Biblical Gender Complementarianism, Unacknolwedged Sexism on Right Wing Sites, and Rare Admissions by A Christian Republican Politician that Women Have Sexual Drives – Re: Mike Huckabee’s Controversial Comments on Women’s Libido and Birth Control
Note: If I find editorials, pro or con, on Huckabee’s views that I find interesting, I will edit this post to add them later, probably at the bottom of this post.
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Before I copy in comments from an article or two I’ve seen about this, here’s a reminder:
I am a Republican (GOP) and a social conservative. I don’t consider myself a feminist and disagree with secular feminists on many topics. So don’t get teed off about this post if you are right wing or a Republican.
Me being right wing and a social conservative does not, however, mean I always agree with how other Republicans or social conservatives handle situations, or with how they feel that U.S. Government, should handle things. Nor do I always agree with their premises or assumptions.
Some Republicans – such as ones of the Christian, biblical gender complementarian variety, yes, can be sexist.
(Some Democrats, atheists, and left wingers can be sexist too, but that would be a topic for another post on another day.)
Here’s an example (both links are from left wing sites):
(Link): Congressman: ‘The Wife Is To Voluntarily Submit’ To Her Husband
(Link): GOP Congressman: Wives Should ‘Voluntarily Submit’ To Their Husbands
By Laura Bassett
Posted: 01/22/2014
A Republican congressman published a memoir last month in which he expresses his belief that “the wife is to submit to the husband,” The Washington Post reported on Wednesday.
Rep. Steve Pearce (R-N.M.), a Vietnam veteran, explains in his book that families, like the military command, need a leadership structure in which every person has a role. He says the wife’s role, according to the Bible, is to be obedient to her husband.
“The wife is to voluntarily submit, just as the husband is to lovingly lead and sacrifice,” he writes. “The husband’s part is to show up during the times of deep stress, take the leadership role and be accountable for the outcome, blaming no one else.”
Pearce goes on to write that the wife should have a say in important family decisions and that her submission does mean the husband should have “authoritarian control” or be considered superior.
“The wife’s submission is not a matter of superior versus inferior; rather, it is self-imposed as a matter of obedience to the Lord and of love for her husband,” he writes.
— BIBLICAL GENDER COMPLMENTARIANISM: CHRISTIAN- ENDORSED AND CHRISTIAN- SUPPORTED SEXISM —
Biblical gender complementarians (GCs, or gender comps, also known as “biblical womanhood and biblical manhood”) like to maintain this fairy tale, one that lacks biblical support, that women are equal in being but not in function (or role), which is really not a lot different from the Southern states’ “Blacks are equal but separate” philosophy of decades past.
The biblical gender complementarian expression that “women are equal in being but not in role to men” is merely a rhetorical device (and a shoddy one at that) to keep women from using and expressing all their God-given talents and skills, so that men can remain in charge, and not share power and influence.
If you truly think someone your equal, you don’t seek to maintain or limit their roles in life based on an inborn, immutable trait, or 2 or 3 Bible verses horribly plucked from context and twisted, and hide behind a flimsy rationalization that while you totally believe women are equal to men, you only think that is so in terms of their “value” (whatever that means), but that same inner value does not confer upon them the ability or right to use their skills or talents along side, or in addition to, men.
Using the authoritarian structure in military as an analogy to gender roles, or a boss to employee analogy, as gender comps are wont to do in these discussions, only further re-enforces and exposes their views as being what they really are: sexist – and not “women are equal but different.”
That is, if you truly believe women are equal to men, you are not going to seek to put a limit on what women may or may not do by using asinine analogies, such as comparing women to privates in the army and men to generals, and say, “See there, women are not lesser than men; we just don’t let them serve as army generals!”
If a woman is qualified to act as a general; if she has the traits, education, and talent to serve as a general – then yes, she should be permitted to act in the role of army general.
Your gender comps, though, say no, even should that woman have the set of skills needed for that particular role, she should be barred from holding it, based on her gender alone.
That is not equality in any way, shape, or form, no matter how much one blathers on about “being equal in worth and value but not in role.”
There is nothing in the Bible that says God the Holy Spirit grants “army general talents” (or ‘preaching to men,’ or ‘leadership ability,’ or ‘boss over employees’ talents) to men only.
If you want to read more on that topic and related ones, please see:
The end result in such thinking is the same from the gender complementarian, no matter how much they wish to couch it or soften it: you are basing who may do what, or be in power, based on an in-born, immutable trait.
It does not matter if you use the boss/employee analogy or the private/general analogy, the end result is limiting women based on their gender and not their education, talents, skill, or experience.
A woman can teach, preach, or lead as well as any man; the Bible says the Holy Spirit gives gifts to all believers, not just males, and the Bible even has positive examples of women, such as Junia and Deborah, leading and preaching to men, with God’s permission.
— SEXISM ON RIGHT WING SITES AND BLOGS —
I, a right winger, have personally encountered rudeness, hatred, and vitriol by conservatives and Republicans on right wing forums, sites, and blogs, on topics pertaining to sex, marriage, divorce, gender roles, and family, with this hatred being based on sexism and very narrow views of what these types of right wingers feel is acceptable lifestyle choices for American women.
Many conservatives tend to assume, knee jerk fashion, that if one disagrees with them on gender roles or marriage, that one must be a feminist who hates marriage or traditional values.
They cannot seem to wrap their heads around the idea that a person can be a fellow right winger but one who realizes that women are not limited to only marriage and motherhood, nor should they be.
Even though I am usually careful to preface my remarks on right wing sites by reminding readers I am also a social conservative, sympathetic and respectful to a lot of Judeo-Christian beliefs, and that I vote Republican, the other conservatives – males in particular – will keep assuming or trying to paint me as a liberal, atheistic, feminist – or they treat me as such.
It’s also fascinating to watch how male conservatives will read things into my comments that I never said – even if I express the opposite belief!
For instance, even should I write, “I respect marriage and would like to be married some day myself,” and then mention that right wingers and Christians have made too much of marriage, some of the right wingers will act as though I said, “Hello, I am a man-hating feminist, a flaming lesbian, and I despise traditional marriage.”
They do this typically in discussions where I agree I support marriage, but I think many times, social conservatives and Christians have idolized marriage and pro-creation, to a point that not even the Bible supports.
I sometimes even provide quotes directly from the Bible to remind them of the words of Jesus and Paul about God’s valuing of singleness. The male conservatives (and sometimes females, though it’s usually males) really chaff at this reminder, though.
Many right wingers do not want to acknowledge that the Bible does not esteem traditional marriage and parenthood as much as they ASSUME it does.
Republicans, Christians, and social conservatives on political sites bristle and act upset when confronted with clear quotes from the New Testament that Paul wrote it is better to stay single than to marry.
Some right wing males behave as anything less than full nuclear family worship is tantamount to rejection there-of, or is an acceptance of homosexuality, or they assume I must be a liar who is really a lesbian, Democrat, feminist who hates right wingers, the family, and marriage.
In the process of hurling their many incorrect assumptions at me, and responding to points I never made, they tend to make very rude, sexist comments about all women in general.
I recently ran into one such right wing asshole on a political site who referred to any and all women as “sluts,” and he did this repeatedly in his posts. He was also very condescending to me, though I was polite to him through our exchange. I suspect that the guy might be a troll, but it’s hard to tell.
I have also noticed that many conservatives and Republicans, in discussions about sex, birth control, family, marriage, or divorce on political sites, also misquote and twist the comment from the Bible in Genesis about being fruitful and multiplying.
Just as atheists and liberals – some of whom can be terribly biblically illiterate who seem to know only ONE verse from the Bible (and that only when it suits them, and they tend to mis-use it), and that one verse being the one containing the comment of Jesus of, “judge not lest ye be judged” – your usual right wing, socially conservative Christians on political sites are only acquainted with the verse from Genesis about “being fruitful.”
(For more on this, see:
(Link): Misapplication of Biblical Verses About Fertility (also mentions early marriage) – a paper by J. McKeown)
Some Conservatives have blinders on about all the passages (which tend to be in the New Testament) which negate marriage and pro-creation being divine commandments or preferences, but which make each activity optional for believers.
Despite the fact I point out to right wingers on political sites that things changed under the teachings of Jesus Christ and Paul (e.g., (Link): Matthew 10:37), where-in pro-creating is no longer a mandate, not for believers, they remain incredulous about it. It’s in the Bible, particularly in the New Testament, that marriage and making babies is not mandated, but some right wingers continue to act as though it were.
I was only able to shut some of them up about it in one thread months ago when I quoted straight from Scriptures, from the New Testament, about these issues.
It’s as though some conservatives minds go totally blank about the New Testament passages that talk in positive terms about singleness and celibacy. They tend to forget such passages are in the Bible, and some lapse into the incorrect, wrong, unbiblical view that only “some are chosen for singleness.”
The Bible does not teach that marriage and making babies is the norm for any one in any culture. Americans may assume that getting married is the norm for Americans, but the Bible does NOT contain a teaching saying, “God wants or demands most people to marry and make babies.”
As 44% of American adults are single these days, being married is not even the cultural norm in the United States any longer, not that it once was.
For more on this topic, please see: (Link): False Christian Teaching: “Only A Few Are Called to Singleness and Celibacy” or (also false): God’s gifting of singleness is rare – More Accurate: God calls only a few to marriage and God gifts only the rare with the gift of Marriage
Many Republicans and conservatives only hone in one “be fruitful and multiply” verse from the Old Testament and harbor the assumption that being married and having children is the only God-sanctioned manner of living life.
Continue reading “Biblical Gender Complementarianism, Unacknolwedged Sexism on Right Wing / Republican Sites, and Rare Admissions by A Christian Republican Politician that Women Have Sexual Drives – Re: Mike Huckabee’s Controversial Comments on Women’s Libido and Birth Control – Unlike Most on the Right and Left Huckabee Believes Sexual Self Control is Possible”
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