You Tell ‘Em, Rush!
I just finished a long essay for Public Eye magazine on the ideal and reality of Christian Right childrearing, which will be published sometime in the next month. I discovered that while Christian Right parenting ideals — primarily about the supremacy of fathers, subordination of mothers, and inborn wickedness of children — are simple and often frightening, the actual behavior of conservative evangelicals is pretty complex.
As I write in the article, conservative evangelical homes must confront the same problems as their nonevangelical counterparts: the erosion of real wages, the rising costs of necessities like health care and education, the ubiquity of electronic media, and the declining rights of workers, to name a few. This explains why, for example, rates of teen sex and divorce are not significantly lower in these homes. In fact, divorce is especially high in Bible Belt states, due at least in part to higher unemployment.
In an interview, the sociologist W. Bradford Wilcox, who studies the impact of conservative evangelical faith on the behavior of both men and women, urged that I distinguish “between what elite evangelicals [like James Dobson] say and what average people are doing.” While elites may rail against the social and economic changes of recent decades, Wilcox said that “your average evangelical takes all that with a grain of salt.” That’s in part because most evangelical wives work. “Part of that is a class issue,” Wilcox said. “Evangelicals are more working class, than, for example, mainline Protestants, [and] they have less economic flexibility. And so the reality on the ground, with gender issues, is more flexible than some might expect.”
I immediately thought of Wilcox’s point when I stumbled across this recent broadcast transcript from right-wing blowhard Rush Limbaugh. In it, Rush grumbles against fathers cooking for their families and parents buying toy kitchens for boys. “This is not men reshaping and rethinking their roles,” says Rush. “That’s being done for them with various sorts of pressure being applied if the behavioral model that is demanded isn’t met” — and the pressure, he says, is coming from “feminazis.”
This is all par for the course, and not really worthy of comment. But then the calls start coming in from listeners. Here’s the first:
RUSH: To the phones, to Fort Wayne, Indiana. This is Steve. Nice to have you on the program, sir.
CALLER: Mega dittos, Rush. I absolutely love you.
RUSH: Thank you.
CALLER: I’m a stay-at-home dad. I run a small business out of my home, and my boys — I got two boys — are great cooks. Now, I haven’t bought ‘em a kitchen set, and it’s not on my short list of toys to buy, but they can make a mean batch of cookies, but they’re in wrestling, and they’ll kick somebody’s tail with a sword — playing swords with them — and I wouldn’t have a problem with them cooking at all. That’s not a… I cook every meal in our house.
RUSH: How old did you say that these two boys are?
CALLER: My boys are eight and five.
RUSH: Eight and five, and they bake cookies?
CALLER: They do. They buy a brand-name mixer and…
And so on. As he listens, Rush is obviously confused. It’s hilarious, ironic — and a perfect illustration of Wilcox’s research. It’s also a measure of the degree to which conservative ideologues are being left in the dust by their followers — who must, after all, live in the same 21st century as the rest of us.
[Crossposted with Daddy Dialectic.]
What makes you such an expert on “evangelicals”?
Maybe you’re just one more ignorant bigot.
Merry Christmas! Is this what you do on Christmas day?
I’m actually not an expert–that’s why I interview people like Wilcox, who is an expert and also himself an evangelical Christian, I believe. I should note that I read about a dozen conservative evangelical parenting manuals in researching this article, interviewed other academics like Wilcox, and drew on my own experience as a member of a family with many conservative evangelicals. I should also note that I’ve been researching right-wing social movements for fifteen years (though I mostly focused on conservative campus organizing and right-wing media). Still, I wouldn’t consider myself an expert on conservative evangelicals–just someone interested enough to learn more and share what I learn through articles like this one. You’re free to disagree–though just calling me an “ignorant bigot” isn’t going to convince anyone of anything.
Hey there! Wonderful idea, but will this truly work?
-note to Jam, if you claim to be evangelical, we as Christians aught to show grace and love to the world, at least that’s how I read our Bible.
Mr. Smith;
Briefly, -I personally wouldn’t include Rush as a leader in the ‘evangelical Christian’ segment. -Politically to the right, but spreading the gospel of Christ is not what he works for on a daily basis. His job is drawing a crowd to sell advertisement.
I stumbled across this article accidentally, and was intrigued. I primarily identify myself as a Christian. As such, I would like to clarify the ‘Christian Right’ parenting ideals. -I am very sorry and ashamed of my fellow Christians if the summary of what they provided you in your research led you to believe that Christian parenting ideals can be summarized as ’supremacy of fathers, subordination of mothers & wickedness of children.’ True Christianity teaches that yes, people by nature are sinful (i.e. have broken God’s moral law and are prone to do so). Christians have this same problem and struggle with the same sins (as you rightly noted) -the only difference (again for the true Christian) is that we acknowledge our wickedness and find peace with God forgiveness and reconciliation through the sacraficial death and ressurection of Jesus Christ.
All that to simply say that as a father of 2 boys, I do take the responsability for the rearing of my children very seriously. I am the head of the household. So yes, there is some primacy of the father, but it is always in the context and acknowledgement that it is in my nature to be sinful, selfish (& if i’m honest a failure most of the time) at what God has called me to be, a father. That I am incapable & unable to manage the task of parenthood if left to my owner power could be easily observed, just ask my wife. It is only by God’s grace and His help that there would be any real difference between my parenting and anyone elses. Yes, I do make the final decisions in our house on most things, but it is with the wisdom to understand that perhaps my wife has better insight on some issues and that the vast majority of the correct decisions I have made, are not what I would have chosen to do, if I followed my natural instincts. To leave it as ‘the primacy of fathers rule with an authoritarian harsh hand, leaves out the injunction for husbands to “love your wifes,just as Christ also loved the church and gave Himself up for her.” (Eph 5:25). -this is a self sacraficing, self denying love. this is a father making decisions based on the best interest of His wife and children. -Again, it is a call to perfection that will not be obtained in this life, but we can be assured of God’s provision to help us reach for this end. Yes, Ephesians also admonishes women to “be subject to your own husbands as to the Lord.” (5:22) again, this is in the context that both man and wife are submitting themselves to God, trusting in His mercy and in love. Each looking for the best interest of the other. All one needs to do is listen to the longing in the songs produced to see that there is a deep longing for most people to have a relationship where they are gauranteed that the other party truely has their best interest in mind in all that they do. This is great stuff.
-Children should obey their parents, the parents have an even more difficult and daunting task, to follow God.
-God will call each Christian to account for what he has given. It is in humility and an utter awareness of our falibility and a willingness to submit to God’s direction that the Christian is called to undertake in leading a family. I hope that you can at least see that there is a distinction in what your projecting as ‘Evangelical Christian Principles of parenting’ vs. what the bible and true Christians actually believe.