Jasmine (Baucham) Holmes' third chapter in "Joyfully At Home" focuses on how stay-at-home daughters (SAHDs) can be useful to their fathers. I do believe that a teenage or young adult daughter can be helpful to her father - but I do question how helpful a teenager or young adult can be.
Let's use the most optimistic outcome where a young lady has completed a rigorous homeschool curriculum that included the basics of college prep. That's a strong start for a college education - but in my opinion, a high school graduate daughter is trapped in a strange donut hole of education in terms of helping her father in part because she is a daughter.
Under the rigid gender segregation of CP/QF rules involving employment, a teenage boy or young man is more than eligible to start working in a variety of jobs that have on-the-job training like the Bates' family tree removal business, the Duggar's car sales business, or the Maxwell sons' lawn mowing business. For the rare families who use some more advanced skills like the CNC work by the younger Botkin sons or the computer security work done by Nathan Maxwell, the sons have a few years of training ahead of them to reach full competence but they will be bringing in useful income while learning a new skill.
Girls, on the other hand, need to be sheltered far more from the external malign influences of the workforce. The Duggar daughters who have worked are Jill and Jana Duggar who received haphazard and subpar training in midwifery and labor support. Sarah and Anna Maxwell work remotely for their brothers' businesses. Those are the only four young women who I can think of who work. The Botkin Sisters keep house. The Mally Sisters try to convert people. Most of the Duggar Daughters either keep house for their family of origin or are stay-at-home mothers.
Keeping house and working in a family business are both respectable options - but the issue is that these are the ONLY options available for young women rather than a choice from a wide variety of careers. That's a big regression even from the restrictive standards of the 1950's. I'll never forget an elderly teacher of mine in high school mentioning how when she was a teenager girls had five career options: be a nun, get married and stay at home, be a nurse, be a secretary, or be a teacher. (Well, five options if you were a Catholic girl...). For SAHD, they are down to two - secretary (which is pretty much how most SAHD are used in family businesses) or an under-maid-cook-nursery-worker for their mother or married sisters.
On the flip side, I question how much help a recent homeschool graduate is if her father has a job that usually uses helpers who have more education or experience. Both 19-year old Jasmine Baucham and a few years older Anna Sofia and Elizabeth Botkin brag that they worked as research assistants for the men in their family. I don't get how that worked. When I need research done, I either hit the stacks electronically myself or ask a reference librarian. These three young ladies sound like they did half the legwork for their fathers (or brothers) in that they flagged items of interest in materials that they read. That's kind of helpful...I guess...but I would expect their fathers to be fully conversant in the major works on a given topic. Once you are knowledgeable in a topic, determining if an article or book is worth including doesn't take very long. A quick skim of the abstract, introduction and conclusion is plenty for a paper. For a book, a speed-read of a chapter does the trick. That's not very time-consuming and it's not a step that Geoffrey Botkins or Voddie Baucham should skip. (In fairness to Baucham since he has earned multiple degrees from real colleges, I suspect he doesn't skip that step.)
Now, Jasmine Baucham and Sarah Maxwell both were given the same job in their family business: running the online store.
Blessedly, because of the similarities in our personalities, my dad and I have been able to work together on several projects-- I have worked full-time as his research assistant, was the online coordinator of his online store for two years before it outgrew the confines of our garage, have written articles for a family newsletter when he didn't have the time to do so, and have recently taken over his booking.
(...)
When I was running the online store, there were days when I had to turn down outings with friends because I had fifty messages waiting on my answering machine at home (sometimes, they will come over and help, and we'd make a day of it). I knew that supporting my dad was more important than a trip to the mall.
(...)
For instance, when Daddy needed someone to step in and run the online store, my hand was not the first to go up. When he asked me to come on as Voddie Baucham Ministries' first and only employee, I was nervous about the huge responsibility. I was relieved when, after it outgrew our garage, the store passed from my hands and into more capable ones, but in that 2 years I juggled the store with my other responsibilities, I learn self-discipline that I would not have learned otherwise, and my dad was given the aid that he would not have otherwise had. (pgs. 50-51)
Jasmine Baucham was 20 when this book was published and 19 when she was writing it. I'm going to assume, then, that she was running the store when she was a minor for at least one year and possibly two.
(...)
When I was running the online store, there were days when I had to turn down outings with friends because I had fifty messages waiting on my answering machine at home (sometimes, they will come over and help, and we'd make a day of it). I knew that supporting my dad was more important than a trip to the mall.
(...)
For instance, when Daddy needed someone to step in and run the online store, my hand was not the first to go up. When he asked me to come on as Voddie Baucham Ministries' first and only employee, I was nervous about the huge responsibility. I was relieved when, after it outgrew our garage, the store passed from my hands and into more capable ones, but in that 2 years I juggled the store with my other responsibilities, I learn self-discipline that I would not have learned otherwise, and my dad was given the aid that he would not have otherwise had. (pgs. 50-51)
Jasmine Baucham was 20 when this book was published and 19 when she was writing it. I'm going to assume, then, that she was running the store when she was a minor for at least one year and possibly two.
I am always curious about homeschool graduates who can pull off running an entire wing of the family business while still in high school. Personally, I hope that the family business is new and fairly low volume so that the daughter - and it's always a daughter - has time to study challenging material along with caring for a mob of smaller siblings and doing the packing/shipping for the family business. I worked during my junior and senior years of high school but since I was taking a lot of classes state law limited me to 8 hours of work a week until I turned 18. I was overly busy - but I did manage a full college prep course load along with working and afterschool activities.
The Bauchams do seem to value education and Jasmine earned a college degree so I suspect her education was not curtailed unduly to run the store. (Her afterschool activities....no promises about that.) By comparison, Sarah Maxwell was slated to spend at least 4 hours a day working at Titus 2 Ministries or her dad's fledgling computer business when she was 16.
I just feel like both women could have been better occupied in learning career skills with an outside employer during that period.
The next post in this series explores the drive to keep daughters dependent in the SAHD movement.
Your second to last sentence I back 100%. They absolutely would have learned valuable skills in being able to learn from and how to work with someone other than a family member.
ReplyDeleteIt seems a lot in CP/QF land that there is such a narrow criteria for why something would be valuable. Eg: I'm going to be a homeschooling mom, so why would I need to learn things that would lead to having a career?
In this case it's "I'm serving my father so I can practice serving my husband." It doesn't seem like there is any understanding of a variety of people and experiences leading to growth. It's the difference between eating a handful of vitamins and actually eating food for nutrients.
I also find it interesting that they lead with saying there are ways they can help their fathers. I've traditionally heard of girls being "mommy's little helper". Not daddy's. What's weird is that it's likely the mom who actually needs the help.
And speaking of research... based on what I've heard and read of the Botkins, it sure doesn't seem like there are a lot of scholarly journals being devoured.
In Baucham's defense - her previous chapter - the one with the letter where a mom got jealous when her daughter started elbowing in between her and her husband - Jasmine talked a lot about helping your mom at home.
DeleteThe Botkins are amusing in that they swear left and right that they are self-educated and their self-education is better than anything that comes out of traditional schools. That's all good fun - but they've never produced anything outside of family financing and publishing except for "So Much More" which was published by Vision Forum. At some point, they need to start producing goods - or let it go.