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Patriarchy or not Patriarchy – Stacy McDonald and Kelly Crawford respond to my recent article and reveal their true colors. Does it walk like a duck? Quack like a Duck?
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Suppose you see a bird walking around in a farm yard. This bird has no label that says ‘duck’. But the bird certainly looks like a duck. Also, he goes to the pond and you notice that he swims like a duck. Then he opens his beak and quacks like a duck. Well, by this time you have probably reached the conclusion that the bird is a duck, whether he’s wearing a label or not. ~Richard Cunningham Patterson Jr., United States ambassador to Guatemala during the Cold War in 1950
Are you familiar with the Duck Test? It’s an inductive reasoning test. This familiar expression is an example of inductive reasoning:
If it looks like a duck, swims like a duck, and quacks like a duck, then it probably is a duck.
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Not long after I posted this article: Queen Bees of Homeschooling Stacy McDonald and Kelly Crawford Don’t Like the “Victim” Word in the Lourdes Torres-Manteufel vs. Doug Phillips Lawsuit, there was some fallout, most likely related to the push back they received here. It’s always interesting to watch the responses to blog articles where we are exposing truth. We typically see back-peddling, web scrubbing, but rarely an admission of wrong teaching, etc.
I think it’s important to document what happened so that people can see for themselves and discern. Do the behaviors match the message? What is the fruit that we see? Is this the kind of teaching we want to stand behind and pay good money to hear at conferences? Do we want these foundational teachings to influence our families for decades?
Last week, R.L. Stollar, co-founders of Homeschoolers Anonymous blog informed me that Kelly Crawford had written a blog article in 2008 entitled, Tired of Patriarchy’s Bad Rap.
Crawford’s article comes up here on a Google search:
But surprise, surprise. If you click on the link to the original article, this is what you see:
QUACK, QUACK
Homeschoolers Anonymous shared Crawford’s 2008 article on their Facebook page on recently (on April 29) and noticed the article was removed between 4/29 and 5/2. Stollar also quoted Crawford in his comment:
For a clear definition of biblical patriarchy,” she said, you should “go here” — here being a link to the now-defunct Vision Forum’s “Tenets of Biblical Patriarchy.”
The “Tenants of Biblical Patriarchy” has been long scrubbed from the Vision Forum website, but here is the cached copy.
Homeschoolers Anonymous has a copy of Kelly Crawford’s article on file here. When will people learn that if they post articles on the internet and remove them, it makes them look like a fool? Take a look at the first two paragraphs of her article, the article she scrubbed:
I guess I’ll be rehashing the same topics with new names until I die, but they won’t let me go.
There is something I’m so tired of. The word “patriarchy” is practically synonymous with an explicative in this culture. I’m tired of that. Patriarchy is not a new concept, but one as old as the world itself. It is biblical and if you don’t like it, and you’re a Christian, perhaps a new religion would suit you better.
So, did Kelly Crawford change her views on Patriarchy?
She said she would rehash the same topics until she dies. Why would she remove that article from 2008? What is she trying to hide?
QUACK, QUACK
After posting the Queen Bees article, both Stacy McDonald and Kelly Crawford came to the blog to comment, having never participated at SSB before. We saw their true colors:
Seriously? LOL Okay – thank you for the confirmation of why I do NOT get into these fruitless online discussions…no more temptation here. Check out sometime, on the database of the mentally stable (or not), those who you allow to comment here. I recognize a scary person…
truly.
Yes, Stacy McDonald, publicly made a low blow about the mental stability of one of my commenters.
Stacy has had a couple of weeks to think about that comment, a couple of weeks to e-mail me and say that perhaps she was out of line with that wording, but she has not. That was a RUDE comment. People pay to hear this woman speak, they read her blog articles. They look to her for guidance in how to raise their families. Enough said.
I also want to point out another incident that occurred on the same day the article was being discussed here. SSB reader, Taunya reported that Kelly Crawford privately e-mailed her after 6 years of silence between the two saying,
“Can’t you see what kind of people you’re running with now? The evidence, the fruit, is so clear.”
Did you notice the 6-years-of-silence part? Although Crawford doesn’t mention the silence, it’s important to the whole story. Obviously this hit a nerve for Crawford and is not something to be dismissed lightly.
Imagine Taunya’s surprise in receiving such an e-mail after so many years of silence. Let me put in my own words my interpretation of what Crawford is saying: This information I am sending you is so important that I am breaking 6 years of silence to send it to you. Listen to me! If you don’t believe the way Stacy and I believe, you’re one of those bad-fruit people.
Ewwwww – rotten fruit
What was the rotten fruit Taunya was talking about? Things like this:
Furthermore it is not “God’s will” for adult daughters to live in the homes of their fathers until marriage. There is nothing biblically wrong with young women attending college, working or living on their own. This is wrong and any woman falling for this as “God’s Word” is deceived. These are cult-like teachings must like the idea that women need to wear skirts and dresses for the sake of modesty or that it is wrong to limit the number of children one has.
And:
The definition of priest says it all Kelly! No women needs a priest! A man goes directly to God through Jesus and a woman does as well. She does not need her husband to be her mediator nor does she need him to be her prophet. She can read Scripture and the Holy Spirit resides in her just as He does her husband, no need for a husband to be her prophet! And KING? Wasn’t that addressed in the Old Testament. None of us need a king, we have that in Christ.
Doesn’t that 6-year silence also say a lot? It reminds me of junior high. “I’m not going to be your friend if you don’t like Suzy Q.” Do you see what this is? It’s my-way-or-the-highway mentality. You have to go along with my beliefs in order to be part of my group. It creates an us vs. them mentality. You are either in, or your are out.
If it looks like a duck, and quacks like a duck, we have at least to consider the possibility that we have a small aquatic bird of the family Anatidae on our hands. ~Douglas Adams
QUACK, QUACK
Stacy and Kelly left the conversation, but the conversation continued to over 400 comments, but look what happened within 24 hours on Stacy and James McDonald’s Facebook page. The first is a rant from James McDonald:
James McDonald
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Attitude much, James?
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On the same day, April 23, Stacy posted a note on her Facebook wall endorsing her husband’s article, The “P” Word , which is about Patriarchy. Her husband, in his article on Patriarchy discusses words and their meanings and how sometimes the meanings change. He tries to paint a beautiful picture of Patriarchy.
But check this out, is she really saying she is going to have to disguise that P (patriarchy) word from her vocabulary?
Ok, so let’s just act like that word doesn’t exist. Is that what she’s saying? We’re going to continue doing the talk, and walking the walk, but we’re just not going to let anyone know what we’re really doing is Patriarchy.
When I see a bird that walks like a duck and swims like a duck and quacks like a duck, I call that bird a duck. ~James Whitcomb Riley
What we see is a very familiar pattern of behavior:
- anyone who disagrees is labeled in a negative way: mentally disabled, rotten fruit, divisive, some might even question the salvation of one who disagrees
- instead of addressing conflict or misunderstandings: remove article entirely with no explanation
- completely mischaracterize a critic, claiming criticisms they never made like a “strawman,” then talk only about the strawman instead of the matter at hand
- publicly air a “woe is me” rant of martyrdom on own forum to garner support and “attaboys”
- black/white thinking: you are for us or against us
Folks, the above patterns are the rotten fruit. It’s rotten fruit in attempt to defend more stinking, rotten fruit: Patriarchy.
Stacy and Kelly have been promoting “Biblical Patriarchy” for years. Now Stacy wants to quack about it, without using the P word. It’s time to call this heretical teaching down NOW. It is destroying families. It is keeping young ladies held captive in their own homes, not giving them choices to further their education, to be critical thinkers, to use the creative minds God created for them. Removing blog articles and not saying the P word is not going to change the fact that Patriarchy = Duck.
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This video quacks me up.
Spiritual Sounding Board 
Re the kidnapped Nigerian girls, a relative is involved in Bible translation and works with the father of three of those girls, he teaches mathematics. Please pray. I am heartened by the international outrage over what has happened. Lord, be present with each young woman and bring them all home.
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I think of Mary as an example of faith, not femininity. This quote, however, makes me wonder why the patriarchs completely ignore her. In Mary they have their perfect dream woman – she’s a mother (which they love) who never had sex (which they demonize). You’d think they’d be on this but no. Probably because it would make them look too Catholic (cue dramatic music).
And Julie Anne – can’t ever go wrong with Vaughan Williams (or most 20th century British choral music, from where I sit). But oh no – VW was apparently a distant nephew of Charles Darwin! I just looked it up, his mother was a Wedgwood. So maybe he’s really evil after all. 😉
If we may swap awesome, my choir sang this a few months ago. It’s by a much more obscure Englishman named Sir Edward Bairstow.
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I’m a complementarian and at least a partial Calvinist (depending on one’s definition of that word), so I know I’m not going to be a popular commenter. However, I’ve noticed with concern a tendency in the above thread and in some previous posts to equate Calvinists with abuse. To debate, even to debate strongly, Calvinist and Arminian ideas is in my opinion fine, but to imply that Calvinists are inherently spiritual and sexual abusers is insulting to me as it slanders a great many godly people that I personally know. It would, I think, help your attempts to debate other ideas to keep the Calvinist/Arminian debates limited to the Calvinist/Arminian threads and to separate it from some of the other topics. I know this has already been suggested above, but I just wanted to offer my two cents as an outsider (who admittedly often does not agree with the viewpoints of this blog) looking at your discussions.
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ia, I have difficulty using my Word Press account on Word Press blogs. You’d think if I had signed into Word Press from my blog, Word Press would recognize me at other blogs. Weird.”
And what is even weirder is that blogs that use discus sign me on using a defunct facebook page signon I have not used since early days of Facebook. I have no idea how to change it. I changed email addy because of my war with yahoo so I am seeing if that will change how I come up on your blog. This stuff is beyond me.
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Welcome, Cal!
And thank you for validating one of the most challenging aspects of moderating. I agree with you that all Calvinists are not abusers. Thanks for the reminder.
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The issue is “Calvinism”, not Calvinists, of whom there seems to be 347 flavors. Until a few months ago, I hadn’t read one page in The Institutes. Go to the Bible first, before you read systematic theology.
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Carmen,
347 flavors?
Not sure why anyone would want to lay claim to being a Calvinist when they can’t come up with a consensus to their Doctrine..
A large number of those abused were at the hands of the more Reformed, Hyper, YRR and New Calvinist Flavors. .
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Cal and Mark,
I think it’s important to delineate all the doctrines and ideologies within Christianity, wherever they show, that set up environments where abuse can more easily thrive.
Yes, some of the problems do lie in the traditional Calvinist doctrinal package, but the way that hyper-Cals grabbed/ran with it has layered issues that weren’t in the original, issues with which none but the most rigid trad Cals would agree.
The Independent Baptists and SBC also have an ideology/doctrinal system that has allowed abuse to thrive. I’m not knowledgeable about that corner, but it would be good if they could be delineated more clearly. Because the problem is that not only has the SBC been taken over by hyper-Cals but also that the most rigid of the Independents are blending with the SBC. Plus, if there were no underlying tendencies, SBC would not have been open to the authoritarian system that hyper-Cals promote.
ISTM good to remember what Brad and Cindy K have been pointing out: systems that allow abuse all look somewhat similar. So there are reasons why we see a blending of these subsystems and it would be helpful to build on our understanding of how abusive systems work by tracking back to the incorrect doctrines/ideologies in all the places they occur, rather than foist it all on one subsystem or another.
This way we might be able to avoid some of the infighting and it would def give us a broader view.
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Mark,
I can’t keep up with many people whose response becomes “that’s not what Calvinists believe”.
You are correct. The abuse is coming at the hands of the YRR/New Calvinists. Old Calvinism has been watered down from the original, which New Calvinists hold to very closely. Read The Institutes. Would love to say more, but Julie Anne has provided the Calvinism thread to discuss this 🙂
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“The Independent Baptists and SBC also have an ideology/doctrinal system that has allowed abuse to thrive. I’m not knowledgeable about that corner, but it would be good if they could be delineated more clearly”
Boy is that ever true. The IFB might take the cake. But what most people miss is that there is a doctrinal problem in the entire Protestant Evangelical mode of thinking when it comes to what is sin and sin itself. Something for another day.
The reason the Calvinist get the focus is because of the resurgence started back in the 70’s that has become very public over the last 15 years with the advent of social media. We just know more stories. The Calvinist resurgence used the internet quite deftly to grow the resurgence so it makes sense many would use the same medium to point out the consistent parade of abuses.
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Cal,
You gave yourself away with the Calvin/Arminian dichotomy. That false dichotomy has been used for years on pastor blogs to frame all doctrinal debate by Calvinists. I am not suggesting you mean anything nefarious when you frame it that way. It has probably just been presented that way to you as the norm. It isn’t. In fact, I had to look him up and do some reading. My take away is that Arminius is Calvin-lite in the wake of TULIP. Which I found most amusing and understood better why so many Calvinist YRR used that dichotomy to frame all debate.
I am not Arminian. I am a 0 point Calvinist. :o)
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All: Let’s bring the Calvin topic to the Calvin debate thread. I don’t want to lose the original direction of the article. It is very important to me especially as I see young women trapped in it.
Calvin debate thread: https://spiritualsoundingboard.com/2013/12/02/its-calvinism-free-for-all-off-the-top-of-your-head-part-2/
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I’m surprised Stacy hasn’t been here to post” But i’m not THAT kind of duck.”
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If I recall, both Kelly and Stacy were informed of the article last time around, so likely that happened again. But let’s face it, they didn’t get too far in their arguments here before, did they? And really, how can you back peddle on your own public words? Their own words and behavior show the rotten fruit. I didn’t have to embellish anything.
The proper response would be to apologize. Stacy knows it is the proper response. She wrote about it several years (and I quoted it earlier in the comments). Stacy and Kelly have behaved poorly publicly, so it’s time to publicly own up to it.
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Estelle said: “Re the kidnapped Nigerian girls, a relative is involved in Bible translation and works with the father of three of those girls, he teaches mathematics. Please pray. I am heartened by the international outrage over what has happened. Lord, be present with each young woman and bring them all home”.
Amen!
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Julie Anne, Cindy K
I think it would be fair to suggest that Spiritual Abusers have positioned themselves in their minds to be among the Spiritual “Elites” or modern day Pharisees. Whether I’m correct or not, I have tied “most” of the abuse to Doctrine.
When Doctrine is the catalyst, and when the “Abused” can identify that “Abusers” stand behind the most reckless form of Hyper Doctrine, the “Abused will begin to develop understanding and finally discover the Abusers motives are out of hand and find freedom.
Some of us may have friends and even family that embrace certain dialects that is part of the Hyper-Doctrine family
The Pharisees held the sinner and tax collector in bondage while rebuking Christ for not conforming to them. Kind of like what Hyper Abusers are doing today.
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“The proper response would be to apologize.”
But my guess is that they won’t, because Pharisees do not apologize. They simply look for bigger and better ways to persecute their victims for not abiding with them. The Bible and history prove this fact. Perhaps they might consider as their substitute word for the “p” word they currently use, the word — “perpetrator-al”. Now there’s a word.
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I have just heard from my relative that two of the sisters have been identified among the Nigerian girls shown in a video reciting the Koran. The third sister’s name is not on the list. Please hold them and their family in your prayers.
Here is Psalm 27 (CEV), amended to the situation.
You, LORD, are the light that can keep the girls safe.
May they not be afraid of anyone.
Please protect them, so that they have no fears.
Brutal people have attacked and done evil to them,
but they will stumble.
You say that fierce enemies may attack, but they will fall.
Even though armies may surround them, may they not be afraid;
war may break out, but may they trust You.
I ask only one thing, LORD:
Let them live in Your presence every day of their captivity,
that they may see Your goodness as they bring all their questions to you.
In this time of trouble, You will protect them.
You will hide them in your tent and keep them safe
on top of a mighty Rock.
You will let them defeat all of their enemies.
Then they will celebrate, as they enter your tent
with sacrifices and songs of praise.
Please listen when we pray!
Have pity. Answer our prayer.
My heart tells me to pray.
The girls are eager to see Your face, so don’t hide from them.
We are your servants, and you have helped us.
Don’t turn from us in anger.
You alone keep them safe. Don’t reject or desert them.
Even if they have been taken away from their fathers and mothers,
You will take care of them.
Teach us to follow, LORD,
and lead the rescuers on the right path
because of our enemies.
Don’t let them do to the girls what they want to do.
People tell lies and make terrible threats,
but we trust that the girls and their families will live
to see how kind you are.
Trust the LORD!
Be brave and strong
and trust the LORD.
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Could we make a list of people who denounced the word “patriarchy”, but not the idea, lately?
>Michael Farris. http://www.patheos.com/blogs/nolongerquivering/2014/06/farris-patriarchy-makes-kids-gay-and-atheists/
>Kevin “I am not a patriarchal-ist” Swanson.
>Kelly Crawford
>Stacy McDonald
Who else? I want to do a blog entry about this on my blog.
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You also may want to check what she’s written on her blog recently. Kelly Crawford. She says she’s against Quiverfull. I honestly think I can remember a past blog about that too but it’s probably gone.
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This is the problem about these ideologies. There are some who are so extreme in this ideology that it makes others look like they are not part of it. What you have to do is look at the full picture and how much of the ideologies she promotes. She is clearly part of The Homeschool Movement.
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