar wouldn’t forgive the “repentant” homosexual (again… Read more »
John, I’ve read your argument here three or four times and I really can’t figure out what narrow needle you’re trying to thread. You act as if the years during which Duggar condemned the sexual acts of others never happened. Duggar and the leaders of his conservative evangelical political movement continue, over and over again, to get caught doing in secret what they condemn in public. This is the very definition of hypocrisy. Say one thing, do another. You act as if it all comes down to what they do after they are caught lying. A strange view of personal… Read more »
I think we need to differentiate between levels of hypocrisy. There is the do as I say not as I do because it’s OK for me to do it, which is similar to the argument I hear a lot of progressives make, and do as I say not as I do, but I shouldn’t be doing it either. That’s more the “bad feminist” yes I oppose objectification, but I’m going to watch Magic Mike type stuff because I’m a weak willed human. Would you be willing to hold progressives to the same standards? Your arguments against objectification are invalid because… Read more »
You know, John, I appreciate your willingness to share your point of view. But you keep going to a meta discussion of a vast range of issues and agendas. You may be right about parallel inconsistencies in other areas of debate. I’ll grant you that. But I’m not here to address every touchstone issue of the men’s movement, nor every poorly structured or biased debate strategy across those issues. I’m writing about Josh Duggar and his politics as amplified by a wide swath of conservative evangelicals. And as for “love the sinner, hate the sin,” that is not an improvement… Read more »
As a musical leader of a large church, I watched my then husband exit the stage (he was also part of the church’s band), and proceed to admit to an affair, porn addiction, and his own childhood molestation. It was a wakeup call to me and my bubble that I had been living inside, where I believed that if I was serving God along side my mate, nothing immoral could ever happen to us. The church needs to address sex addiction in a sincere and straightforward manner. The church needs to quit being a harbor for so many to hide… Read more »
Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that.
Martin Luther King, Jr.
Holding someone accountable for their actions is not darkness nor is it hate.
Jimmy, that is the perfect response to this piece.
Mark, your words go beyond accountability. Your eloquent writing does a masterful job expressing your hatred and contempt. I don’t expect you to recognize it any easier than the christians who can’t see themselves doing it. There are many reasons for righteous anger in this story, but you’ve let yours grow until it clouds the way see entire groups of people.
Chad, the moral issue here is that conservative evangelical politicians and religious leaders have attacked and condemned others for behaving sexually in ways that they themselves do in secret. I stand by my words.
Some have, yes.
To conclude, therefore, that every conservative evangelical politician and religious leader is equally guilty is unfair.
When those guys start condemning the more public hate language from other evangelicals, I’ll happily let them off the collective hook.