The following article was originally published on Purely Presbyterian, but was taken down on May 12, 2020. Their own explanation is here. At least one of the members of their editorial team was persuaded that our particular battle with feminism was not theirs to fight, that they could not in good conscience affirm every claim we had made, and that therefore the blog would no longer run the articles. Other editors strongly objected but were not able to change the decision: we thank them for standing firm. We are glad that Shane Anderson at the Daily Genevan was willing to repost them. They are reproduced here as originally published, and Lord willing, the final three installments will appear here over the next days.
Feminism in the Reformed Churches:
2. The Tactics, Online
In the last article we met three women leading the charge of feminism in the Reformed churches, and three men who publicly aid them in the fight. That we might better see the fruit these women and their supporters are bearing, it’s worth taking a closer look at their battle tactics, here considered as they appear online: on blogs, social media, and podcasts.
In a word, the prominent tactic in their online discourse is victimhood. This is the all-too-familiar method, borrowed from Marxism and applied by every progressive, of painting all disagreement as the oppression of the weak by the powerful, in order to garner sympathy for the opinion of the oppressed.
The Reformed women promoting feminism on the internet are experts at playing the complaining victim. Take Aimee Byrd: she complains that men do not hear women’s voices (here). Then when men do hear her, she complains when they critique her (here), and apparently, even when they ask her reasonable questions (here). The only way a man can escape such complaints, it seems, is to join the complainers in their complaining (e.g. here). If he does not, they yet again complain (again, as Byrd does here). Very many men hear these complaints, perceive that a woman is in trouble, and as men tend to do, rush to her side, or rush against those who are bringing trouble upon her, taking her word for it that she is an innocent victim, and they are evil oppressors.
If these complaints are false, they are simply lies. But even if they are true, this tactic is still deceitful. The method of loudly trumpeting the defense of victimhood rests on a false assumption, that the weak are always in the right. God instead says, “Thou shalt not respect the person of the poor” (Lev. 19:15). God does not say, nor do I, that there is no real oppression of the poor, no real tyranny of male leaders, no real abuse of women. These sins abound in our culture, and sadly, in our churches. And at least in my church, we exercise a biblical severity against them. But being a victim of these sins does not mean that the victim thereby possesses a clearer understanding of biblical truth, a greater right to be heard in church courts, or an open invitation to lecture at conferences or teach Sunday School. Victimhood is worthy of pity, not a platform.
This is especially so in cases where people are victims, at least in part, of their own foolish choices. Again, this is cause for pity—like Christ, we weep over sinners (Luke 19:41). Yet it is not cause for approval of the sins that made them victims in the first place. Indeed, witnessing the shame of drunkenness should make us all the more hate the abuse of alcohol, and rebuke the drunk himself (Lev. 19:17). So insofar as feminists have oppressed themselves, or given others occasion to oppress them, by refusing to keep silence in the churches (1 Cor. 14:34), or to marry, bear children, guide the house (1 Tim. 5:14), by disputing their subjection to their husbands (Gen. 3:16), by going out in the attire of an harlot (Prov. 7:10; see Byrd’s claim of “perfectly acceptable bikinis”), we do pity them. But we do that best by calling them to repentance, not by handing them a microphone.
More briefly, but no less seriously, we address two other tactics. The first is spying. This is not merely the collecting and presenting of public evidence, as we have done. Spying is collecting information with intent to harm, and often by deceit. For a testimony that the feminists have, for years, been deceitfully spying on the godly, see this explanation. Then see the letter linked to it at the end, in which Aimee Byrd’s own session admits that she asked her elder to be a “ninja,” spying for her on a private Facebook group. His refusal to do so was apparently one reason for her to call for his resignation. The same letter features screenshots and quotations taken without permission from that private group, presented out of context to paint Byrd as a victim. Like the Pharisees and Herodians, they have been seeking to catch good men in their words (Mark 12:13). But their efforts have so far been fruitless, and quite pitiful: the crowning item of evidence the letter marshals against the evil patriarchs is their “laugh emojis.”
Finally comes slander. As already shown, claiming to be oppressed implies alleging that others are oppressors. But if these allegations are false, they are sins against the ninth commandment. These women are practiced at such slander. Rachel Miller came to public notice by accusing well respected teachers, such as John Piper, of Trinitarian heresy and denial of the gospel (the links can be found on her blog). None of these charges have ever been substantiated. Some have been answered decisively (e.g. here). Yet Miller to my knowledge has made no retraction, and shown no remorse for harming good men’s reputations. Valerie Hobbs has insinuated numerous times that Reformed pastors demean and abuse women (see her academic work cited in our previous article, and her various pieces in the Aquila Report). And if we may descend to Twitter, it too will testify, filled as it is with accusations from these women and their followers that their critics are vile, dirty jerks. Then just last week in this episode of Mortification of Spin, Todd Pruitt mocked critics of Byrd as “hardcore patriarchalists” guilty of “shoving the women in the small corner.” The written podcast introduction says such men accuse Byrd of the “crime” of “refusing to be barefoot and confined to a yellow wallpapered kitchen making sandwiches for men.” Do they not realize that unbelieving feminists mock Christian family life in these exact same terms? Nor can they stand that these same awful men make light of these slanders by rejoicing publicly in sandwiches lovingly made in the kitchen by their happy pregnant wives. Such unflappable delight in their home life is, in Byrd’s judgment, “shameful.” Carl Trueman weighs in with a more academic but no less slanderous critique, accusing Complementarians of Trinitarian heresy (a serious charge we will deal with elsewhere) and insinuating that they are driven by a Marxist and Nietzschean obsession with power. And all this is crowned by incredulous laughs shared among the co-hosts against those who would even suggest that Aimee Byrd is a danger to godly churches.
I could say more, but these samples will suffice to show the behavior of these feminists online. We will have occasion next to show more from their books, and then from their work within the church itself.