Rising in response to a bout of insomnia early this morning, I got on the computer and found a trending topic on Twitter: #ExposeChristianSchools. What was this?
Seems that in response to criticism of his wife for teaching in a Christian school, vice-pr*sident Mike Pence tweeted:
Mike Pence✔ @mike_pence
We’ll let the critics roll off our back. But the criticism of Christian education in America must stop.
...because it’s not as if there’s a First Amendment or anything like that.
Remember Christopher Stroop, the Exvangelical movement leader I cited extensively in a diary about the movement a little while back? He responded.
So they did, to the tune of 14,100 tweets as of 4:55 a.m. Eastern as I write.
It’s mind-blowing, horrific, sickening. And for me—an epiphany about why white evangelicals support T***p despite his frequent and obvious violations of what purport to be Christian values. They’ve formed a cult of T***p because they were raised in a cult. They support an abuser because they grew up with routine abuse of every imaginable kind at school. They cannot see through his lies because their education was lies, and extinguished critical thinking. They worship a hateful man because they were taught that secretly hating themselves and outwardly hating others was sacred.
I included a lot of tweets, won’t be at all surprised if people don’t read all of them, but even so could not begin to do justice to what the former students/victims have written.
These are the people who were intelligent, strong and independent-minded enough to get out, realize what they were in and seek healing. The people who are still trapped in the brainwashing aren’t tweeting here.
Trigger warning. This stuff is really tough to read.
We were repeatedly told that going to a Christian school was a privilege. That if we went to public school, we'd become drug addicted pregnant athiests because the Liberal agenda was out to get the youth...#ExposeChristianSchools
In elementary school we were taught that non-Christians were incapable of real love.
Per Huffpo, What Is A Cult? Recognizing And Avoiding Unhealthy Groups: The Top Ten Signs the ‘Group’ You’ve Joined is Not what It Seems:
The ‘outside’ world — often including family and friends — is presented as rife with impending catastrophe, evil, and temptations.
DaveGass @DaveGass3 12h12 hours ago
#ExposeChristianSchools at my college (PCC) they employed “outside security” whose job was to patrol the city and make sure male and female students weren’t fraternizing off campus. Essentially they were spies who reported you if you broke rules OFF CAMPUS.
Noor ☭🇵🇸🇮🇹🧕🏼♿️ Nug Bug @MuslimMissWorld 14h14 hours ago
Okay, for normies with non-cult childhoods, yknow how in middle school the kids were all little monsters? Imagine that but they all think they’re being Godly by pointing out each other’s flaws- that’s what we were taught! Harsh cruel criticism is love.
Huffpo, cult signs:
Reporting on members for disobedient actions or thoughts is mandated and rewarded.
Followers are meant to believe that they are never good enough.
These “schools” are rife with racism:
At Colorado Springs Christian School in seventh-grade Bible class, we were taught that people of African descent originated with Noah’s cursed son Ham.#ExposeChristianSchools #Exvangelical #EmptyThePews #Resist #ChristianAltFacts
Was taught the same thing. And that Noah cursing Ham (You shall serve your brothers,etc.) was God SANCTIONING slavery. Also the Civil War was about States Rights. Never learned a single thing about segregation or Jim Crow.
When I promoted one of my students of color to the next grade, I was overridden because they wanted to “spread out” the children of color and there was already a POC in the class a grade above. They held my kid back and told his parents he didn’t pass.
Sexism:
Alright, #ExposeChristianSchools is trending, and I have FEELINGS. Mandatory marriage & family class, (hetero pairs only, obv). Boys drew occupations out of hats (wife wasn't allowed to work). Boys wrote the budgets. I got a C & all I did was name the kids (also mandatory).
In 8th grade I was sent to the principal’s office for wearing a shirt that was completely within dress code and covered me up to my collar bone. My flat-chested classmate had the same shirt on and was not told to change. My crime was being 14 with boobs.
Homophobia:
Lest anyone dismiss evangelical christian craziness as a “southern” issue, I went to Mid Vermont Christian School.
Their handbook bans LGBTQ+ students AND parents. Parents must submit also proof of regular church attendance.
I could write a book on my alma mater. They had a whole fucking staff-wide meeting about how they’ll discriminate against LGBTQ+ students from getting housing “for the Lord” even though it’s illegal and they could face a lawsuit.
#ExposeChristianSchools teachers casually talking about queer people like they're animals. one teacher wrote a classification system on the chalkboard including: "the celibate gay" "the secretly active gay" and "the militant gay"
Sexual abuse:
#ExposeChristianSchools There we're at least three men(monitors) that sexually assaulted students at the ace school I attended. No arrests no public outcry. They were just made to resign quietly.
Melissa Baker @bakerpartyofsix
At my Christian school the Pastor’s wife was the school administrator. She knew of several sexual abuse cases involving students during her tenure. She was a mandatory reporter and reported none of them. Which is a felony. She wanted to keep it “in house”.
My “sex education” teacher (the same under-qualified teacher who taught geography and biology) told us that sex creates an unbreakable blood bond, which is A) false and B) convinced me that I was forever bound to my abuser.
Physical abuse:
Oh shit. I have VOLUMES on the fuckery of the Christian schools
I went to. Let’s see...where to start?
•All my siblings & I were spanked & physically assaulted at Doris Todd Memorial Christian School & Ka’ahumanu Hou Christian School
One of christian schools I attended didn’t just spank... they used a belt. Thankfully I never found myself in the principal’s office, but I know other kids were not so lucky.
not your enemy...just a liberal @nimr80
I got the paddle from my principal when in 3rd grade 4 defending myself against a bully. My patsy mom was there and walked out ignoring my cry 4 help. I'll never forget the child abuse as the principal took a batters stance and swung. Also the abandonment.
Emotional abuse:
Do you have any idea how damaging it is for a kid to be told from a young age that who they are is wrong? If Christians want to practice this fine, but don’t inflict it on children.
This was a common occurrence, I remember it starting in first grade and one girl in particular was always singled out. She’d have to do it at the front of the classroom. #ExposeChristianSchools
At Heritage Christian School in Indianapolis, girls could be subjected to humiliating skirt length checks in front of their peers—forced to kneel to make sure the skirt was at least knee-length.
#ExposeChristianSchools Christian counselors taught me that my depression and anxiety existed because I didn't have enough faith in God. Couldn't miss an opportunity to teach me to blame myself for my suffering
Political extremism:
Heritage Christian School in Indianapolis considers radical right-wing conventions to be suitable field trips for high schoolers.#ExposeChristianSchools #Exvangelical #EmptyThePews #Resist
20. My Christian school took high schoolers on "field trips" to hard right Citizens Concerned for the Constitution conventions.
The only colleges they suggested were Bob Jones University & Lee College. I didn't understand why until I returned 2 college years later & realized I learned nothing of value in the Christian school system since I wasn't interested in being a Republican.
And a commitment to producing ignorant sheep incapable of critical thinking.
#ExposeChristianSchools I was denied a proper science education due to the young earth dogma that required that logic and critical thinking NOT be properly taught lest we see through it; caused all sorts of problems when I tried to go into a scientific field after graduation. 1/
Christian Nightmares @ChristnNitemare
Christian fourth grade textbook published by Bob Jones University tackles the ‘mystery’ of electricity http://bit.ly/mR8yOm
Now here is the whole purpose, excerpted from a thread by Stroop:
9. White Evangelical Protestantism in the US largely exists in what scholars of fundamentalism call an "enclave culture."
10. Withdrawn from "the world," Evangelicals build a parallel society. My childhood social milieu was mostly church and Christian school.
11. Let me tell you about socialization in that environment. We got pounded into our heads that Democrats kill babies (or approve of that).
12. We got told we had the only Truth, the only way to heaven. It was urgent to try to "save" others. Pretty much by any means necessary.
13. We were taught that "liberal" was basically an antonym for "Christian," and "real" Christians only include people who believed like us.
14. That makes us "quirky" and "weird" I suppose, but let me explain where we stopped being benign Ned Flanders figures. Are you ready?
15. Our parallel society wasn't meant to stay that way. It was meant to cultivate culture warriors to "take back" the US for Christ.
This authoritarian cult weaponizing Jesus wants to do to all Americans what they do to their kids.
Stroop points out that part of the problem is that people don’t want to talk about it. But to be stopped, it must be talked about. The Exvangelicals are leading a movement to stop the abuse by talking about the abuse the same way #MeToo has about a different (but very much overlapping) kind of abuse.
Please talk about it. 7:16 a.m. now and #ExposeChristianSchools is trending #1 in the US with 20,000 tweets. Perhaps that will kick the mainstream media into paying attention.
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