Josh Harris Announced "I Kissed Dating Goodbye" Was Discontinued

[Antipatriarch]

Oh boy. Josh Harris and his wife "are separating and will continue our life together as friends."

Spoiler

https://www.instagram.com/p/B0CtVRingGj/

I have a hard time snarking at the death of anyone's marriage, but this guy's misguided book and marriage philosophy deserve all the scorn possible. Anyone who still claims that no-dating, no-kissing, let-your-parents-set-you-up is a guaranteed better way to find a committed life partner, had better look carefully at Exhibit A (and all the countless other exhibits).

"The book also gave some the impression that a certain methodology of relationships would deliver a happy ever-after ending—a great marriage, a great sex life—even though this is not promised by scripture." source

[JermajestyDuggar]

This really doesn’t surprise me. It’s almost like he’s been preparing for this to eventually happen with everything he has said and done over the past few years. 

[SecularMusic]

28 minutes ago, Antipatriarch said:

Oh boy. Josh Harris and his wife "are separating and will continue our life together as friends."

  Reveal hidden contents

https://www.instagram.com/p/B0CtVRingGj/

I have a hard time snarking at the death of anyone's marriage, but this guy's misguided book and marriage philosophy deserve all the scorn possible. Anyone who still claims that no-dating, no-kissing, let-your-parents-set-you-up is a guaranteed better way to find a committed life partner, had better look carefully at Exhibit A (and all the countless other exhibits).

"The book also gave some the impression that a certain methodology of relationships would deliver a happy ever-after ending—a great marriage, a great sex life—even though this is not promised by scripture." source

Strangely, one of  the things I remember most about reading this book as a teen was how Josh suggested that his wife was "damaged" bc she'd had unspecified physical contact with another man before they met. I felt this was a way he thought could legitimately shame her in the guise of preventing other teen girls from making the same mistake.

[Antipatriarch]

13 minutes ago, SecularMusic said:

Strangely, one of  the things I remember most about reading this book as a teen was how Josh suggested that his wife was "damaged" bc she'd had unspecified physical contact with another man before they met. I felt this was a way he thought could legitimately shame her in the guise of preventing other teen girls from making the same mistake.

Reprehensible. Same thing at play in Mark and Grace Driscoll's book... I would say it's different because she's a co-author on that one, but with the hyper-masculine/-complementarian dynamics at work there, I honestly question whether she would have had the agency to keep those details private if she wanted.

Either way, it's purity culture at work, the belief that one is "damaged" by one's prior dating/love/sex experience, etc.

Edited July 18, 2019 by Antipatriarch
clarify: Grace Driscoll is co-author

[Giraffe]

Does this mean his documentary was only because he knew he’d be getting divorced?? It was a strange and disappointing not-an-apology and felt more like a pr stunt than anything genuine.

Wonder if his next documentary will be a real apology. Hopefully this acts as the catalyst for him to do a 180 this time. 

 

[Antipatriarch]

23 minutes ago, JermajestyDuggar said:

This really doesn’t surprise me. It’s almost like he’s been preparing for this to eventually happen with everything he has said and done over the past few years. 

I'm not at all disagreeing with you, but I'm curious: did you see something specific in the last few years during his documentary/non-pology/etc. that hinted that his marriage was in trouble? I didn't see this coming.

[JermajestyDuggar]

2 minutes ago, Antipatriarch said:

I'm not at all disagreeing with you, but I'm curious: did you see something specific in the last few years during his documentary/non-pology/etc. that hinted that his marriage was in trouble? I didn't see this coming.

He has talked about issues in his own marriage before and it made me wonder if he would eventually divorce. 

[Alcyone]

1 hour ago, SecularMusic said:

Strangely, one of  the things I remember most about reading this book as a teen was how Josh suggested that his wife was "damaged" bc she'd had unspecified physical contact with another man before they met. I felt this was a way he thought could legitimately shame her in the guise of preventing other teen girls from making the same mistake.

I've never forgotten that part either. I imagine that it has been very difficult to live with the intensity of sexual shaming this implies.

I found an interview that Josh and Shannon did to promote their book, "Not Even a Hint", and she said in the interview: "Back when I was younger, I wasn't thinking about any of those consequences. But then I met Josh. There was a time when we were actually sitting at a restaurant, and I’m having to pour out my past to him. It all of a sudden was very real and very tangible that my past did affect my future. There were consequences to the sin that I had committed previously." It seems to me that the consequences here are Josh being disappointed and hurt about her relationship with previous boyfriends. He says that it wasn't so much about her "sin against God" but about the guilt that follows. Mhm....only problem is that she didn't have guilt over having these normal young adult relationships until she was told that she should feel completely crappy about it and the stigma of her sexual past would never be erased. Ugh! 

I'm really curious about their current relative positions on this issue. Judging by the little I know of Josh's apology video, he seems to have changed his views only slightly. I wonder if Shannon has doubled down and taken a stand for even purer purity or if she has a lot more regret than he does over all the purity stuff and wishes to move away from it more forcefully. I can't find anything that she has said recently; the above interview I quoted was eight years ago. 

[louisa05]

@Alcyone Shannon has been tweeting with the tag "exvangelical" actually. 

Correction: Instagram, not Twitter. 

Edited July 18, 2019 by louisa05

[Alcyone]

2 minutes ago, louisa05 said:

@Alcyone Shannon has been tweeting with the tag "exvangelical" actually. 

Thank you, @louisa05!  I just saw that she also has recorded an album under the name Shannon Bonne. She has a beautiful voice!

[AmazonGrace]

On 3/25/2019 at 3:40 PM, Terrie said:

"Hard as Nails" sounds like a porn title.

Debbie Does Ministry

 

16 minutes ago, Alcyone said:

I've never forgotten that part either. I imagine that it has been very difficult to live with the intensity of sexual shaming this implies.

I found an interview that Josh and Shannon did to promote their book, "Not Even a Hint", and she said in the interview: "Back when I was younger, I wasn't thinking about any of those consequences. But then I met Josh. There was a time when we were actually sitting at a restaurant, and I’m having to pour out my past to him. It all of a sudden was very real and very tangible that my past did affect my future. There were consequences to the sin that I had committed previously." It seems to me that the consequences here are Josh being disappointed and hurt about her relationship with previous boyfriends. He says that it wasn't so much about her "sin against God" but about the guilt that follows. Mhm....only problem is that she didn't have guilt over having these normal young adult relationships until she was told that she should feel completely crappy about it and the stigma of her sexual past would never be erased. Ugh! 

 

The male can't deal with his jealousy so it must be the woman who is at fault.

[erunerune]

Gregg Harris commented with tear-face emoji ? on his son's insta separation announcement (it's totally ok that I find that super-weird, right?).  I'm not surprised the separation is happening, and I got the sense over time that a lot of Shanon's individual identity had been stifled being married to a personality like Josh.  He was my gateway fundie over 20 years ago so I'm clearly qualified to comment with authority ?

 

[louisa05]

9 minutes ago, erunerune said:

Gregg Harris commented with tear-face emoji ? on his son's insta separation announcement (it's totally ok that I find that super-weird, right?).  I'm not surprised the separation is happening, and I got the sense over time that a lot of Shanon's individual identity had been stifled being married to a personality like Josh.  He was my gateway fundie over 20 years ago so I'm clearly qualified to comment with authority ?

 

Her instagram makes multiple references to growing up fundamentalist and the harm that did. So it's not all on Josh. Not saying that his messed up ideas about marriage didn't hurt her as well, but he didn't introduce her to fundagelical shit. 

[erunerune]

My understanding was that Shannon had not been raised in a fundie home -- she came to the Harris brand of Christianity after college (this is outlined in one of the awful books I believe).  It was definitely NOT Josh who introduced her to it though, that is correct.

Edited July 18, 2019 by erunerune

[fundiefun]

I wonder how this will all play out for Shannon and if she will ever publicly share how her now ex husband's teachings are harmful. I wonder if she finally got tired of how their marriage/courtship was used in his book to promote harmful ideology and the fall out after thanks to social media and news. 

[Howl]

2 hours ago, louisa05 said:

@Alcyone Shannon has been tweeting with the tag "exvangelical" actually. 

Well, now we know.  

Also, at some point in the not too distant future, he'll announce his new partner.  I'll give 70-30% odds that the new partner will be male. 

Also, was there a specific reason they moved to Canada?  Getting Canadian citizenship is a fairly extreme step. 

Edited July 18, 2019 by Howl

[JermajestyDuggar]

1 minute ago, Howl said:

Well, now we know.  

Also, at some point in the not too distant future, he'll announce his new partner.  I'll give 70-30% odds that the new partner will be male. 

Oh I think he will remarry to a woman. And probably in the next couple of years. She will take much longer to remarry in my opinion. If at all.

[dripcurl]

1 minute ago, Howl said:

Well, now we know.  

Also, at some point in the not too distant future, he'll announce his new partner.  I'll give 70-30% odds that the new partner will be male. 

Interesting. I predict lesser odds for his partner to be male, but I definitely do not rule it out. I also can see Shannon going the other way too, given the circumstances (her newfound spirituality when she was young was directly tied into purity culture but even more tied into his legalistic bullshit) But I put money on the fact that they will have a gay kid. It’s a somewhat easy bet since a good number of Gen Z kids are not exclusively straight, but I just have a feeling there is a good chance they’d have a queer kid anyway.

[Antipatriarch]

3 minutes ago, Howl said:

Also, was there a specific reason they moved to Canada?  Getting Canadian citizenship is a fairly extreme step. 

Yes, Josh left his pastorate to go back to seminary. (The SGM network he was part of was filled with men who jumped into pastoring at a young age with no seminary training... part of the reason IMO for all the trouble they had.) So I'm not sure he had to become a Canadian citizen.

If he's going to stay in his current tribe, and graduate from seminary, and go back to pastoring, he's going to have to remarry (a woman). And his tribe not only doesn't put single men in the pulpit, they also frown on divorce. So this may crimp his plans, or he may have to choose another path.

[treehugger]

They aren't divorced yet, just separated.  

I've been reading through Shannon's posts.  Sounds like she is seeing the light and working her way out of fundamentalism. I wish nothing but the best for her, and their children. 

 Josh doesn't look like he is trying for ministry.  It looks like he has started some sort of story brand marketing company.  (Btw, does instagram randomly select people for someone to follow? Because after reading some comments on his last post, I looked at his list of followed pages, and Lordy! I'd die of embarrassment if people could see I was following some of those pages).  Also, no mention of religion on his instagram at all. 

[AmazonGrace]

4 hours ago, Antipatriarch said:

I'm not at all disagreeing with you, but I'm curious: did you see something specific in the last few years during his documentary/non-pology/etc. that hinted that his marriage was in trouble? I didn't see this coming.

I didn't follow this closely but I remember him saying that he thought he had all the answers when he was younger but now he realizes he didn't. Or words to that effect.  It kinda sorta sounded like his marriage might be on the rocks.

[MamaJunebug]

5 hours ago, Giraffe said:

Does this mean his documentary was only because he knew he’d be getting divorced?? It was a strange and disappointing not-an-apology and felt more like a pr stunt than anything genuine.

Wonder if his next documentary will be a real apology. Hopefully this acts as the catalyst for him to do a 180 this time. 

 

These type never apologize. And the 180’s are only half the movement: before you know it, they’re facing the exact same way as they started. 

[acheronbeach]

It's such a sad situation.  Shortly after he was married, I remember reading where he wrote about how he never expected to fall for a girl like Shannon with a past.  He really sounded like he was struggling to reconcile his love for his wife with the awful misogyny he'd been taught about "good versus bad" women.  I felt for him, but I felt far worse for Shannon.  She looked like such a vibrant young woman with a lot of talent.  

This situation has no winners.  There are three children that I'm sure are very hurt.  I truly hope that Josh has gained wisdom, compassion, and tolerance for others.  He seemed to struggle with the ability to put himself in others' shoes.  I blame that squarely on Gregg Harris - a "stage dad" who turned his sons into a brood of egotistical, trained-seal proselytizers.  

[MamaJunebug]

@Alcyone perceptively wrote,

“...It seems to me that the consequences here are Josh being disappointed and hurt about her relationship with previous boyfriends. He says that it wasn't so much about her "sin against God" but about the guilt that follows. Mhm....only problem is that she didn't have guilt over having these normal young adult relationships until she was told that she should feel completely crappy about it and the stigma of her sexual past would never be erased. Ugh! ...”

This resonated with me. My ex- and I both were unattractive and very awkward in our  youths, but  I had grown out of that phase we’ll before I met him. One of the many red flags I ignored was when he stated outright he wouldn’t marry any woman who wasn’t a virgin. I wasn’t thinking straight and I still met his qualifications (ugh!) so I shrugged it off as him being troglodytic. The rest of the miserable marriage reflected his inability to get past his own “disappointment and hurt” about any number of things that were none of his goddamned business. 

Oh, young women, pay attention, do!

We now return to talking about Harris and his filthy output.  Thank you for your patience with my PTSD. 

[purple_summer]

Most of the comments in my circle are....less than sympathetic. Not necessarily mean but no one feels bad for him. 

 

His is wife seems lovely.