Babblin' Botkins: "Good Girls and Bad Guys": Four Types of Guys - Part Three

In hindsight, writing the posts about how ATI/ATIA/IBLP teaches people to brainwash victims while discussing how the Botkin Sisters mangle any understanding of human sexuality, consent and criminal behavior has been an absolute drag.

On the other hand, I don't live that shit and never have - compared to the poor souls who think this crap is real - and Biblical to boot.

This last section is trigger-laden for sexual abuse survivors - so please, don't read this if that will bother you.  I mean - it's the Botkin Sisters so their views manage to be punitive, half-baked, and trite at the exact same time.  Go pet a kitten or take a nap or whatever you need for good self-care.   We've got your back.

The Botkin Sisters have messily divided the men into three groups (with an assumed fourth group):

• Assumed Group 0:  Men who are attracted to a woman, follow her family's courtship guidelines flawlessly and never by word, action or existence cause a woman to choose to pursue an physical relationship banned by CP/QF.  (The group is assumed - and peopled by imaginary men.)
• Group 1: Men who don't follow the family courtship guidelines instantly and perfectly.
• Group 2: Men who act like a woman they are attracted to has the skill and intelligence to choose if she wants to romantically interact with him.  (This is also known as "normal US dating culture")
• Group 3: Men whose relationship with the woman causes her to freely chose to pursue a physical relationship,  any form of sexual abuse or assault that isn't being raped by a stranger (which the Botkinites term "molesters"), and "creeps".  (It's the worst example of "One of these things is not like the other" we've seen so far.)

Today, we get to meet Group 4: Violent rapists.    Needless to say, I find this division between groups of sexual criminals abhorrent.  I've seen the hurt and pain caused by "non-violent" sexual abuse; non-consensual sexual activity is ugly and hate-filled.  Pretending that abuse by family members or known adults is somehow less harmful than being attacked by a stranger is sick - and telling of how rampant it must be in CP/QF society.

[00:44:21] Ok. Oh, yeah. So the last type of guy. The last and the worst is the violent criminal. And, yes, these men are out there. And so the first thing that we will recommend is that you embrace whatever rules or limitations or boundaries or curfews that your father has given you for your protection. If your father counsels you not to be out after a certain time or not to go to certain places without a bodyguard, you should listen to him. Our dad has made rules for us like this. And um... we follow them. Like, like Anna said earlier this really is our dad's business.

That's absolutely worthless advice. 

 I've had one experience where I was followed by a man I didn't know and was getting seriously bad vibes.   It happened at a local grocery store in the middle of the damned day.   My mom survived a violent stranger sexual assault as a girl - and she was vigilant to keep all of us kids safe.  But she knew that there are no magic bullets in terms of times of day or locations that are always safe or always dangerous.  She took the time to teach us to trust our instincts and to never, ever be afraid of making a scene.

In that situation, I stared directly back at the man and asked him why he was following me.  He didn't reply.  He continued to follow me - so I walked up to Guest Services at the store and asked for a security escort.  They found the biggest male employee in the store and he walked me out to my car.  The other guy vanished.

Next, the Botkin Sisters try an amatuer-hour attempt at Biblical analysis that makes me queasy:

[00:44:56] We also need to know what God's Law requires of us to do in a situation like this. When we need to physically resist or call for help. In Deuteronomy 22, we find the principle that is that a woman's duty to resist violation is that at the very least it needs to start with --- it needs to be expressed in crying out for help. This, this duty goes beyond just saying "no" or telling somenone to stop. Just letting the guy know that you're not ok with what he's doing and that you are not a consenting adult..um... isn't really enough.

The principle in Scripture is that we actually need to call for help. And bring in a third-party to intervene. And according to stories we've heard from women who .....we actually have a number of friends who were attacked and almost violated and they said that this takes a lot of courage and a lot of guts. 'Cause like I was saying earlier a very common response to this sort of situation is just to freeze up. I remember hearing one woman say "You know looking back it doesn't make any sense but the only thing running through my mind was that I didn't want to make a scene. I didn't want to make a ruckus or ...you know... cause a disruptance.(​sic)" Umm. But if we don't cry out or make any move to resist, Scripturally we could be considered accomplices in the crime.

*slow claps*
These two hold themselves up as the mature flowering of homeschool education - which insults every homeschooled kid I've ever met.

Deuteronomy 22 is chocked full of obscure laws that no one follows anymore.  The first four verses are about how to deal with roaming livestock and how to set up a lost-and-found.  Verse 8 talks about making sure no one falls off your roof while verse 9 outlaws interplanting crops in vineyards.  Verses 10 and 11 - which are personal favorites of mine - outlaw plowing with a donkey and ox yoked together and wool-linen blends respectively.

After we've disregarded completely Deuteronomy 22:1-12 for obvious reasons, we reach verse 13 that starts outlining how to deal with sexual sins - and we should adhere to those diligently!

Yeah, right.

The strangest bit about the whole thing is that the Botkin Sisters don't even get the summary right.

 For engaged women living in the city who are caught having sex with a man not her betrothed husband, the burden of proof is if she cried out.  There is no discussion of physically resisting; in my opinion that is because the authors themselves understood(ish) the dangers of fighting back if no one is around to back up the woman.

For engaged women in the country, there is no burden of proof because no one would hear them if they screamed.

Is modern life anything like life in a city in ancient Biblical times?  People were living in very close quarters with non-existent privacy or soundproofing.  In a city, there were always people around - and always people listening - and always people ready to get into other people's business.

No, we essentially all live in the country now - and that's why no mainline denomination I know of holds Deuteronomy 22 as applicable at all nowadays.

Plus, the Botkin Sisters seem to have missed the reality of the "fight or flight" response.  "Flight" includes "freeze" as a defensive tactic.  If a predator - including a human predator - hasn't seen you, holding perfectly still in a hiding spot may well keep you safe.   Overriding that response is very, very hard because the body is following an old set of instinctual commands.

Remember, the Botkin Sisters sell women on the idea of being pliant, submissive and unobtrusive - so acting like women should be able to turn that off instantly and go all "female-Rambo" at the drop of a hat is disingenuous.

[00:46:11] And this is where our best weapon against evil comes in. We have to hate it as much as God does. One important byproduct of just really immersing ourself in the Word and in the Law is that it teaches us to love what God loves and to hate what God hates and the ability to hate sin is very important because our strength to resist sin is only going to be as strong as our hatred of the sin and our love of righteousness.

That would work if overriding cultural training combined with fight-or-flight response was a matter of correct, logical thinking. 

Alas - both of these require active practice as well as mental preparation so we've wasted another 30 seconds of our lives.

[00:46:39] And we also believe that if we are serious about resisting evil we should back that up with some resistance training or maybe even some firepower. Taking a self-defense class, maybe organizing one for the young ladies in your church, studying situational awareness, carrying pepper spray or a gun, all of these would be good lawful options. We both carry. And um if you want to take this option we would recommend that you take a gun safety course, get some training. Train and practice often because just having a gun with you isn't any good if you don't know how to use it and you are not comfortable with it.

I've never gotten used to how CP/QF society overreacts to some threats while underreacting to others.  The Botkin Sisters have wandered through sexual crimes - but seem strangely unaware of abuse in families and by people in authority.  Now, the Botkin Sisters have created a safety regime that's appropriate for traveling in remote wilderness areas - have a strong male around! carry pepper spray! be armed! - to be used in middle America. 

Situational awareness / self-defense is phenomenal - but using both of these requires being allowed to control who crosses personal boundaries.  Stay-at-home daughters have no practice in that!  They've been dragged along to massed family gatherings, expected to be the drudge worker at church and practiced being subservient to everyone their entire lives. 

I'm not sold on either guns or pepper spray as a form of defense against other humans.  During an attack, the victim is already at a disadvantage by being surprised without adding tricky weapons to the mix.  Pepper sprays only work at fairly close range - around 10-13 feet -which is far too close to allow an assailant for my tastes.  I've sprayed myself in the face with enough harmless chemicals - hairspray, non-stick cooking spray, WD-30 - to not trust that in an emergency I'll be capable of spraying the assailant and not myself.    My husband and I did carry bear spray when we were in Yellowstone on our honeymoon - but I relied more on my incessant loud talking and the bells I had on my pack than the spray.

Guns increase the risk of death by suicide by far too much for me to feel comfortable dragging a handgun everywhere with me.  Also, my son is nearly crawling and starting to grab at every object he can reach.  I love him too much to risk him dying in a firearm accident.

Totally random side note: Soon after I moved out to the country, a relative of my husband's moved to a solidly middle class bedroom community near here from cow country.  Since that area is more populated (or something), she and her husband wanted her to have a firearm for self-defense.  When they told me that, I laughed so hard I cried.  I grew up in Wyoming, MI - which is a nice enough blue-collar area - but does have a local, home-grown gang presence and some occasional burglaries at empty homes.  Folks in the bedroom community often refer to Wyoming as a "ghetto" - partially from generalized racism, but mostly from good-ol' American classism.  Anyway, I told her that the standard home defense weapon of choice in Wyoming is a baseball bat - and I'd happily buy her a used Louisville Slugger of her choice.   It's multi-use, requires little or no training to use effectively, needs no maintenance, is very cheap, and sends a nice, clear message when you answer the door with it resting on your shoulder. :-)

[00:47:17] Also if you are dealing with or have dealt with criminal behavior, you actually really need to let someone know. There are times when the right thing is to go to your parents, there are times where the right thing is to go to your elders and there are times where the right thing is to go to the police. This speech isn't the speech to address all that, unfortunately. And finally, if a crime is committed against you that you tried to resist, you tried to call out for help, and it didn't work out. You know what? In the Lord's eyes, you are completely 100% innocent. You are not damaged goods. You are not soiled or tarnished. Even if your virginity has been taken away from you, your virtue has not been compromised.

I have no use for the Botkin Sisters as people. They can't bring themselves to say the word "rape" or "sexual assault".  They brought disgusting purity metaphors into the talk - which is horrifying beyond my ability to describe.   They can't even say "It's ok to go directly to the police if you've been hurt" or "here's a toll-free help line".

Cowards.
Here's my adult talk:

If you have been a victim of sexual assault, abuse or incest, you can call 1-800-656-4673 24/7/365 days a year to get in contact with a trained sexual assault counselor who can help you decide what to do next in terms of reporting the crime to the police, getting medical help, and providing a listening ear.   They know the resources in your area and are there to help you.  You can do this if you were hurt today or decades ago.  You can do this if you are a man or a woman.  The line is open to anyone.  It is confidential - unless state law requires them to report the abuse of a minor or vulnerable adult.

If you'd prefer, RAINN has a live chat online  .  For men who survived childhood sexual abuse, 1in6 offers support including a weekly online support group.

For those of us who have not been victims, listen to others.  Speak out against cultural beliefs that minimize the damage of abuse and assault.  Don't be a Botkin.