The heartlessness... you might cry - Lewis

[Oddeverything]

True. His full name is on his blog. If you Google his name, the facnet forum thread is one of the first things that comes up. No, no one can control who will Google or why. But, often, if you are writing a blog or telling a particular story in other ways online, people will Google your name to see if there is anything about you that either offers credibility or refutes you. I do. Maybe I am a cynic but if I'm going to take the time to form an opinion on what someone is saying I'm going to find out what I can about that person in the first place.

Lewis took reasonable measures on his blog not to name anyone. What more could he do? A few years ago he discussed the situation elsewhere and more information was used in those discussions. We all know nothing on the Internet ever really goes away. That doesn't mean he is doing wrong now. He is telling his story, from his perspective, and whatever that story is it is helpful to others. It highlights the really fucked up world that is patriarchy and extreme religious/biblical beliefs that hurt people.

Lewis, I hope this serves to help you heal and recover and do some good for others and all else you need and want to accomplish. Everyone deserves to cope in the way that works for them and if helping others is part of that process, more power to you.

I believe you but I just checked and on the front page, the contact page and other links and it was not immediately apparent to me where he lists his last name. And I don't think it is cynical to Google people when reading their blogs. In this case, without his last name it would have been hard to find anything and I felt a strange sense that my conscience would not rest well if I spent time reading up on the girl in question. He wanted her to remain anonymous at least in context of that blog and I found it easy enough to respect that.

But nah, Googling is something I engage in most of the time.

ETA: Ahh, okay, I see his Facebook link. This may be user bias on my part because I don't use Facebook and tend to mentally bleep over anything associated with it. My bad.

[LynnKaboom]

Not flaming you but age gaps are common. My mother is 17 years older than her husband. Age gaps happen.

Her chronological age versus her developmental age became clearer and clearer to Lewis as he dealt with her and her family. It was not until he became immersed in patriarchy and that family's bizarre manner of dealing with life that he started to understand how limited she was. But entering into it, he was not familiar with patriarchy and could not have known the impact on her psyche until well after he was in love with her. At that point, what was he to do? Abandon her in the interest of not seeming like he was influencing her in a "nefarious" manner? Had he done so I can only imagine how little you would think of him for not trying harder to save this young woman from a life wherein she would continue to have no life but the one the men said she could have.

What on earth leads you to think Lewis wanted to marry this young woman for nefarious reasons? You are comparing his courtship with her to a family accepting a known and convicted child molester for their daughter's husband. I don't even begin to understand your motives and making such an accusation veers into character assassination. Older people marry younger people and people become romantically involved with broken people before they understand the depth of the person's mental misery. Neither of those come close to being nefarious reasons.

Yeah, really, when you first meet people, it's not apparent what their state is. You can't know the extent of another person's dysfunction until you get involved deeply with them, and it doesn't necessarily have to be romantic. One of my best friends has a family, that is, quite bluntly, incredibly fucked up. I didn't know this until I went to stay with him for a few weeks. I knew his brother (who he lives with) didn't get along with their parents, but I had no idea as to how bad it was or what it was about until I stayed there. And holy shit, was it ever eye-opening. I did not break off my friendship with my friend, but now I have a greater understanding as to why he reacts to certain things in the way he does- it was the way he was raised.

[meda]

Oh please. So someone who's been hurt is supposed to just sit down, shut the fuck up and deal with it because the other person who had been hurt was considered to be part of a "less privileged" group? If someone stabs you in the back it's going to hurt whether you're male or female, and he has every right to be angry. I've read the story he's posted so far- he seems to be nothing but respectful of his ex and instead focusing his vitriol on her lunatic family.

It's stupid to try to make emotional pain into a hierarchy of privilege, and it really grates on me that people try to do so. I have survived some very traumatic experiences, but I've had people tell me that because the people who harmed me were female it wasn't as bad as it would have been if the people who harmed me were male. Oh really? I think it would have been just as painful either way.

I'm not trying to go off at you specifically, I've just seen this attitude a lot recently and it makes me feel rather ill, to be perfectly honest. Trying to categorize trauma in such a way is offensive and pointless.

I think you missed my point, which is probably easy to do since I was not particularly clear. I am not categorizing or minimizing his pain at all because he is male or older than his ex. In fact, and I am completely speculating here, but I would almost think his suffering would be greater in some ways because he was the more mature (chronologically and emotionally) person in the situation, and was able to see the train wreck in all of it's glory.

I was pointing out that as a an adult male in that particular subculture, he has more status and power than his ex. I don't think that is a particularly controversial opinion, particularly sense the obsessive dick worship of these people is what we seem to snark on. I think that power imbalance makes part's of Lewis's blog sound like he is shooting fish in a barrel, so to speak. I already said that Lewis's blog is a good thing, so I don't think it's trashing the guy to suggest that he look at his own privilege a bit. I am not trying to engage in the pain Olympics.

[LynnKaboom]

I think you missed my point, which is probably easy to do since I was not particularly clear. I am not categorizing or minimizing his pain at all because he is male or older than his ex. In fact, and I am completely speculating here, but I would almost think his suffering would be greater in some ways because he was the more mature (chronologically and emotionally) person in the situation, and was able to see the train wreck in all of it's glory.

I was pointing out that as a an adult male in that particular subculture, he has more status and power than his ex. I don't think that is a particularly controversial opinion, particularly sense the obsessive dick worship of these people is what we seem to snark on. I think that power imbalance makes part's of Lewis's blog sound like he is shooting fish in a barrel, so to speak. I already said that Lewis's blog is a good thing, so I don't think it's trashing the guy to suggest that he look at his own privilege a bit. I am not trying to engage in the pain Olympics.

I guess I'm not sure what you're trying to say? Because it really is coming across as though you're trying to categorize pain based on a concept of privilege. I don't think that's what you're going for, but that is how it is reading, but with the qualifiers you added it looks to me as though you're contradicting yourself. You're saying you don't think he didn't have to deal with the pain, but that he was still in less pain than his ex because he was male?

I don't know if that's what you're trying to say, but that's how it reads.

[meda]

I guess I'm not sure what you're trying to say? Because it really is coming across as though you're trying to categorize pain based on a concept of privilege. I don't think that's what you're going for, but that is how it is reading, but with the qualifiers you added it looks to me as though you're contradicting yourself. You're saying you don't think he didn't have to deal with the pain, but that he was still in less pain than his ex because he was male?

I don't know if that's what you're trying to say, but that's how it reads.

Where are you getting that I am quantifying his pain in any way? Some of his writing, (which is an deliberate action, NOT an emotional state) strikes me as a power play. A power he is able to use because of his gender. Were this a discussion about a man writing about a breakup in another context, I would not draw the same conclusions. However in this case, and in this subculture, there is a power imbalance. If you feel that that Lewis has no obligation to to be aware of that power and the consequences of wielding it when writing about the intimate details of his former relationship, that's fine. I think he should.

[LynnKaboom]

Where are you getting that I am quantifying his pain in any way? Some of his writing, (which is an deliberate action, NOT an emotional state) strikes me as a power play. A power he is able to use because of his gender. Were this a discussion about a man writing about a breakup in another context, I would not draw the same conclusions. However in this case, and in this subculture, there is a power imbalance. If you feel that that Lewis has no obligation to to be aware of that power and the consequences of wielding it when writing about the intimate details of his former relationship, that's fine. I think he should.

It's the fact that you keep bringing up the concept of privilege when we're talking about an expression of the mental and physical anguish this man suffered during his relationship with his ex. That's what gives me the impression that you're trying to quantify the pain. When it comes to emotions and responses to events, the privilege concept really holds no water- it doesn't matter where on the socio-political spectrum you fall, your emotions and reactions are your own. Trying to categorize them is pointless. Like I said before, it doesn't matter what your gender is, if someone stabs you in the back, it's going to hurt.

Also, the only power imbalance I see in this story is the imbalance between the ex's father, and the ex and Lewis. They are also no longer together, so technically, he has no reason to try to protect her. He does seem to be protecting her. So I guess we're going to have to agree to disagree.

[DamnPrecious]

Not flaming you but age gaps are common. My mother is 17 years older than her husband. Age gaps happen.

Her chronological age versus her developmental age became clearer and clearer to Lewis as he dealt with her and her family. It was not until he became immersed in patriarchy and that family's bizarre manner of dealing with life that he started to understand how limited she was. But entering into it, he was not familiar with patriarchy and could not have known the impact on her psyche until well after he was in love with her. At that point, what was he to do? Abandon her in the interest of not seeming like he was influencing her in a "nefarious" manner? Had he done so I can only imagine how little you would think of him for not trying harder to save this young woman from a life wherein she would continue to have no life but the one the men said she could have.

What on earth leads you to think Lewis wanted to marry this young woman for nefarious reasons? You are comparing his courtship with her to a family accepting a known and convicted child molester for their daughter's husband. I don't even begin to understand your motives and making such an accusation veers into character assassination. Older people marry younger people and people become romantically involved with broken people before they understand the depth of the person's mental misery. Neither of those come close to being nefarious reasons.

ETA: I wanted to double check but I can't find any of the threads about the girl who is engaged to the known pedophile because I think those were the ones that got deleted by Yuku. If that is not what you were referring to, I fully expect and deserve to be schooled, but that was the first nefarious thing that came to mind.

No, that was not what I was referring to. Meridith had blog. The man she would marry did not come patriarchy, but some how he found her blog. They court and marry, she shuts down her blog. Some people are worried that he may be a good person. You can find million threads on it.

Yes, age gaps are common and in the real world that's generally not a bad thing. I can't see what a 23 year fundie would have in common with a 23 year old non-fundie. The women are kept child-like.

Also it was't his job to rescue her, so if he cut loose and ran I wouldn't have held it against him.

[gardenvarietycitizen]

Though I was no sheltered fundie girl by any stretch of the imagination, mr. erunerune just happens to be 15 years older than me (I'm 35 now, I was 24 when we married so do the math).

I was married at 38 and my husband is 14 years older than me. I am not fundie or even Christian by any stretch of the imagination either but I was EXTREMELY nerdy, and with culture shock issues, and gender transgression issues, so I never had really dated anyone and just sort of consigned myself to the "out of bounds, surely" category until it happened. I can honestly say that my husband was the first person I kissed, but to me it's not something to brag about!

FWIW, we were just "dating" for around 10 years before marriage, anyway. We met at a political rally, became friends (and worked together on various political issues) in a circle of people, socialized in that circle, eventually we preferred each other in that circle, I found myself happy that he seemed to prefer me, but he made the first move. We were nerdily obsessed about the same stuff. And I was shocked and flattered at the same time. We were "an item" for years before we realized, it's permanent, for financial reasons it just makes sense to legally marry.

But at our age (upper twenties for me, on the young end) 14 years wasn't such a thing. It sounds shocking to realize, well, he graduated high school when I was in nursery, but... we didn't know each other then. Anyway our circle had a large range of age, from upper teens to 70+, socializing and working together (with a lot of homeschoolers!), and this was (is!) normal, and so having older friends wasn't unusual for me.

In 100% honesty the potential regret I have is the knowledge that I will likely be a widow, eventually. I don't like to think about it. But, there's no way in the world I can say that such fears would be a reason to not sign on for the happy life I have now in the meantime. They say 「会ã†ã¯åˆ¥ã‚Œã®å§‹ã‚ã€("to meet is the beginning of separation" basically) but... that's true for anyone.

But honestly at my age now it seems no one really cares so much.

[Lainey]

Okay, I just finished reading Part 15, and the story's still not finished. There's nothing after that. What do I read next?

[camdendayton]

Okay, I just finished reading Part 15, and the story's still not finished. There's nothing after that. What do I read next?

I'd been waiting for 15 for months :) :eusa-violin: :eusa-whistle:

[Lainey]

Oh...I was under the impression that all the installments were there. No? How does everyone else know what happened, then?

[MamaJunebug]

Oh...I was under the impression that all the installments were there. No? How does everyone else know what happened, then?

It's been a while since I read it, but Lewis has written of how the engagement was called off and that not long after that, she was courted by a guy the parents approved of.

He mentioned, in one of his two recent posts, that her wedding (or the first anniversary thereof, I CRS tonight) was an emotional blow to him.

When I became aware of his blog he'd only posted two or three times, and I was on the edge of my seat, hopoing it all turned out all right. I think several people begged for the denouement, and he acknolwedged that things didn't work out.

Everything I've just posted, I'm 99.44% sure, is at commandmentsofmen.com. Yeah, I'm seriously trying only to post something if I've got a link to it. ;)

[Lainey]

I was reading Commandments of men, but I can't find anything after post 15 in the "The Joke Was on Me" series. :?

So she's married now? That's not what it says on their website. I guess maybe they just haven't updated it in awhile.

[Lewis]

It's a mistake to think that I had ANY power in their culture. I had none, as far as the people in her world (daddy, grandpa, their friends) were concerned, and was repeatedly reminded of as much. In their world, until a wedding ceremony takes place, a guy like me is nothing more than a "boot". My ex and her sisters respected me from the outset, though, and this had never sat well with daddy dearest.

To read about this paradigm is one thing, but to experience it is another animal entirely.

[Lewis]

"My sympathy goes to her. The whole story reads as two dogs fighting over a bone."

Then you don't understand the story any better than the people in her world did. My battle wasn't for "her". My battle was for "us". My goal, throughout the entire thing, was to make this a me/her issue (which it should've been) rather than a me and the asshat issue. If this were all about some kind of power play, I'd have just beat the hell out of the weasel early on. HE's the one who wanted to play games with people's lives. Regardless of whatever you may think, I was genuinely trying to do the right thing by the people involved.

If I'd have known, when I first met her, all of the dysfunction, and all of the crap I'd have to go through, do you really think I'd have subjected myself to this? Yes, I could see that some things were a little different, but by the time the full picture came into focus, I'd already developed deep feelings for her. When you love someone, walking away is considerably less of an option - if an option at all. Also, you can't really control the age of a person you may fall in love with. It's not like I set out to find someone significantly younger than me. It's the last thing I expected, or even wanted, frankly.

The age difference was of no real consequence to her father. His only beef with me was that I wouldn't "submit to his authority" (tinged with a bit of personal jealousy). He admitted as much to a mutual acquaintance before he began inventing ways and manufacturing justifications to try to destroy me, personally and professionally. The next youngest sister married a man 14 or 15 years her senior a couple of years ago, and last I knew, the youngest sister, 18 at the time, had begun a relationship with a man in his 30s.

Yes, I still love my ex. That's not really something where you can just flip the switch to the "off" position. While I pity her, I don't have a lot of respect for her as a person these days - but then again, I know a lot of things that you don't regarding this.

I'm barely even to the halfway point in the telling of the story (if even there). It'd be foolish to draw lasting conclusions about the storyline of a book at its halfway point. If you've never been a part of the movement, or if you've never been brushed with it like I have, there are a TON of nuances that you may never understand about it and the way it consumes people, no matter how many fundie blogs you read or episodes of the Duggars you watch. This doesn't even address some SERIOUS issues within my ex's world that have nothing, whatsoever, to do with anything P/QF.

I don't know anything about Meredith, so no comment there.

[demgirl]

I'm not really one of the ones concerned about Meredith, but here's the difference:

Meredith/Stephen: Stephen searches internet. Stephen sees Meredith's blog. Stephen contacts Meredith. Stephen gets sent by Meredith to Dad. Stephen and Dad talk. Stephen spends a week with the family. Stephen and Meredith get engaged. Stephen and Meredith get married. Stephen spirits Meredith off to a foreign country.

Lewis/His Ex: Lewis and Ex (I will keep her name out of it, even though I'm of the opinion that I'm not even sure that's something Lewis has to do) meet in person. Lewis and ex develop bond in person. Lewis gets sent to talk to Dad -- thinks this is sorta wonky but goes along with it. Lewis and Ex develop close relationship through talking constantly and he goes out of his way to spend time with her and her family in person over a long period of time. Lewis encourages his Ex to think for herself, to make her own decisions, to question patriarchy and basically calls bullshit on some of the P/QF stuff that she's been brainwashed to believe.

Do you see what I mean? I don't know that I have any opinion on Stephen's contemplated nefariousness, but w/o his perspective for his actions, I can see why some wonder. Here, we have Lewis' perspective and it's a totally different story.