Warning! Slightly risqué language ahead. You have been warned.
Another day, and yet another Evangelical explaining the importance of women covering up their bodies lest they cause men to “sin.” Today’s member of the clothing police is Kara Barnette, wife of Tim, pastor of Heritage Hills Baptist Church in Conyers, Georgia. In a post titled Modesty Matters (no longer available), Barnette had this to say about modesty and the dangers of women spreading their “sin” to men:
It’s that beautiful yet dreadful time of year when summer clothes come-out. And it seems that every summer shorts get shorter, necklines plunge lower, styles get tighter, and fabrics are so thin that one could read a newspaper through them. Yet issues over modest clothing aren’t just significant to the Amish and crotchety old people who complain about “those ‘dang teenagers.”
When a glutton eats too much, no one else gets fat. And when a thief steals from a convenience store, only the thief goes to jail. But when a young lady dresses inappropriately, the effects of her sin are expansive.
Her sin spreads.
As she strolls down the beach in her immodest bathing suit or worships on a Sunday wearing a revealing dress, everyone who sees her is handed temptation. The men and boys around her must battle the sin of lust, while the women and girls around her must battle the sins of bitterness and jealousy and the temptation to show-off their bodies, too. Everyone is distracted by the young lady’s clothing and everyone struggles to think pure thoughts.
Sadly, today there is often little difference in the immodest clothing choices between girls who’ve never heard the name of Christ and those who come from Christian homes. Satan is winning the war of indiscrete clothing, and these are the weapons he’s using on parents:
….
My daughter must dress in short/tight athletic-wear to play her sport. Newton’s Lesser-Known Fourth Law of Motion: A volley ball will travel at the same velocity and direction whether it’s served by a player dressed appropriately or by a player dressed inappropriately. (The law likewise holds true for golf, tennis, and soccer balls, as well as for the dynamics of jogging, cheerleading, and dance…) Joking aside, if a team uniform doesn’t meet God’s standards and an alternative is not allowed, then God doesn’t want my daughter playing that sport or participating in that activity. Her personal testimony is worth even more than an athletic scholarship to college.
I can’t find modest clothing for my daughter. Principals often hear this complaint from moms about school dress codes, and youth pastors similarly struggle to enforce clothing standards for youth groups and camps. God has plenty to say about ladies dressing modestly (1 Timothy 2:9, 1 Timothy 2:8-10, 2 Peter 3:1-4), and He doesn’t give commands that our daughters cannot follow. Shop a different store. Order on-line. Buy a sewing machine and make clothes yourself. Or have your daughter wear the same modest clothing over and over if that’s all she has. Parents must go to whatever lengths necessary to help our daughters protect their purity.
My daughter will hate me if I make her dress conservatively. Following the Lord’s commands should not be a chore, but a joy! Teaching a daughter to present her body as… ‘a living and holy sacrifice, acceptable to the God, which is her spiritual service of worship’ (Romans 12:1) ought not be a knock-down fight in the dressing room at the mall; it should be a pleasant experience as she learns to embrace colors, fabrics, and styles that please God and accentuate her beauty. All rules given by the Lord are for our good and His glory, so helping girls learn to dress modestly can be a fun and creative challenge.
Modesty isn’t an important Scriptural issue. Tell that to the wife humiliated by her husband’s pornography addiction. To the congregation who lost their pastor because he had an affair. To the teenager who has to inform her parents she’s pregnant.
….
My daughter needs to show some skin if she’s going to get a guy. Allow your daughter to dress provocatively so she can catch the attention of boys, and you’ll get your wish. But it won’t end well for her.
While you would never throw chum into the ocean water where your little girl was swimming, you’re doing something far more dangerous when you allow her to capture boys with her body. It’s a deadly proposition.
Just ask Bathsheba.
2 Samuel 11:2 simply states… and from the roof he saw a woman bathing; and the woman was very beautiful in appearance. David’s sinful lust of Bathsheba was provoked because of her revealing appearance. David didn’t fall for Bathsheba because she was a great conversationalist, or because he felt an emotional connection to her, or because she could cook a delicious rack of lamb.
He fell for her skin.
And while we will never fully understand Bathsheba’s culpability in the affair, we know that it sure caused her a lot of grief. Literally. Bathsheba would eventually grieve both the death of her faithful husband Uriah and the baby she conceived with David.
When we allow our daughter to show too much skin, we lead her into temptation. We deliver her into evil. And that evil is contagious: it not only harms her but will infect every person she contacts.
Modesty matters.
Once again, we have an Evangelical blaming “immodestly” dressed women for the inability of men to keep themselves from “lustful” thoughts. Pathetic men, they are, who can’t control their thoughts once their eyes focus on women showing too much of their bodies. In Barnette’s mind, dressing “immodestly” causes women to spread their sin and we all know that women spreading their sin leads to them spreading their legs.
Yes, we live in a culture where women publicly expose more skin than previous generations. My God, my wife wore a dress to a wedding that showed a bit of cleavage! What’s the world coming to? Doesn’t Polly know that she is spreading her sin by wearing a 38DD push-up bra? (Her first push-up bra, by the way — a sure sign of her atheistic depravity.)
Barnette’s problem is that she is immersed in a Fundamentalist religious culture that treats human sexuality as something that must tamped down and, at times — because the Bible commands it — denied. Women are viewed as Jezebels, temptresses out to bed every man who casts a gaze their way. These weak, pathetic, horn-dog men have little or no power to keep themselves from lusting (evidently God living inside of you is not even enough), so it is up to women to keep men from lusting by covering up their bodies and avoiding behaviors that might lead men to think they are “available” — Greek for “easy.”
Most Evangelicals are Republicans who supposedly believe in personal responsibility. One need only listen to Evangelical congressmen pontificate about welfare and the importance of holding assistance recipients accountable for their behavior to see this thinking at work. Yet, these haters of the poor attend churches that preach, when it comes to sexual matters, that heterosexual men are not accountable for what are deemed immoral behaviors; that women who tempt men to lust are also culpable for their “stiff prick having no conscience” (a line told to Midwestern Baptist College ministerial students by crusty IFB preacher Paul Vanaman).
Lust is a religious construct meant to elicit fear and guilt. Two thousand years of preachers lustily preaching about the dangers women present to unsuspecting men have led to the female sex being blamed for the inability of the males of the species to keep from wanting to bed women they find attractive. And therein lies the problem. Evangelicals live in denial of their biology — that men and women being physically attracted to one another is necessary for the propagation of the human race. Some Evangelicals will grudgingly admit the biological aspect of human existence, but will then say that our biology has been corrupted by the fall — Adam’s and Eve’s sin in the Garden of Eden.
Remember the story? God created Adam and Eve naked, put a mystical fruit tree in the middle of their subdivision, and told them he would kill them if they ate fruit from the tree. Adam and Eve ignored God’s threat and once they ate kumquats off the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil, they became knowledgeable of good and evil. Since that day, all humans have been cursed, born with a “sin” nature. According to Evangelicals, we don’t become sinners, we are by nature sinners — haters of God. This is why we need the salvation that was made possible through the sacrificial death of the God-man Jesus on the cross.
The first thing God did after confronting Adam and Eve over their poor choice of a snack was to kill several animals and make the sinning couple one-of-a-kind fur outfits — covering up their nakedness. Implicit in this story is that nakedness is sinful. Christians, Muslims, and Jews have spent several millennia drilling this idea into the minds of primarily the fairer species. Why? Because it was Eve who first ate of the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil. It was Eve who gave a kumquat — I love that word — to Adam. Get the gist of the story? Adam may have been the head of Earth’s first family, but Eve is the one who plunged the entire human race into sin. A woman was to blame then, and women are to blame now.
Let me conclude this post with my view of human sexuality and personal accountability. I am an atheist, so Barnette’s Puritanical, anti-human views on sexuality play no part in my sexual ethic. I recognize that I am sexually attracted to some women. How women dress can get my attention sexually. As Polly will attest, my eyes have been drawn to the comely shape of women who are not my wife on more than a few occasions. And Polly will admit to the same. Several years ago, she told me over dinner, why are some gay men so damn attractive? I laughed, thinking of how, not so many years ago, such a discussion would have been impossible. I subscribe to the look but don’t touch school of thought. Everywhere I look I see attractive women. I saw them as a fifteen-year-old Baptist virgin and I see them fifty years later as a well-used atheist. What I have learned as a grown-ass man is that I am TOTALLY responsible for my sexual behavior. I am TOTALLY responsible for how I deal with my sexual desires. It is up to me, not women, to control my sexuality. If I behave inappropriately, the only person responsible for my behavior is yours truly. I am mature enough to be around women I might find attractive, and if I feel some sort of sexual stirring — down boy, down boy — it is up to me to control my physical response.
My wife and I are in a committed monogamous relationship forty-six years in the making. Now that we have been liberated from the sexual bondage of Christianity, we are free to embrace our sexuality, while, at the same time, living according to the commitment we made to each other forty-six years ago on a hot July day in Newark, Ohio. Both of us are TOTALLY responsible for how we behave sexually. Knowing that marriage is far more than sex, neither of us worries about the other being tempted to sin by a nice ass or an attention-seeking babe or hunk of a man. And yes, both of us are comfortable enough in our sexual skins to admit that there are times we have found someone of the same sex attractive, all without flying a rainbow flag on our porch.
Humanism and Buddhism teach me to treat others with respect, and while I may not be able to control what happens to or around me, I am responsible for how I respond to these outside influences. When a nurse puts an IV in my arm, I know it is going to hurt, and that it might take her several attempts to get the job done (thick skin, deep veins, genetic curse). I also know it is up to me to decide how I respond to the nurse. After making sure the nurse has sufficient experience to do the job (I am considered a difficult stick, so only the experienced need apply), I turn to humor to control the pain that is coming. I tell the nurse about my best and worst phlebotomist list, sharing stories about who is at the top of the list. Once the IV is in, I let the nurse know where she placed on my list. By doing this, I am choosing to be accountable for how I respond. I have heard more than one patient go into a profanity-laced tirade at a nurse who couldn’t magically make an IV insertion pain-free. It is not the nurse’s fault, and blaming her is misplaced. So it is with people who wrongly want to blame women for the moral failures of the human race. Barnette’s blaming of women for unapproved chubbies is misplaced. Men are, from start to finish, responsible for how they respond when sexually attracted to women. Instead of long lists of rules that have proved to not work, why not teach not only men, but women too, how to behave sexually? Surely Evangelical churches can teach men that the Billy Graham rule — never allow yourself to be alone with a woman who is not your wife, a rule even Jesus didn’t practice — is fear-mongering bullshit; that the former Vice President of the United States, Mike Pence, should be able to have a private lunch with a woman without fearing that he will succumb to lust and try to fuck her. Surely the people who gave us purity rings made in China can instead teach men and women that it is not what you wear that matters — no ring has ever successfully kept young adults who want to have sex from doing so; that the choice of how to respond to sexual attraction rests solely with us, not others; that inappropriate sexual behavior by me is not anyone’s fault but mine.
Bruce Gerencser, 67, lives in rural Northwest Ohio with his wife of 46 years. He and his wife have six grown children and thirteen grandchildren. Bruce pastored Evangelical churches for twenty-five years in Ohio, Texas, and Michigan. Bruce left the ministry in 2005, and in 2008 he left Christianity. Bruce is now a humanist and an atheist.
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A little over a week ago I was sitting on a beach in Spain watching young people play beach volleyball. All were dressed appropriately. That is the boys wore shorts or trunks, and the girls wore what in other circumstances would be called bra and knickers or thongs. They were kids enjoying themselves. If they’d adorned themselves in Victorian style dresses they’d have been far too hot, and the sand is not respectful of such clothing. One of the girls wearing a thong also wore a T-shirt, modestly covering her top so complying, to some extent, with what Barnette approved. Trouble is this disguised the fact she was wearing a thong so, from behind, it was as though she was playing with a bare bottom. I noticed, I admired, but I wasn’t tempted to molest her (my wife was next to me!), and nor did anyone else take a blind bit of notice, so far as I could tell.
The problem with Barnette and her ilk is that they’ve been raised in a repressive atmosphere, where even the mention of the word sex is frowned upon. Until these people learn how to incorporate these feelings and natural urges into their world view there is going to continue to be these kinds of attitude. It’s why religion also acts as a melting pot for the majority of sexual abuse throughout the world.
If one listens to Barnette, it’s never men’s fault, always women’s fault, so that is why he thinks patriarchy and women blaming is essential. You respect women, he does not, it’s just that obvious.
🤔🤔
I am not a theologian or preachers wife, so maybe I don’t understand….
But.. how is it Bathsheba’s fault that David was peeping from a rooftop as she bathed and lusted after her??
Seriously, I thought it was David’s fault that he lusted after a woman, used his power to send people to get her so he could fuck her, got her pregnant, then tried to cover it up which ultimately led to him having her husband killed so he could marry her and hide his sin. I thought god held David accountable, not Bathsheba.
Sure, let’s put the blame on the poor woman who had the audacity to bathe. What was she thinking?
Yup, I was in Lake Garda**, Italy recently, plenty of german and italian tourists there, women sunbathing and swimming topless, all ages and wrinkles too. Good on ’em. Barnette and her ilk won’t be happy till all of us who possess a vagina have to wear the burka, can’t go out of the house without a male protector or speak in a public place. I recall reading “wonderful” missionary tales of how western missionaries converted heathen ethnic groups and told traditionally clothed women – who were bare-breasted, that jesus wanted them to cover up. A missionary with the old China Inland Mission appealed back home for donations of white wedding gowns so that his converts there could have a “proper” western marriage ceremony.
**Couldn’t fancy swimming in Garda myself, though many were in the water. I was enjoying a coffee at a lakeside cafe -and suddenly saw a snake curled up on a sunny rock just two feet from my toes! The waiter and I had a chat in pidgin english and I gather they’re harmless…..but grow as thick as his chunky arm!!!!!!
No.
Just no.
I grew up with those icky purity culture messages, but I also grew up with some push back to those messages. I lived in a 4-generation household. My great-grandmother, born in 1895, never wore pants in her entire life. My grandmother, though a devout Christian, was kind of a rebel in some ways. In 1942 she bought a red skirt and jacket suit because she thought it was beautiful, had her photograph taken at a studio, and that was the photo her husband carried through WWII. My great-grandmother shamed her daughter for being “common” (vintage Southern for “slut”). My grandma wore pants while I was growing up, and Bermuda shorts when cleaning the house. I heard my great-grandmother shaming my grandma all the time, calling her “common”, and Grandma tole her mother, “This Is my house, I have hot flashes, and I will wear what is comfortable”. My great-grandmother shamed my aunt and my mom for wearing short skirts in the 70s. She shamed me for wearing shorts as a child. My mom and Grandma told me to ignore her, that she grew up in a different era and didn’t understand that fashion changes.
The fundamentalist Christian school I attended had a dress code very similar to that of Bob Jones University (as the school founders and some faculty were BJU grads). Girls had to wear skirts/dresses with a prescribed length. We could wear pants but never jeans to extracurricular events like ball games. (Once I pushed the envelope by wearing denim slacks that were cut like dress pants, with pleats – I got away with it 😁). Sleeve length and neckline were monitored too. At the beginning of each school year, boys and girls were separated for a meeting about dress code, hygiene, purity bullshit. Girls were shown by a female faculty member how to stretch and bend in front of a mirror before leaving the house to make sure clothing didn’t gape, ride up, etc, when we moved. We were shown the proper way to bend over and sit while wearing a skirt so that nothing showed. We were told that males are visual and we were only aroused by touch, so we must do everything not to cause our “brothers in Christ” to stumble and want to touch us. We knew we were the gatekeepers.
Another traumatic memory was having to model my swimsuits in front of a couple of female faculty for approval to wear on senior trip. The women were sweet, but how mortifying for an 18-year-old who already had body issues.
This stuff contributed so much to my body issues. I started wearing huge, baggy clothing. When I went to college, I wouldn’t wear a dress or skirt except when absolutely necessary. My mom never understood how much the purity culture of the fundamentalist Christian school affected me. She bought me a cute suede miniskirt and a 2-piece bathing suit because she couldn’t take it anymore 🙃. She told me I’d thank her one day (she was right).
I can’t say I fully got over body issues, but I certainly don’t think I am responsible for men’s thoughts anymore. They’re responsible for their actions. Last weekend, some middle-aged guys were joy-riding in a dune-buggy type vehicle and cat-called at me while I was running, and I just ignored their idiocy. I’m 54 freaking years old – you can’t intimidate me, and I certainly am not interrupting my training to hop in your little dune buggy.
Fortunately, I raised my son and daughter to respect other people and to take responsibility for their own actions. If someone walks down the street naked, you have no right to assault them. Period.
That belief by evangelicals (and other fundamentalists) that men are a few inches of fabric away from sexual assault is disturbing AF.
(Snark ahead) Oh dear. It looks like Lori Alexander (“The Transformed Wife”) now has competition in the Judgmental Department Store. Is the world big enough to handle both of these Clothing Police Officials?
Who knew that as a trans woman in, ahem, late middle age. I could have such power over men?
Joking aside: Having experienced both sides, so to speak, I’ve noticed that I and other women are often falsely accused of being immodest and promiscuous. Those accusations are hurled at us over matters that have nothing to do with our sexuality: A family member claimed he saw me in a crop-top (which I’ve never worn) and shorts that exposed my “crack” (again: negative) simply because I deflated his argument (about immigration) with facts.
Let’s call this business of blaming women for men’s inability to control themselves what it is: slut-shaming.
Oh, and when we are modest, we’re called “dowdy.”
This article about women goes back to Augustine and Martin Luther freed up humans so that sexuality as we have come to know it is a result of Luther’s liberty. I think that we could all take a page about our bodies from Luther. I am a nudist and enjoy many bodies at nudist beaches and resorts. The wonderful feeling of not having to be conscious of lustful thinking because of seeing naked people is so refreshing and it does take the lustfulness away if any. An article I read said that under the East German regime after WW2, everyone could be naked in several places and they did not have the problems with pornography until they united with West Germany and nudity was curtailed, although today there is nudity in many places in Germany.
I really enjoy my body as a christian who is a rebel against the nonsense such as you have described. But whatever, I pity the poor weak men who believe this nonsense. They are weaker than those who can pull parking meters out of the sidewalk, or conquer a city.
It’s easy to assume something about another person (I.e. a female in summer clothing) when you haven’t walked a mile in their shoes. So to the men that want to slut shame or cat-call a woman for wearing a sleeveless shirt that exposes some cleavage- do you know how much more body heat a woman has to deal with if it is hot outside? I don’t know myself but I would assume based on talking with my wife it is easier for a man to deal with summer clothing for hot weather than a woman, especially in religious communities.
Women have been in a “damned if you do, damned if you don’t” position ever since the Garden of Eden. Either they’re judged for being overtly enticing or for “tempting” a man because their clothing, even if modest, shows their natural curves (and how can clothing honestly hide this on a woman?). I’ve read where some incel type guys are even turned on by Amish women in their dresses, because “modesty is hot”, and in most cases you can see the outline of their natural curves when they move, work, etc.
Like alot of issues that are religiously inspired, the reality is far from the perception. In my view, a man is responsible for the custody of his mind and eyes, period. You want to express your admiration for a woman? First be polite and respectful, like you would towards anyone else. Look her in the eye instead of looking her over like some creep, regardless of what she is wearing. Treat all people with respect. That goes a long way.
All this time I was burdened with guilt because of my bad-boy urges and it was the women to blame? Well that’s a load off my conscience. Thanks a mill Rev! And get thee hence and cover thy faces, arms and ankles, thou handmaidens of SATAN!
(bazinga)
https://ondemand.ewtn.com/free/Home/Play/en/~PS20240711 This if I did it right was an episode of Beacon of Truth. This program is hosted by Deacon Harold Burke-Sivers. The talk was on fortitude. If possible, listen to this program. Some male college student had been falsely accused of sending inappropriate pictures of himself to some female college students. The male college student said that he had not been sending pictures to that woman but that after he made the mistake of publicly admitting that he was waiting until he was married before he engaged in sex, more than one woman started to send inappropriate pictures of themselves to him. He did not succumb to temptation. That story is around the 35 to 36 minute of the program. In all likelihood those women were unsaved Protestants. I’m being sarcastic about the women being unsaved Protestants ( or possibly Seventh Day Adventists).
I’m late to this one, so it probably won’t be read, but this woman is just repeating one of the many Christian persecution lies when she says she can’t find any appropriate clothing for her daughter. My 15-year-old niece dresses in baggy pants and enormous baggy T-shirts in the Billy Eilish style, exposing no skin whatsoever. Lots of teenagers dress this way now, my niece is not some outcast being mocked for her clothing. Yes some teenage girls show their cleavage and wear extremely short shorts, while many others, even those not living by church-enforced rules, don’t. To say you can’t find “modest” clothing is just more Christian whining. I’m so sick of these people pretending that the world is out to get them.
my school district (in Queens, New York) had dress code rules for skirt length, and hair length for boys in the 1950s. when the principal tried to enforce the skirt length rules by having the girls kneel on the stage in the auditorium to see if the skirt was longer than the knee, parents went ballistic. Christian parents were enraged that this person insisted the child kneel; Jewish parents were if anything more upset. Since many of us were children of immigrants from Europe our parents and grandparents were livid; they left Europe to get away from such abuse. The principal retired a year or two later.
Teachers never bothered about my skirt length; ready-to -wear was always too long!
The dress code required short hair for boys; a crew cut looks awful on a young boy, with typically thin neck, big head and oversize ears. (when I read “Death Be Not Proud” by John Gunther I found it interesting that Mr. Gunther’s teenage son was concerned that his surgery for a brain tumor would require him to shave his head; at his school a crew cut would be grounds for dismissal!)
Kara Barnette suggests women simply sew “better” clothes. I suggest she try it for herself. There is more to sewing clothes than getting a sewing machine. You need fabric, patterns, thread and tools. I started sewing my clothes in 1968. Miniskirts were in fashion and I refused to pay full price for only half a skirt. Plus I was married by then, with a child. I have always looked younger than my years, but that was ridiculous. Fortunately there were patterns available for petite adults back then. I’m still using those patterns. My children also had the same hassle about finding clothes. When my daughters started school they were still wearing size 3 clothes, but I had to lengthen the pattern before I cut the fabric. My children were quite short, but extremely thin, and needed custom garments. For my sister’s wedding I made dresses for my daughters. the girls grew taller, but not wider, for several years. So I lengthened the pattern and used it again. Every time we have moved we have to locate new fabric sources.
Even now I have to sew much of my clothes. Once I locate fabric I get extra. I am able to purchase long sleeve turtleneck shirts on line. (necessary, because I sunburn too easily) I still wear knee length skirts. my coats and jackets always end up too long at the sleeves. And some men look at me as if to check if I’m available; never mind my age (70+) with white hair and bifocals. Especially when my husband is with me!