"True Women" movement, reclaiming traditional gender roles of barefootness, pregnancy

[The Traveler]

This October, more than 6,000 women gathered in Chicago for the True Woman Conference ’08: a stadium-style event to promote what its proponents call “biblical womanhood,” “complementarianism,” or -- most bluntly -- “the patriarchy movement.”

Women gathering to support the patriarchy movement? It’s evangelical counterculture at its most contrarian.

The Associated Baptist Press explains the relationship of biblical womanhood to feminism, highlighting an ambitious initiative that arose from the meeting: a signature drive seeking 100,000 women to endorse its “True Woman Manifesto,” which, the ABP writes, aims “at sparking a counterrevolution to the feminist movement of the 1960s.”

To outside observers of the patriarchy movement, the starkness of the calls for gender hierarchy often seem amusingly outdated (not to mention historically misleading: feminist blogs Feministing and Pandagon have deftly dismantled some of the speakers’ Leave it to Beaver idealizations of the 1950s as a time when women were universally protected).

Though only just under 3,000 women have actually signed the document since its unveiling on October 11, the fact that it exists, and the campaign to gather such a large showing of public support, reveals something important about this movement: that its followers don’t view themselves simply as a remnant of polite, churchy women, holding out against a crass culture, but rather as a revolutionary body waging “countercultural” rebellion against what they see as the feminist status quo.

“We are believing God for a movement of reformation and revival in the hearts and homes of Christian women all around this world,” one organizer, Nancy Leigh DeMoss, said at the close of the conference. “I just believe there is a massive women’s movement of true women in those millions of women who are able to capture all kinds of battlefronts for Christ.”

The terms of the manifesto serve as a good shorthand description of the aims and principles of the submission and patriarchy movement. Signers affirm their belief that women and men were designed to reflect God in “complementary and distinct ways”; that today’s culture has gone astray distinctly because of its egalitarian approach to gender (and that it’s “experiencing the consequences of abandoning God’s design for men and women”); and that while men and women are equally valuable in the eyes of God, here on earth they are relegated to separate spheres at home and in the church.

The “countercultural” attitudes that signers support include the idea that women are called to affirm and encourage godly masculinity, and honor the God-ordained male headship of their husbands and pastors; that wifely submission to male leadership in the home and church reflects Christ’s submission to God, His Father; that “selfish insistence on personal rights is contrary to the spirit of Christ”; and, in a pronatalist turn of phrase that recalls the rhetoric of the Quiverfull conviction, their willingness to “receive children as a blessing from the Lord.”

Finally, in a reference to the importance of woman-to-woman mentoring within the conservative church, they affirmed that “mature Christian women” are obliged to disciple the next generation of Christian wives, training them in matters of submission and headship, in order to provide a legacy of “fruitful femininity.”

Full article.

[Jimmy McForum]

Oh Jesus.

[Rutkowski]

They can all go hang themselves.

[KageNeko]

I still hold to my belief that feminism is about choice. If these women want to CHOOSE to live their lives like this, it's not my place to question it. My only problem with it comes when they feel this is the only choice they have.

If a woman wants to choose to be barefoot and pregnant in the kitchen making pies, then more power to her. It's not my way, and that's why I'm glad I can choose differently.

[Matt]

This doesn't faze me at all but of course I live in Texas. Yes there are a lot of people who still think like this but they aren't going to bring any significant numbers people into the fold and younger women will only continue to break away from this line of thinking.

[Aloysius Snuffleupagus]

If it makes them happy then good for them. Having the freedom to make choices like this is what true feminism is all about.

[The Dude]

Look you can have obedient Christian wives who'll do whatever you want or you can have free-thinking women who are A-OK with pre-marital sex. Choose wisely, America.

[Boreas]

Shouldn't their men be out protesting for them?

[Ladina]

Originally Posted by KageNeko

I still hold to my belief that feminism is about choice.

Word. Let your non-freak flag fly ladies! Or you know..don't, whatever.

If that's how they get down the so be it. Although "training them in matters of submission and headship" took me to places in my brain I shouldn't go to while at work.

[Pacifist]

Originally Posted by Rutkowski

They can all go hang themselves.

Man, when did youtube comments start getting cross-posted here?

[The Famous Ben Jackson]

I have no problem whatsoever with a woman choosing this sort of life for herself. This movement seems to be actively attempting to gather support for a traditional gender hierarchy and indoctrination because it's more biblical. That is something with which I take issue.

[OrangeDice]

Who wants to have a book club meeting about The Handmaid's Tale with me?

[Banphrionsa]

Originally Posted by KageNeko

I still hold to my belief that feminism is about choice. If these women want to CHOOSE to live their lives like this, it's not my place to question it. My only problem with it comes when they feel this is the only choice they have.

If a woman wants to choose to be barefoot and pregnant in the kitchen making pies, then more power to her. It's not my way, and that's why I'm glad I can choose differently.

I wish this is what the feminist movement had fostered, but instead it fractured women and made them work against one another instead of support one another. Women on the whole are VERY judgmental of those who make a choice different from theirs.

[Templar]

Originally Posted by Ladina

If that's how they get down the so be it. Although "training them in matters of submission and headship" took me to places in my brain I shouldn't go to while at work.

Really? Please, tell me more. Tell me sloooowlyyyy...

[Don't Tread on Steve]

Originally Posted by Banphrionsa

I wish this is what the feminist movement had fostered, but instead it fractured women and made them work against one another instead of support one another. Women on the whole are VERY judgmental of those who make a choice different from theirs.

Banphrionsa,

what, if anything, do you know about the feminist movement?

[KageNeko]

Originally Posted by OrangeDice

Who wants to have a book club meeting about The Handmaid's Tale with me?

I love The Handmaid's Tale, but this isn't nearly far enough to the extreme for that. They're making a choice, not forcing it on everyone.

[Aloysius Snuffleupagus]

Originally Posted by Banphrionsa

I wish this is what the feminist movement had fostered, but instead it fractured women and made them work against one another instead of support one another. Women on the whole are VERY judgmental of those who make a choice different from theirs.

Some women just make really, really stupid choices, though.

[The Famous Ben Jackson]

Originally Posted by KageNeko

They're making a choice, not forcing it on everyone.

Please re-read the last three paragraphs that were quoted in the OP, with particular attention to the last paragraph

[Banphrionsa]

Originally Posted by Aloysius Snuffleupagus

Some women just make really, really stupid choices, though.

So do some men, what's your point?

[nekodeev]

Originally Posted by Aloysius Snuffleupagus

Some women just make really, really stupid choices, though.

Thats why, as dudes, we have to set them right.

[Aloysius Snuffleupagus]

I am glad, however, that these women are choosing to stay at home, rather than getting out and spreading their absurd beliefs as teachers or whatnot.

[KageNeko]

Originally Posted by The Famous Ben Jackson

Please re-read the last three paragraphs that were quoted in the OP, with particular attention to the last paragraph

I read it just fine. But they are talking about in-church ministry. The women they are "training" are already a part of the conservative church. It's not like these women are grabbing random women off the street and forcing them to pop out babies. There's still a choice being made. Now, I'm not a fan of the fact that the younger girls probably feel a lot of pressure because they were raised in the church, but that happens with kids raised in any faith. With luck, these girls aren't all being homeschooled and get to see what options are out there for them.

[Kaete]

“selfish insistence on personal rights is contrary to the spirit of Christ”; and, in a pronatalist turn of phrase that recalls the rhetoric of the Quiverfull conviction, their willingness to “receive children as a blessing from the Lord.”

Finally, in a reference to the importance of woman-to-woman mentoring within the conservative church, they affirmed that “mature Christian women” are obliged to disciple the next generation of Christian wives, training them in matters of submission and headship, in order to provide a legacy of “fruitful femininity.”

I truly feel sorry for their daughters.

[Kaete]

Originally Posted by Banphrionsa

I wish this is what the feminist movement had fostered, but instead it fractured women and made them work against one another instead of support one another. Women on the whole are VERY judgmental of those who make a choice different from theirs.

Oh please. Don't blame Feminism on the "fracturing" of women. We are no more fractured than men. Face it, women are human, and that means we're going to be selfish, inspirational, territorial, judgmental, accepting, frantic, serene, angry, kind....

[Fjord]

Sigh, there is just no helping some people.