Jesus and John Wayne author Kristin Kobes duMez is one of the talking heads in the documentary FOR OUR DAUGHTERS (2025) now streaming on YouTube. It’s about thirty minutes and intensely powerful. Also very simple: women who’ve been abused by the clergy talk about what happened, how it felt and why they spoke up. DuMez,
Nothing they said was news to me — this is stuff I write about, after all — but it’s still pretty shocking. For example, one woman was raped as a teen by Andy Savage, who went on to become a rising megachurch star as a preacher. When he confessed to a “sexual incident” involving a teen, his church gave him a standing ovation; when she went public the church sighed that she wasn’t on the same “path to healing” as Savage. As his victim says, why would he even need healing? He wasn’t raped!
Another victim describes how after her minister, a Southern Baptist, raped her, her parents took it to the higher officers of the church, such as Paige Patterson and Paul Pressler (who has his own rape history) … they did nothing. And there were a lot more victims.
DuMez and abuse-victim advocate Rachel Denhollander put this in context showing the misogyny and support for rapists makes it not that shocking they supported Trump. And the talk about a Christian America is very much a misogynist one supported by Christian misogynists.
One of those misogynists, Christian authoritarian and Trump ally William Wolfe insists the Southern Baptist Convention is no worse than other organizations. I’ve not heard of him providing examples; I doubt he has any. Even if true, the women’s accounts show the church is still unique — colleges and corporations can’t invoke God as a defense against accusations or tell a victim God demands she keep quiet.
Even if they were, say, “no worse than IBM” or “no worse than the FDA” (I’m picking those name entirely at random), so? Isn’t the point of Christian theocracy supposed to be that it will uplift people and make us morally better? Many leaders of the religious right want to be recognized our moral superiors, they don’t want to put in the effort to achieve that level of morality.
They love Trump because he’ll deliver on things like ending Roe and signing abortion bans. JD Vance is much more deeply in bed with theocrats and anti-democracy extremists. A Trump win would put him dangerously close to having the power he (and they) crave. Let’s keep it from happening.
For more about misogyny and its ugliness, check out Undead Sexist Cliches, available in ebook or paperback. Cover by Kemp Ward, all rights remain with me.
