Do you ever get attached to the bloggers that you read?

[GenerationCedarchip]

There are some I definitely get attached to. I can see a spark of SOMETHING in them, and hope they can get off of the fundy-farm and find out for themselves who they are and what they really deep down believe. I'll admit I have a soft spot for the Botkinettes and for a few others.

[polabear]

I'm currently attached to a family that has a very sick little boy. It breaks my heart, and it seems like they really are trying to take care of the boy (who is soon to die) and the rest of their family at the same time. I've been considering sending the girls a gift (they did a tea party), but then I remember that as a feminist woman who is not very religious, they'd probably not want to have anything to do with me.

[jaelh]

I'm currently attached to a family that has a very sick little boy. It breaks my heart, and it seems like they really are trying to take care of the boy (who is soon to die) and the rest of their family at the same time. I've been considering sending the girls a gift (they did a tea party), but then I remember that as a feminist woman who is not very religious, they'd probably not want to have anything to do with me.

polarbear - i've got a couple of fundies who are in dire straights on my gift list. (And oh wow, some of them are in terrible situations). I figure that - as a (radical) feminist and liberal - what better way to show them that we're also loving, kind good people. I make no attempt to disguise who I am, and I've found receivers to be incredibly grateful and surprisingly open. If you do feel drawn to sending them something - do it. You have no idea how it might affect their perception of non-believers (or at least, sow some seeds for change); or what it might mean to them in a time of awful darkness.

[FriendlyFundie]

Polabear, if they are the same family I am thinking of whose son is in hospice now they would greatly appreciate your gift. I think that having such a sick little one has opened them up to see the good in quite a variety of people.

[Milly-Molly-Mandy]

Oh yes! I have even donated money to them...not much but $10 here and there for fundraisers they are having ie for adopting a child with special needs.

[QueenMother]

Other than the fundie family I am close to IRL, I don't become attached.

I used to and then I'd be awake at night upset with something they were doing now--something I didn't agree with and it would frustrate me that they could be so shallow and self absorbed.

I have learned to no longer care and set my boundaries with them.

[darkplumaged]

I've never been very attached to any fundie blogger. I'm still sorry that Anna of the now-defunct Maidens of Worth no longer blogs; I'd like to know what she's up to. I also was somewhat attached to Rebecca Loomis when she was a SAHD blogging for her family. But the bloggers I get attached to aren't fundies. They're generally people I can relate to and admire at the same time. I can't relate to fundies, nor is there enough about them to admire for me to feel any connection to them.

[Lily]

I admit I just love the Baker's Dozen family. I don't really classify them as fundie, if they are it's an extremely lite version, more just run of the mill conservative Christians. But they're wildly creative, genuinely seem to love their kids and have only their interests at heart, and the kids seem so full of life. We're in the same general area and from friend-of-a-friend relationships, I've heard they're as genuine as the blog suggests, which is always nice.

I also feel something of a mother's concern for a lot of the really young fundie girls, especially those who've gotten married off really young. I can't blame them for their positions up to a certain point - they're just products of their upbringing who have very little chance of breaking away from it. I hope they break away of course, but in the mean time, I hope things are... tolerable, for them.

[almi]

Long... LOOOOONG.... time lurker, first time poster :)

I would not this call being "attached" but I root for all fundy girls (esp on the lower ranks of the fundyland) to ESCAPE ESCAPE ESCAPE and live life without all the restrictions and hate. And by escaping they can really stick it to the "patriarchs" :mrgreen:

I have no pity, however, for anyone in the fundy royalty- they are the plague and will be the first against the wall when the time comes :violin:

[Constance Vigilance]

I miss Lara. When I started reading her she just wasn't that crazy, but her descent was :shock:. I still wonder about her and her kids.

[formergothardite]

Gah, you can't do that!

I know! I'm dying of curiosity now! Trying to guess. Is it Zsu Zsu, Vitafamilia, who is it?!

[simplysweet]

These people are my enemies. I like to know what they are up to.

Becoming attached to one of them is like saying you're attached to a yeast infection.IMHO

I agree. I found myself starting to get attached to Meredith and then she got engaged to Stephen and that killed off that love affair. Otherwise - I just want to know what they planning and keep a eye on their baby counts..........

[Austin]

Long... LOOOOONG.... time lurker, first time poster :)

I would not this call being "attached" but I root for all fundy girls (esp on the lower ranks of the fundyland) to ESCAPE ESCAPE ESCAPE and live life without all the restrictions and hate. And by escaping they can really stick it to the "patriarchs" :mrgreen:

I have no pity, however, for anyone in the fundy royalty- they are the plague and will be the first against the wall when the time comes :violin:

I root for the kids to escape, too.

[pomology]

Yes, but I won't tell you which one or you will all hate me.

Have you found Taryn's blog and are you trying to keep it all for yourself?!?!?!

[formergothardite]

I've got to admit that Taryn is a favorite of mine, just cause she is so crazy.

[ladypuglover]

Sometimes I do. I am a huge fan of the Duggar kids from Jana on down, but not of the other adults. Except for maybe Grandma Mary but even then I have to remember that she helped JimBoob become the man he is today.

I also have a love for the Mortons and Sanders family because on a lot of things they seem likeable. I too would love to go to their New Years party and have a night of pretend but I think the love/worship the South pre-civla War would drive me insane.

I felt really Close to Mama Ant during the Facebook drama of her daughter's labor and birth because of being a mother myself. She came across as a devoted, worried mother.

I really like one of our old posters who used to post on here. She has a blog called Tomato Soup Cake and I donated money to her for her children.

Thats all I can think of other than maybe the Bates. I like them a little as I really do care about those kids too.

Then when all these different families have gotten me lulled into a warm fuzzy feeling they will blog something stupid about pregnancy, love of pre-Cival War or such crap and I remember how scarey these folks really are.

[VodouDoll]

I used to really like Sarah Maxwell, until she wrote that post (since deleted) about how Catholics are all heretic members of a false religion and damned to hell. Since then, there are blogs that I enjoy following to see what happens to the family or what dumb thing their authors will write next, but there aren't any that I feel attached to as people.

[Boogalou]

Ok, I'm telling. Mainly because I hate when other people do things like that and I didn't actually realize I was doing it when I did it.

It's ZsuZsu. Yeah, I know. My name is Boogalou and I have I problem... but let me explain:

Everyday when I get on the internet I check facebook, Free Jinger, and two blogs, one of them ZsuZsu's. I think that when something is so part of your everyday life and you read so much about them it is hard to not get invested. I didn't really realize this until the thread about ZsuZsu being fat, old, ugly, and a non-makeup wearing Grandma. It made me mad and I tried (but failed) to resist posting on it (this wasn't just because it was about ZsuZsu, I had other problems). I should take a break from her blog but I can't do it.

Anyway, why I'm attached. It's not just that I read her a lot. I guess I see a bit of me in her. She was a young university student caught up with a pretty good looking guy who showed an interest in her and she got caught up in it all. I don't really know how to phrase this as I really don't think I would ever go along with all that crazy and hate but I could see myself getting caught up with a charming and charismatic guy if I wasn't careful or in a very good place. Also, she believes some pretty radical things way out of the mainstream that others think is utterly ridiculous. I do too, a bit (although completely in the other direction) and I am moving farther away everyday.

Finally, and I know MANY will disagree here, but I think she is a good mom in some ways. She puts a lot of effort into making her kids' birthdays special and fun, she puts a lot of effort into their nutrition, she makes those awesome advent calendars (just not this year), she tries to keep them in tough with their Hungarian heritage, she seems to put a lot of effort into their (skewed and biased education), etc. I know this is a very conditional love, ending as soon as they leave the faith, announce that their gay, or any number of things. I also know that that house is full of hate, misinformation, and fear mongering.

And that is why I am attached. Don't get me wrong, I know she is horribly mean and hateful and what's all kinds of people dead, to take away people's rights, to enact some sort of Christian theocracy and is completely anti-science. I know all this. It's just that somewhere, way deep down, I see a good person in her. She does try to follow the Bible in her own way (which most people do, I don't think you could find the "correct" interpretation). I don't know if the good person in her will ever get out but I hope so, but either way, I truly believe it's in there somewhere.

Sometimes, I think I have too much empathy. This is one of those times. Sorry. Please note, that I am not trying to defend her in any way. I know on a logical level her beliefs are absolutely terrible and on an emotional level they are quite repulsive, but on another emotional level, I got attached.

tl;dr: I read her everyday and somewhere in there I see a good person.

[PBrooke]

I felt really Close to Mama Ant during the Facebook drama of her daughter's labor and birth because of being a mother myself. She came across as a devoted, worried mother.

Yeah, I suppose I used to be attached to BB (hence why I was worried about her in the first place) and I'm glad everything seemingly turned out ok, but maaaan have they all been hitting the Kool-Aid extra-hard since then.

I think I was semi-attached to LL when I first stumbled across it - but that was before she adopted Mira, before the posts about disciplining, etc. Now I'm much more critical about looking past the jeans and window-dressing. Sometimes it's a sign of rebellion or open-mindedness, sometimes it's just... wearing jeans.

[fundies_like_zombies]

I kinda want to say STOP to some of the ones that are getting more fundie - books and opinions and all. Not sure they realise what they are getting in to. Sort of like when they mention vf and go on about the nice stories but not all the bad patriarchy behind it.

[JesusFightClub]

No, I don't in the slightest. It's sentimentality (no offence intended, but there is no better word).

"She seems like a nice person". Yeah and she hates you and everything you stand for.

I applaud kind, caring FJists. I'm just of the "come the revolution" school. These people would have absolutely no issue with making you feminist, gay, nonChristian, prochoice, nonfundie (pick any or all of the above) types go away. Looking for stuff like cute baby posts and feeling sorry for grown women who haven't left Fundieville even though they've had above 13 years to do it in, what's the point?

[Soldier of the One]

No, I don't in the slightest. It's sentimentality (no offence intended, but there is no better word).

"She seems like a nice person". Yeah and she hates you and everything you stand for.

I applaud kind, caring FJists. I'm just of the "come the revolution" school. These people would have absolutely no issue with making you feminist, gay, nonChristian, prochoice, nonfundie (pick any or all of the above) types go away. Looking for stuff like cute baby posts and feeling sorry for grown women who haven't left Fundieville even though they've had above 13 years to do it in, what's the point?

I respectfully disagree, JFC. I think that for many fundamentalists it's easy to engage in the rhetoric while we are still living in a liberal democracy. I suspect a fair share of them would be unpleasantly surprised to find life under Dominion not all that... pleasant. Not that this means that we should underestimate any theocratic agenda, but I am inclined to think that your average fundamentalist is probably more bark than bite.

[Jezebel]

I can't get attached to any of them. I remember when Rebecca Serven Loomis was a favorite around here, and I remember thinking, "Yeah, she's sweet and pretty and had to wait so long to marry the man she loved--and she's also enmeshed in a patriarchal, Calvinist belief system that is completely fucking toxic, and if she had her way we would all be living under it." I never wished her ill (and I don't for any of the other bloggers, either), but no way was I going to turn a blind eye to her belief system.

I enjoy occasional posts by some of these bloggers. I can recognize an individual blogger as a warm, caring person who is happy with her life, who adores her kids, or who has a creative talent, and I can appreciate that in her and feel happy for the joy she gets from that. But getting attached? No. Not when they hold beliefs they do.

[Terrie]

I have fundie relatives, who are perfectly nice people, but who have beliefs that HORRIFY me. But "nice" is neither a moral value nor a character trait, so it's not really surprising. As much as I dislike them, there's something honest about the PP and Zsuzsu.

[bea]

Yes. I have a lot of sympathy for Natalie Nyquist-Klein-Ference-Nyquist; she was taught the "rules," she followed them, and her life ended up.....kind of a spectacular mess. The fact that she's reinvented herself as a single Orthodox mom is a little troubling to me, but I think that anyone would want to start over, and God knows the whole evangelical fundie thing blew up in her face. She's at Loyola now, studying to be a paralegal and has book proposals out (she's on Twitter under a different last name entirely). I wish her well, and I hope she gets the mental health care that she's clearly been denied for waaaaaay too long.

I think she's officially divorced from conman James. He's in arrears for $4500 in child support - I wonder how much he owes to all the women he's had kids with? And I wonder if he's on the hunt for victim...ahem, wife, number five?