Is the Godly Wife Real?

[Burris]

Thanks to another post here on FJ, In Which Someone Rides Robert's Coattails, I have discovered a new chew toy in the form of a blog called Young Godly Women.

The inspiring tagline: "The harsh Biblical truth for Young Women, Wives, and Mothers." (younggodlywomen.wordpress.com)

I didn't read very far into Robert's thread because he's just too damned irritating, so I instead turned my attention to his new fangirl.

After deconstructing just one of her posts, I find myself wondering if she's the genuine article or a clever parody. (If people aren't questioning her veracity yet, they will be by the time they're reading my analysis.)

Even before having the chance to read one of YGW's posts, I have some idea the kind of nonsense I'm about to inflict on myself: Her marquee contains a red flag denoting toxic levels of stupidity ahead.

There's no crime in being young, as this kid surely must be, but pride is unbecoming at any age and it's especially unappealing a youth.

Despite her lack of life experience, however, she believes she is in a position to tell any kind of "harsh truth" to older women.

Whereas older women are commanded to teach the younger ones in Titus 2, apparently YGW simply could not find an old lady from whom to gain wisdom. )Paging Lydia?)

And given the poor quality of YGW's arguments, she would have done well to spend a few years with her mouth shut - you know, following that "harsh truth" about women remaining silent - before offering not merely an opinion but an authoritative complaint against modernity.

In continuing with the theme of pride, YGW's banner promises to tell "the harsh truth [to] young women, wives, and mothers."

I've read many fundamentalist blogs and yet this is actually a first for me - to find patriarchy described as "harsh" by a female blogger. Only occasionally do men even dare to refer to inequality as "harsh truth." Instead, complementarians of both genders usually prefer to describe the subordinate role they recommend for women as a type of liberation; a traditional division of labour where women are free to remain home with their own children.

The model patriarchal family - that by which proponents hope to be judged - is one where each member describes the woman's role as essential; the angel of the home, without whom nothing would be done. Every ill that afflicts the modern family, from debt to the flu (when it appears in children who attend school), may be blamed on the absence of the mother at home.

One of Paul's arguments for patriarchy in his own time was that woman was created second specifically to help man, created first, because the latter was not capable of tending the primeval garden without a helpmate.

In fact, even in the midst of a patriarchal statement about a woman's veiling, Paul directed an uncharacteristic smack-down at those of his contemporaries who denigrated women: "For man was not made from woman, but woman from man. Neither was man created for woman, but woman for man. ... Nevertheless, in the Lord woman is not independent of man nor man of woman; for as woman was made from man, so man is now born of woman. And all things are from God." 1 Corinthians 11:8-12

And so for all that, I have never heard a woman who supports this ideology refer to it as "harsh."

YGW's latest post, "Divorce Isn't Really That Bad, Right?" begins with the following observation:

Everywhere we turn, we can see broken families. Everyone knows someone who’s parents or friends are divorced. There is an obvious correlation between the women’s liberation and the rise of divorce rates starting around the 1970s. Many a conservative has brought this painful truth to light in their defense of traditional marriage and yet the world continues to rummage through their wreckage looking for ways to encourage one another in their futile attempts at ignoring the importance of the biblically instituted marriage model. No matter how much truth they are shown, the world will reject what is right.

NOTE: PARAGRAPH LENGTH - 98 WORDS

One paragraph; several factual errors, an unfounded assertion and - because I'm feeling "catty" - a grammatical error as well. That's not exactly a good start in trying to impress a harsh truth upon me.

Before addressing YGW's mistakes, I would find it therapeutic to digress. There are at least three reasons why debunking bullshit is a never-ending task:

1) It takes only a moment to make a dubious claim, and yet it can take minutes or even hours to debunk nonsense.

2) Sometimes, a naïve explanation makes more sense to both the writer and the average reader than a truth that could be far more complex and difficult to understand.

3) It's a mixed blessing that 'ideas are bullet-proof': Whereas humanity and goodness can persevere in times of cruelty, so too can ignorance and malice continue to infect people - especially in the so-called Information Age - even despite an abundance of accessible facts. The paradox is in how technology which makes factual information accessible can also be used to bring like-minded paranoiacs together.

...and now let us return to YGW and her errors:

1) The "Women's Liberation Movement" began in earnest (US) approximately 130 years before YGW blames it for an alleged spike in the divorce rate.

The CDC released a fascinating document that does indeed show a sharp rise in divorce between the years 1867 through 1967. One factor listed as a reason for this trend is population growth: The more people there are, the more divorces there will be. That isn't the whole story, of course; while there were five times more marriages in 1967 than in 1867, there were 50 times more divorces. But the growth in divorce was not a steady climb; it rose and fell, spiking not in the late 1960s, but rather between 1940 and 1950 (Figure 2).

The 19th Amendment to the US Constitution passed in 1920. Both marriage and divorce rates were already climbing steadily by that point. There was then a brief, small spike in divorce after which the rates again fell following universal suffrage.

The 2011 US Census shows that divorce rates do indeed go up again in the 1970s.

2) YGW does not offer proof the 1970s were an especially promising time for women's rights. Even if she could prove it, however, correlation does not equal causation.

I'm sure there is some truth to the claim that a wider variety of choices for women would make them less likely to remain with an unsuitable partner, but the story is a lot more complex.

Take, for example, this quote from page 8 of the CDC report linked above:

"The number of marriages depends, among other things, on the maximum number of couples who could possibly be married. When the numbers of unmarried men and women, including the single, widowed, and divorced, are approximately equal, either figure can be considered a good approximation of potential couples or of the maximum number of possible marriages."

Economic factors play a role in the decision to marry versus cohabitation, and these same factors also play a role in divorce.

3) Regardless of how "many a conservative" has brayed in alarm over the modern divorce rate, it turns out Conservative Christians have a higher divorce rate than members of other faiths (or of no faith). That statistic, reproduced here, comes from the Barna Research Group, an evangelical Christian polling organization.

4) The following statement, given the data above (and also the fact the United States is not - although some people believe otherwise - actually the entire world), has the dubious distinction of being both false and barely coherent: "...and yet the world continues to rummage through their wreckage looking for ways to encourage one another in their futile attempts at ignoring the importance of the biblically instituted marriage model."

She then completes this, the first paragraph of her article, with a hypocritical complaint about how people reject the truth regardless of the evidence for it. NOTE: REBUTTAL WORD COUNT - 507 (And this includes only the four points listed in the section on YGW's errors.)

And finally, it's "whose" and not "who's." I hope YGW doesn't plan on homeschooling her kids.

That was the first paragraph of the first post I have ever read by this woman and there is so much wrong with it that the words required to explain her errors could cover the rebuttal to a well-written book.

The next paragraph is a complete non-sequitur. It has nothing to do with marriage, divorce, or women's rights. Instead, it reads...

Jesus did miracles for 3 consecutive years and those who witnessed the most profound and captivating stories ever told in all fiction or non-fiction, were the very people to reject Him and sentence Him to an unjust death.

If I mentally paw through that gibberish, I can assume YGW is comparing what she sees as a modern apathy concerning divorce to the torture and execution of an innocent man.

(And this kind of nonsense goes on for another ten paragraphs! Do I dare endanger my sanity?)

YGW continues on by making a standard - and, in this case, clumsy - plea for Christians to reject worldly trends and cling to Biblical ideals such as lifelong marriage. And yet it isn't enough that she and those like her live a set-apart life, living in the world without adopting those cultural trends they find objectionable.

No; she is bent on ensuring everyone, regardless of what they believe, should have to observe the customs she holds dear:

We must never stop fighting for the importance of traditional marriage. It is at the very core of societies’ prosperity. When we read things like this NY Times article or this Huffington Post article, we must use our Bibles; our textbook concerning anything pertaining to our lives, and defend the truths written therein.

I clicked on the articles she linked. The first, which appears on the NY Times website, is called "The Divorce Surge is Over, But the Myth Lives On." If YGW had read beyond the first two sentences - and I strongly suspect she did not - she would have read about how, as the title suggests, the divorce surge is over: The rate is not at 50% and perhaps it never was.

She uses this as proof that traditional marriage is dying.

Next, I clicked the HuffPo link.

I am sure you can guess what I found.

The title: "The Truth About the Divorce Rate Is Surprisingly Optimistic."

The following appears on a list discussing the latest statistics:

About 70 percent of marriages that began in the 1990s reached their 15th anniversary, up from roughly 65 percent of those that began in the 1970s and 1980s. And couples who wed in the 2000s are divorcing at even lower rates.

I can't even begin to make sense of this woman. Not only are her claims demonstrably false, but the two times she actually does cite sources, they say the opposite of what she argues.

I'm beginning to wonder if this is a clever parody - or is it a sad record of one of the least intelligent people who ever learned how to read and write well enough to maintain a blog and imbed hyperlinks?

I almost feel stupid for asking this, since the rational part of my mind keeps screaming, "Come on! No one is this stupid!" And yet I've been posting here for years and some of the genuine articles are every bit as brain-dead as the one I've deconstructed here.

Hell, I've done things dumber than this article, and yet I still cannot believe it's real.

[jerkit]

If this is a parody, I applaud her. There is some extensive nonsense here.

[browncoatslytherin]

ugh. i've only read the testimony portion of the blog, and that part especially has a bit of a poe-ish ring to it. just all kinds of bad tropes thrown in there with little sense to be had of it.

wouldn't it be funny if a blogger that boobert likes and supports turns out to be a troll? :lol: that would be just like him. :roll:

[jerkit]

ugh. i've only read the testimony portion of the blog, and that part especially has a bit of a poe-ish ring to it. just all kinds of bad tropes thrown in there with little sense to be had of it.

wouldn't it be funny if a blogger that boobert likes and supports turns out to be a troll? :lol: that would be just like him. :roll:

I would LOVE to read Robert's public call out if that were the cast. I bet he'd "move to Siberia" if that happened lol.

[Grimalkin]

First, Burris thank you for the well thought out post.

I have wonderd myself. The hatred is so obvious especially the post blaming her husband's cousins suicide on his ex wife for divorcing him. She is over the top and maybe even too much. If she is she I would think she is one of us, no?

[salex]

I wondered the same thing, in part because of her long talk about her felon boyfriends, her saying she counsels people by email if they are "exceptions", her near complete lack of pictures (even my anonymous blog has stock photos) and some of the phrasing.

If so, she is more believable than the Ashleigh/Brittaneigh one, and power to her.

Let's say, I hope she is faux.