What will all the SAHDs do long term?

[TurtleBelly]

I haven't been on FreeJinger for long, but as soon as I learned of the Botkins a few months ago, I read some of their blog "Visionary Daughters." Interestingly, the most recent post was from Valentines Day, addressing this topic of being a SAHD and still waiting. They had this to say:

And the rest of the good news is, if you find yourself Valentine-less this Valentine’s Day, that means the Lord is giving you more time to die to sin and live to righteousness, more time to make yourself ready, more time to become a better gift.

Basically, I interpret this as them trying to seem like they're not angry with God, although it would be easy to be impatient, because he's using this as a lesson in how they need to be less demanding and more giving and more patient to allow God's plan to be fulfilled His way, or something. But how sad is that? That they could be out using their obvious marketing, technology, and networking skills to do something of value in the world and meeting people who could get to know them for who they are, not just meeting people at these conventions who get to know them as daughters of Mr. Botkin. I guess it's obvious to say that I bet most young Fundie men might be intimidated to approach Pa Botkin to ask about courting a daughter since they're such Fundie royalty? But the brothers wouldn't have had that problem since they get to be the ones to initiate something.

AS & E Botkin seem to do a lot of work helping their brothers and father with their film and other projects...I wonder, do they get their own bank accounts? What resources do they have that are truly their own for all the work that they do?

[Arete]

The reason they don't work while they wait is even a non skilled job would bring them into contact with people from other walks of life. This would introduce new ideas and lead to them questioning whether this lifestyle really was the best way. Isolation is a key component for these families. They go to ridiculous lengths to make sure they only interact with like minded people who tow the party line. Anything new or different is a threat to their control over both their underage and adult children.

[oil]

I think a lot of these SAHDs will put a biblical spin on the single life as they enter their 40s and 50s. There's nothing wrong with being single, and there's no real need for them to justify their lives to anyone, but of course they won't see it that way. Instead, they'll brand themselves as Brides of the One King, A Perpetual Keeper of My Father's Hearth, or some such. They will create a market for ebooks on how to care for aging parents biblically, or manage estate planning the King Solomon way. After their parents have died, they will re-invent themselves as Submissive Spinsters and try to convince elderly fundie women that it's their duty to be keepers of their brother's (or nephew's) home. And then they will die.

This is what I think. There will be a community with in the community of these older un-married ladys and they will make it their special ministry.

But Im wondering if the Duggar/Maxwell/Botkin etc girls are the first generation to be un-married? Arent there any fundy groups that were here before Gothard? What happened to the un-married fundy ladys and men from a generation past ago? May be fundy way is newer than that?

[Pearl]

What I find interesting about this whole movement is that only a select few of their women are being married off. It seems like the father's don't actually want their daughters to get married and are holding them back from their sacred duty. I find it very strange, seeing that their movement is dependent upon women getting pregnant.

I'm thinking that the father worship has gone to their heads and they don't want to lose one supplicant even if it brings down the whole movement.

On another note, I think the sons might be better off as they seem to get a tad better of an education and probably have more access to breaking free and finding a normal woman from a normal family (if that is what they wish).

[debrand]

I think if my SIL did a lot of cooking, cleaning and child care then I would be happy to have her there especially if I was constantly pregnant. If you're raising and homeschooling 10+ kids then I think the extra help would be a "blessing" not to say there wouldn't be disagreements and fights but I think those are unavoidable when people are spending almost all their time together.

That is a good point. I was thinking as a modern woman who has choices and can decide how many children to have, so I would resent a SIL who refused to work but expected her brother and myself to support her. Her SIL would also be a SAHD so she might be more accepting.

[Mela99]

So what do you think would have to happen for dads to WANT to marry off their daughters?

[TrueRebel1]

So what do you think would have to happen for dads to WANT to marry off their daughters?

See, I think that for some of these families, (the more well-known, revered ones such as the Bodkins, Mallys, etc.) the dads will realize that their daughters need to marry to avoid public embarrassment. They may let their daughters stay single into their late 20's or early 30's, but eventually I think they'll literally arrange a marriage so that the image of their perfect daughter entering the perfect marriage is not altered.

But for other families that are under the radar...even people such as the Maxwells, I'm sure the daughters will remain single until a married sibling lets her move in as a "nanny", or the parents pass on. I would see these girls eventually having mental breakdowns, or perhaps devoting their lives to mission work, or best case scenario, finally having a life and marrying. In the meanwhile, for the SAHD who are entering their 30's, I'd imagine they may get a small, dead-end job simply to occupy their time. Of course, these jobs would always be with daddy's permission, and probably short-lived so that they have not long-term hope of being self-supporting.

[RachelB]

I think a lot of these SAHDs will put a biblical spin on the single life as they enter their 40s and 50s. There's nothing wrong with being single, and there's no real need for them to justify their lives to anyone, but of course they won't see it that way. Instead, they'll brand themselves as Brides of the One King, A Perpetual Keeper of My Father's Hearth, or some such. They will create a market for ebooks on how to care for aging parents biblically, or manage estate planning the King Solomon way. After their parents have died, they will re-invent themselves as Submissive Spinsters and try to convince elderly fundie women that it's their duty to be keepers of their brother's (or nephew's) home. And then they will die.

And I've just depressed the piss out of myself...

Pretty much what I foresee, too. And if any of them has the courage, during her life, to honestly say "This isn't the life I'd hoped for," without appending some version of "But God gave me an even better life than the one I imagined!," she will be roundly criticized for being ungrateful.

[dragonsarewhat]

Are there any examples of this out there in the blogging world, like a family with an unmarried, older sister to the 'patriarch' living with them?

[mlady]

This is what I think. There will be a community with in the community of these older un-married ladys and they will make it their special ministry.

But Im wondering if the Duggar/Maxwell/Botkin etc girls are the first generation to be un-married? Arent there any fundy groups that were here before Gothard? What happened to the un-married fundy ladys and men from a generation past ago? May be fundy way is newer than that?

Aren't they all basically first generation movement? Most of the parents of today's SAHD's were NOT this sheltered but bought into the program for themselves and their kids (who have no choice). I'm waiting on some of these gals and some of the 2nd gen kids to buy into THEIR OWN idea of life. So much harder for them though, not knowing about the world and all. How does a person make any decisions if they never have the chance? I'm sad.

[ThatSnark]

There is a MASSIVE business opportunity for some higher-up patriarchal family to provide a Christian matchmaking service, under a very different name/scheme, to locate men for these women, introduce their parents, and kill the moss under their feet. If they marketed it properly, that family would have more business than all their stay-at-home adult children could possibly handle.

[itaintmebabe]

There is a MASSIVE business opportunity for some higher-up patriarchal family to provide a Christian matchmaking service, under a very different name/scheme, to locate men for these women, introduce their parents, and kill the moss under their feet. If they marketed it properly, that family would have more business than all their stay-at-home adult children could possibly handle.

Like FundieMingle.com?

[ThatSnark]

Like FundieMingle.com?

or FundieParentMingle.com -- you know the kids can't talk amongst themselves unless they've put a ring on it. :naughty:

[Carla Bruni]

I think that's definitely a part of it. I also think the thought of sex must get more terrifying for them as they get older. If you're in your 30's and no guy has ever seen so much as your knee, what must it be like to imagine being nekkid in front of a man, even if you are imaging it in the dark?

To this point: I have a close female friend who's totally liberal, non-religious, beautiful, smart, well-rounded, multiple degrees, multilingual, etc, etc. For whatever reason (probably the fact that she was suuuuuper selective about boys when the rest of us were all PENIS PENIS in our late teens), she stayed a virgin until 24, I think, despite having been in a serious relationship for TWO years by that point. The longer she waited, the more freaked out she became. It got to the point where she couldn't even joke about anything remotely sexual involving herself OR other people, and if we ever referenced HER relationship in a sexual way (very very very carefully, like "heeeey, so how was your guys' weekend cabin getaway?!"), she'd immediately shut down and the evening would be ruined. I think she got caught in a vicious cycle of being terrified of sex and then being terrified of her anxiety, which led to even more anxiety. It was really sad to watch, but there was nothing we could do to help without totally pissing her off! I cannot even IMAGINE how freaked out these SAHDs are.

[darkplumaged]

Are there any examples of this out there in the blogging world, like a family with an unmarried, older sister to the 'patriarch' living with them?

I can't think of any. All of the older SAHDs I know of still have living parents. Of course, the oldest SAHD I can think of is around 36. Surely there are others who are older and whose parents are gone, but they don't have blogs (that we've found yet).

Like others here, I fail to see how fundies can execute their 200-year plans for intergenerational faithfulness, or whatever they call it, when they can't even get the current generation of young people married off. And these are, in many cases, physically attractive (especially the women), "godly" :roll: people with skills fundies value. In other words, they're "perfect" fundies--and yet even they can't seem to do what they're supposed to be doing. The very system that is supposed to "protect" them is royally screwing them, and they can't admit it or do anything about it.

[miffy]

Maybe some of them will become Baptist nuns? Of course they will have to start new non papist orders.

[tuckerphez]

I think there's two opposing forces at work here.

In many old-world religious, strict, don't-look-at-the-opposite-sex-before-marriage, fundamentalist-type communities, marriages were arranged by parents, matchmakers, etc. (Hell, I'm pretty sure Orthodox jews have some form of this today. Or at least Jdate. :P )

But most of our fundies live in the modern United States. Since the 18th? 19th? century, it's been a very American ideal to choose your own spouse, or at least "fall in love" with your spouse. Falling in love takes time, or at least a chance to talk to the opposite sex.

So I think SAHD have the expectation that they're supposed to fall in love, but they don't have the opportunity to really talk to a man and fall in love with him. And there's no one arranging marriages or really pushing single people together in most of these families.

Like I'm surprised Gothard or some other leader hasn't realized that the huge cohort of spinsters is going to be a problem and pushed for arranged marriages.

(This is all assuming that a SAHD wants to get married and have a ton of babies. And that their headship isn't intentionally pushing potential suitors away.)

[lilwriter85]

When it comes to the Maxwells, I get the feeling that Steve will marry off Anna and Mary. He has to know that many people in his fanbase have wondered about Sarah hasn't married.

[Maul the Koala]

To this point: I have a close female friend who's totally liberal, non-religious, beautiful, smart, well-rounded, multiple degrees, multilingual, etc, etc. For whatever reason (probably the fact that she was suuuuuper selective about boys when the rest of us were all PENIS PENIS in our late teens), she stayed a virgin until 24, I think, despite having been in a serious relationship for TWO years by that point. The longer she waited, the more freaked out she became. It got to the point where she couldn't even joke about anything remotely sexual involving herself OR other people, and if we ever referenced HER relationship in a sexual way (very very very carefully, like "heeeey, so how was your guys' weekend cabin getaway?!"), she'd immediately shut down and the evening would be ruined. I think she got caught in a vicious cycle of being terrified of sex and then being terrified of her anxiety, which led to even more anxiety. It was really sad to watch, but there was nothing we could do to help without totally pissing her off! I cannot even IMAGINE how freaked out these SAHDs are.

I would bet good money that a lot of the SAHDs have vulvar pain disorders due to the fear of sex being drilled into them.

[Irishy]

There must be something holding these marriages back. Its bizarre. Some unknown force. Maybe its The LORD's way of shutting down the quiverfull/dominionist nonsense.

[browngrl]

I think it must be very hard for fundie sons as well as daughters. The sons know that if they get married they have to become someone's "hero" or the "leader" of the family - not to mention being the sole wage earner for what might be a huge family. Imagine dealing with job loss, illness or exhaustion in this scenario. I am not minimizing the stress of being a SAHD - it is just that I think that the fundie system does no one any favours. One of the nicest benefits of marriage for me has been knowing that there is another person who has my back - someone who can take care of things should I be unable to. Fundies do not have that option. Fundie men and women are locked into airless cages so when bad times come they have severe limits on the options available.

I don't think I'd want to be married in a fundie scenario. It would leave me no room to breath. I think that some fundie boys think the same thing even if they can't say it out loud.

[cosmictraveler]

I think it must be very hard for fundie sons as well as daughters. The sons know that if they get married they have to become someone's "hero" or the "leader" of the family - not to mention being the sole wage earner for what might be a huge family. Imagine dealing with job loss, illness or exhaustion in this scenario. I am not minimizing the stress of being a SAHD - it is just that I think that the fundie system does no one any favours. One of the nicest benefits of marriage for me has been knowing that there is another person who has my back - someone who can take care of things should I be unable to. Fundies do not have that option. Fundie men and women are locked into airless cages so when bad times come they have severe limits on the options available.

I don't think I'd want to be married in a fundie scenario. It would leave me no room to breath. I think that some fundie boys think the same thing even if they can't say it out loud.

I have to agree with your assessment. It does neither gender any favors to be locked in to these rigid gender roles. If I were a girl being raised in this situation, knowing my personality and knowing my only options were to be a single spinster or being a mother to a buttload of kids, I'd choose single spinsterhood.

I also like what another poster said about how the fundie system of marriage is odd because they're expected to "fall in love," but also do the daddy-approved courtship thing. I agree that actually falling in love with someone takes getting to know who they are, in an unsupervised way. I imagine the communications between the two people in a courtship are probably also read over by their parents, so maybe they hold some things back from each other. Also, sexuality isn't some impure, satanic thing as they believe, so they don't even get to talk about what they want or don't want in that arena, which IS an important part of a romantic relationship, unless the two partners are asexual. So they're not even allowed to touch base about what their likes or dislikes in the bedroom might be, well, since they're not allowed to even touch that topic with a ten foot pole until they're married.

I can actually see why some people choose not to actually have sex until they get married, but the less extreme people who are abstaining probably at least get to talk it over with the person they intend to marry before tying the knot. Also, they're probably allowed to at least cuddle with each other before getting married and figure the pheromones and chemistry are just right. Things like pheromones and sexual chemistry can't be explored from a distance of 5 feet, which is what it seems these courtship couples are maintaining.

I know some of their dads "let" them hold hands and sit closer once they're actually engaged. Imagine getting engaged, and you suddenly find your courtship partner has the funkiest halitosis EVER, and it's permanent. Seems superficial to dump a guy over chronically bad breath, but you ARE going to be living with this dude hopefully for life. I find my husband's smell overall to be wonderful, even when he's been out mowing the lawn and doing yard work for several hours and sweating his butt off. And I don't sense his "morning breath" when he wakes up, and overall when I smell his breath, it smells good to me. It's called being a chemical/pheromone match, and it IS important no matter what people say. Although these fundie types don't believe in teh ebil science or anything. They'd just be instructed to pray to God about it to help them become content with not liking their partner's natural scent. But still, imagine that the first time you really smell your partner, you're completely turned off by it, and it doesn't change no matter how impeccable their hygiene is, you just don't like their natural scent. Are you supposed to just get used to that?

Some of these courtships really freak me out, because it's like the males are giving a resume of sorts to their potential mate's dad, and the rest of the process is like a dang job application. Of course I do think a couple should hash out all the important issues before they commit to marriage, but there should be some fun, spontaneity, and romance (unsupervised) in the early part of a relationship as well. It's like the courtship phase isn't even a real relationship, and the real relationship isn't supposed to start until they get married. I know with Josh and Anna, they had more of a chance to spend in-person time together, but I know some of the fundie families who are friends and have courtships going on between their kids are several hundred miles apart, so most of the correspondence is long distance, and any visits they have aren't just for the two of them, but between their two families, so they're always supervised.

And when courtships fail, when one of the "kids" (it's like they're eternally treated as children until they're married, which is warped) ends it for whatever reason, there's often so much drama over it. If you're just dating someone, it's not a big deal if you find you're not compatible with someone. It just didn't work out, and you can move on. These courtship arrangements are such a huge deal, and if one of the two feels as though it's just not a match, since courtships are intended to lead to marriage, everyone in the two families gets all bent out of shape over it. It's just not healthy.

I really wonder if arranged marriages are just around the corner in the Gothard movement since there's going to be a whole generation of "spinsters." Unless there are a few rebellious ones who risk being disowned to strike out on their own and have a separate life, maybe get a job and work their way through college, have a career, and marry someone who's not a patriarchal, fundie type, or even more radically, decide they don't need a man to be happy and stay single but have a successful life with lots of friends. When they're living at home, their daddies won't let them get a part-time job, lest they mingle with the common folk and learn that there are *gasp*, other lifestyles and points of view, and the way of life they've been brought up in isn't the only way to live.

[salex]

I don't understand why these girls can't get a job while they wait for their future spouse. If all they want to do is marry and have children, that's fine. But shouldn'they take care of themselves now? I realize they all still live at home, but why couldn't they work in a coffee shop or a grocery store? Something where they can earn money, get life experience and aren't 100% dependent on their families while they wait for their husband. Learning to be a homemaker isn't going to take years of training!

I think there are multiple reasons.

1) the whole "answering to another man" ie, having a boss somewhere, that they talk about sometimes

2) A woman working makes it look like daddy can't support his family.

3) exposure to unclean people might tempt them. Coworkers with different beliefs show them that not everyone lives the frightened, repressed, obedient world they were raised for, and that some of these other women are not sluts nor do they hate their children. Not to mention male coworkers--nice cute, unmarried and disinterested in what their daddy taught them. "How you gonna keep them down on the farm, after they've seen Pariee?"

4) points out how poorly educated they really are.

5) hard to enslave a person who realizes they have options beyond blind obedience to a father or headship--if a person can earn their own living, they can leave if things get ugly.

[cosmictraveler]

I think there are multiple reasons.

1) the whole "answering to another man" ie, having a boss somewhere, that they talk about sometimes

2) A woman working makes it look like daddy can't support his family.

3) exposure to unclean people might tempt them. Coworkers with different beliefs show them that not everyone lives the frightened, repressed, obedient world they were raised for, and that some of these other women are not sluts nor do they hate their children. Not to mention male coworkers--nice cute, unmarried and disinterested in what their daddy taught them. "How you gonna keep them down on the farm, after they've seen Pariee?"

4) points out how poorly educated they really are.

5) hard to enslave a person who realizes they have options beyond blind obedience to a father or headship--if a person can earn their own living, they can leave if things get ugly.

Ding ding ding! You nailed it! It's pretty dang depressing, though. :(

[Justme]

I have to wonder if Gothard just doesn't care. He's in what, his 70's? By the time the "movement" realizes there is a problem, he'll be so old he doesn't care what happens or dead.