The Duggars
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Junior Member
Registered: 11-01-09
Posts: 21
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There is a major flaw in the thinking and ideals of the Duggar family and the families who follow their beliefs and lifestyle. I do have some personal experience in this in the way I grew up so it's not just theorizing. Despite the constant referrals to allowing and trusting God to dictate our life's path, and therefore absolving them of all personal responsibility, the actions of families such as the Duggars completely goes against this belief. If you trusted God (not to mention your own parenting), to guide kids to make good life choices, would you not then allow them the freedom to make their own choices regarding all aspects of their life? Career, education, values, beliefs, what to wear, who to associate with, who to vote for, to attend church or not, to have a family or not, who to marry, where to live. To keep these children under such tight control gives the very strong impression that JB & Michelle have absolutely no trust in God, themselves or their children. Life is about making mistakes and learning from them and growing as a person. The life these children are being forced to lead only encourages prejudice and fear of the world and the people in it. They are being given a very black/white, wrong/right, good/evil view of the world. The world is one big GREY area as are the people in it. Abuse is a word that's bandied about a fair bit, but in my opinion it is abuse to deny a child their right to make their own decisions and to dictate with complete control how they are to live their life. It just reeks of mistrust and fear.
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Senior Member
Registered: 11-28-06
Posts: 700
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Good post. It also amazes me that Jim Bob isn't willing to trust his sex drive or they would have a lot fewer children. Seems they pick & choose what they want to "trust God" with and that is another huge problem from my perspective. Having a truck load of kids isn't honoring God. It's causing more work and burden for their older girls. They could not possibly afford those kids if they didn't have the TV show going. The fact that they won't let their kids watch hardly any TV is also ironic. Many things about the Duggar family are bizarre to say the least.
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Senior Member
Registered: 09-02-09
Posts: 83
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quote: Originally posted by aussiegirl24:
There is a major flaw in the thinking and ideals of the Duggar family and the families who follow their beliefs and lifestyle. I do have some personal experience in this in the way I grew up so it's not just theorizing. Despite the constant referrals to allowing and trusting God to dictate our life's path, and therefore absolving them of all personal responsibility, the actions of families such as the Duggars completely goes against this belief. If you trusted God (not to mention your own parenting), to guide kids to make good life choices, would you not then allow them the freedom to make their own choices regarding all aspects of their life? Career, education, values, beliefs, what to wear, who to associate with, who to vote for, to attend church or not, to have a family or not, who to marry, where to live. To keep these children under such tight control gives the very strong impression that JB & Michelle have absolutely no trust in God, themselves or their children. Life is about making mistakes and learning from them and growing as a person. The life these children are being forced to lead only encourages prejudice and fear of the world and the people in it. They are being given a very black/white, wrong/right, good/evil view of the world. The world is one big GREY area as are the people in it. Abuse is a word that's bandied about a fair bit, but in my opinion it is abuse to deny a child their right to make their own decisions and to dictate with complete control how they are to live their life. It just reeks of mistrust and fear.
Excellent! Your post is very insightful and to the point and I, for one, couldn't agree more. Thank you! |
Senior Member
Registered: 08-15-07
Posts: 2028
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quote: They are being given a very black/white, wrong/right, good/evil view of the world. The world is one big GREY area as are the people in it.
I have to go by what the Bible says on this point. I don't believe the Bible teaches there are shades of gray. Something is either right or wrong, pure or impure, holy or unholy. If you're not for God, you are against God. In fact, one of the reasons Jesus got so upset with so many of the "religious people" was the fact that they were neither hot nor cold. They preached one thing and did another. They tried to act holy when being watched but loved the "many shades of gray" when no one was around to see them. The Duggars are doing it right and I applaud them. |
Senior Member
Registered: 08-04-09
Posts: 143
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Chris,
How is preaching modesty, then giving birth in front of cameras not falling into a grey area?
EVEN though we did not see anything, they had the sound guy and the camera guy in the room and he would not have known where NOT to focus the camera, if he wasn't looking....
Sounds rather grey to me.
So how can you say they are doing it right. There is an entire thread (and many other posts) about how hypocritical they are, and although I may not agree with all points, I agree enough to say...
The DUGGARS ARE VERY GREY!
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Senior Member
Registered: 12-23-08
Posts: 985
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quote: Originally posted by aussiegirl24:
There is a major flaw in the thinking and ideals of the Duggar family and the families who follow their beliefs and lifestyle. I do have some personal experience in this in the way I grew up so it's not just theorizing. Despite the constant referrals to allowing and trusting God to dictate our life's path, and therefore absolving them of all personal responsibility, the actions of families such as the Duggars completely goes against this belief. If you trusted God (not to mention your own parenting), to guide kids to make good life choices, would you not then allow them the freedom to make their own choices regarding all aspects of their life? Career, education, values, beliefs, what to wear, who to associate with, who to vote for, to attend church or not, to have a family or not, who to marry, where to live. To keep these children under such tight control gives the very strong impression that JB & Michelle have absolutely no trust in God, themselves or their children. Life is about making mistakes and learning from them and growing as a person. The life these children are being forced to lead only encourages prejudice and fear of the world and the people in it. They are being given a very black/white, wrong/right, good/evil view of the world. The world is one big GREY area as are the people in it. Abuse is a word that's bandied about a fair bit, but in my opinion it is abuse to deny a child their right to make their own decisions and to dictate with complete control how they are to live their life. It just reeks of mistrust and fear.
Excellent post. You aren't the first person to notice their hypocrisy, their lack of trust in their children. |
Junior Member
Registered: 11-01-09
Posts: 21
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quote: Originally posted by chrislukas: quote: They are being given a very black/white, wrong/right, good/evil view of the world. The world is one big GREY area as are the people in it.
I have to go by what the Bible says on this point. I don't believe the Bible teaches there are shades of gray. Something is either right or wrong, pure or impure, holy or unholy. If you're not for God, you are against God. In fact, one of the reasons Jesus got so upset with so many of the "religious people" was the fact that they were neither hot nor cold. They preached one thing and did another. They tried to act holy when being watched but loved the "many shades of gray" when no one was around to see them. The Duggars are doing it right and I applaud them.
I am by no stretch of the imagination an expert on theology so I'm not qualified to go into a debate about interpretations about what the Bible says. I do believe however, like you say, it warns against 'fence-sitting' or words to that effect. I believe personally I am 'for' God and therefore not a fence-sitter. I am also about as grey and imperfect as everyone else in this world, as are the Duggars. It's just my observation that the Duggar's actions are not in line with their words. Humans were created to be individuals, even down to our finger prints all being different. The Duggars controlling every aspect of their children's lives and forbidding any kind of individual expression and creating wind-up cookie-cutter robots appears, to me, to stem from fear and insecurity. To view this family with rose coloured glasses and hold them up as a highly esteemed family to aspire to is naive. Their show should be viewed as light entertainment, much as same as you would the Kardashian air-heads or the equally low IQ Girls of the Playboy Mansion. |
Senior Member
Registered: 11-28-06
Posts: 700
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Aussiegirl is correct. People who claim to live by the Bible and take certain passages literally actually do a lot more harm in promoting religion than they realize. The Duggar's show themselves to be mindless fundamentalists who think that the likes of Bill Gothard make a good role model. The Duggar's DO NOT make a good role model for society. Tell me in the Bible where it says to have a truck load of kids, no matter what the cost, what the burden it might be to raising, etc.? You won't find it. That's because the Bible often talks about using common sense which sadly, the Duggar's don't do when it comes to family planning. They mindlessly procreate and people like Chrislucas think they are "so great". Take the blinders off! The Duggar's are doing their older kids an extreme disservice by having them raise those younger kids. IT IS NOT THEIR JOB! It is Jim Bob & Michelle's job to do that. If they can't (and clearly they can't) then they should use the brains that God gave them and STOP! Having 18 kids is WAY too many--Michelle has some mental issues and I stand by that belief. She has a twisted notion that she's honoring God by trying to make up for the one baby lost over 20 years ago. And you think the Duggar's have it together? Think again Chris!
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Senior Member
Registered: 07-15-09
Posts: 573
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quote: Originally posted by arnaras:
Excellent post. You aren't the first person to notice their hypocrisy, their lack of trust in their children.
I agree, several of us have seen the lack of trust they have as parents, as Christians and as role models. Anything done to an extreme like their life is a sign of insecurity. If they trusted God, they would trust that he would lead their children in the way they should go.....without the need of a chaperone. I think JB had a bad experience at the Christian Academy that he attended and when he met Michelle and found her to be a fragile, new Christian looking for someone to tell her how to follow God, he used that to boost his ego and ran with it. Here we are 25 years later, 19 kids later and a freakin' TV show!! Plus, I'm not too impressed with that Academy he went to since his Bible studies with his children are so off. He should know the Bible much better than that if he went to a private Christian school. |
Senior Member
Registered: 12-23-08
Posts: 985
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quote: Originally posted by mitsy12:
Aussiegirl is correct. People who claim to live by the Bible and take certain passages literally actually do a lot more harm in promoting religion than they realize. The Duggar's show themselves to be mindless fundamentalists who think that the likes of Bill Gothard make a good role model. The Duggar's DO NOT make a good role model for society. Tell me in the Bible where it says to have a truck load of kids, no matter what the cost, what the burden it might be to raising, etc.? You won't find it. That's because the Bible often talks about using common sense which sadly, the Duggar's don't do when it comes to family planning. They mindlessly procreate and people like Chrislucas think they are "so great". Take the blinders off! The Duggar's are doing their older kids an extreme disservice by having them raise those younger kids. IT IS NOT THEIR JOB! It is Jim Bob & Michelle's job to do that. If they can't (and clearly they can't) then they should use the brains that God gave them and STOP! Having 18 kids is WAY too many--Michelle has some mental issues and I stand by that belief. She has a twisted notion that she's honoring God by trying to make up for the one baby lost over 20 years ago. And you think the Duggar's have it together? Think again Chris!
No theologian with his/her salt would take the Bible literally. Anyone who's ever truly studied it knows about the history of the writers, the audience they were writing to, and what they metaphors, stories, and analogies they used to teach their audience. Blindly following any faith is stupid. But you're likely to not get any common sense arguments - as we've already seen - because there aren't any. They say they're following the Bible, and that's their feeling, and that's that. Not much of an argument... So we'll throw common sense to the wind, have 18 kids to make up for a miscarriage, and then we'll not teach them things like sex ed, because it's better to keep them ignorant (since apparently we can't trust them). |
Senior Member
Registered: 04-28-09
Posts: 450
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I think JB has always enjoyed that he "leads" Michelle. He continues to come across as arrogant and his smile just flat creeps me out. It has always bothered me that he holds church in his home not because I am bothered by "home churches", but because he controls EVERYTHING in the home. It appears that he does not even have a pastor who he answers to. How many of us here can think of a pastor who thought they did not have to answer to anyone else?
From JB's interviews to the show he continuously acts as though everyone answers to him. It is no wonder the "show" turns viewers off and if they don't they think that this is how "christians" actually live. It gives most of us a bad reputation.
God created the world to have many colors and I for one am honored to live in the world of color and NOT of black and white. Take a trip into the country this weekend and look for just black and white on the trees. Funny the trees in the gorgeous Tennessee hills are a mix of shocking orange and brilliant yellows to deep reds. I think that NO God of mine only made the world to live in black or white.
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