Guest Post by ObstacleChick
Dear Evangelical Christian Sisters,
You were my classmates, my friends at church, my relatives. We came of age in the 1980s when MTV, Madonna, Michael Jackson, Magnum PI, and Shaker sweaters were all the rage. We permed our hair and used a TON of hairspray. Nancy Reagan’s “Just Say No” campaign against drugs was targeted at us, and we were terrified of HIV and AIDS. Boy George and David Bowie showed us a gender bender look, and within a decade our gay friends started coming out of the closet.
I left Evangelicalism, but you stayed. As Southern Baptist churches ramped up their complementarian teachings and the Moral Majority increased its efforts, you became more conservative in your political beliefs. You rallied behind the anti-abortion movement. You denounced feminism as destructive to the family. You were vocal in excoriating President Bill Clinton for lying about his affair with Monica Lewinsky (technically a sexual harassment situation as President Clinton was in a position of authority over Ms. Lewinsky). Many of you attended Christian colleges, got married, had kids. Some of you sent your kids to Christian schools not unlike the one we attended, teaching Fundamentalist Christian doctrine and creationism instead of science. Others of you chose to homeschool your children.
Most of you I have not seen in person since I moved a thousand miles away to start a new life in 1994. As social media took off and expanded, we have connected in a virtual way. Where I probably would never have heard about most of you or seen what you were doing, now I can see what your lives are like, what you do for fun, what you think is important enough to post on social media. Darn, you all look old. I guess I do too.
When you posted about marriage being between one man and one woman, I saw it. Every time you posted about the evils and horrors of abortion, I saw it. I saw when you voiced your support for Donald Trump and when you made fun of the Women’s March. Those of you who remained silent through the era of the 2016 election – I saw you too. I like to think that you were conflicted, but I do not know for sure. When news reports showed children being separated from their parents in detention centers, I saw your posts talking about border control and following the law. Every time you post some pithy meme about putting “God” or mandatory prayers or Ten Commandments posters or plaques saying “In God We Trust” in a school, prison, town hall, or any other public property, I saw that too and wondered how we sat through the same history and civics classes yet you completely misunderstood the Establishment Clause (but then, history was my favorite subject and I was the history state champion for Tennessee Association of Christian Schools, and yes, I admit to being a jerk).
Now I see you, sisters, posting your support for Brett Kavanaugh, a man who has been accused of sexual abuse. You say you stand with Brett Kavanaugh. You post articles saying it’s a con job by the Democratic party to support the “communist/Satanic/progressive sacred cow” of abortion. You call his accusers unreliable, you say they are unreliable, you ask where their witnesses are. I was especially sad to see you, my friend, posting in support of Kavanaugh, my friend who cried in anguish to us in high school when you revealed that your grandfather had raped you throughout your childhood – does sexual abuse only count if penetration occurs? Is that the line? Everything else is just . . . boys being boys? My heart breaks for you, and I can’t understand why you, of all people, don’t stand in solidarity with other women who were sexually abused as teenagers or young women. None of you waited until you heard Dr. Ford’s testimony to call her a liar, a pawn of the Democrats, someone intent on “taking down” a conservative candidate just because of politics. You automatically assumed Kavanaugh was not guilty rather than listening to evidence and letting the whole situation play out.
Is the issue of abortion so important to you ladies that you are willing to turn your back on women who may have been sexually abused? Do you want forced prayers and Christian religious symbols so badly in the public forum that you denigrate women who come forward saying that Mr. Kavanaugh sexually abused them? Some of your posts blame “the left” for telling us which women to believe – the Democrats and Democrats only. I’m not sure where you came up with that information. I can’t help but see the irony – the inconsistency – in your condemnation of President Bill Clinton two decades ago and your support of Brett Kavanaugh today.
Let me assure you, I do not care what your party affiliation is or whether you have one. If you tell me that some man shoved his “junk” in your face without your consent, I will support you. If you tell me someone pushed you down on a bed, covered your mouth, and tried to tear off your clothes, I will support you. If you tell me that a stranger grabbed your posterior in the subway, I will support you. If you tell me someone raped you, I will support you. You do not need to show me your voting record. You do not need to show me your social media posts supporting candidates or issues one way or another. I will support you. Why? Because it is the right thing to do. Because I value your right to ownership of your own body. Because I value your right to consent. Because I believe you should be heard, your story, all of it, regardless of who else was involved.
Do I believe you would do the same for me? I do not know. Maybe it depends on the situation and who was involved. And that makes me sad. It reaffirms my disgust with the religion that I walked away from so long ago.
OC
A great letter OC.
Well said, ObstacleChick.
I watched that Brett Kavanaugh shit on CNN all day yesterday. Ms. Ford was believable. Kavanaugh was not—and I especially did not like his angry, highly biased Donald Trump impersonation at the end of the day’s testimony yesterday. We have a particularly nasty septic tank here at the house, and I felt sure that he might feel at home in it.
I don’t know where you got that photograph of Trump and his women—-but I really do not want to know. The question that immediately comes to mind is what kind of woman in her right mind would love Trump so much. I think we can immediately dispense with the “right mind” part—because that just ain’t possible.
I grew up in the American South. Women like this live all over the American South. They grow up with their mommas telling them they need to go out and find themselves a large-bodied (6′ 3″ + and 200+ lbs) man—because every girl deserves a big old hunker of a man to fuck her good—protect her good—and when she gets tired of that—the man needs to have just a whole lot of money so she will never have to work, never have to worry about not having a roof over her head, have plenty of food for the servants to cook, and have access to buying all the toys she will ever want to buy. As one of them put it to me one time:
“I don’t want no scrawny little man. I want me a big old man like you.” Lord help us all!!!!!
Listen folks. I am going to say this like my mom (RIP) would say it:
“Charles. I’m so tired of ‘The Donald Trump Show’ that I can hardly live!!!”
It’s true. Never in all of my life have I wanted to see a daily TV show cancelled by the network as much as I do this one. If I have to watch another episode, I may have to start cutting myself with razor blades. I may have to nail my feet to the pavement in front of my house and pray to be run over by a freight truck.
My soul feels trampled over like a 1,000-year-old oriental rug. It’s hard to watch a Tennessee VOLS football game because the uniforms are the same color as that asshole’s head mat. I could go on for pages, and pages, and pages—but my mind, heart, and soul are just too lowly and worn out to do it. Trump has just drained me dry. I’m serious folks. I don’t know if I can take another daybreak knowing that Trump is waiting for me somewhere in it—waiting to jump out and assault my senses with some new inanity or tragedy.
Let me tell you one more—just in case you might not have noticed. Nexium, Prevacid, and generic Lansoprazole have disappeared almost completely from the drug store shelves and other retail shelves in my city, which has a population of about 30,000 people. The shelves at Wal-Mart have been empty for weeks now. and I think its disappearance is being kept quiet—and I suspect it is disappearing nationwide. Why? A few years ago, the People’s Republic of China instituted a new economic initiative to become—and this is a quote—“Prescription Drug Supplier to the World” by the year 2025. I read an article on it a few nights ago, and this Chinese national program is already deeply into achieving its goal. Its goal was to make itself the world’s chief supplier of finished prescription medications and the chief world supplier of the millions of tons of bulk finished chemicals that go directly into prescription capsules and pills—as well as in OTC medications.
I suspect that the bulk chemicals (like Lansoprazole itself) that goes into Nexium, Prevacid, and generic Lansoprazole capsules are no longer easily obtainable because China manufactures them—and they are now trapped up somehow in Trump’s stupid trade war with China. If so, that is really bad news for me because my GERD is so bad that nothing lower on the antacid spectrum even comes close to doing the job for me. I soon expect to be spitting up blood and holding my chest because of Trump.
I would like to ask you to do me a favor. If you go out shopping today, please check your local retail shelves for Prevacid, Nexium, and generic Lansoprazole. I would really like to know whether this huge RETAIL SHELF DISAPPEARING ACT that is going on in my city is going on in your city or town too. If it is, then we will know it is Trump’s stupid trade war, and we will also know that medications we all use are beginning to disappear—and no one in the Trump administration is telling the American people about it—-yet. Even my pharmacist did not know that this was happening until I told him. He was clueless.
Thanks folks—and beware—because if this is real—your heart medication may be next—and orange-headed asshole is going to spring the bad news on you when it is too late.
This hit me: “None of you waited until you heard Dr. Ford’s testimony to call her a liar, a pawn of the Democrats, someone intent on “taking down” a conservative candidate just because of politics. You automatically assumed Kavanaugh was not guilty rather than listening to evidence and letting the whole situation play out.”
You articulated what I was trying so hard to communicate. That is what bothered me. That. The automatic assumption that a woman was lying to derail a man’s career, to ruin his reputation, to be vindictive and spiteful.
Fuck that.
All of what you said, especially the next to last paragraph, is just damn brilliant. I wish it were broadcast on every media outlet across the United States.
These blond women sure look like the ladies at “Word of Faith Fellowship ” in Spindale
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/morning-mix/wp/2017/06/02/gay-man-says-church-members-beat-choked-him-for-hours-to-expel-homosexual-demons/?
noredirect=on&utm_term=.f422aebcc089https://www.ctvnews.ca/world/word-of-faith-fellowship-church-uses-power-and-lies-to-keep-grip-on-kids-ex-members-say-1.3675459
astonishing! your surprise at their hypocrisy. the only way the can tolerate their husbands foot on their neck is to act as if they like it, like people like kavanaugh or the orange ferret wearing treason weasel are normal and acceptable. other wise they would be forced to uprise, to rebell.
What about women who make false accusations of rape and ruin a man’s life? It happens, don’t think it doesn’t. Liberals and Dems do not want conservatives in offices. I have heard that there are women who have been contacted and asked to make accusations against Kavanaugh. Something bad may have happened to this woman, but I’m not convinced Kavanaugh is guilty. Libs will do whatever they can to promote their agenda, they through a colossal childish tantrum when Donald Trump won the election fair and square and have been doing their best to undermine him ever since.
Rare is the woman who makes false accusations of rape/sexual assault. Sure it happens, but not often, and not on a public stage such as the Kavanaugh hearing. What did Ford (or the other women) stand to gain from revealing what she did about Kavanaugh? Unless you are a conspiracy nut, there’s no rational explanation for their testimonies except a willingness to tell the truth and to keep an unqualified man off the Supreme Court.
I suspect you voted for Trump. By all means square what your Bible says with your vote for Trump. It can’t be done. I was every bit as Fundamentalist as you years ago. I would never have voted for such an immoral, vile man.
Trump’s actions are a threat to progress and the future of our democracy. My hope is that come November thoughtful voters will elect at least a Democratic majority in the House, putting a serious damper on Trump’s ability to further harm our country.
Actually I didn’t vote in the last presidential election. I get disillusioned with the whole political scene, but I would have voted for Trump had I voted and plan to at the next presidential election if I’m still alive. I’d say more and even recommend a few books to read but figure that would be pointless due to your “conspiracy nut” reference. My beliefs certainly wouldn’t have squared with voting for Clinton had I chosen to vote.
P.S. Where were these women all these years? A man gets nominated for a position and all of a sudden they start coming out of the woodwork. What they have to gain is keeping someone out of office that they don’t want there. And it’s usually a conservative. Hmmmm….ok, I’m going.
With regards to that cult in Spindale, I wonder why the Feds don’t raid that place, given all the abuses going on–even babies aren’t spared. Enough ex-members have come forward to describe long years in that cult. Reading about the survivor’s ordeal made me so flipping anger. And people always want to ask, “Where the hell was God while this was happening ? It still is.”