Where in the World is Doug Phillips (Who is a Tool)? Part 11

[JermajestyDuggar]

On 11/15/2019 at 4:00 PM, Jasmar said:

I know this is a little silly, but I know how Beall pronounces her name, but I stubbornly cling to Beel when I read about her. I was recently visiting one of the universities my son is interested in, and they has a Beall Hall in the music department. They pronounce it Bell, as well. Not that that changes anything in my mind ?

What? You don’t pronounce it like Be All in your head? I sure do!

[FundieGhostWriter]

18 hours ago, CyborgKin said:

cosmology) was when partway through the speaker said, "Now I'll summarise, in more detail

John Hartnett?

On 11/16/2019 at 7:00 AM, Jasmar said:

I stubbornly cling to Beel when I read about her.

Would Baal be an acceptable compromise?

[hoipolloi]

2 hours ago, AnnaSofia said:

If VF were still going strong, I really don't think we'd see the Phillips offspring attending RBC.

Agree. We'd probably see something along the lines of Scott Brown's family, where his uneducated son & son-in-law, Taylor Tsantles, have jobs primarily due to Scott's various business activities.

In the case of the Phillips family, the male children would be learning how to grift employed at VF & related "companies."

3 hours ago, AnnaSofia said:

Doug's other projects didn't get off the ground

Considering those projects include all of the filming & dancing with the nouveau burlesque crowd, one wonders what Beall thought of its potential for producing a living. She absolutely blamed Lourdes Torres for what happened, based on a now-deleted blog post. At least then (Dec 2017), as far as Beall was concerned, Dougie was as pure as the new-driven snow.

It is almost irresistible not to think of her as Be-All. 

[CyborgKin]

59 minutes ago, FundieGhostWriter said:

John Hartnett?

I'm 80% sure it was him.  That would have been the first time I saw/heard him.  It was probably a talk about how there's quasars and such which seem to be physically connected but have very different redshift values.

[FundieGhostWriter]

23 hours ago, CyborgKin said:

one camp was back in the AiG days before the split, so Ken Ham was there.  My only impression was that he looked extremely busy.

I can imagine. When Ken 'does his thing' in a neutral venue, I think anyone would be impressed by his composure. People flood him, full of strong opinions, and he conducts himself well. Few could politely 'hold court' under that sort of scorn. It's doubtless one of the secrets of his success.

JohnH could indeed summarize in more detail. (It was perhaps more 'revealing slip' than 'goof'.)

7 hours ago, AnnaSofia said:

the full reality of "this isn't just a bump in the road, this is a long-term lifestyle change" didn't hit home until much more recently.

Yes indeed.

4 hours ago, hoipolloi said:

We'd probably see something along the lines of Scott Brown's family, where his uneducated son & son-in-law, Taylor Tsantles, have jobs primarily due to Scott's various business activities.

This is just going to keep getting harder for the arrows. The sons of the patriarchs have of course arrived too late in the pyramid scheme.

On 11/16/2019 at 5:57 AM, dripcurl said:

The fact that Jubilee is going to college

It might also be because she is a Phillips, and hence very very special. I agree with @AnnaSofia's view on the plan in the parallel world where Doug's fall didn't occur. But I'd make the point that the girls were young, and the fact that JT was still following the script proves little. The boy wonder had already written, years earlier, a study guide to the history of western civilization and Christianity(!), so he wasn't barred from college - he scorned it!

Doug is a hypocritical weakling. Everything about VF screams just how scared of the ladies our little man has always been. If he had been confronted by a fuming, hormonal, fed-up Jubilee demanding college, he would have buckled (Beall might not have, so I think @AnnaSofia is on the right track that this might have been presented to her as a fait accompli). Doug's press release would have included the names of Deborah, Huldah, or other Biblical heroines, in making his one-off justification. Remember that Jubilee is when debts are cancelled, slaves freed - the normal rules get shaky - so there'd be a corny joke about how appropriately his daughter is named, the one female worthy in the sight of her heavenlyearthly father. He could reverse engineer her name as an example of providence (see why I'm a @FundieGhostWriter - I can write the scripts for them!). Unlike Geoff or Scottie, I don't think Doug had enough belief in his own BS to jeopardize his relationship with one of the girls by digging his heels in if push came to shove. He was always smirking and chuckling to himself behind his false-prophet's-false-beard. Quite possibly in that 'other world' the girls would have stayed obedient - but I can't see Doug casting out a daughter for the sake of ideology if one of the girls proved 'unstoppable'. He would have made an excuse, and then resumed business as usual, over the objections of the likes of Bradrick! Remember, those guys only stood up to Doug once his pants were around his ankles*. Anything less than that he could have ridden out. That is how cults work. The leader gets to set the rules, and bend them where needed to his own whims. I think Doug would enjoy the feeling of dispensing a unique exemption from SAHD to his own spawn. It would just enhance the sense of being in perfect control.

*read that any way you like

[Flyinthesoup]

8 hours ago, FundieGhostWriter said:

I can imagine. When Ken 'does his thing' in a neutral venue, I think anyone would be impressed by his composure. People flood him, full of strong opinions, and he conducts himself well. Few could politely 'hold court' under that sort of scorn. It's doubtless one of the secrets of his success.

JohnH could indeed summarize in more detail. (It was perhaps more 'revealing slip' than 'goof'.)

Yes indeed.

This is just going to keep getting harder for the arrows. The sons of the patriarchs have of course arrived too late in the pyramid scheme.

It might also be because she is a Phillips, and hence very very special. I agree with @AnnaSofia's view on the plan in the parallel world where Doug's fall didn't occur. But I'd make the point that the girls were young, and the fact that JT was still following the script proves little. The boy wonder had already written, years earlier, a study guide to the history of western civilization and Christianity(!), so he wasn't barred from college - he scorned it!

Doug is a hypocritical weakling. Everything about VF screams just how scared of the ladies our little man has always been. If he had been confronted by a fuming, hormonal, fed-up Jubilee demanding college, he would have buckled (Beall might not have, so I think @AnnaSofia is on the right track that this might have been presented to her as a fait accompli). Doug's press release would have included the names of Deborah, Huldah, or other Biblical heroines, in making his one-off justification. Remember that Jubilee is when debts are cancelled, slaves freed - the normal rules get shaky - so there'd be a corny joke about how appropriately his daughter is named, the one female worthy in the sight of her heavenlyearthly father. He could reverse engineer her name as an example of providence (see why I'm a @FundieGhostWriter - I can write the scripts for them!). Unlike Geoff or Scottie, I don't think Doug had enough belief in his own BS to jeopardize his relationship with one of the girls by digging his heels in if push came to shove. He was always smirking and chuckling to himself behind his false-prophet's-false-beard. Quite possibly in that 'other world' the girls would have stayed obedient - but I can't see Doug casting out a daughter for the sake of ideology if one of the girls proved 'unstoppable'. He would have made an excuse, and then resumed business as usual, over the objections of the likes of Bradrick! Remember, those guys only stood up to Doug once his pants were around his ankles*. Anything less than that he could have ridden out. That is how cults work. The leader gets to set the rules, and bend them where needed to his own whims. I think Doug would enjoy the feeling of dispensing a unique exemption from SAHD to his own spawn. It would just enhance the sense of being in perfect control.

*read that any way you like

I appreciate your perspective, thank you for sharing!   

[MamaJunebug]

On 11/15/2019 at 3:00 PM, Jasmar said:

I know this is a little silly, but I know how Beall pronounces her name, but I stubbornly cling to Beel when I read about her. I was recently visiting one of the universities my son is interested in, and they has a Beall Hall in the music department. They pronounce it Bell, as well. Not that that changes anything in my mind ?

She will always snd only be “Be-all” to me. If ever I meet her in person, I’m in trouble. ?

[AnnaSofia]

17 hours ago, hoipolloi said:

Considering those projects include all of the filming & dancing with the nouveau burlesque crowd, one wonders what Beall thought of its potential for producing a living. She absolutely blamed Lourdes Torres for what happened, based on a now-deleted blog post. At least then (Dec 2017), as far as Beall was concerned, Dougie was as pure as the new-driven snow.

 

I remember that post, and while I totally agree that Beall (and probably lot of the former VF sycophants) put the fault on Lourdes and probably regard her as a hussy who knowingly "tempted" a poor, weak, married man before filing an opportunistic lawsuit, I suspect Beall still finds plenty of blame (and possibly a hideous leopard print shoe or two) to throw at Doug in private. I don't know how much of it she can admit even to herself without facing some ugly truths about both the man she married, and her own part in building the cult that allowed him the access he needed to groom victims in the first place, but there's no way she's let him entirely off the hook for their current situation. She seethes with so much pent-up resentment she practically vibrates.

Despite all the #happilymarried hashtags, I still think Beall and Doug were just flat out living apart for awhile (possibly still are), even after he came back from his European jaunt. Operation Meatball was registered as a non-profit (presumably by DPIART Esq.) in December of 2017, using an address at the San Antonio apartment complex where Beall and the kids live now, though they were clearly in Durango at the time. There was some speculation here that it was Liberty's apartment, but social media posts place her in Colorado with Beall and the gang. If anyone was living at the SA apartment, I think it was Doug alone (or at least, not with his family). That also might explain the multiple posts Beall made at the time about how she was decorating her rentals with thrift store finds because most of their furnishings were back in Texas. Yet the couple of times that Doug was obviously in the Durango area (for photography jobs) Beall was conspicuously back in San Antonio. I suspect this is all because the two of them are at the point where they can hardly stand to be around each other, but for whatever reason won't formally announce a separation, possibility in keeping with @DomWackTroll's theory that Peggy is helping them out financially. I think that if they are living together now it's only because they couldn't swing two rents. I'm not entirely convinced of it, though. There was some evidence that Doug was there (at least for awhile) during the month or so Beall was in Scotland last year with JT and Delaney, but absolutely none since then.

13 hours ago, FundieGhostWriter said:

 

Doug is a hypocritical weakling. Everything about VF screams just how scared of the ladies our little man has always been. If he had been confronted by a fuming, hormonal, fed-up Jubilee demanding college, he would have buckled 

It's funny, I can easily picture Liberty and Faith in a hypothetical world where Vision Forum never folded. Liberty would be writing bland accounts of WWII vets for VF to publish (ala Kelly Brown's book about her grandfather), Faith would be singing and making costumes much as she is now. Liberty probably wouldn't be traveling to veterans reunions on her own, and Faith's creations would be more modest, but for the most part, their interests fit in the VF mold. With Jubilee, I have no idea. I'm still not sure if she's seriously motivated by the idea of a college education (I sort of hope not, for her sake, given RBC's unaccredited status), or if enrolling  was simply the easiest and most acceptable way out of the chaos of living in the San Antonio apartment with 6 or 7 other people, including the fallout of whatever is left of her parents marriage.

[hoipolloi]

24 minutes ago, AnnaSofia said:

I suspect this is all because the two of them are at the point where they can hardly stand to be around each other, but for whatever reason won't formally announce a separation, possibility in keeping with @DomWackTroll's theory that Peggy is helping them out financially. I think that if they are living together now it's only because they couldn't swing two rents.

Yes, I think @DomWackTroll may be on to something there. 

It's hard to believe that Beall earns enough from her elder companion/home care jobs to support herself + 5-6 kids. If Doug is actually earning money legally these days, his means of employment are completely on the down low. Also, despite my longstanding belief that Doug (and Beall) absconded with a fair amount of money + salable items after the demise of VFM/VFI, whatever they had seems to have run out in the last couple of years. Finally, according to its IRS filings, Operation Meatball is not bringing in more than $50K a year. Even if they hit that benchmark *and* Beall + kids are living on the proceeds, that's still not a lot of money for a family that size.

[JermajestyDuggar]

18 minutes ago, hoipolloi said:

Yes, I think @DomWackTroll may be on to something there. 

It's hard to believe that Beall earns enough from her elder companion/home care jobs to support herself + 5-6 kids. If Doug is actually earning money legally these days, his means of employment are completely on the down low. Also, despite my longstanding belief that Doug (and Beall) absconded with a fair amount of money + salable items after the demise of VFM/VFI, whatever they had seems to have run out in the last couple of years. Finally, according to its IRS filings, Operation Meatball is not bringing in more than $50K a year. Even if they hit that benchmark *and* Beall + kids are living on the proceeds, that's still not a lot of money for a family that size.

I imagine all the 18+ kids at home have some sort of job to support some of their neeeds. So she only has 3 to fully support, right?

[AnnaSofia]

I do think the three older kids are probably all working at this point. That only leaves Providence and Virginia, and Prov is getting close to the age Faith was when she began working part time, so he could be soon as well.

I tend to doubt that Operation Meatball is bringing in much money. I think that's why Jubilee and Faith got jobs back in Durango, and began to feature less and less in the OM posts of that era, which were suddenly all Liberty (or Liberty and Beall for some of the road trips). Lately, Liberty's engagement level with Operation Meatball has been way down as well. There have been a few signs of life here and there (the Ebook, or an IG post once a month or so), but I have a strong suspicion that, like her sisters before her, she's working an actual job now and has less time to devote to OM. She didn't run the MCM this year, either.

Faith is working as a waitress, and also does repair work for Ellen Vernier and Jessica Courter's vintage clothing business. Plus heavy plasma donations . She's mentioned things like having a food budget and posted IG stories of Trader Joe's runs, so I assume she either buys her own groceries, or has a set amount she contributes to the household, though I'm not sure if she flat out pays rent.

Honor is 18, and I've wondered if he might be working at Sea World San Antonio, since the family suddenly began spending a lot of time there last year. Out of all the kids, he seemed the most likely to be employed there at the time. If not, I'm guessing he has another job. We also saw him doing some work on a old house clean-up. Could have been a one-off thing, or he could be working for a contractor.

[Marian the Librarian]

Be-All and several of the Phillips children attended the Esther Courter/John-Luke Solid wedding in Florida last weekend. It takes a bit of detective work, but you can see Be-All (yes, that's how I'll always think of her), JT, Virginia, and Honor?Providence? (I get them confused) in a couple of audience shots. So, travel to Florida is within their means, this was their second trip there as wedding guests this year. No photo evidence of DPIAT, at least none that I see.

evangelinereneeblog.com

[AnnaSofia]

I see both Honor and Providence in there with JT (Honor is farthest to the right in that top photo).

Is John-Luke Solid related to Madisson Solid? She volunteers with the same veterans charity (Best Defense Foundation) that Liberty Phillips does.

[Marian the Librarian]

3 minutes ago, AnnaSofia said:

I see both Honor and Providence in there with JT (Honor is farthest to the right in that top photo).

Is John-Luke Solid related to Madisson Solid? She volunteers with the same veterans charity (Best Defense Foundation) that Liberty Phillips does.

Yes, they're siblings.

I spotted Be-all b/c of her white hair. She's wearing bright pink/fuchsia. Virginia is in a couple of other pics, posed with friends.

[JermajestyDuggar]

Man that wedding was gorgeous. 

[AnnaSofia]

19 minutes ago, Marian the Librarian said:

Yes, they're siblings.

I spotted Be-all b/c of her white hair. She's wearing bright pink/fuchsia. Virginia is in a couple of other pics, posed with friends.

Could that be Liberty in the blue dress, in front of JT and next to Beall?

I'm surprised I don't see any sign of Faith. She's close to the Courters.

Edit: Yeah, definitely Beall in this shot, with Providence behind her.

Edited November 18, 2019 by AnnaSofia
Edit: Photo

[FundieGhostWriter]

5 hours ago, AnnaSofia said:

if they are living together now it's only because they couldn't swing two rents.

If anyone visits, please check the sofa for the imprint of a very small man.

10 hours ago, MamaJunebug said:

“Be-all” to me. If ever I meet her in person, I’m in trouble.

That's why I tend not to use the FJ nicknames. Though now that I've thought of it, Dog and Baal is almost irresistible.

Quote

who knew distracting a marine into giving you more than the alloted [sic] shirt quantity was so EASY

proudly wearing eye-traps?

5 hours ago, AnnaSofia said:

I'm still not sure if she's seriously motivated by the idea of a college education

Neither am I. In that other world all the girls may have been as obedient as Botkins. My thoughts are about Doug more than them. I've met plenty of prominent conservative Christians, and Doug is unique among them. Doug would casually throw out lines of fundie bigotry, and to my objections would smirk and shrug as though to say 'who cares'. With anyone else I'd expect a brief quarrel, ending with 'agree to disagree'. Doug either really needs to be liked, or didn't believe his own teachings. I thought both. My hunch (and I know that people from Beall's early life 'blame' Doug - and of course I know about his dad) was that Beall brought the fundie, Doug the charlatanry. Put them together and you've got VF. In a world where Doug married someone else, he might have been just as happy ripping folks off in another walk of life. Post 2013, the trajectories of the two of them have seemed to confirm that.

I just checked JT's goodreads page for the date of his magnum opus - 2010! He was born ’93 (or was it ’92?) - so, seventeen years old. What a marvel! Anyone want to offer a review? Liberty, you'll be pleased to know, gave it 5 stars (poor Justice must have forgotten to post his review...). You'll not be so pleased to know that, despite JT presently reading Ricœur and Dostoyevsky, his fave author is - drum roll, please

R C Sproul Jr (just ahead of C S Lewis and G A Henty). The creator of Narnia would be ever so flattered! And his buddy links include Doug Wilson (if anyone's interested, @Columbia and I have just looked at him in the 'is there a new VF' thread), so you can take the boy out of the cult, but you can't take the cult out of the boy. Grow up JT. You're at a real University. Act like it. Surely your Mrs doesn't demand you put daddy on the list? And if you still really like that sort of stuff, how on earth does daddy rate above grandaddy? Maybe RC Sr's not around to suck up to anymore? Stop being pathetic. Scrub your online profile of your embarrassing past, get a good degree, and then do something respectable with your life. (I'll be your cheerleader if I see that happening. I imagine FJ will momentarily celebrate you, and then leave you alone.)

And for a gender obsessed couple, didn't they ever come up with some gender opaque names. Justice, Liberty, Jubilee, Honor, Providence... Even after all these years I still sometimes have to do a quick mental - oh, is that boy 3 or girl 3?

8 minutes ago, AnnaSofia said:

I'm surprised I don't see any sign of Faith.

No, just grifting and hypocrisy. (Couldn't help myself.)

[Jasmar]

Quote

You'll not be so pleased to know that, despite JT presently reading Ricœur and Dostoyevsky, his fave author is - drum roll, please

R C Sproul Jr 

Does that mean he spanks Delaney?

[AnnaSofia]

Couple of pics from JT's Instagram stories:

With Justice, Delaney, & Erin Claire Sproul (Delaney's sister)

With Sam Turley

 

[Howl]

14 hours ago, JermajestyDuggar said:

Man that wedding was gorgeous. 

I agree.  Beautiful in every way.  The wedding photographer is really talented and the bride's dress was GORGEOUS! 

Which reminds me.  Doug made some forays into the wedding photographer realm, but apparently didn't follow through or wasn't talented enough or sufficiently personable (!) to attract clients.  That said, a wedding is about the bride and groom and family and friends, not about Doug so...

Edited November 18, 2019 by Howl

[VVV]

56 minutes ago, Howl said:

I agree.  Beautiful in every way.  The wedding photographer is really talented and the bride's dress was GORGEOUS! 

Which reminds me.  Doug made some forays into the wedding photographer realm, but apparently didn't follow through or wasn't talented enough or sufficiently personable (!) to attract clients.  That said, a wedding is about the bride and groom and family and friends, not about Doug so...

Wedding photography is incredibly stressful and requires a lot of work and attention to detail along with being able to get along with all sorts of personalities under difficult circumstances. It isn't free money, regardless of what MWACs (Moms with a camera) or other people who dip their toe in the water may think. I can't imagine that Doug has anything like the work ethic or the personality necessary to succeed in that field.

I've provided the music to hundreds of weddings. It's stressful. I don't enjoy it, even though it is lucrative. I could be happy never playing for another wedding again in my life. And I would still 100X more rather be the wedding musician than the wedding photographer.

[Hane]

@VVV, my sister has done countless weddings, and agrees. Most of them have been in Catholic churches, or other churches with strict guidelines, which makes things a *little* less tense. 
One couple had a guitar-playing relative added on at the last minute, without attending the rehearsal, and he strode up in front of the altar mid-Mass, and from what I heard, the priest damn near had a stroke.

Re wedding photography: At every Methodist wedding I’ve ever attended, the minister gets up before the ceremony and announces that there will be *ABSOLUTELY NO* photography during the wedding, and that the ceremony will be re-enacted after it’s over so pics can be taken. I think that’s brilliant: at one Catholic wedding, so many of the groom’s relatives, who didn’t seem to be familiar with American customs, kept rushing the altar in a disruptive way for close shots that the priest had to stop the ceremony and order them to sit the eff down. (I was surprised, as the groom’s father was the deacon of the parish.)

[CyborgKin]

@FundieGhostWriter speaking of John Hartnett I remembered just now that he has a daughter, Katharine, so I looked her up and found her instagram: https://www.instagram.com/glowingliving/ (well actually it's one of two she has).

[JermajestyDuggar]

The family resemblances are strong in that pic of the Phillips and Sproul siblings. Delaney and Erin look alike while Jtits looks just like his father and Justice looks just like his mother. While somehow still looking like each other.

[Jigsaw3]

That's a gorgeous wedding and a very skilled photographer.

JT and Delaney: does this mean that they're back in the US? I wouldn't expect them both to fly back from the UK for a wedding in November otherwise, but I could be wrong. Does anyone know what he's up to now: doing further study, or looking for work, or what? The St. Andrews MLitt is a year, so he would have been done at the end of this past summer (August/September.)