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Speaker 1: Understand the thinking atheist. It's not a person, it's a symbol,

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an idea.

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Speaker 2: The population of atheists this country is going through the.

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Speaker 1: Rule, rejecting faith, pursuing knowledge, challenging the sacred. If I

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tell the truth, it's because I tell the truth, not

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because I put my hand on a book and made

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a wish and working together for a more rational world.

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Speaker 2: Take the risk of thinking. Feel so much more happiness.

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Truth Usian wisdom will come to you that way.

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Speaker 1: Assume nothing, question everything, and start thinking. This is the

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Thinking Atheist podcast hosted by Seth Andrews.

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Speaker 2: With July Fast approaching Real Fast on July the eleventh,

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that's a Saturday from two to five, No Illusions and

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myself on stage in Cincinnati, and then the following day

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is the big ARC Encounter protest in Williamstown, Kentucky. Ken

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Ham's gonna love his special guests on Sunday as we

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go out midday and have a big protest right there

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at the entrance of his ARC Encounter and a bunch

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of other stuff coming up with Nanocon Baha kon the

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Freedom from Religion Foundation. We just announced the Unholy Trinity

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Tour with me and Matt Della Hunty and arn Raw.

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That's going to be in Fort Worth, Texas, August twenty ninth.

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Get the details on everything at the Thinkingatheist dot com

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slash events. There is video of this interview. That YouTube

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link is in the description box of the show. Joining

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me today a friend of mine and fellow ex vangelical.

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Her name is Promis Becklund, and we've been talking about

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the upcoming release which is finally released. It is a

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book called Gospel of Lies. Surviving and Resisting Evangelical Extremism Promise.

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So good to see you again, Welcome to the show.

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Speaker 3: Thanks for having me back again. I feel very honored.

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Speaker 2: You got pretty good ranking when it released. That had

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to feel good, right that did it feel really good?

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Speaker 3: It felt especially nice, obviously, like you want something that

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you do to be successful, but it felt really nice

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to see it taking over books like Toxic Empathy and

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you know JD Vance's pre orders for Communion, those kinds

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of things, because I just know that that means it's

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in a section where religious people are having to see

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Gospel of Lies, and I hope it sparked a little

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curiosity for them.

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Speaker 2: JD Vance has a book coming out called Communion. That

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sounds horrifying, horrified. Yes, that guy just leaves a bad

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taste in my mouth. I mean the whole thing does.

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But there's something uniquely bothering, kind of creepy about that. Gud.

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My wife calls it the spirit of ick. Does that

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resonate with you?

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Speaker 3: Chlems so good?

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Speaker 2: The spirit of ic?

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Speaker 3: Do you feel the spirit of ic? That's I'm going

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to use that from now on, because getting the ick

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is totally a thing. But I think when it comes

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to people like JD. Vance, there is just a general

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spirit of ick happening.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, okay, You and I recently co hosted again on

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a debate channel called The Line The Sunday Show where believers,

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I don't know spiritual people God defenders is maybe a

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better way to say it, because they're on the gamut.

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But they dial in and they give us all their

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reasons to believe in God and for three hours promise

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and I do our best to field. Some of the

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calls aren't bad, and others, yeah, are really bad. Validate

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me right? Really?

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Speaker 3: Oh yeah, there are some painful ones. And it is

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difficult because sometimes it's very hard to tell the difference

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between a sincere believer and an absolute trull because the

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arguments from somebody who is being genuine and honest are

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sometimes on par with somebody who's trying to just make

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a mockery of it and is not being honest and

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all of that, because the indoctrination can go so deep,

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I think that it turns people dumb. Basically.

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Speaker 2: Let me start with a few comments from that show.

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I just had to show these tow you. This is

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from the Sunday Show, which aired on the seventh of June.

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The comment from Ronald said, Seth and Promise are a

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great pairing and this was a great show. The hosts

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are smart, thoughtful, and don't engage in the shouting matches

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that have become so common. They shared the time well,

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ask insightful questions and covered a nice wide range of topics.

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Love to see them do another show. Look at us,

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look at us getting validated plea and then it was fun.

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Speaker 3: Hellowed by his comments, I've seen.

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Speaker 2: Promise is not sufficiently educated to handle a show like this.

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I know Catholics and Christians don't think each other are right.

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This is something that you said. He's like laughing my

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fucking ass off. What's question mark times two Okay. When

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I was growing up, Catholics were not Christians, at least

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in my home, you know, a fundy Protestant home where

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there was Christianity and there was Catholicism. So no, I mean,

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they weren't even cousins. That Catholics were a false faith.

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Speaker 3: I grew up being taught that Catholics are probably going

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to Hell and that we should be praying for them.

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So I hate to break it to the Catholics, but

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there is a lot of Christians out there who don't

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believe that you are quote true Catholics. And I hear

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from Catholics regularly that say, the reason I've fallen away

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is because they grew a Protestant instead of Catholic.

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Speaker 2: How much of that do you suspect? Is you being

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a woman because you didn't come after me? And I

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don't know. It's hard to really know, but you see

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a lot of that, right.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, it's very I mean, I honestly err on the

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side of caution, maybe more than I should. And I

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try not to assume that it's because I'm a woman,

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because it's so obvious so often that it is that

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I think I would just be really depressed if I

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went ahead and believed all the times that it's misogyny,

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that it really is that. But I mean, I think

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you noticed we've talked about this. We'll be talking and

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you know, you or Matt or somebody will be having

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a conversation with someone and you know, y'all will be

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starting the conversation off, and then I'll jump in at

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a certain point, which is how we sometimes do these calls,

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and suddenly that person one sentence out of my mouth,

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they can't handle it. They don't want to hear a

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word I have to say. And it's so obvious to

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me when it happens repeatedly. It's got to be because

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I'm a woman, that is the difference that's going on.

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And either that or these people just personally don't like me. However,

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most of them have never heard of me before, or

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so they come on the show, they call, they're happy

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to not happy, but they'll let they'll let a man

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talk for a while. As soon as a woman jumps

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in and says something, they're interrupting me or saying that

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I'm interrupting them, or that I'm being emotional. And that's

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just one sentence into the conversation.

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Speaker 2: You said in your book that you were aware that

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Jesus loved you at the age of three. I don't

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have a memory that young. Like I think I remember

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things when I was five, but I mean, at three,

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you had an understanding in some way of Jesus.

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Speaker 3: Absolutely. I know there's videos that exist from before that

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time that I don't remember, but I have actual, unique

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memories that aren't on video and stuff that I've recopted

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family and they're like, oh, yes, that did happen. But

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even before then, there's a video of me about two.

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I was two years old and it was Christmas time

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and I was so excited to be opening my presence

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and one of my parents, who was behind the camera,

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was going on and on, but what's the reason for

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Christmas promise? Before you can open more presents, you have

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to say it, you have to say And I'm like,

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I'm two years old, and so I'm trying and I'm going, uh, okay,

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and they're like, whose birthday is it? And I'm answering,

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It's Jesus's birthday And it's just this wild video. It

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goes on for quite a few minutes and the other

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parent is like, hey, she's like, let her open her presence.

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But that is how I was raised with this. Every

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single moment was supposed to prioritize the Christian belief and

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the Gospel and Jesus or Satan if you know, if

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somebody was sick, we were commanding the demons to leave,

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or you know, participating in spiritual warfare. But it was

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ingrained in my head from a very young age, so

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especially right when I started, you know, having memories that

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I can look back on. Those memories are things like

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saying that Jesus loves me, or that I love Jesus

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and feeling like I really felt like Jesus existed like

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an imaginary friend. I didn't actually grow up with an

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imaginary friend. A lot of my friends talk about, oh,

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I had an imaginary friend as a kid. I didn't.

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I had Jesus.

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Speaker 2: When you're in the church, it's charming little children, you know.

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Bring me the children and let them understand the love

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of Jesus. And so when they this is a true story.

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Promise people are going to think this is horseshit, But

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it's Oklahoma. I'm driving out of my neighborhood and at

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a house near the exit of the neighborhood, standing on

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the lawn are like three four kids and they're all

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super young, and they are holding up these little cardboard

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homemade signs that say honk if you love Jesus, and

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so they're shouting at the cars, Honk, honk if you

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love Jesus, honk for Jesus. And I had a moment

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of conflict because I was like, well, sweet, kids want

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me to honk the horn and it'll make them smile.

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But I don't love Jesus. I don't believe in Jesus,

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so I don't want to validate that. So like an asshole,

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I mean, I just drive right by as the kids

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are shouting in my window. But I see I see

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them as victims, right, because yeah, they're being told the

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answer before they're old enough to genuinely ask the questions.

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Would that be a fair way to phrase that promise?

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Speaker 3: And I just thought about that situation if I were

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to have been in it as a child. If you

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do honk, then I'm validated in my faith, and if

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you don't, then I'm also validated in my faith because

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I've been told over and over and over again that

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there are people that hate Jesus and they'll be offended

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just at the mention. And so either way, your faith

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is being bolstered by everything happening around you, because it's

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already been just you know, you've been instructed that if

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something goes in the category of bad, it's a sign

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that Satan is real. If it goes in the category

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of good, it's a sign of God. So yeah, it's

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it's wild how how deep indoctrination goes, and it just

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sets you up to continue to believe these things.

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Speaker 2: I was talking to No Illusions a few shows ago,

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and I am kim all right, if you could grab

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one of the lesser known and more alarming Bible stories

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to teach Christians like Sunday Christians, what would it be?

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And I think his was the time in the Old

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Testament where Moses wasn't able to see God's glory. So

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God said, look, you stand here, and I'll walk by,

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and you can see my ass, you can see my backside.

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But if I was to sit down with the young

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children and teach them the Bible, it would be hard

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for me not to go there to say, hey, there's

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crazy shit in here. So I guess I'll segue into

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now that you're out, is there a Bible story that

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most Sunday Christians aren't aware of that you would like

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for them to be aware of.

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Speaker 3: There are so many. I mean, in my book, I

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actually have a little section where I go through some

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of them, and I think, at least for me, I

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was aware of all the Bible stories, but I wasn't

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really paying attention. And there's, for whatever reason, one stands

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out to me is just so wild and hilarious because

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it sets us up for a lot more stories like

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this in the Bible. Is I call it the story

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Touched by a Foreskin, but it's where God gets super

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angry at Moses and decides that he wants to kill him,

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and Moses's wife somehow figures out and decides that the

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solution is to circumcise their son and touch the foreskin

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to Moses, and somehow this basically like protects him from

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God's wrath. And as we know, God really likes foreskins

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or hates them. I can't tell which in the Bible

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because he demands them over and over again, and that

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is just such a wild thing to me. There are

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you know, There's also like the story of the bald man,

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who the kids make fun of. The bald prophet and

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then a bear comes out and mauls them to death.

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I think it's like forty two kids or something that's

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crazy too, but that one where it's just like, imagine

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your god of the universe and that's what prevents you.

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First of all, imagine wanting to kill one of your career.

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That's already crazy, but then imagine a foreskin being what

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stops you.

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Speaker 2: There's a great resource called the Brick Testament. I think

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it used to be called the Brick Bible, and it

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displays literally in lego form, stories like these out of

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the Bible. And it's interesting because when you see it

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depicted in this way, it really brings home how crazy

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it is. And there is a lego depiction of David

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going into battle against the Philistines and slicing off two

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hundred Philistine foreskins and bringing them back to King Saul

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as a dowry for his daughter in marriage, and in

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lego you see this pile of plastic foreskins being counted out.

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It's crazy, promise crazy.

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Speaker 3: That is absolutely wild. Yeah, And what's funny, I wouldn't

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have been able. I wouldn't have been allowed to watch

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something like that as a kid. That would have been

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absolutely forbidden, and yet it's in the Bible, and that's

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they want to ban all kinds of books. But of

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course they want the Bible to be accessible to children

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at all times, and they're not talking about, well, maybe

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this part of the Bible is okay, and as partisan

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they want the whole Bible. They're available to kids anytime.

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Speaker 2: I can't get away with that. One more comment from

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our appearance together on the line it is uh Kakaweese said,

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I've tried, but I just can't stand seth. They comes

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across as someone who fell in love with his own

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voice decades ago and never looked back. And are there

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really no conservative atheists? And you and I were talking

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about humanist progressive values. I don't buy that all atheists

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subscribe to these radical left political views that's being pushed

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down our throats on all of these shows. I'm liberal too,

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but Jesus Christ, now, I don't think you and I

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said anything like atheists can't be conservative. I do tend

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to think. I mean, I've met some atheist conservatives, and

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a lot of them are they have some very tragic ideas.

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There's an atheist MAGA group and somehow they're supporting Donald Trump.

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I mean, atheism is not a guarantee of rationalism, but

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I do tend to think that while atheism isn't a

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world view, it opens the world where I'm probably going

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to be more humanist, solving human problems, pro science, you know,

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those types of things, pro LGBT people, pro liberal values.

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I tend to think that the reason that a lot

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of atheists lean more left, and this is true statistically,

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is because humanism is more progressive. And I know conservatives

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hate that, but I'm just I don't know what else

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to say in the question. I just want you to

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take this over promise progressive liberal atheists, conservative atheists.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, it makes a lot of sense. Reading the criticizing

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you in your voice was so confusing, and then I see, oh,

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they actually dislike him because of his political views.

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Speaker 2: So that actually, now that may be fair. That may

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be fair. Maybe I talk too much and it's all subjective.

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Maybe the tone of my voice of the cadence. Some

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people said I sound like a pastor. That turns them off.

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I get that. Some people say it sounds performative. He

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sounds too much like a radio DJ, which is strange

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since I did it for fifteen years. But I mean,

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if I'm not your cup of tea, I get it.

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Speaker 3: I get it right, promise well if that had been

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left alone as that comics or whatever. But to go

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on and say that about, you know, us being radical

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leftists is so funny to me. I think what I

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think is most likely is that when somebody specifically leaves

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religion and changes their mind in such a big way

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and then becomes whether it's progressive, Christian or atheist or

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whatever it may be, because you've actually had to examine

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what you believe and why and figure out if you

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have good reasons behind it. And I think that little

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bit of skeptic that desire to abandon dogma is what

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can lead people to a more progressive way of thinking

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and caring about fellow humans around you, because otherwise you

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are just kind of relying on dogma. And I've noticed,

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and I wonder if there are stats to back this,

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but it's a lot of the atheists that have kind

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of been lifelong atheists that are more susceptible to this

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right wing extremism or to be annoyed about us being

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radical leftists because to them, they don't understand the bigger picture,

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and they're more prone to dogma because they haven't questioned

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their own before.

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Speaker 2: I come out of a fundy faith where I was

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told what my position ought to be. I leave that

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faith and I say, okay, well, how do I feel

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about the death penalty? Now? I was pro Now I'm against,

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And that's more of a progressive value. I don't freak

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out about marijuana et cetera. Right, why should alcohol be

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legal and we'd not be legal? What's the big dust up?

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You know? I get into LGBT rights, that's an easy one,

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because the fundy faiths say almost actuals or sodomites. I

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get into whether or not foreign policy should be about

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America is God's country and we're superior. Does that make

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any sense? Well? No, we are all the human condition.

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I can love my country but also see the rest

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of the world as equally valuable. Right, I mean, time

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and time again, when I go down all of these

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I just think these are I think they're more humanistic,

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and I don't think I'm being defensive when I say that.

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Speaker 3: So many of the things that you have conservative conservatives

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in general in the US against things like abortion or

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gay gay rights, and now of course they've turned trans

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people into the the demon of the year. It requires

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dogmatic beliefs, It requires some big sky person telling you

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that you should be against this because if you actually

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examine reality and put things like well being and personal

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autonomy at the forefront and consent, which is totally anti

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religious extremism, if you put those things at the forefront,

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you're going to go towards a humanist perspective. That's that's

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what humanism ends up becoming as people that care about

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the well being of others, basically. And it is crazy

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to me to have when we get these phone calls,

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and you and I have taken quite a few of

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these together, people wanting to argue about morality with us.

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And there, you know, we have people calling in claiming

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that Catholicism is the most moral way to live your life,

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and they're supporting the Catholic institution, which is, you know,

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protecting predators all the time and hoarding wealth. And we'll

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get people calling in who end up it throughout the

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phone call, they end up defending slavery because instead of

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actually examining reality for themselves actually you know, deciding that

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they have values, they look to a two thousand year

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old text.

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Speaker 2: In Oklahoma, they recently barely passed a resolution a law

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of banning child marriage. Almost every Republican voted against that

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measure to ban child marriage, and the excuse was Mary

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in the Bible. And so I think we see that

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a more progressive position on that is one that is

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more tethered to human rights and the rights of children.

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Speaker 3: And I think part of the issue is that when

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you're a humanist, your morals can progress as the world

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around you changes and as we learn more so. Yes,

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it used to be much more acceptable to, first of all,

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to entertain marriages where consent wasn't happening. It was a

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property exchange. Now we've figured out as a society like, hey,

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that's actually not that's not conducive to a happy, healthy society.

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It's going against another person's personal autonomy. Children can't consent

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things like that. But again, it requires letting go of

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dogma and and moving towards progress.

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Speaker 2: I remember that guy on the line talking about Catholicism

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being pro woman, and I think we asked, like, why

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can't women be in the priesthood? Why does the Catholic

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Church ban women from leadership? And I don't remember what

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the answer was, But it was a tap dance. It

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was a game, a twister, right to defend the indefensible.

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Speaker 3: Well, we asked him why I couldn't be a priest

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and his answer goes. His answer was, well, you could

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be a nun.

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Speaker 2: There are other roles that you could feel as a woman.

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Promise yes.

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Speaker 3: Then we asked why a woman couldn't be pope, and

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he finally conceded that he didn't know, but he was

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sure there was a good reason behind it. And that's

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the blind trust, the blind faith, where instead of acknowledging

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that we were making really good points and that that

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is not equal rights, that is not something a woman

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should feel inspired by, they say, well no, because God

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has to be right. So I have to twist in

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turn and go against sense and logic in order to

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fit into this narrative.

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Speaker 2: And you brought up a great point about the Catholic Church,

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and I go back and forth on the Catholic Church.

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I to a degree do appreciate Pope Leo. He's pushing

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back against some of the oligarchy, but at the same

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time he's part of the oligarchy. I think the papal

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throne itself this gold gilded throne is worth seventeen eighteen

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twenty million dollars. So if you're looking at an institution

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that is supposed to be advocating for the poor, how

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do you defend a multi, multi, multi billion dollar tax

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free corporation with a twenty million dollar throne. And you

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made that point as well, right.

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Speaker 3: Yes, I mean if you are advocating for morality, and

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then you're turning to the Catholic Church where they are

405
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claiming to care on the values of the guy who

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said it's easier for a canal to go through the

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eye of a needle than for a Richmond to enter

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the Kingdom of heaven, and like you said, then they're

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sitting on golden thrones. The hypocrisy is just right there

410
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on display for everyone to see. And things like not

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allowing women in positions of leadership and not advocating for

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equal rights and recognizing all marriages and all of that.

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So it is sad how people will contort their views

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in order to agree with their religion.

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Speaker 2: When I come back, I'm going to talk to Promise

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about religious bigotry and discrimination and the attitudes about the other.

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We'll do it next. Speaking here with author promised Backland

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it is Pride month. I was a bigot. When I

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was an evangelical Christian, I didn't see it that way.

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But gay people are perverts, They perverted God's model, they

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are aberrant. I think they may be going to Hell right.

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They should be avoided. So I don't know how else

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to ask the question, but were you a were you

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a religious bigot? Promise?

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Speaker 3: I definitely was in a lot of ways. I was

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also really young. I left religion when I was about

427
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twenty five twenty six, and it was in my early twenties,

428
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kind of late teens, that I started actually even knowing

429
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that gay people exist. I was very sheltered and you know,

430
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didn't consume a lot of pop culture content other than

431
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Christian stuff, and so it wasn't until I started actually,

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you know, meeting gay couples or having gay friends that

433
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I had to start thinking all of this through. And

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I've always just I love people so much, and so

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I would get to know these amazing people and I

436
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was just scratching my head, like, wait, why am I

437
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supposed to be bothered by this? And that was distressing

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to me, and I felt really torn. I think the

439
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most my bigotry showed up in this kind of like

440
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all these poor people, I think they're probably sinning, but

441
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that's between them and God, and I'm sending to in

442
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all kinds of ways, and so you know, we'll all

443
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figure it out, and Jesus loves us, and I don't

444
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want to have to think about it, basically, but it

445
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was still a really condescending way of thinking. And but

446
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for me, a big part of starting to question my

447
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faith was that my values were exceeding that of my faith.

448
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So I was I was having so much love for

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people that I was told I shouldn't be loving towards

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And to me, being loving meant being accepting. It meant

451
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advocating for them to have equal rights like gay marriage.

452
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So that was one of my controversial moments as a Christian.

453
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I remember posting something celebratory when the Equal Marriage Act

454
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passed and got a lot of, you know, messages from

455
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Christians saying that that was really wrong of me and

456
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that I was promoting sin and all of that. But

457
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but for me, I just was like, I can't be

458
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more loving than God, right, so I must be on

459
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God's side about this.

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Speaker 2: You wrote in your book about another condescending attitude toward

461
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other people. When it came to warning others about Hell, right, well,

462
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you weren't necessarily saying you sinner, you wicked thing, you've

463
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abandoned God, you deserve to burn. It was considered, I mean,

464
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health teaching was considered an act of love, right for sure.

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Speaker 3: And that was also part of what led me to

466
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deconstructing is. I was very convinced that people around me

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were going to go to Hell because they didn't believe,

468
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and I wanted to figure out ways to convince them,

469
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and so I was trying to learn as much as

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I could. I was reading Lee Stroble all of that,

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and I thought it was very very important that I

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not just tell them, you know, hey, Hell, it's going

473
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to be real bad. You don't want to go there.

474
00:27:06,319 --> 00:27:08,359
I wanted to be able to convince them to not

475
00:27:08,440 --> 00:27:10,920
go there and how to go about that. But it

476
00:27:10,960 --> 00:27:16,799
was all falling apart very quickly. It was a huge

477
00:27:16,799 --> 00:27:20,119
part of my childhood was especially believing that people who

478
00:27:20,200 --> 00:27:24,720
were getting abortions or who were pro abortion, that they

479
00:27:24,799 --> 00:27:27,920
were actually evil and demonic and they were definitely going

480
00:27:27,960 --> 00:27:30,359
to Hell. And that's the time when I was a

481
00:27:30,519 --> 00:27:33,960
child that I was most heavily, you know, being judgmental

482
00:27:34,039 --> 00:27:38,400
and you know, wearing the life tape and carrying the

483
00:27:38,440 --> 00:27:42,680
weird signs and going to the protests and stuff. And

484
00:27:43,319 --> 00:27:46,200
it's sad to me that as a child I was

485
00:27:46,240 --> 00:27:47,920
taught to be hateful in that way.

486
00:27:48,640 --> 00:27:52,559
Speaker 2: You said the word demons scanning the horizon, I mean

487
00:27:52,920 --> 00:27:55,839
demon demons, we talking demons promise.

488
00:27:57,000 --> 00:27:57,160
Speaker 1: Oh.

489
00:27:57,240 --> 00:28:00,680
Speaker 3: I very much believed in demons just as much as

490
00:28:00,680 --> 00:28:04,400
I believed in God. And I was terrified all the

491
00:28:04,400 --> 00:28:06,359
time of them. I mean, if you think about it,

492
00:28:06,440 --> 00:28:08,920
you're a child. So children are constantly afraid of all

493
00:28:09,000 --> 00:28:12,799
kinds of stuff anyways, like a monster in your closet

494
00:28:13,039 --> 00:28:17,279
or whatever. But I remember going to sleepovers and not

495
00:28:17,319 --> 00:28:19,160
just struggling with you know, you go to sleepover and

496
00:28:19,160 --> 00:28:20,559
you're like, oh, I miss my mom and I want

497
00:28:20,559 --> 00:28:23,319
to go home. I was terrified that there might be

498
00:28:23,759 --> 00:28:26,240
demons that live in this person's house because they aren't

499
00:28:26,240 --> 00:28:28,319
as good of Christians as we are. And so now

500
00:28:28,319 --> 00:28:30,799
I have to stay up all night in spiritual warfare.

501
00:28:32,079 --> 00:28:35,319
And that was a huge part of childhood for me,

502
00:28:35,480 --> 00:28:38,920
is constantly feeling like I was warring against demons. And

503
00:28:38,960 --> 00:28:42,000
then on into my adulthood when I first started experiencing,

504
00:28:42,960 --> 00:28:44,480
or even just being able to put a name to it,

505
00:28:44,559 --> 00:28:49,119
really intense anxiety and my OCD was manifesting in new

506
00:28:49,119 --> 00:28:52,240
ways when it came to health issues or thinking that

507
00:28:52,279 --> 00:28:54,759
I had health issues that I didn't. And I was

508
00:28:54,799 --> 00:28:57,359
told by all of the adults and family members around

509
00:28:57,359 --> 00:28:59,759
me that I needed to go to war. I needed

510
00:28:59,759 --> 00:29:01,759
to get in my prayer clauset every day, I needed

511
00:29:01,799 --> 00:29:04,079
to be reading the Bible out loud, and I needed

512
00:29:04,079 --> 00:29:07,599
to be commanding these demons of depression and anxiety to leave.

513
00:29:08,119 --> 00:29:12,039
I wasn't encouraged to take the medication that I was given.

514
00:29:12,079 --> 00:29:15,000
I wasn't encouraged to talk to a therapist about any

515
00:29:15,039 --> 00:29:17,279
of this. In fact, I was told to go to

516
00:29:17,359 --> 00:29:19,039
deliverance sessions instead.

517
00:29:19,559 --> 00:29:22,720
Speaker 2: So an anti science home, I mean, did that lean

518
00:29:22,759 --> 00:29:26,119
into vaccines or the rejection of vaccines? Right? Just pray

519
00:29:26,200 --> 00:29:27,319
and God will protect you.

520
00:29:28,000 --> 00:29:30,960
Speaker 3: I didn't experience the anti vaccine side of things. I

521
00:29:31,000 --> 00:29:33,559
think that is now the position of a lot of

522
00:29:33,559 --> 00:29:36,920
my family members. I think I was lucky and that

523
00:29:36,960 --> 00:29:39,240
I was born to such young parents that they just

524
00:29:39,359 --> 00:29:41,960
went with whatever the doctors were saying at the time.

525
00:29:42,400 --> 00:29:45,960
But we definitely ended up going very anti science very quickly.

526
00:29:46,119 --> 00:29:50,039
I was homeschooled, as I said, using Christian curriculum, and

527
00:29:50,079 --> 00:29:52,839
that included you know, Kent Hovind. At one point I

528
00:29:52,880 --> 00:29:55,440
was being taught dinosaurs didn't exist at all. Then I'm

529
00:29:55,440 --> 00:29:58,160
being told that they existed and they walked alongside of us.

530
00:29:59,119 --> 00:30:02,359
Anytime we did happened to go to a secular museum

531
00:30:02,400 --> 00:30:05,000
as we would call it, I was being told that

532
00:30:05,359 --> 00:30:07,960
it was full of lies. This is the agenda from

533
00:30:08,039 --> 00:30:12,000
the enemy. There are demonic scientists out there who want

534
00:30:12,039 --> 00:30:16,720
to fool us and the big lie of evolution. I

535
00:30:16,759 --> 00:30:20,279
even went to a school that had the word science

536
00:30:20,359 --> 00:30:23,119
in it, like a Christian homeschool co op school where

537
00:30:23,160 --> 00:30:25,599
you'd go once a week, and they claim that they're

538
00:30:25,640 --> 00:30:28,839
all about science, and the whole thing was just creationism,

539
00:30:29,240 --> 00:30:32,720
which as we know, is extremely anti science. And I've

540
00:30:32,759 --> 00:30:36,720
watched how over time that has leached into family members'

541
00:30:36,759 --> 00:30:42,480
lives and especially came to fruition during COVID nineteen, which.

542
00:30:42,279 --> 00:30:44,839
Speaker 2: Takes us back to the rights of a child to

543
00:30:45,000 --> 00:30:48,440
have a proper education. There's some tragic videos showing can't

544
00:30:48,480 --> 00:30:53,839
Hoven younger creationism. He is in a church auditorium with

545
00:30:54,000 --> 00:30:57,680
very young kids, and they called him doctor Dino, which

546
00:30:57,720 --> 00:31:00,720
is fun. What children don't like dinosaurs? So they come

547
00:31:00,799 --> 00:31:05,319
in and this adult expert teaches them that. I think

548
00:31:05,480 --> 00:31:07,960
his thing. Was it humans and dinosaurs lived at the

549
00:31:07,960 --> 00:31:12,359
same time or was that ken Ham or both? I

550
00:31:12,359 --> 00:31:18,079
can't remember, but holy shit, you know, and you know

551
00:31:18,119 --> 00:31:20,000
now I look back and I'm like, as a child

552
00:31:20,079 --> 00:31:23,799
that I have a right to properly understand the world,

553
00:31:24,240 --> 00:31:27,119
which gets us into a weird spot because you don't

554
00:31:27,160 --> 00:31:30,680
want other people raising your kids, right. Parents have a

555
00:31:30,759 --> 00:31:32,960
right to be able to guardians have a right to

556
00:31:33,000 --> 00:31:35,119
raise their kids, but don't kids have a right to

557
00:31:35,160 --> 00:31:37,880
be raised correctly. I don't even know how to solve

558
00:31:37,920 --> 00:31:40,119
that problem. Promise. I know.

559
00:31:40,359 --> 00:31:43,039
Speaker 3: It's it's funny you say that because I remember growing

560
00:31:43,119 --> 00:31:45,559
up my mom would tell people would ask why are

561
00:31:45,559 --> 00:31:48,599
you homeschooling your kids? And my mom would always say, well,

562
00:31:48,599 --> 00:31:51,000
because I don't want someone else raising them. I want

563
00:31:51,000 --> 00:31:53,519
to be the one that's influencing them the most instead

564
00:31:53,559 --> 00:31:56,200
of sending them off. Which is a really privileged position

565
00:31:56,319 --> 00:31:58,119
to be able to say that you can stay home

566
00:31:58,279 --> 00:32:01,359
and homeschool your children. I think I was really lucky

567
00:32:01,359 --> 00:32:04,559
and that my mom had. She was educated. In fact,

568
00:32:04,640 --> 00:32:08,000
she was a first grade teacher before she had children,

569
00:32:08,160 --> 00:32:11,599
so there was at least that much. However, then you

570
00:32:11,640 --> 00:32:16,720
bring in these curriculums that are absolutely designed to indoctrinate.

571
00:32:16,799 --> 00:32:20,200
The point of those textbooks was not to give me

572
00:32:21,319 --> 00:32:24,119
an education that would set me up for success in

573
00:32:24,160 --> 00:32:27,440
the real world. It was specifically to quote protect me

574
00:32:27,839 --> 00:32:31,319
from the real world and to make sure I had

575
00:32:31,359 --> 00:32:34,720
a firm foundation in Christianity, which meant rejecting a lot

576
00:32:34,720 --> 00:32:38,160
of basic facts about the world, like even just the

577
00:32:38,200 --> 00:32:39,799
age of the Earth. So I grew up thinking that

578
00:32:39,839 --> 00:32:42,640
the Earth was about six thousand years old and thinking

579
00:32:42,640 --> 00:32:46,400
that anybody who said otherwise was either deceived or they

580
00:32:46,440 --> 00:32:50,799
were a deceiver. And so yeah, I think there's a

581
00:32:50,839 --> 00:32:54,799
fine line between wanting to allow for freedom and for

582
00:32:55,200 --> 00:32:58,839
people to raise families how they want to raise their family,

583
00:32:59,279 --> 00:33:01,839
but also there has to be a standard for education.

584
00:33:02,039 --> 00:33:04,440
And I don't know if that looks like laws about

585
00:33:04,839 --> 00:33:07,400
what curriculum you can use. I don't know if it

586
00:33:07,440 --> 00:33:11,720
looks like better testing, but I do think there have

587
00:33:11,880 --> 00:33:13,960
to be regulations around things like that. I live in

588
00:33:14,000 --> 00:33:18,559
Finland now and they have very strict regulations. When it

589
00:33:18,599 --> 00:33:21,079
comes to things like homeschooling or even the idea of

590
00:33:21,160 --> 00:33:24,960
a Christian school, they have to use the same curriculum

591
00:33:25,319 --> 00:33:27,079
that the public schools are using.

592
00:33:27,480 --> 00:33:31,920
Speaker 2: What's the attitude in Finland about us? In the United States?

593
00:33:32,319 --> 00:33:34,240
How are people talking about us there?

594
00:33:35,519 --> 00:33:38,319
Speaker 3: I can't obviously speak for all fans, but the general

595
00:33:39,240 --> 00:33:43,359
vibe is that it's an absolute joke. And I what

596
00:33:43,440 --> 00:33:46,359
I hear a lot is I'm constantly being asked by

597
00:33:47,119 --> 00:33:51,240
my finished friends and family, how is this even happening?

598
00:33:51,720 --> 00:33:53,799
How are people letting this happen? How have you guys

599
00:33:53,880 --> 00:33:56,960
let it get to this point? Who is even acting

600
00:33:57,000 --> 00:33:59,799
this way? So here, I'm kind of this circus freak,

601
00:34:00,000 --> 00:34:01,359
and they find out that I grew up in an

602
00:34:01,359 --> 00:34:05,480
evangelical home because I don't think they realize how pervasive

603
00:34:05,640 --> 00:34:07,400
it is. I think they think it really is this

604
00:34:07,519 --> 00:34:09,599
fringe group, and so they're like, well, how has it

605
00:34:09,639 --> 00:34:13,440
taken over so much? They don't understand that evangelical culture

606
00:34:14,079 --> 00:34:17,880
is almost a part of American life at this point.

607
00:34:17,920 --> 00:34:22,719
It is taken over in so many states, and it's

608
00:34:22,840 --> 00:34:26,360
you know, you can see people on street corners preaching

609
00:34:26,400 --> 00:34:29,559
all the time. You see there's like fifteen churches to

610
00:34:29,599 --> 00:34:33,239
choose from in every little town, and it's not the

611
00:34:33,280 --> 00:34:36,320
same here, and it's hard for Finns to understand because

612
00:34:36,360 --> 00:34:39,400
they have I think it's seventy percent of people here

613
00:34:39,880 --> 00:34:43,960
are a part of the Lutheran Church, but only thirty

614
00:34:44,000 --> 00:34:46,760
percent of Finish people even believe that God exists. So

615
00:34:46,840 --> 00:34:50,400
to them, religion isn't actually about these like deeply held beliefs.

616
00:34:50,400 --> 00:34:54,320
It's more about traditional culture and and the Lutheran Church here.

617
00:34:54,519 --> 00:34:56,719
You know, during Pride month they have like big rainbow

618
00:34:56,760 --> 00:34:59,280
flags out and everything, so it's much more progressive. It

619
00:34:59,320 --> 00:35:01,199
is not the same, and so I think there's a

620
00:35:01,280 --> 00:35:05,079
lack of understanding. How could you guys let this happen?

621
00:35:05,199 --> 00:35:09,760
Speaker 2: Basically, there's a common argument when people visit my comments section.

622
00:35:10,400 --> 00:35:13,039
I like Seth when he talks religion, but I tune

623
00:35:13,079 --> 00:35:16,519
out when he talks politics. But how can you divorce

624
00:35:16,599 --> 00:35:19,400
the two in this country? Because if you are raised,

625
00:35:19,480 --> 00:35:25,840
especially in a fundamentalist, evangelical, dominionist faith, I mean we

626
00:35:25,880 --> 00:35:29,599
were trained as kids to go out be soldiers in

627
00:35:29,679 --> 00:35:33,360
God's army. We want you to spread the gospel and

628
00:35:33,559 --> 00:35:37,000
change hearts and attitudes and run for office and be

629
00:35:37,079 --> 00:35:40,679
a part of you know, godifying all of our laws

630
00:35:40,719 --> 00:35:44,400
to make us more one nation under God, to save America,

631
00:35:44,760 --> 00:35:48,239
so one bleeds into the other. I'm often struck by

632
00:35:48,280 --> 00:35:51,199
how people think, well, I can talk religion in the

633
00:35:51,280 --> 00:35:54,000
United States, but I shouldn't talk politics. It makes no

634
00:35:54,119 --> 00:35:54,639
sense to me.

635
00:35:56,239 --> 00:35:58,039
Speaker 3: I get told the same thing, And it's so funny

636
00:35:58,039 --> 00:36:00,639
to me because every now and and I will make

637
00:36:00,719 --> 00:36:04,239
a blatantly political post where I'll mention someone like Trump

638
00:36:04,320 --> 00:36:07,800
or something, and I'll inevitably have people show up and say,

639
00:36:08,119 --> 00:36:10,519
why are you talking about politics. I'm not here for that,

640
00:36:11,280 --> 00:36:14,079
And I always say, well, I've messed up somewhere then,

641
00:36:14,199 --> 00:36:19,320
because me even creating this account and talking about these

642
00:36:19,360 --> 00:36:24,599
things and writing a book where the tagline is resisting

643
00:36:24,639 --> 00:36:28,880
evangelical extremism, that is political. You're right, you absolutely cannot

644
00:36:28,880 --> 00:36:33,079
separate the two in the US, and me criticizing evangelicalism

645
00:36:33,599 --> 00:36:38,519
is a direct result of the Christian nationalism that's forming

646
00:36:38,559 --> 00:36:40,719
in the US and how I grew up under it.

647
00:36:41,239 --> 00:36:44,320
So it's wild to me when people think that those

648
00:36:44,320 --> 00:36:47,800
things aren't almost one and the same. At this point,

649
00:36:48,159 --> 00:36:48,480
in the.

650
00:36:48,559 --> 00:36:53,159
Speaker 2: Subtitle of your book, you just have the words evangelical extremism.

651
00:36:53,199 --> 00:36:55,559
There are some who would say they're the same thing.

652
00:36:56,119 --> 00:36:59,000
If you're an evangelical, you're an extremist. How would you

653
00:36:59,039 --> 00:36:59,639
respond to that?

654
00:37:00,360 --> 00:37:04,960
Speaker 3: It feels that way a lot. I never I never

655
00:37:05,159 --> 00:37:07,840
like to get into the game where you're saying everyone

656
00:37:07,960 --> 00:37:12,800
always never this that. So there's there are exceptions to everything.

657
00:37:13,719 --> 00:37:19,039
But there is this specific brand of American evangelicalism that

658
00:37:19,199 --> 00:37:22,519
I believe is extreme at its core. The very idea

659
00:37:22,559 --> 00:37:26,119
that you are called to evangelize to convert people, which

660
00:37:26,159 --> 00:37:30,079
is a huge part of evangelicalism. It's in the name

661
00:37:31,000 --> 00:37:34,199
that entire people groups are going to hell if they

662
00:37:34,280 --> 00:37:37,159
don't believe exactly as you do and live the lifestyle

663
00:37:37,199 --> 00:37:40,480
that you think is appropriate or that you think your

664
00:37:40,519 --> 00:37:44,440
God thinks is appropriate. That is an extreme position, and

665
00:37:44,559 --> 00:37:46,559
I find that to be extremism.

666
00:37:46,760 --> 00:37:49,159
Speaker 2: I'm going to come back to women in the Bible.

667
00:37:49,400 --> 00:37:52,000
Your former handle or the one that you still use,

668
00:37:52,079 --> 00:37:56,280
I think is what promise it's.

669
00:37:56,199 --> 00:37:59,119
Speaker 3: Eve was Framed. That was when I first started talking

670
00:37:59,159 --> 00:38:01,599
about all of this publicly. I didn't want to share

671
00:38:01,639 --> 00:38:04,360
my name. I thought I could somehow stay anonymous, and

672
00:38:04,440 --> 00:38:06,039
so I went with Eve was framed.

673
00:38:06,199 --> 00:38:12,119
Speaker 2: Okay, so a woman in fundamentalism and a woman outside

674
00:38:12,159 --> 00:38:16,840
of fundamentalism. Can you think of the first or one

675
00:38:16,880 --> 00:38:18,920
of the first times in your life that you, as

676
00:38:18,960 --> 00:38:23,159
a woman felt or did something that your church would

677
00:38:23,159 --> 00:38:27,639
have considered transgressive, like a liberating moment where you were like,

678
00:38:28,079 --> 00:38:29,920
you know what, I'm a woman and I'm going to

679
00:38:29,960 --> 00:38:31,679
say and do it anyway, and I don't care what

680
00:38:31,719 --> 00:38:33,760
religion thinks. Can you think of an example.

681
00:38:34,239 --> 00:38:37,800
Speaker 3: It actually happened when I was still in the church.

682
00:38:38,719 --> 00:38:41,880
I was nineteen years old and I had been married

683
00:38:42,280 --> 00:38:45,320
very young because that was part of the purity culture

684
00:38:45,360 --> 00:38:49,400
and all of that, and the marriage was so bad

685
00:38:49,599 --> 00:38:52,079
that Eve and I had figured out it was dangerous

686
00:38:52,119 --> 00:38:54,039
for me to stay in it at this point, and

687
00:38:54,199 --> 00:38:57,039
I was like, I value my own life. I have

688
00:38:57,119 --> 00:38:58,320
to leave, I have to get out of this. I

689
00:38:58,320 --> 00:39:01,079
will not do this the rest of my life. And

690
00:39:01,280 --> 00:39:04,800
I remember going to my family in tears saying that

691
00:39:04,840 --> 00:39:08,039
I needed to file for divorce. And one of the

692
00:39:08,039 --> 00:39:10,199
first things being said to me was, well, what is

693
00:39:10,239 --> 00:39:13,360
the church going to think about you? And that was

694
00:39:13,400 --> 00:39:15,920
the response from then on is just, well, you have

695
00:39:15,960 --> 00:39:17,639
to call it an annulment, then we can't call it

696
00:39:17,679 --> 00:39:19,679
a divorce, and I kept saying, no, I'm calling it

697
00:39:19,719 --> 00:39:22,719
a divorce. I am getting a divorce. I was very

698
00:39:22,719 --> 00:39:24,760
married and now I don't want to be married anymore

699
00:39:24,800 --> 00:39:27,320
because it is harmful to my well being and it

700
00:39:27,360 --> 00:39:30,079
is not good for this marriage to continue. And that

701
00:39:30,159 --> 00:39:31,719
was one of the first times I had like this

702
00:39:31,760 --> 00:39:33,800
little fire in me where I was like, I don't care.

703
00:39:33,920 --> 00:39:36,400
And my church that I had grown up in for

704
00:39:36,559 --> 00:39:38,679
most of my life, the people, the leaders around me

705
00:39:38,719 --> 00:39:41,119
that knew me since I was a little girl, they

706
00:39:41,159 --> 00:39:43,559
had all basically rejected me for this in one way

707
00:39:43,599 --> 00:39:45,800
or another. In fact, they had had my ex husband

708
00:39:45,840 --> 00:39:48,320
come up front on a Sunday morning so they could

709
00:39:48,360 --> 00:39:51,440
all pray for him. And meanwhile I wasn't even allowed

710
00:39:51,480 --> 00:39:53,480
to move back home. And I remember sleeping on friends'

711
00:39:53,519 --> 00:39:56,519
couches and I found another church that was more progressive

712
00:39:56,559 --> 00:40:00,960
that I started going to, and that was one of

713
00:40:00,960 --> 00:40:03,239
the first little moments I felt empowered. But that was

714
00:40:03,280 --> 00:40:05,199
still as a Christian, and I ended, you know, I

715
00:40:05,239 --> 00:40:08,119
got some apologies and all of that. But I think

716
00:40:08,239 --> 00:40:11,960
after that when I first started feeling empowered is I

717
00:40:12,000 --> 00:40:14,920
remember moving in with a boyfriend when we weren't married,

718
00:40:16,280 --> 00:40:20,320
and that was like this wild you harlot, allow.

719
00:40:20,360 --> 00:40:25,519
Speaker 2: You, harlot. Oh my god, you're shacking up. You're living

720
00:40:25,559 --> 00:40:26,239
in sin.

721
00:40:26,320 --> 00:40:29,239
Speaker 3: Promise terrible, absolutely to.

722
00:40:29,320 --> 00:40:34,400
Speaker 2: Well, let's talk about sexuality inside and outside of the church.

723
00:40:34,599 --> 00:40:37,559
We were taught, I mean, my sisters were taught that

724
00:40:37,679 --> 00:40:43,280
women are less sexually activated than men. Like for men

725
00:40:43,360 --> 00:40:47,159
it was more of an impulse, and for women it

726
00:40:47,199 --> 00:40:51,239
was more of a I don't know, obligations, not the word,

727
00:40:51,519 --> 00:40:53,960
but are you you get the spirit of where I'm going?

728
00:40:54,840 --> 00:40:57,119
Speaker 3: Yes, I mean I was actually taught that for men

729
00:40:57,280 --> 00:41:01,840
it was a need and basic women we were special

730
00:41:01,880 --> 00:41:04,480
because we could fulfill that need. But I was also

731
00:41:04,519 --> 00:41:07,679
taught if you don't fulfill that need and your husband

732
00:41:08,239 --> 00:41:11,519
goes outside of the bounds of marriage, that's basically your fault.

733
00:41:11,639 --> 00:41:14,239
Like they're still kind of responsible, but it could have

734
00:41:14,280 --> 00:41:17,920
been prevented if you were doing your job. Basically, I

735
00:41:18,079 --> 00:41:21,760
was never taught that women can even experience pleasure. I

736
00:41:21,920 --> 00:41:25,840
wasn't taught that women even have a sex drive. It

737
00:41:25,880 --> 00:41:28,920
was all about the man, and it was you know,

738
00:41:29,039 --> 00:41:31,840
they use these words and talk about this beautiful oneness

739
00:41:31,880 --> 00:41:34,440
and this connection and all this, and that's what you're

740
00:41:34,440 --> 00:41:36,760
supposed to get out of it, but it was like

741
00:41:37,599 --> 00:41:42,880
men need water and food and sex. Basically nothing was

742
00:41:42,920 --> 00:41:47,519
said about women being any kind of sexual beings at all.

743
00:41:47,599 --> 00:41:49,599
Men were sexual and women could fulfill that.

744
00:41:50,000 --> 00:41:52,079
Speaker 2: I think one of the ways that it was framed.

745
00:41:52,079 --> 00:41:54,119
I don't know if this is religious in nature, but

746
00:41:54,199 --> 00:41:57,360
it was women need a reason to have sex, but

747
00:41:57,400 --> 00:41:59,599
men just need a place. I don't know if you

748
00:41:59,639 --> 00:42:00,920
ever heard that one promise.

749
00:42:01,400 --> 00:42:02,039
Speaker 3: I've heard that.

750
00:42:02,639 --> 00:42:02,880
Speaker 1: Yeah.

751
00:42:03,159 --> 00:42:07,400
Speaker 3: Oh, that was very much perpetuated by the purity culture

752
00:42:07,400 --> 00:42:09,880
that I grew up, and it led to me being

753
00:42:09,920 --> 00:42:14,199
in situations that were extremely abusive. And I hear from

754
00:42:14,239 --> 00:42:16,639
women all the time that have been in these relationships

755
00:42:16,679 --> 00:42:20,239
where they were being abused and it was very coercive.

756
00:42:20,360 --> 00:42:24,079
And it's really sad how that plays out. But that's

757
00:42:24,119 --> 00:42:26,239
what happens when you don't teach consent, when you don't

758
00:42:26,280 --> 00:42:28,199
even value consent, and you have a god that doesn't

759
00:42:28,280 --> 00:42:31,800
value consent, that plays out in every area of life.

760
00:42:31,920 --> 00:42:34,960
Speaker 2: Is that the reason you got married so young? I mean, right,

761
00:42:35,119 --> 00:42:38,280
it is better for someone to marry than to have

762
00:42:38,400 --> 00:42:41,880
lust in their heart. I can't remember I'm paraphrasing the verse.

763
00:42:41,920 --> 00:42:43,719
I'm sure I butchered it is that the reason you

764
00:42:43,760 --> 00:42:44,880
were still a teenager.

765
00:42:45,639 --> 00:42:50,880
Speaker 3: I was taught very early on that getting married would

766
00:42:50,880 --> 00:42:56,039
be the first step in fulfilling my calling. That if

767
00:42:56,159 --> 00:42:58,000
God was going to use me to do anything, I

768
00:42:58,039 --> 00:43:02,280
basically needed to get married first. And I'm either under

769
00:43:02,400 --> 00:43:05,559
my dad's rule or I'm under my husband's rule. And

770
00:43:05,599 --> 00:43:07,000
so if you want to get out of the house,

771
00:43:07,079 --> 00:43:10,000
if you want to have a career of any sort,

772
00:43:10,079 --> 00:43:13,079
even if it's within the church, I was told I

773
00:43:13,119 --> 00:43:14,880
was called to be a worship leader, so in order

774
00:43:14,920 --> 00:43:17,719
to begin my ministry, I needed to come under the

775
00:43:17,760 --> 00:43:21,320
covering of my husband. And I was also taught just

776
00:43:21,480 --> 00:43:26,000
ridiculous things about like crushes are not okay. That's cheating

777
00:43:26,079 --> 00:43:29,559
on your future husband. Dating is not okay. You're supposed

778
00:43:29,559 --> 00:43:31,880
to court. So basically you're supposed to ask God, is

779
00:43:31,920 --> 00:43:34,000
this who I'm supposed to marry. Turns out, when you're

780
00:43:34,000 --> 00:43:36,320
a teenager and you have a crush on someone like

781
00:43:36,360 --> 00:43:39,559
you're going to you're gonna think that that means God

782
00:43:39,599 --> 00:43:41,920
wants you to marry that person, because why else would

783
00:43:41,960 --> 00:43:44,679
you feel so strongly, And turns out, when that person

784
00:43:44,760 --> 00:43:47,119
also has a big crush on you, they're going to

785
00:43:47,199 --> 00:43:49,079
be like yep, God told me I'm supposed to marry

786
00:43:49,119 --> 00:43:53,440
you too, So that was you know, it shows how

787
00:43:53,719 --> 00:43:59,360
there's no conversations about picking a partner that you're compatible with.

788
00:43:59,400 --> 00:44:01,519
There's nothing about like, hey, maybe get to know each

789
00:44:01,559 --> 00:44:03,760
other for a couple of years and see how your

790
00:44:03,760 --> 00:44:08,119
relationship dynamic plays out. There's no conversations about what kind

791
00:44:08,159 --> 00:44:10,000
of life do you want to live together? Where do

792
00:44:10,079 --> 00:44:11,880
you want to where do you want to live, what

793
00:44:11,920 --> 00:44:13,320
do you want it? Do you want to have kids?

794
00:44:13,320 --> 00:44:15,719
Do you not? Because your life is mapped out for

795
00:44:15,800 --> 00:44:18,360
you and you're supposed to just follow that and basically

796
00:44:18,400 --> 00:44:21,599
go under someone else's covering on that journey. And I

797
00:44:22,639 --> 00:44:24,639
was very independent. I wanted to be independent, so I

798
00:44:24,639 --> 00:44:26,079
was like, I guess that means I'm supposed to get

799
00:44:26,119 --> 00:44:29,519
married young. And I had parents and religious leaders telling

800
00:44:29,519 --> 00:44:31,679
me they felt God was calling me to get married

801
00:44:31,719 --> 00:44:34,559
young because I was so mature for my age, which

802
00:44:34,639 --> 00:44:36,920
that's just I was the oldest child in a pastor's family.

803
00:44:37,559 --> 00:44:38,960
That was just trauma playing out.

804
00:44:39,239 --> 00:44:42,840
Speaker 2: No, that's it's a great excuse to you know, the

805
00:44:42,920 --> 00:44:45,760
Lord is saying that I need to that we should

806
00:44:45,840 --> 00:44:48,480
not see each other because he has other plans for me.

807
00:44:49,239 --> 00:44:53,400
And it's kind of an ingenious way out or how

808
00:44:53,440 --> 00:44:57,320
creepy is that to say God told me I'm your destiny,

809
00:44:57,920 --> 00:45:01,000
Because what is the supposed part ander's supposed to say

810
00:45:01,039 --> 00:45:03,880
to that, if they don't agree to be your partner,

811
00:45:03,960 --> 00:45:07,199
what they're violating what God wanted? It seems like kind

812
00:45:07,239 --> 00:45:11,480
of a scamp. Purity culture exists in many forms, but

813
00:45:11,559 --> 00:45:13,760
it certainly exists within the church. I'm going to ask

814
00:45:13,760 --> 00:45:18,360
Promise about her experience with true love weights and purity culture. Next,

815
00:45:25,480 --> 00:45:31,159
speaking here with Promised Backland, who is an exvangelical and author,

816
00:45:31,280 --> 00:45:35,760
did you take the True Love Weights abstinence pledge when

817
00:45:35,760 --> 00:45:36,360
you were young?

818
00:45:37,119 --> 00:45:38,480
Speaker 3: Yes, I had a ring.

819
00:45:39,199 --> 00:45:41,639
Speaker 2: Would you describe it? For everybody? I set you up?

820
00:45:41,800 --> 00:45:44,920
But I didn't describe it? What's true love weights?

821
00:45:44,960 --> 00:45:49,000
Speaker 3: Sure? True love weights for me. I remember hearing about

822
00:45:49,039 --> 00:45:51,760
this first from Rebecca Saint James, who was a famous

823
00:45:51,800 --> 00:45:54,000
Christian artist at the time. She was kind of supposed

824
00:45:54,039 --> 00:45:58,920
to be like the Christian Alanis morseet slash Britney Spears

825
00:45:59,000 --> 00:46:02,320
slash you know, Christina Aguilera. She was supposed to, you know,

826
00:46:02,440 --> 00:46:06,440
take on that role. And I was obsessed with her,

827
00:46:06,480 --> 00:46:09,639
and so she had this song. I think it was

828
00:46:09,679 --> 00:46:12,039
called I Will Wait or something like that, And the

829
00:46:12,079 --> 00:46:15,599
whole teaching was basically that we are called to save

830
00:46:15,760 --> 00:46:20,480
ourselves for marriage. For some that meant just virginity. For me,

831
00:46:20,880 --> 00:46:23,840
I was taught that meant saving myself in every way.

832
00:46:23,960 --> 00:46:28,199
No hand holding, no kissing, no crushes. I was supposed

833
00:46:28,239 --> 00:46:32,119
to basically act as though I was married to someone already,

834
00:46:32,280 --> 00:46:34,360
even though I wasn't in a relationship. So I was

835
00:46:34,360 --> 00:46:37,719
supposed to to behave at all times and not let

836
00:46:37,719 --> 00:46:41,599
my heart wander, not have physical contact, not even be

837
00:46:41,760 --> 00:46:45,039
alone in a room with a boy, because that could

838
00:46:45,239 --> 00:46:49,920
lead to who knows what. And so what we had

839
00:46:49,920 --> 00:46:53,559
were these rings, and mine my ring specifically said for

840
00:46:53,679 --> 00:46:56,519
you I wait, because when I got married then we

841
00:46:56,559 --> 00:46:59,239
had it engraved with for you I waited. We just

842
00:46:59,280 --> 00:47:01,480
added the D on to the end. And that was

843
00:47:01,480 --> 00:47:04,679
supposed to be like some romantic thing. But I look

844
00:47:04,719 --> 00:47:07,559
back now and I think it is so creepy that

845
00:47:07,599 --> 00:47:10,159
they had a bunch of twelve year old girls walking

846
00:47:10,159 --> 00:47:15,039
around wearing rings to signify, to give off the message

847
00:47:15,079 --> 00:47:18,880
that we were sexually pure and waiting on our husbands.

848
00:47:19,119 --> 00:47:22,000
Speaker 2: I did a speech about purity culture where I showed

849
00:47:22,039 --> 00:47:26,800
examples of these, talk about creepy wedding ceremonies where dads

850
00:47:26,840 --> 00:47:30,320
would take twelve year old girls in tiny wedding dresses

851
00:47:30,360 --> 00:47:32,960
and they would bring them into a ballroom and they

852
00:47:32,960 --> 00:47:38,880
would exchange a promise ring where the dad says, you

853
00:47:38,920 --> 00:47:42,079
are now essentially married to dad because you are going

854
00:47:42,159 --> 00:47:44,960
to keep yourself pure. So you're promising Dad and you're

855
00:47:44,960 --> 00:47:47,760
promising God that you won't have sex. And these little

856
00:47:47,920 --> 00:47:52,119
minnows with wide eyes in wedding dresses are nodding and

857
00:47:52,199 --> 00:47:54,920
crying and saying yes, I promise not. And of course

858
00:47:54,960 --> 00:47:59,039
this teased them up for years, perhaps a lifetime of

859
00:47:59,079 --> 00:48:03,599
sexual disc function. You know, they're wrestling with desire, you know,

860
00:48:04,800 --> 00:48:07,400
what they want, what they were inclined to do. They

861
00:48:07,400 --> 00:48:13,440
don't understand, and they feel terrible about. Welcome to fundamental religion, right,

862
00:48:13,599 --> 00:48:15,880
Welcome to dogmatism in the faith.

863
00:48:16,639 --> 00:48:20,199
Speaker 3: Yes, I remember growing up and naturally having crushes on people.

864
00:48:20,280 --> 00:48:24,119
I mean, that happens, and I would never talk to

865
00:48:24,400 --> 00:48:27,840
a parent about it because I was I had already

866
00:48:27,840 --> 00:48:30,480
been programmed to feel shame about that, that that was

867
00:48:30,519 --> 00:48:33,400
something wrong with me, that I was supposed to reserve.

868
00:48:33,480 --> 00:48:37,079
Those sorts of feelings of affection for my future husband,

869
00:48:37,239 --> 00:48:39,599
and so I would have a journal, and I would

870
00:48:39,679 --> 00:48:41,239
you know, right in there about a crush. And I

871
00:48:41,280 --> 00:48:43,199
remember one time one of my parents coming across it

872
00:48:43,239 --> 00:48:45,800
and confronting me, and I remember at that time feeling

873
00:48:45,880 --> 00:48:49,480
like I had done something so horrible, so evil, and

874
00:48:49,519 --> 00:48:52,440
so wrong. But if I had just been in a

875
00:48:52,480 --> 00:48:55,039
healthy household where we could talk about crushes and stuff,

876
00:48:55,199 --> 00:48:57,039
I don't think I ever would have gotten married. The

877
00:48:57,079 --> 00:48:58,920
first time I would have understood that you can date,

878
00:48:58,960 --> 00:49:01,320
I would have been like, oh sucks, I don't want

879
00:49:01,360 --> 00:49:05,440
to spend any more time with him. And instead, you know,

880
00:49:05,519 --> 00:49:08,840
you're taught to be, you know, to feel shameful for

881
00:49:09,400 --> 00:49:13,760
very basic, natural, normal, innocent little things like a crush.

882
00:49:13,960 --> 00:49:16,760
Speaker 2: I love the fact that on the line, especially when

883
00:49:16,840 --> 00:49:21,679
guys call and mansplain religion, God, spirit's faith, et cetera

884
00:49:21,840 --> 00:49:24,159
to you. I don't know what you were like earlier,

885
00:49:24,800 --> 00:49:26,719
but you take no shit. I mean you're not a

886
00:49:26,840 --> 00:49:29,840
jerk about it, but I mean you shut him down

887
00:49:30,239 --> 00:49:33,039
and say, oh, hell no, you're not going to talk

888
00:49:33,079 --> 00:49:35,440
to me that way. And so there must have been

889
00:49:35,480 --> 00:49:38,960
the seeds of that young I mean, did that manifest

890
00:49:39,000 --> 00:49:41,760
it mean, did you have take no shit moments even

891
00:49:41,800 --> 00:49:43,880
when you were a submissive woman in the faith?

892
00:49:44,400 --> 00:49:48,079
Speaker 3: I think so. I mean I was still much more submissive,

893
00:49:48,119 --> 00:49:51,559
but it would reach a point my tolerance would finally

894
00:49:51,639 --> 00:49:53,360
hit a point where I couldn't anymore. Like I said,

895
00:49:53,360 --> 00:49:57,079
when I got a divorce. I think some of the

896
00:49:57,159 --> 00:49:59,719
seeds of that. I actually think we're planted from my mom,

897
00:49:59,760 --> 00:50:02,679
who was a pastor and that was frowned upon in

898
00:50:02,679 --> 00:50:06,400
a lot of circles and watching her kind of try

899
00:50:06,440 --> 00:50:08,159
to come into her own and I just felt so

900
00:50:08,320 --> 00:50:11,880
bad for her because she was never fully taken seriously,

901
00:50:12,000 --> 00:50:15,480
and you know, as a teenager, i'd feel kind of embarrassed, like,

902
00:50:16,079 --> 00:50:19,519
you know, like maybe we shouldn't take my mom seriously,

903
00:50:19,559 --> 00:50:22,800
like this internalized misogyny. And over the years I've now

904
00:50:22,920 --> 00:50:25,159
replayed all of that, and I just my heart breaks

905
00:50:25,159 --> 00:50:28,480
for her that she was fighting for her equal rights

906
00:50:28,519 --> 00:50:32,239
basically within the church and had to work so hard

907
00:50:32,280 --> 00:50:34,920
to just get the basic little you know, just to

908
00:50:34,960 --> 00:50:36,920
be able to share a message on a Sunday morning.

909
00:50:38,280 --> 00:50:42,000
And so I think that little part of me was

910
00:50:42,039 --> 00:50:45,320
always there, But once I hit my thirties, I really

911
00:50:45,360 --> 00:50:49,559
stopped giving a shit. I don't care anymore the whole.

912
00:50:49,800 --> 00:50:52,920
I think evangelicalism also programs women to be these kind

913
00:50:52,960 --> 00:50:55,119
of pick me where you want to make men happy

914
00:50:55,239 --> 00:50:56,840
and think that you're cool and you want men to

915
00:50:56,960 --> 00:50:58,840
like you, and that somehow is the best thing that

916
00:50:58,840 --> 00:51:01,239
could ever happen to you if you have the approval

917
00:51:01,280 --> 00:51:03,960
of a man. Once you go through the process of

918
00:51:04,039 --> 00:51:07,519
completely losing your faith and starting your life over again,

919
00:51:07,559 --> 00:51:11,280
where everybody hates you, including men and women in your life,

920
00:51:11,920 --> 00:51:15,639
you kind of like the exposure therapy is just like, ugh, Actually,

921
00:51:15,719 --> 00:51:17,480
I don't have to care what other people think. This

922
00:51:17,639 --> 00:51:21,119
is my life, and if I want to say some say,

923
00:51:21,440 --> 00:51:23,199
I'm going to say it. If i'm if somebody is

924
00:51:23,239 --> 00:51:26,199
mistreating me in a conversation, if they're not letting me speak,

925
00:51:26,239 --> 00:51:28,559
if they are accusing me of something, if they're lying

926
00:51:28,559 --> 00:51:32,280
about something, I'm going to say something. And I wish

927
00:51:32,360 --> 00:51:35,119
I would have been more like that earlier on, because

928
00:51:35,119 --> 00:51:38,079
I definitely let a lot of things slide. So probably

929
00:51:38,119 --> 00:51:43,199
what's happened is I'm now speaking up for the part

930
00:51:43,239 --> 00:51:45,599
of me that couldn't speak up all those years.

931
00:51:45,760 --> 00:51:49,800
Speaker 2: And you're probably hearing from a lot of women and

932
00:51:49,960 --> 00:51:53,679
men who were in a similar position, right, submit, obey,

933
00:51:54,360 --> 00:51:57,840
don't trust your own mind, trust not in your own understanding,

934
00:51:58,519 --> 00:52:03,480
defer d woman's shame, all that, And then they get

935
00:52:03,519 --> 00:52:06,920
into your story, your book, etc. And then the feedback

936
00:52:06,960 --> 00:52:09,239
comes in. You want to talk about that before I

937
00:52:09,320 --> 00:52:09,760
let you go.

938
00:52:10,639 --> 00:52:14,360
Speaker 3: I've been loving the feedback on the book. I was

939
00:52:14,400 --> 00:52:16,559
so nervous to put it out because, you know, you wonder,

940
00:52:16,679 --> 00:52:18,840
is this going to come across the way that I

941
00:52:18,880 --> 00:52:23,480
intended it to. But the feedback has been just continually

942
00:52:23,519 --> 00:52:26,239
people saying thank you so much for validating my experience,

943
00:52:26,320 --> 00:52:28,920
or thank you so much for educating me on what

944
00:52:28,960 --> 00:52:31,480
people are going through that grew up differently than me.

945
00:52:31,719 --> 00:52:34,639
And more than anything, what I've really loved is a

946
00:52:34,679 --> 00:52:36,440
lot of people have reached out saying that they just

947
00:52:36,440 --> 00:52:39,039
went ahead and bought another copy to gift to a

948
00:52:39,079 --> 00:52:42,360
family member to help them better understand their journey and

949
00:52:42,400 --> 00:52:46,199
their process and the religious trauma that they've experienced. So

950
00:52:46,320 --> 00:52:49,519
I'm very grateful that that is the message that's coming

951
00:52:49,519 --> 00:52:51,559
out of all of this. And then it's been a

952
00:52:51,599 --> 00:52:56,039
helpful tool to people already to communicate what they've experienced.

953
00:52:56,239 --> 00:52:59,000
Speaker 2: You release it on in the wild and you just

954
00:52:59,039 --> 00:53:02,800
think that's going to happen well with the am. I

955
00:53:02,800 --> 00:53:07,519
loved that. I saw one single star Amazon review by

956
00:53:07,559 --> 00:53:11,679
someone who is condemning your understanding of things, and it

957
00:53:11,760 --> 00:53:15,039
was obvious they had not read the book, but they

958
00:53:15,239 --> 00:53:18,119
knew it deserved one star. Those are always fun.

959
00:53:18,559 --> 00:53:21,880
Speaker 3: I love it. I think that's an indicator that I'm

960
00:53:21,920 --> 00:53:24,400
doing something right. If you feel the need to go

961
00:53:24,440 --> 00:53:26,599
ahead and leave me one star and say that I

962
00:53:26,679 --> 00:53:29,880
am destroying hope, I think is what they said, and

963
00:53:31,199 --> 00:53:33,519
you know, saying that I'm talking about other stuff, and

964
00:53:33,719 --> 00:53:35,960
then I am. If you have to write a review

965
00:53:36,000 --> 00:53:40,239
on my book without reading it, I've done something really shit.

966
00:53:40,360 --> 00:53:44,199
Speaker 2: Let's put that on the promo page, Promise Backland author,

967
00:53:44,679 --> 00:53:49,480
expangelical destroyer of Hope. It just makes you sound badass.

968
00:53:50,440 --> 00:53:53,000
Speaker 3: I can't bring Satan too. That one's come up.

969
00:53:53,039 --> 00:53:57,000
Speaker 2: Agent of Satan. Yeah, I get that. Like I post

970
00:53:57,760 --> 00:54:01,079
something and it requires five ten minutes of your time,

971
00:54:01,239 --> 00:54:04,360
people will not even bother watching it, and they'll tell

972
00:54:04,400 --> 00:54:07,119
you that at the beginning, I didn't even click play,

973
00:54:07,480 --> 00:54:10,960
but I know he's wrong. And that tells you the

974
00:54:11,000 --> 00:54:14,159
difference between someone who wants to be right or someone

975
00:54:14,199 --> 00:54:17,199
who wants to simply be proven right, and there's a

976
00:54:17,239 --> 00:54:22,039
big difference right. Promise Backland, author of the new book

977
00:54:22,199 --> 00:54:28,039
Gospel of Lies, Surviving and Resisting Evangelical Extremism. I'm so

978
00:54:28,159 --> 00:54:32,199
happy for you. Congratulations. It is a well written book.

979
00:54:32,199 --> 00:54:34,119
And I'm not saying I'm supposed to say it because

980
00:54:34,119 --> 00:54:37,719
we're friends, but it's good. I mean the way you

981
00:54:37,800 --> 00:54:41,280
lay it out, it's in every person language, it's relatable,

982
00:54:41,320 --> 00:54:43,719
and I think it's enlightening. A lot of people don't

983
00:54:43,760 --> 00:54:46,039
get it. They don't know what it's like behind the walls,

984
00:54:46,079 --> 00:54:49,920
behind closed doors, this alternate reality, and you paint it

985
00:54:49,960 --> 00:54:54,159
in full living color. It's just so good. Congrats and

986
00:54:54,239 --> 00:54:55,519
all success promises.

987
00:54:55,559 --> 00:54:55,920
Speaker 3: Thank you.

988
00:54:56,599 --> 00:55:00,599
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989
00:55:00,719 --> 00:55:03,920
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990
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991
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992
00:55:12,440 --> 00:55:18,440
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