Complementarian and Pro Family Values Christians Claim to be Pro Woman and Pro Family But By Their Actions Show They Are Not
Complementarians claim to be respectful of women, but their theological views help to enable mistreatment of women and bar women from taking positions and roles that should go to them, if they have the skills, talents, and education.
Many Christians claim to be pro “Family Values” but in reality treat children and women (you know, who tend to be parts of families) like dirt.
Here are some posts explaining in detail or giving examples:
First post:
(Link): When I Became a Single Mother, Patriarchy Let Me Down by Bridget Jack Jeffries (excerpts from this first link farther below)
Second post:
And by way of WW – that is (Link): Wartburg Watch – (from a February 2017 post entitled, “Ignite: Remove Alleged Rapist, Ben Roethlisberger, and Joe White, Who Is Being Sued for Child Sex Abuse Cover Up, From the Speaker Lineup!”)
Christian Liberty University is holding something called “Ignite,” which pertains to advocating godly manhood or family values, or some such. One of Ignite’s scheduled speakers is a guy named Ben Roethlisberger, who is accused of rape by at least three different women. The guy is, or was, a football player.
A sub-heading on the WW page reads: “The troubling history of rape allegations against Ben Roethlisberger”
The WW blog owners in turn link to this page in their post about this guy here:
(Link): Without Consequence: When Professional Athletes Are Violent Off the Field
So, a Christian university is allowing an accused rapist to speak at an event that is purportedly about encouraging men to lead godly lives.
After detailing the accounts of rape accusations against Ben Roethlisberger, and other troubling incidents surrounding “Ignite,” the WW bloggers say:
Ignite appears to show concerning disregard for the safety and well being of women and children by the speaker lineup.
I agree with WW’s assessment of the situation.
This is one thing of several that kills me about conservative, pro- Family Values, and I take it these guys at Liberty and Ignite are gender complementarians, as well: they constantly complain about the left wing being against “family values” and against sexual purity, and they certainly give lip service to support of family values and claim to respect women and kids, but at the end of the day, it’s easy to see from their actions that they really don’t care about Family Values, sexual purity, or about women or children.
And I am a right winger. I agree that some of the left wing’s rhetoric or views about sexuality and so on is wrong – but to see people from my side of the ideological fence claiming one thing while doing the other is reprehensible.
“Family Values” and “respect for women” is largely nothing but posturing and talking points for a lot of political conservatives and Christians on the right.
It’s even more annoying to me, as a childless, never-married woman. A lot of these conservatives bad mouth women such as myself or else ignore women such as me, because they spend an inordinate amount of time worshipping the Nuclear Family and Motherhood. Conservatives have a dislike or suspicion of any woman who does not get married and have kids.
Anyway, they need to be consistent: if they claim to really value women and The Family, they need to stop protecting domestic abusers and child abusers, and stop giving the mic or stage to guys known or suspected to be pedophiles, rapists, wife beaters, and other types of slime balls
(Link): When I Became a Single Mother, Patriarchy Let Me Down by Bridget Jack Jeffries
Excerpts (the author comes from a Mormon marriage, where her Mormon husband cheated on her, and as she points out, Mormons have many similar beliefs about marriage and family as do conservative, evangelical Christians):
An article at the Huffington Post by Samantha Johnson — (Link): “When I Became a Mother, Feminism Let Me Down” — has been making the rounds. Though heartfelt and thoughtful (Johnson identifies as a feminist herself), I disagree with Johnson’s assessment of the failings of feminism. As a woman who was married for nearly 11 years and is now divorced, I have had a different experience in regards to feminism, marriage and motherhood.
There has already been (Link): one excellent response by Dr. Julie Hanks, but every woman who has been failed by patriarchy should tell her story. Here is mine.
You should know that my now-ex-husband was (and is) a Mormon, and Mormonism is a religion that heavily promotes the “traditional” husband-breadwinner / wife-homemaker model — probably more so than even most conservative Christian religions today. So, having been married to someone who was thoroughly immersed in a patriarchal model, these were the ways in which patriarchy failed me.
… Patriarchy Failed to Teach My Husband to Be Faithful
My husband had three affairs over the course of our marriage.
The first happened in undergrad shortly after our marriage in 2003, and I didn’t learn of it until 2014, after the divorce was final. (My former college roommates approached me to let me know that they had never known how to break it to me, and felt bad about this.)
The second was an emotional affair with his co-worker, one that involved my husband driving this woman around for three hours a day, spending hundreds of dollars on her every month, and partying with her until 6:30 AM on weekends. I was pregnant with our second and our oldest, age 6 at the time, was disabled.
….Patriarchy Fails to Hold Men Accountable for Anti-Family Behavior
My husband was denied a Mormon “temple recommend” so he could attend his sister’s wedding in May 2013 (a form of soft discipline), and he got a few talking-to’s and wrist slaps. But the man who had effectively abandoned his pregnant wife and disabled child, the man who had brought his mistress to a church meeting with him, was (to my knowledge) never disfellowshipped or excommunicated — and I gave proof positive of his affairs to his local church leaders.
Mormons are far from the only ones who fail at this. Women in the evangelical community could tell you many stories of church leaders urging them to stay with unfaithful and abusive husbands. Noted theologian and preacher John Piper, who strongly advocates for traditional gender roles, infamously advised battered women that they needed to (Link): “endure . . . perhaps being smacked one night.”
…If patriarchy really valued stay-at-home mothers and homemakers(which is what I was from 2006 to 2013, until my husband’s affairs forced me to return to work), married men who engage in anti-family behavior would see swift retribution. But they seldom do.
It’s more often than not the faithful wives who are ostracized and punished, while it’s feminists who have fought to protect battered women and raise awareness of the various forms of spousal abandonment and abuse.
… Patriarchy Failed to Teach My Husband to Share in the Housework, Even When I Was Working Full-Time and Earning More Money Than Him
I’m not going to go into a lot of details here, but housework in my marriage was a nightmare. My husband almost never did chores without being asked, and if I delegated any tasks to him, he either “forgot” or he did a terrible job.
Errands would be left undone until I either got angry at him or gave up in frustration and did them myself. I later asked a male co-worker about this, and he laughed and said, “Doing a bad job on the chores is a tried-and-true method of getting your wife to stop asking you to do them.”
… But the reality is that patriarchy has never truly valued motherhood or homemaking to begin with.
Feminism lets me down (Link): when it tries to ostracize pro-life women like me. But feminism has given me a lot: the right to vote, the right to work, the right to own property, the right to divorce, and the right to seek child support.
(( click here to read the rest of her excellent post ))
Mormons, like Christians, often behave as though marriage or the Nuclear Family will solve all of society’s problems, but as you can see, it does not. The Bible says that humanity’s problem is sin and that Jesus is the remedy for that; the Bible does not say that marriage or family will make things all better.
Getting married does not make a person more godly, loving, empathetic, mature, or responsible. If the person didn’t already have a decent set of core values going into a marriage, they’re probably not going to magically develop them afterwards.
Related Posts:
(Link): Democrats Using Family Values and Religion as Platforms or Draws – UGH
(Link): The Conservative Definition of ‘Family Values’ Is B.S. by K. Holloway
(Link): ‘Family values’ Republican: Men should be allowed to grab breastfeeding women’s nipples in public
(Link): White Christians No Longer Majority in U.S.A. (2015 Pew Study)
(Link): If the Family Is Central, Christ Isn’t, by John B. Carpenter, CP Guest Contributor
(Link): If Family Is Central, Christ Is Not
(Link): Creepy: ‘Barna: [Christian] Women Value Family Over Faith’
(Link): Do You Rate Your Family Too High? (Christians Who Idolize the Family) (article)
(Link): Francis Chan Challenges Christians: Stop Idolizing Family, Put Christ’s Mission First
(Link): “Who is my mother and who are my brothers?” – one of the most excellent Christian rebuttals I have seen against the Christian idolatry of marriage and natalism, and in support of adult singleness and celibacy – from CBE’s site
(Link): Redefining Family (How Christians Exclude, Marginalize Adult Singles) – post from Sojourner’s
(Link): The Deification of Family and Marriage (re: Kyle Idleman book)
(Link): Please Stop Shaming Me for Being Single by J. Vadnal
(Link): Statistics Show Single Adults Now Outnumber Married Adults in the United States (2014)
(Link): Really, It’s Okay To Be Single – In order to protect marriage, we should be careful not to denigrate singleness – by Peter Chin
(Link): Are Single People the Lepers of Today’s Church? by Gina Dalfonzo
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