Ladies - This is NOT proving the point you think it is!

Here's a quick recap of the rationale behind the Stay-At-Home Daughter movement. 

The "theology":  Bible says that women need a male authority figure at all points so girls need to live at home under their father until they are handed off to their husband.  The theology is neither deep nor reflecting any portion of the Gospels, but no one seems to notice or care.

The educational correlation: Women are meant to be wives and mothers.  The main forms of post-secondary training in the Western world make women less likely to be wives and mothers so girls should avoid traditional education options once they graduate from homeschool.  The traditional works of women including cooking, basic household chores and childrearing are so complicated that a young woman who stays at home and helps her mother (or other Godly Woman (TM)) will end up so far ahead of women who attend college, receive vocational training or work after high school.  (No part of this section is demonstrably true, but no one seems to notice or care, either.)

I have a rather dark sense of humor and I've been enjoying watching the recipes published on the Maxwell Family's Titus 2 blog by Teri Maxwell or Sarah Maxwell along with Jill Dillard's published recipes on the Dillard Family site.  I'd call the recipes basic, but I feel like that's insulting the recipes found in real basic cookbooks.

I'm going to share my favorites by writer:

Teri Maxwell:

I have a sneaking sense of sympathy for Teri Maxwell.  I believe she really wants to be helpful to women who don't know much about cooking - but she's not great at explaining the theory that underlies the details.
How to Flash-Freeze Strawberries:

• The process she describes is not flash-freezing; it's just ordinary freezing.  
• There's no tips or anything that is noticeably different from what I have in the standard Ball Blue Book....
• The reason we half or quarter strawberries and other fruits is two-fold.  First, cutting a whole fruit into smaller pieces speeds the freezing time up markedly since the amount of time it takes to freeze is mostly dependent on the size of the fruit.  The second benefit is that smaller pieces can be packed more tightly when frozen.

Make the Most of Your Leftovers:

• This post demonstrates how to make a casserole out of leftover rice, pork spare rib meat, ham gravy with ham bits, and a few biscuits.   The resulting casserole sounds heavy for my tastes - but that's no sin.
• My bigger issue is that she doesn't - or can't - generalize that specific example into a broader idea.   I think the post would have been so much more useful if she explained that leftover meat and vegetables can be made into a casserole by combining them with a grain product like rice, tortillas, hearty breads or noodles and a condensed soup or sauce.  To assemble, put a layer of grain product on the bottom followed by the meat and vegetables.  Top with a shallow layer of grain product.  Pour sauce over top.   Cook at 350 for 30 minutes or until heated through.     
• For leftover chicken, I use tortillas, tomatoes, corn, ricotta cheese and green enchilada sauce to make enchilada casserole.  
• Leftover beef combined with egg noodles, cream of mushroom soup, a little bit of wine, and green beans makes a nice casserole, too..  
• I don't have a great leftover pork casserole - but pork fried rice is a household favorite.

Sarah Maxwell - the dedicated Amazon Affiliate writer:

How to Make Taco Meat in Your Instant Pot:

• That's a fascinating title.  An equally honest title would be "Brown meat.  Add commercial taco seasoning.  Buy an Instant Pot through our Amazon affiliate link so we get cash!"  The reason they didn't use that title is that there would be nothing left in the body of the post.
• An Instant Pot is a pressure cooker that can also be used as a crock-pot.  There are a lot of times that a pressure cooker is a great choice.  A pressure cooker speeds up working with dried beans, lentils and rice of all types.  Pressure cookers can do amazing things with tender foods that can get gross if over cooked like shrimp and eggs.   Using a pressure cooker/crock pot to brown hamburger or ground poultry makes NO sense.   That wastes so much energy that it is insane. 

How to Make a Pour Over Mocha

• I've always found this one painful due to Sarah Maxwell's angst seeping through the post.  The post is so clearly written to list six fairly expensive items in the Maxwell's Amazon affiliate links program.  The purpose is obvious - but Sarah also seems to realize that most of her most dedicated readers don't have around $100 to drop to buy a ceramic coffee dripper, coffee bean grinder, milk frother and reusable insulated tumbler to make the perfect cup of mocha.  But she needs to drum up the income and so we have this post.

This post feels like it has multiple writers involved so I'm assuming that Teri and Sarah were involved in this classic:

The Maxwell Burrito Recipe:

• An excellent recipe to use for an open house or any other party where you invited 500 people and forgot to ask them to RSVP.   
• Let's see: 70 cups of cooked pinto beans and 15 pounds of onions with 4 cups of spices/flavorings.  I have a well-supplied kitchen but this would overwhelm every pot, pan, bowl and cup I own in the process including my boiling bath canner and pressure canner pressed into service as really big pots.
• I have to give Sarah (or whoever wrote the post) credit for detailing all the steps the family goes through.  At the same time, the process is completely crazy!  The process of cooking the mountain of beans separately from the hill of onions and the peppers simply creates more dishes to wash and more time on the blender/mixer without adding anything to the finished recipe.  
• If they were to add some cumin, garlic and oregano to the burrito mix, it would change their lives.  Just saying.  It's a magical part of burritos.

At least the Maxwell recipes require some skill at cooking.  Jill Dillard seems to be specializing in creating/remembering recipes for children too young to reach the stove. 

Cinnamon Toast:

• Like Joseph Duggar, I enjoy cinnamon toast.  Unlike his sister, I've never even thought about writing out a recipe for adding sugar and cinnamon to a buttered piece of toast.  
• Do I get credit for "Honey-flavored Breakfast Cereal" if I explain how to drizzle honey on corn flakes?

Poor Man's Pizza:

• Tortillas, pizza sauce, and cheese.  Microwave for 1 minute.  
• If this is really for a meal instead of a snack, I'd substitute bagels instead of tortillas and bake in the oven for 20 minutes.  It's amazing - but probably not cheap enough for large broke families.

Jill Dillard's secondary theme is accidently exposing how huge families need to skimp on protein to feed everyone.  After all, Cinnamon Toast has very little protein and Poor Man's Pizza is only slightly better because of the protein in the cheese.  Here are some more:

Easy Chicken and Noodles

• This is a giant pot of egg noodles and diluted cream of chicken soup.  Using cooked chopped chicken is optional.   
• She notes that her family would eat it with homemade bread (ATI teaches that the line about "Give us this day our daily bread" in the Our Father means you have to bake bread daily), a big salad and fruit.  That sounds yummy - but unless the big salad is made with lots of hard boiled eggs or beans  - this meal is really low in protein.

Cheesy Chicken and Rice Enchiladas

• The Duggars got this recipe from a family friend.  It makes 20 enchiladas out of 20 tortillas, 5 cups of cooked rice, 4 cans of cream of chicken soup, four cups of cheddar cheese and one 12.5 oz can of cooked chicken.  Each enchilada has 0.6 oz of chicken in it; a serving of meat for a child age 5 and up is supposed to be around 3 oz.  My toddler routinely eats more than 0.6oz of meat at a sitting - and he's tiny!
  

I know I'm supposed to be a dunce at cooking since I went to college - but this week we've had citrus-stuffed slow roasted chicken with green beans for dinner one night followed by chicken soup made with the back, rib, wing, neck and thigh meat from the roasted chicken combined with fire-roasted tomatoes, corn, green peppers and zucchini. 

I think I'll stick to the cooking I learned from my parents.....

Dominion Orientated Femininity: Part Five

I apologize for the late post. My husband was injured in a workplace accident and burned his arm. He's doing fine, but the burn got infected so he's had a lot more doctor's appointments than usual so I've had much less free time than usual. Thank God for antibiotics!

This post covers the seventh and eighth points on the topic of dominion-orientated women.  When I was in junior high, I was really into Star Trek: Deep Space Nine.  In DS9, a massive interstellar federation that could be contacted by traveling through the wormhole was called the Dominion.  Bluntly, I'd prefer to listen to a podcast of fanfic surrounding women from the Dominion than having to listen to the Botkin Sisters blather on about womanhood.

Number seven is a dominion woman thinks like a shepherd. Jesus said, "Do you love me? Feed my sheep." And this is a basic Christian duty that we have to make disciples of all the nations. And this for many of us young homeschooled girls this is going to involve overcoming obstacles like shyness and timidity. This can be very hard for us. I used to be extremely shy. I used to be so shy I had a hard time talking to a person one-on-one let alone even thinking about standing up on stage and speaking to over 500 people like I'm doing right now.

I have a mental block when thinking about how CP/QF adherents are going to make disciples of all the nations.  So many of their beliefs are interwoven with white middle-class values from the 1950's US that they struggle to convert new members and lose a good number of children born into CP/QF homes to other belief systems.   When they struggle this badly in their homeland, I can't imagine how this could spread to other nations.   Derick and Jill Dillard's abortive attempts at missionary work in El Salvador demonstrates many of the issues.  The Dillards had energy, youth and enthusiasm on their side.  Unfortunately, their lack of fluency in Spanish, minimal cultural appreciation, and absence of previous training or experience in launching a mission doomed their venture. 

The Gothardite/Vision Forum/ IBLP/IFB belief system has two separate issues that doom missionary work.  First, cults work best when members are highly indoctrinated in cult materials and marginally educated in other ideas.  The Wisdom Booklets are constructed to indoctrinate by exposing adherents to the same ideas repeatedly while selectively demonstrating outside facts that "support" the cult ideas.   The problem is that these ideas won't hold up well when adherents are exposed to a wider education which happens when people are immersed in a foreign language and culture.

The second issue is the idolization of large families of closely spaced children.  In my church, missionaries are primarily single adult men and women - generally priests or sisters.  Simply, single adults are easiest to embed in a new culture.  They are able and willing to focus intensely on determining the needs of the community, searching out culturally and economically sustainable solutions, and are able to bring specialized skills in medicine, education, engineering or agriculture.  They strive to be a benefit to their new home.  The issue with missionaries who have huge families is that supporting that many kids is a drain on the new church mission.  Additionally, the medical needs of actively reproducing women and young children are much different than a celibate men and women.   Jill Dillard faced an unenviable choice of traveling repeatedly between the US and El Salvador for prenatal care and delivery or utilizing a scarce resource in a developing country that was facing difficult times.  As her sons grew and became more mobile, they would need a series of expensive vaccines for typhoid and rabies.

Changing subjects abruptly, a lot of kids are shy especially around new adults in groups.  Being so shy that you remember struggling to talk one-on-one to other person sounds agonizing.  I can't help but wonder how much kept away from other people through homeschooling along with exclusion from community activities worsened the issue.  Thinking back over my campers when I was a counselor, I always had a few shy or introverted campers who needed a bit of help breaking the ice with the other girls - but that wore off pretty quickly both in the cabin and in workshop groups.

And I realized after a while that my shyness was a result of two things: excessive focus on self and fear of man. That's what shyness always is. And my father helped me understand that this was something that I needed to get over. And so he told me, "You need to focus on other people and when you do that, your shyness will go away. And he was right. It did. But if we're going to be shepherds, we have to learn to stop thinking about ourselves and we have to learn to love the other people we are supposed to be ministering to. We can't retreat into ourselves. We have to ignore our comfort zone and reach out to others.

My method for helping shy teenagers is to pair them up with friendly teenagers.  I'm going to stick with that method over telling the teenagers that they are being self-centered and need to get over themselves.   The Botkin girl who is speaking in this section clearly believes her father's method is great - but the story is creepy as hell to me.

The exhortation to reach out to others and avoid retreating into a personal comfort zone is surreal coming from a pair of sisters who have disappeared for months, if not years, from their website and social media.  They've withdrawn from all sorts of potentially discomforting arenas like advanced education, starting a career or forming their own family.  If they cannot branch out in the first steps to becoming independent adults when they are in their early 30's, how do they hope to convert everyone on the planet?

And the good thing is when we're thinking like that it gives us boldness in how we interact with people. Some girls have told us that they panic or they break out in a cold sweat when someone asks them, "So what do you do?" I'm sure you've all gotten that question and I'm sure you know it's an interesting question to be asked and I'm not sure why it's frightening for some girls. I guess because they're afraid of disapproval or confrontation. But instead I think we should look at this question as an opportunity to talk to people about the beauties of God's design. Why should we be ashamed? We have nothing to be ashamed of. God's ways are wiser than the heathen's ways and we should be happy whenever someone gives us the opportunity to explain that. Here's a verse I love in Deuteronomy 4. Moses has just given the Israelites several of God's Commands and says "Keep them and do them for that is your wisdom and your understanding in the sight of the peoples who will hear all these statutes and say, 'Surely, this great nation is a wise and understanding people.' For what nation is there that has a God so near to it as the Lord Our God whenever we call on him? Or what nation is there that has statutes and judgements as righteous as this whole law which I am setting before you today?" Honestly, what nation is there that has statues and judgement as righteous as the law which we have?

 *waves*

Hi!  I'm one of those people who cannot entirely hide my disapproval of young women who leave education and career in order to "train" to be a wife and mother before they are married or pregnant.

I understand that sometimes people need to take time off for health or family reasons; that's part of life and NOT what I'm talking about here.  After all, I took time off from college to receive treatment for depression and anxiety and suspended my graduate school program to care for my premature son.  Sometimes life throws a curve ball and we just have to do the best we can to get through the tough times.

No, I'm thinking of the 17-year old woman who I met at a young adult Catholic event when I was 19 or so.  She had just graduated high school after being homeschooled and we were excited to hear about what she was planning to do next.  She replied that she was going to live at home until she got married and started a family.  Someone asked when she was getting married because we assumed that she was engaged.  She was not engaged.  In fact, she wasn't dating anyone.

The response of the rest of us was that being a wife and a mother was a great life goal - and one that she was very likely to achieve.  In the meantime, though, she should probably do something or learn something.  Most of us were concerned that a very young woman who was on the sheltered side who was focused entirely on marriage and motherhood would be far too likely to marry the first man who displayed any interest in her - regardless of if he was a good match.  We also worried about how boring living at home without any stimulation from a job or education might be for a young woman.

And we need to not assume that the other nations are going to be hostile or look down on us. Because they don't sometimes. A lot of people have responded very interestingly when Anna and I tell them what we're doing and why. A lot of girls actually.have responded very wistfully and said, "You know what? I wish I could do that. I would love nothing more than to be able to do that." A lot of people can see the wisdom in what we're doing but we have to be bold in our witness.

Let's discuss for a few minutes why those wistful girls can't stay home.

 If I had bounced that idea off my parents, they would have rejected it immediately.   There was no one in my home who needed me to give in-home care to and I was healthy enough to restart college within a few months after I was diagnosed with depression.  All of us kids had the option of working after high school or receiving advanced training.  Sitting at home for years while waiting for someone to marry sounds irresponsible from a parenting point of view.

The other issue I see is that the stay-at-home daughter movement expects parents to financially support unmarried daughters forever.  Most of the CP/QF families in my area are working-class families that won't be able to provide much more than room and possibly board for their adult daughters.  Paying for clothing, computers, travel, and all of the incidentals for a middle-class lifestyle is beyond these families unless the daughters are working.   I've never heard a coherent plan for how a stay-at-home daughter will be supported once their father has died.  Sarah Mally and Sarah Maxwell are in their mid-to late 30's.  Both women have income streams from self-published books and Sarah Maxwell does some work for her brothers' businesses - but I doubt the income for either woman is enough to support themselves independently let alone at the socioeconomic standard that they are used to.  Steven Maxwell seems to be withdrawing from at least one of the Maxwell Family businesses as he approaches retirement age while Anna is now prominently displayed as a call-service representative for Nathan's business.  The darkest outcome I can imagine for the Maxwell family is that Sarah, Anna and Mary's incomes are used to support the Maxwell parents during their retirement - and then the women are left without career skills or a nest egg when they are suddenly without a male income source when they are in their 40's, 50's or 60's.

Moving on to number eight. A dominion woman strengthens her arms and trains her mind. Now, one of the things that our family has been accused of is that we don't believe that women should be educated. I don't know how many times we can say this but we said it as many times as we possibly can. We believe that Christian women... Christian young women need to be the best educated women in the world in the right ways and for the right reasons. And a useful woman a dominion woman the kind we've been describing here today is one who has been equipped for the battle is ready for all the duties of life is ready for anything that life might bring her. She's ready to live in a 400 sq ft. almost finished house or she's ready to be the president's daughter or she's ready to live in a mud hut in Africa. She's ready for anything and everything.

The Botkin Sisters believe women should be highly educated - then immediately demonstrate their ignorance.   First, they highly qualify the standard of education to "the right ways" and "the right reasons".  They might as well just say, "We should be highly educated in cult materials." 

No one in their right mind should try and have two people living in one "almost finished" 400 square foot house.  That's a tiny space for two adults with all 400 feet being usable.  There's no room left for areas under construction.  Since people who are not using birth control have a 50% chance of getting pregnant within 3 months and 90% within a year, the family had better have have a plan for expanding that house rapidly.....

Let's not fall back on primitive stereotypes about Africa, ok?    Go read about 5 different African countries on Wikipedia.  Write a comparative essay on your findings. 

If the Maxwells and Mallys are looking down the barrel at future poverty, Anna Sofia and Elizabeth should be extremely worried.  Near as I can tell, the Botkin family has most of their income coming from the younger brother's T. Rex Arms.  That's not a lot of money to support six adults on let alone save up money for the Botkin parents' retirement or a nest egg for the girls.  I hope they are ready for that.

One thing that we need to be asking ourselves is "What is the goal of our education? What are we really preparing to do?" And here's a quote by William B. Sprague in a letter to his daughter that I really like and he says, "The object of education is two-fold: to develop the faculties and to direct them, to bring out the energies of the soul and to bring them to operate to the glories of the creator. In other words, it is to render yourself useful to the extent of your ability." So the purpose of our education is to equip us for the great assignment as women: to be helpers suitable to brave dominion men who have the task of discipling the nations and to be the mothers and teachers of the future generations of Christian warriors. And if we want to raise our sons to be the next presidents, preachers, filmmakers, writers, culture-changers, we're going to need to have an excellent education.

I agree with Sprague that education is about training people to be useful to society at large.  I don't think Victoria Botkin managed to do that with her daughters.    I was thinking about Anna Sofia and Elizabeth's lives while I was mowing the lawn.  They are in their thirties and have achieved none of the milestones that mark adulthood in CP/QF or wider society.  They've never held a job let alone a career.  They've never lived outside of their immediate family.  They've never had a long term romantic relationships.  They've never married.  They have no children.   I suppose they remain busy cleaning up after their two brothers who still live at home and I'm sure their sisters-in-law are grateful for the help they give in childcare - but is that really the fullest extent of their innate skills?  They update their website on a yearly basis.  They've written two books in 15-odd years.  They produced a thoroughly odd movie about stay-at-home daughters.   I'm not impressed.

Now, the question is, " Well, how do we....how do we go about that? How do we educate ourselves in these ways?" And I have another quote here that I really like by John Taylor Gatto who's a former New York Time Teacher of the Year . He says, "Close reading of tough minded writing is still the best, cheapest and quickest method known for learning to think for yourself. Reading and rigorous discussion of that reading is a way that obliges you to formulate a position and support it against objections. It is an operational definition of education in its most fundamental civilized sense." And I might say even better than reading books is writing books [laughs].

*cringes*  The self-referencial praise of people who write books grates on my nerves every time.

I find Gatto to be a bit iconoclastic - but I completely agree with his quote.  My high school English courses along with a phenomenally good Morality course my senior year were based around reading difficult material and discussing it at length with other students and the teacher.  This followed through into my (unfortunately few) college level Humanities and Arts classes.  Based on my memories of  "It's (Not) That Complicated", I doubt either of the sisters was reading at the depth or breadth expected in a college preparatory education.  I know I've forgotten a few novels we read, but I remember reading "Red Badge of Courage", "Lord of the Flies",and "The Odyssey" along with a large research project on a composer, sculptor, painter and in 9th grade.  The next year we read "The Crucible", "The Great Gatsby", "Grapes of Wrath",  "The Education of Little Tree", and "To Kill A Mockingbird" along with a research project on any topic relating to TKAM in American Literature.  Junior year we read "Beowulf", "Macbeth", and "Jane Eyre" for British Literature.  My senior year we read "Utopia", "Hamlet", "Beloved", "Jazz" before diving into cinema classics like "Citizen Kane", "Amadeus", and "Casablanca".    On top of that, we were reading scads of short stories and poems between each of the novels.   Heck, two of my friends and I made a rather horrible, but accurate film version of Poe's "The Fall of the House of Usher" for extra credit.   

I don't believe that the Botkin sisters have been exposed to close readings of works that would be critical of American exceptionalism or patriarchy in general.    I'm sure they've been kept carefully away from any feminist literature (well, except maybe "Jane Eyre" or "Little Women").  Have they read anything written by a person of color?   Have they really participated in an intense discussion where the outcome is not necessarily in line with their family's beliefs?

The self-serving reference to writing a book as a sign of education screams that the Botkin family doesn't really educate their children.  My project related to TKAM was on the Nazi Olympics of 1936 which was an extravaganza of highly organized propaganda for the Nazis.  The Nazis produced plenty of books and articles on why genocide was not only needed, but beneficial to humankind at large.   IOW, writing a book does not prove that the author is thinking critically at all. 

Let's be honest.  The Botkin Sisters two books are awful on so many levels.....

One thing that I think that I mentioned in the last part was novels and fiction and how young ladies can read too many of those and they can escape through them and they can become enraptured by them and that's not the only reason I would caution girls not to read them. The other reason is that there are so many other books that need to be read right now. Elizabeth and I have a reading list that's about a mile long and I don't know if we're ever going to get through it. Some of the subjects that we're studying right now are theology and worldview, writing and communication, history and understanding the times. There's so much to study. There's so much to learn. And I do believe that reading books is the best way to do that.

Mmm-k. 

"Worldview" and "Understanding the Times" are not exactly tricky academic subjects - and I really doubt either of the Botkin Sisters are digging deeply into authors who have any opinions that diverge from the party line. 

Theology, writing, communication and history are genuine areas of study - but it's rare that someone would be able to combine all four of those topics and study them deeply enough to be a real expert.  Perhaps if they were studying a specific theological doctrine and how it changed over time....that would lead to a paper of some sort....and I guess that the presentations on the final topic would be a form of communication...but I'm never going to see that from the Botkin Sisters. 

I feel sad reviewing this section because I know how much the Botkin Sisters have missed.  Imagine if they had attended a college or a seminary.  Imagine if they joined Toastmasters.  Imagine if they took a few community college classes on public speaking.  Imagine if they acted in a community theater or started a book club that read works by women, LGBT+ or people of color.  Imagine if they flipped burgers at the local greasy spoon or joined a literacy outreach to their local community. 

Imagine if they lived fully.

ATI Wisdom Booklet: First-Aid in a cult

I feel like these ATI Wisdom Booklets were created to see how many followers of Bill Gothard they could kill off. 

I was first certified for CPR and First Aid sometime after I turned 18 but before I graduated college.  There's a Red Cross facility not far from the college I went to so I remember taking a long, single day course that covered Infant/Child and Adult CPR with AED followed by First Aid.    I got another long course when I was a camp counselor followed by a refresher class just before I started student teaching.  Once I landed a teaching job, I signed up to be on the Medical Emergency Response Team for my school so I got a full-day course on CPR and First Aid yearly plus I got to participate in random emergency drills throughout the school year. 

ATI manages to forget the first rule of first aid response - be safe.   At my very first CPR class, the instructor got us all on the floor with our dummies and gave us this scenario: "You walk into a Red Cross training room and find 15 people unresponsive on the floor.  What do you do next?"

 My classmates launched into detailed triage ideas.

 I said, "Get the hell out of there and call for help.  Fifteen people down means something really bad like a gas leak, stray voltage, or an axe murderer and I don't want to be number 16.  Especially if it's an axe murderer. "

Yup.  I know when I'm completely inadequate for a job and I know when to call for help.

Once you've verified that there's not an immediate danger, you check to see if the person is really unconscious by yelling at them or flicking at their feet if they are a baby.  Being a camp counselor is even more fun when any counselor who drifts off to sleep in a moment of downtime immediately has another counselor screaming "Are you ok?  Name, ARE YOU OK?" at them.  (I do have a quirky sense of humor, I admit, but I had fun.)

If they are unconcious, you check to see if they are breathing.  If they are not, you move into the ABC's of cardiopulmonary resuscitation where "A" stands for airway, "B" stands for breathing, and "C" stands for "Circulation" or "Compressions".  The idea is pretty straightforward.  First, a rescuer checks to see if the airway is open by tilting the head and lifting the chin to prevent the tongue from blocking the airway.  If the person doesn't start breathing, the rescuer administers two rescue breaths.  Once the two rescue breaths go in, the rescuer either checks for a pulse or begins chest compressions. 

It's not complicated - yet ATI manages to fuck that up:



First aid procedures are created to remedy the most common life-threatening health issues in a target population first.  For adult victims, the most common cause of cardiorespiratory failure is cardiac issues so solo first aid responders are taught to call for help before starting chest compressions because the sooner a victim has access to an AED and cardiac life support the better their chances of survival.  In contrast, infants and small children have a much higher rate of respiratory failure and choking than adults do so solo responders are instructed to give one minute's worth of breaths and compressions before calling for help. 

Civilian responders are unlikely to run to a situation where the main cause of cardiorespiratory failure is catastrophic bleeding - but ATI manages to even mess that up!  Military members in combat have a much higher chance of treating a comrade who has had a traumatic amputation with massive bleeding.  Because of that, soldiers are trained to apply tourniquets to amputated limbs before beginning CPR.  If ATI was aping military first response, the "bleeding" section should be moved first.   Equally importantly, ATI does nothing to differentiate massive, life-threatening bleeding from a nasty laceration that can wait until the person is breathing with a heartbeat. 

ATI next moves into an EFG mnemonic that I cannot find anywhere.  Don't get me wrong; there are protocols for life-support that include "EFG" - but they are not for minimally trained civilian responders and none of them involve E = eyes, F = fractures and G = Get help. 

Having "Get Help" come last makes no sense.  The best thing a first responder can do is to get the attention of another human being who can call 911 and send fully trained emergency responders to the rescue.  During one of MERT team drills, our slightly sadistic nurse-trainer decided to keep all of the other adults "trapped in an office" while I was stuck with a downed student in another room that didn't have any dangerous situations.  I started the ABCs while screaming like a stuck-pig.  I'm not kidding; I let out a series of blood-curdling screams.  Suddenly, the room was filled with teenagers who bailed from the class next door to see what was going on.  I called the name of the most responsible one and told them to pretend to call 911.    Not exactly what our trainer expected - but hey, I got the attention of someone with a phone. Problem solved. :-)

 In ATI-land, "E" is where the responder checks for pupil size and responsiveness and protects the head and neck.  The Red Cross and the American Heart Association both train civilian responders to hazard an educated guess about head and neck injuries in the initial airway phase.  If there is more than one responder and a head or neck injury is suspected, a different way of opening the airway by thrusting the jaw down and out is used by the responder who is keeping the head and spine immobilized.    If there is only one responder, the head tilt-chin lift is used because the responder needs to be at the person's side instead of stationed above their head.   

Doing a quick check to see that the person is neurologically ok is probably not going to hurt at this stage - but in my experience civilian first responders like me spend more time keeping the injured person calm and gently encouraging them to not move around.   Frightened injured people do really weird shit under the influence of "fight or flight" so focusing on keeping them from hurting themselves worse will probably pay off more than staring intensely at their eyes. 

Speaking of bad ideas, ATI also recommends "gently pressing" on people's bodies to look for fractures or joint damage. 

That's insanely bad advice for so many reasons. 

People in fight or flight can react violently to another person intruding in their personal space.  A few years ago, I had a bad case of pleurisy that landed me in the ER.  Every breath caused pain to shoot through my rib cage so I was breathing very rapidly and very shallowly and my heart-rate went through the roof to try and compensate. The pain was so bad that I couldn't talk - but when my blood oxygen level started to drop, a lot of people came in the room.  I was so out of it that I would try and hit anyone who touched me.  According to my husband, the medical staff took it all in stride because this happens a lot apparently.  Someone talked to me quietly and calmly and I let them put the cannula on me. 

If a person is not in fight or flight, the responder can simply ask them if any of their limbs hurt. 

And let's be honest.  ATI has a horrible history when it comes to molestation.  Let's not give cult members any reasons to start feeling up injured folks, ok?

If you want to be trained in CPR or first aid, there are plenty of places that provide both trainings like the Red Cross or the American Heart Association. 

Didn't Expect Derick Dillard to be the First Duggar to Crack

Being a son-in-law of the Duggar clan brings an entirely new level of crazy into a young man's life.  Jim Bob and Michelle Duggar have been used to micromanaging their 19 kids lives for decades and have received accolades for their reproductive prowess in the form of a television show, ghost-written books, publicity tours and public speaking gigs. 

Yeah, Jim Bob and Michelle's aura of wholesome Americana got dinged when their insanely negligent handling of Josh's repeated molestations became public knowledge - but I doubt that those revelations changed the family dynamics.  After all, the revelations were not new news to the people who lived through those years.

The tricky bit for sons-in-law is supporting their ever-growing families financially while still receiving some level of financial support from Jim Bob and Michelle. 

• Ben Seewald works for Jim Bob and in a variety of manual labor style jobs.  Austin Forsyth works for his parents at a campground.  With the minimal education both of these young men have, they are pretty well trapped into family businesses especially since their wives are having children.  
• Jeremy Vuelo has always worked outside of the Duggar penumbra - and Jinger and Jeremy seem to be doing fine financially in Texas so far.   
• Derick is in the most frustrating position of them all.  He has enough education on paper to support his family as an accountant - but decided to become a untrained, minimally supported missionary in El Salvador.  When their mission folded, Derick and his family moved back to Arkansas to pursue a year-long course in "ministry".   This has placed Derick and Jill back in the middle of the Duggar clan - and in the middle of the family stresses.

Earlier this year, Derick posted some insulting tweets towards Jazz - a transgender teenager featured on another TLC show.  Personally, I suspect the reason Derick and Jill were not prominently involved in the upcoming season of "Counting On" had more to do with that than anything else.  TLC will swallow a lot of crazy, insulting things from their TV stars  - but Derick was a two-bit minor character on a show that struggles to get advertising revenue.   Either way,  Derick attempted to walk back his generalized hatred of transgender people by claiming that he was denouncing the way that TLC and Jazz's parents earned money off of a teenager.

Needless to say, the internet pointed out that Jim Bob, Michelle, Jill and Derick did the exact same thing.  Pot, meet kettle....

In the middle of the tweetstorm, Derick blurts out that Sam was in the NICU for two weeks - and that his reading comprehension isn't the best in the middle of the night.

No, Derick.  PM was telling you that earning money by filming Israel and Samuel was using your kids to earn money like Jazz's parents and Jill's parents did.

The vast majority of people are unaware that NICUs - and pediatric hospitals in general - have donated funds to cover the costs of meals for parents without a lot of income.  My husband and I received a standard $5.00 voucher in our "Welcome to the NICU" material.  We told our social worker, however, that paying for our own meals was not a financial hardship and that we would prefer the money be saved for families who had farther to drive or less income available.

Personally, I think Derick and Jill should have gotten the lunch tickets in part because they must have a large bill coming for Samuel's stay.   We had no bills for our son's stay - but that was because Michigan has a Medicare program that is called "Thirty Day Medicare" that automatically covers children who are hospitalized for 30 consecutive days or more regardless of parental income.  Since Jack was in the hospital for 108 days, we qualified easily.   The Dillards, on the other hand, had the costs associated with Jill's C-section and 14 days of NICU care.   That's easily $250,000 in hospital and doctor bills if they are uninsured.

As the spat continues, Derick explains that he asked TLC to cover some of the costs of Israel's failed trial of labor and C-section.

Obviously, TLC wasn't interested in paying for medical claims that were expressly excluded in the contract that either Jim Bob signed on behalf of all the members of his production company (a.k.a. his biological children, their spouses and their children) or that Derick signed...but missed the details.

Either way, Derick's pissed about the relative lack of cash that's come his way from the show.

I know the likelihood of Derick or Jill ever reading this is low - but if you do - think about making a break from both the Duggar clan and natural childbirthing.  Derick, be an accountant.  I'm sure you can find a way to help people while earning a decent income for your family.  If you've decided that you want to work in ministry, get a real theology degree from a reputable college and enter a seminary.  Stop doing bait-and-switches like inviting LGBTQ people to an outing for the purpose of trying to get them to realize how sinful they are or offering English tutoring to Middle Eastern university students (read: Muslim) to also expose them to fundamentalist Christianity.   That's not how Jesus worked and is beneath his followers. Jill, get a GED and apply for a nursing program.  You can go to school and take any remedial classes you need while the boys are small.  There's a need for certified nurse midwives - highly educated women and men who handle uncomplicated pregnancies under the supervision of an OB/GYN.  It would take you a while to work up to that level but that would be a real accomplishment that you could be proud of.

To Jill (Duggar) Dillard From One Mother to Another

Hi, Jill!

I think you've started to realize that you grew up in a cult.  IBLP and ATI taught you that adoption was extremely dangerous spiritually but you have spoken of being willing to adopt.  Those same teachings implied that men with beards and long hair were possessed by the devil but your husband has experimented with a variety of lengths of hair and beards.

You are learning that the world has more options available and that's a good thing.  I want to warn you, though.  Growing up in a high-demand religious movement like IBLP or ATI (or Vision Forum) puts you at higher risk for being pulled into other high demand groups.  My concern is that you are ensnared in the most risky form of natural childbirth (NCB) ideology that conflates an unmedicated home birth with being a good mother.

IBLP/ATI/Vision Forum promise people that following "Biblical" rules will lead to happiness, fulfillment, and a life free from pain or trauma.  Jill, you know that didn't work in your family.  The rules that were supposed to protect you and your siblings instead provided cover for your parents to abdicate their responsibility to seek help when Josh admitted to molesting you and Jessa.  The rules didn't stop Josh from molesting three other girls - and neither did your parents. Your parents were too invested in chasing the limelight of fame for having a lot of cute, well-behaved kids to act like parents.

NCB fits the same pattern.   Facing labor, delivery and raising a child is frightening.  Pregnancy and children take whatever illusions we have about control over our lives and dash them. You saw your mother's last two pregnancies end with Josie being born at 25 weeks and Jubilee's stillbirth which has to make the thought of starting a family more nerve-racking than normal.  Believe me; I get it.  I grew up in a family where my twin and I were born very prematurely and our middle brother died in infancy.   NCB offers a seductive lure; labor and delivery will be safe, painless, and empowering as long as women follow the right rules.  Women need to learn the right mental state by meeting with their midwives during pregnancy.  Labor coaches should be picked by their ability to support your goal of birthing at home.  By laboring without pain medication or medical support, women will realize their personal strength and feel empowered by the memory of a triumphant vaginal birth to a healthy baby.  Thanks to following these rules, the mother and baby will bond instantly, breastfeed perfectly, and everything will be great.

It's a nice dream - but is a dream worth the lives of your sons?

Israel's birth was a comedy of errors.  His water broke before you had contractions and you thought you saw meconium.  You chose to labor at home for the next 48 hours.  I wonder if you realize today how dangerous that choice was.

• Once the amniotic sac has broken, there is a risk of bacteria that normally colonize the vagina migrating into the uterus and causing a potentially life-threatening infection in Israel.  The longer the time the membrane has been ruptured, the higher the risk of infection.  Most doctors would want to be sure that Israel was tolerating labor well and that you weren't showing any signs of an infection before letting labor progress past 24 hours after the membranes broke.  
• On top of the risk of infection, meconium staining in amniotic fluid can be dangerous.  Meconium is the first bowel movement passed by an infant.  The danger with meconium is that a baby who is distressed before birth will instinctively gasp for air.  The gasps draw meconium down into their trachea.  When the baby is born, the meconium can obstruct the baby's breathing or go into the lungs leading to pneumonia or scarring.

After 48 hours, you went to a hospital with a labor and delivery department.  I hope that you told them the truth about how long your water had been broken and the fact you thought you saw meconium.  I hope that the reason they let you labor for another 24 hours was that Israel was doing fine on continuous monitoring and neither of you were showing signs of infection.   

Your shock when the OB/GYNs told you that Israel was breech was memorable.  You spent 70 hours in unproductive labor trying to birth a baby who was in a position that could not be delivered vaginally.   You agreed to a C-section and gave birth to a giant 9 pound 10 oz baby boy who was as healthy as a horse. 

There is a bit of irony in Israel's birth; trying for a home birth with a midwife increased the chances of him being born by C-section.  Some OB/GYNs are willing to try a procedure called an external version on breech babies.  Near the end of the third trimester, you'd get an ultrasound to check Israel's position.  If he was breech at 36-38 weeks, the doctor could give you an epidural and attempt to roll Israel from the breech position to a vertex position.  The advantage is that Israel would have been around 6 pounds 10 oz to 7 pounds 10 oz and more easy to wiggle into the right position.   Not all OB/GYNs do external versions - but the 13 OB/GYNs in the practice I went to did them if a woman wanted to and was a good candidate.   If an external version couldn't be done, at least you would have had time to plan mentally for a C-section and would have missed 70 hours of labor.

The reason Israel's birth was a comedy instead of a tragedy is because Israel was a strong, healthy baby before birth.  His placenta was working well and giving him enough oxygen between contractions that he could tolerate being cut off from oxygen during the contractions over the course of nearly three days.  Israel benefited from some good luck, too.  He didn't have any issues from meconium inhalation and didn't develop a massive infection during the long labor after his waters broke.

Perhaps you hoped your dream home-birth was merely being deferred until your next child.  But, Jill, even midwives admit that a home birth after C-section (HBAC) has a 383% HIGHER chance of stillbirth than a "normal" homebirth.  The stillbirth risk of a HBAC compared to a low-risk hospital birth is 1185% higher. 

Truthfully, I doubt you realized the risks you were taking - but you saw the outcome when something went very wrong during Samuel's birth.

I wondered a bit when I heard that Samuel had been born.   All that your family had stated was that you were in labor for 40 hours before having a C-section.  I've had several friends and family members who had successful and unsuccessful vaginal births after C-sections (VBACs) - but no one was allowed to labor more than 16 hours prior to vaginal delivery or C-section.   Maybe you found an OB/GYN with a very laid-back approach to VBACs - or maybe you tried a vaginal home birth after C-section (HBAC).

Alarm bells really started ringing, though, when I saw the picture of Derick holding Samuel.  Derick was wearing the standard hair-net and disposable sterile gown that support people get decked out in for a C-section.  Samuel was wearing a diaper, a nasal cannula, an IV in his right arm, three monitor leads, a blood pressure cuff on his right leg and an oxygen saturation lead on his left foot.   Samuel, in other words, was wearing the standard outfit of a NICU baby. 

The pictures released from the hospital look like two parents enjoying a new baby - but NICU parents know the signs.  I recognized the monitoring cords on Samuel trailing around Derick; Jack had the same ones.  Jack also had the little bit of reddened skin on each cheek after the stickers that hold the nasal cannula were removed for a bit.    Samuel and Jack shared a dislike of weaning off oxygen and having their little fingers take a bluish tint when they got tired during a wean. 

The picture of Jana cuddling Samuel was adorable - and brought back memories of schlepping Jack around the house with cords that weighed more than he did.    Honestly, I don't know how you managed a newborn on oxygen with a curious toddler in the house - but you guys managed somehow.

You have been blessed with two little boys who survived rough starts in life.  If you are blessed with another pregnancy, please do not risk your child's life and your own life by attempting a home birth after two C-sections!   Find a local obstetrician and let them decide if you are a candidate for a vaginal birth after two C-sections at a well-equipped hospital.  If the doctor recommends a repeat c-section, be grateful that we live in a time and place where the operation poses few risks to you or your child. 

A vaginal birth is not worth a child's life - or yours.  

A New Ministry for the DIllards: Saving El Salvador from Gangs - Part Three

In previous posts, I've highlighted why I think the Dillards are unprepared for dealing with gangs and why SOS ministries is placing volunteers at undue risk.

In this post, I'd like to discuss how SOS Ministry hurts the local population (including Jill, Derick and Israel if they choose to remain in the country.)

My information is based on Carissa's blog posts along with SOS's online mission trip information combined with my experiences working in an urban district with many immigrant students, basic web searches of sites like the US State Department, the Centers for Disease Control, Wikipedia, and a heap of common sense.

What does El Salvador Need?

Let me throw an additional resource into the mix.  The CIA World Factbook is an incredibly useful tool for researching countries.  I'm going to compare three countries: El Salvador, the United States of America and Denmark.

Improved infrastructure: Sanitation Controls

While most of the population has access to safe drinking water, 25% of the population does not have access to safe sewage disposal systems.  The prevalence of bacterial/protozoal diarrhea and typhoid are directly related to underdeveloped sanitation systems.   Getting rid of those two endemic health issues is as simple - and costly - as building sewers and septic systems.

Educational Systems:

Students in El Salvador will - on average - receive 25% years of education than students in the USA and 36% years of education fewer than Denmark.  (Side note: The USA does not have a great educational record.  We have a disturbingly high drop-out rate in high poverty areas.)  Education is free, but class sizes are very high and funding is very low.

An additional problem is that the university system in El Salvador was severely damaged during the civil war due to murders of faculty and students.  Replacing the loss of human capital will take several decades and is affecting the country's ability to train doctors, teachers, and engineers.

Medical Systems:

God, where to start?

• 204% higher infant mortality rate than the USA
• 7.5% shorter life span
• 55% fewer doctors than the USA; 68% fewer doctors than Denmark 
• 62% fewer hospital beds than the USA; 68% fewer hospital beds than Denmark
• Endemic infectious diseases occur.
• 1,100% higher rate of childhood malnutrition than the USA

Is SOS Ministries providing change in infrastructure, education, or medicine?  I see no evidence that they are.

Are Jill and Derick Dillard adding any informational or resource capital to infrastructure, education or medicine?  No.  

(For those who are wondering, Jill's midwifery "certification" is inadequate for use in developed nations where advanced medical support (EMT) is a short phone call away.  Delivering a woman in El Salvador with her training should be criminal.)

But Mel, what harm are they doing?  They're just passing out clothes and toys.

 The road to hell is paved with good intentions.

•  Africa's local clothing market has been destroyed by well-meaning charities.  Every T-shirt, jeans or shoes handed out by SOS Ministry is a job taken away from El Salvadorans.
• Every toy handed to a child is a job taken away from El Salvadorans. (Logically - Salvadoran children were playing with something before SOS Ministries showed up.  Why not support those workers?)
• Every dollar spent on clothes or toys is a dollar NOT spent on school materials, teacher education, new infrastructure, medicines, doctors or hospitals.

Let's think about those good intentions for a second.  Who really benefits? 

•  The volunteers get some warm fuzzy feelings for handing out second-hand clothing and toys - but they aren't really changing anything.
• The locals get free clothing and toys - but is that what they want?  Has anyone from SOS Ministries asked them?  SOS was invited - allegedly - to help run a recreation center to keep the kids out of gangs.  How does a duffel bag of used T-shirts keep the kids out of the gangs?

•  El Salvador has a large textile manufacturing sector that is churning out cheap clothing that will go to the USA and be returned as second hand clothing.  While I enjoy the irony - a cheap T-shirt may well travel more than I ever have - my amusement is not worth the waste of capital involved in using money to buy shirts made in El Salvador in the USA and bringing them back to El Salvador.  

There are better ways of doing this.

My church supports an orphanage in Ecuador for children who are HIV-positive who have no one else to care for them.  One group of professionals - doctors and nurses - heads down several times a year to help the local community medical workers.  If you want to go, you need a RN or a MD/DO.

Not an RN or MD/DO?  The rest of us raise funds.  We use the money to purchase medical goods and devices that were not easily available in Ecuador.  Other things that the children need - clothing, toys, household goods, food - are purchased locally (i.e. in Ecuador).

We do send duffel bags of materials down to Ecuador - but it's full of anti-retroviral drugs, sutures, feeding tubes. oxygen masks - things that are needed, but not accessible

Derick and Jill, it's time to grow up.

• Play-acting in hopes of saving souls is forgivable in pre-teens, but shameful in grown adults. 

•  Real missionary adults have skills - they are teachers, nurses, doctors or engineers.  They know how to raise money and disburse the money in ways that help the recipients rather than soothe the egos of the givers.  They speak the language fluently.  

•  Real missionaries take care of their health and the health of their children.  What are your plans for getting Israel vaccinated against rabies and typhoid?  He's at high risk of exposure  of typhoid right now and will be at extremely high risk of rabies exposure when he can walk/run since little kids like animals.  Did anyone at SOS ministries bother to tell you that?  Did you bother to check yourselves?

To paraphrase 1st Corinthians 13:11, when you were children, you thought and reasoned like children.  When you are an adult, you put childish things aside.

New Ministry for the DIllards: Saving El Salvador from Gangs- Part Two

I'll admit it: SOS Ministries scares me.

I've read through Carissa's blog post about her trip and I've read through all of SOS's online mission trip information.  SOS Ministries is playing a dangerous game that is likely to hurt the local populations they allege to serve and the volunteers they bring on the trips.

Let's start with the potential dangers to volunteers. If you sign up for a short-term mission trip through SOS, you will be sent to El Salvador like the Duggars were.    The website has a PDF file for applications.

The application has

• One page of basic personal information 
• One page of writing about your credentials as a Christian
• One page where you write your testimony
• One page describing how to write a testimony....
• A health release for minors
• A medical release for adults
• Emergency contact information.

I'm going to hazard a guess that the real driving force to determine who goes on the trips is the ability of the person to raise the cash involved.  A two-week trip would cost $950 not including airfare or incidentals.  I've never flown to El Salvador, but some basic research showed that it would cost me around $600 for a round-trip economy class seat from Michigan.  I could knock the cost down slightly by driving to Chicago, but I would end up paying the difference in gas.  That's $1550 per person so far.

They have a mission trip handbook posted as well.  I've read something like this before when I traveled with a youth group for a mission trip.  What worries me is that our mission trip was to Beaver Island, Michigan to help a small, elderly congregation of a Christian denomination with various projects at the church and in the community that they couldn't physically do.  In other words, grunt work well suited for high schoolers in a location where the worst illness you could get is giardia - and only if you drank water right from a stream and had bad luck.

My health concerns:

• SOS Ministry recommend tetanus and Hepatitis A shots.  The CDC recommends those plus Hepatitis B if there is any chance of accidental injury and typhoid if you are staying in homes.  The ministry doesn't require any proof of the recommended vaccinations or even proof of being up-to-date on the standard MMR, DTAP,  chickenpox or polio.   In other words, you could end up getting very sick from this trip from preventable diseases carried by other volunteers.

• SOS Ministry mentions bringing bug spray.   Malaria is not currently an issue in El Salvador, but dengue fever is endemic and currently experiencing a spike.  If the travelers are not careful, they could end up very ill. 

• SOS Ministry recommends bringing diarrheal medication but "no special medicines" are required.  The CDC, on the other hand, recommends talking with a doctor about carrying antibiotics to treat traveler's diarrhea.  A prudent traveler would also think about oral rehydration therapy powders since even healthy adults can get bad dehydration quickly during a bout of bacterial diarrhea.

My cost concerns:  

• Passports are $110 dollars for people over 16 years old and $80 for people under 16 years old.

• The cost of traveler's vaccines from the Health Department in my area is 
• Consult for an individual is $55.00 or $75.00 for a family of two or more people.
• A DTaP shot is $58 dollars.
• A Hep A shot is $56 dollars.  A Hep B shot is $62 dollars.  You can get both in a single vaccine for $86 dollars.
• Typhoid is $66 dollars for the oral vaccine or $78 dollars for an injection.
• Total additional costs: $0 (if they got the Hep A/Hep B series, are up to date on Tetanus, and don't know about typhoid) - $277 (needs one of all the vaccines).

• Cost of treated bed mosquito netting if you don't like the idea of getting dengue: $30.00.
• Cost of prescription for Ciprofloxacin 500mg for 3 days between $4-10.00

• Cost of having a cell phone in El Salvador: $40.00 with no data for 100 minutes.  Going over 100 minutes is 0.25 cents a minute instead of $1.79. 

• An unknown amount of cash needed for "love offerings" and "emergency needs that frequently come up during mission trips".  I have no idea what that means, but I would want at least $200 in cash and some form of credit if I was an adult traveling there.  (Side note: If I were running a trip, I'd add an additional $50-100 per person to put aside for emergencies/gifts to staff and tell the volunteers to bring no more than $50.00.  I don't want my volunteers to become marks.)
• Each traveler is supposed to bring one-half a suitcase of their personal belongings and 1.5 suitcases full of "ministry" materials that they purchase out of pocket.  This includes medicine/hygiene items, Bibles, shoes, clothing for give-aways, and toys for children.  Ignoring my feelings about four of these categories (next post, Mel...breathe.....breathe......) , that's a whole lot of items to purchase.  Conservatively, I'd guess I would need $200 of used clothing to fill a duffel bag or $400 of Dollar General medications for my low and high estimates.
• Grand Total: $1840  to $2,591 with the low end being an experienced traveler with up-to-date vaccinations and the high end being a first-trip adult.

My safety concerns:

• The State Department has had a travel warning up for El Salvador since at least  2014.  Between 2010-2014, thirty-four US citizens have been murdered in El Salvador.  (In a semi-comforting note, the State Department points out that US citizens aren't being targeted per se; El Salvador is simply extremely dangerous. Yay? )

• I would strongly urge anyone traveling to El Salvador to register their trip with the State Department.   El Salvador could easily become unstable at any point; if it does, the US government needs to know where you are to get you out.  If the USA doesn't know you are in the country, they can't get you out as quickly.

• SOS Ministries says they have health staff in El Salvador.  What exactly does that mean?  Do the leaders of the trip have complete traveler's kit or should I be sourcing Epi-Pens and suture kits with my doctor?
• How dangerous are the gangs in the area?  Carrisa's blog has conflicting reports.  The gangs want to end the cycle of violence and are willing to stay out of a community center so the kids can have somewhere to go.  That's a good sign and means that the local area is probably pretty stable.  On the flip side, her second blog post makes it sound like they were under government protection and wild pre-teens would have slaughtered them all if the local gang leaders hadn't protected them.  (Yes, often young gang members want to show that they are hard enough by hurting or killing someone.  They usually target OTHER young gang members - not unarmed tourists doing daft skits.) IMHO, Mike - the leader of the ministry - was overstating the danger since the locals look very relaxed and are letting their children roam freely.  On the other hand, if Mike is horrible at reading local conditions he might be leading the volunteers into genuinely dangerous areas.

What could $2000 do?

• Fund Doctors without Borders to help fight the dengue fever epidemic in Central America

• Protect 200 families from malaria in Africa through Nothing but Net.

• Pay for two sheep, four goats, one heifer,two llamas & one community animal health worker through Heifer International.

• Fund $24,000 worth of school supplies (thanks to corporate donations) through World Vision

New Ministry for the DIllards: Saving El Salvador from Gangs- Part One

Jill and Derick Dillard have headed back down to El Salvador and mentioned in passing some of their prayer requests:

Please keep the following prayer needs in mind as you go before the Father:

• That the political instability and violence of the region would be such that we could make the transition effectively.

• National and local elections – that God would put authorities in place who would honor the Word of God and His people

• Prison and gang ministry. Many of the men in Central America are in custody for gang involvement, leaving the gangs themselves as the primary influence of many children, especially young boys, who, sadly, tend to follow in their fathers’ footsteps. By God’s grace and the prayers and fasting of his people, this deadly cycle can be broken and this land healed.

I'm going to assume that the first bullet point is a poor grammatical construction.  I suspect the Dillards want us to pray that the country has little or no political instability or violence rather than descends into chaos.  (My husband isn't as optimistic as I am on that point....)

The bullet point about "Prison and Gang Ministry" gave me chills.  Do the Dillards understand what they are getting into?  No.  They can't.  Presumably, they have the laughably naive beliefs espoused by Clarissa on her blog which essentially run that Good Christians (TM) will suddenly realize that gangs are evil, magically reject gangs, and everyone will be happy forever after.

It's none so simple. 

First big idea: The USA's history of nation building in Latin America is horrifying.

In the 1980's, El Salvador was on the verge of a civil war.  The US government was terrified that communism would take hold in Latin America. The United States supported the Salvadoran government who eventually destroyed the opposition while destroying the country.  In a country of 5.3 million people, 80,000 were killed and over 500,000 were refugees by 1990.  (One of the murdered people is somewhat known in the USA: Archbishop Oscar Romero.)  Some refugees tried to get into the USA as refugees; most were denied legal entry.  Without a legal way to enter the country, many crossed over as illegal immigrants.  While in the USA, some of the disenfranchised young men who had seen horrific violence in their home country became gang members in established US gangs like the 18th Street Gang (or Barrio-18). Others joined M-13 which was a gang created to protect Salvadorans from other American gangs.  These gang members were caught for a variety of crimes and deported.   In doing so, the USA managed to export two extremely violent gangs (Barrio-18 and M-13) while allowing the government to massacre civilians.

Second big idea: Nothing about gang life is simple.

I haven't talked about my teaching experiences much on my blog.  I have a lot of positive memories, but I also have bad memories.  I started teaching when I was about 25. My first teaching job involved working with students who were actively involved in gangs.  Here are some things I learned quickly:

• You are exposed to gangs your entire life.  More than once, I saw a cutely arranged picture of younger siblings of students dressed up in play clothes.  The boys were dressed in the gang's color - like their fathers and brothers - and throwing gang signs.

• If you are male and live in an area with gangs, you have two choices: join a gang and have protection from other gangs OR be a potential victim of all the gangs.

• Schools were safe zones because the gangs decided that the publicity of school violence was bad for business - but teenagers don't always obey gang rules.

• Getting out of a gang is hard - but not for the reasons most people assume.  
• See, your entire family are probably members of the same gang.  If a relative is hurt by another gang, you will be expected to enforce retribution.  If you don't, your entire family is at risk.  
• For a lot of my students, the gang WAS their family.  They didn't have anything like an intact family; hell, most of them had been in and out of foster-care and various relatives homes for years.  Being in a gang gave them a sense of purpose, belonging and safety that was missing from everywhere else in the world.

What does this look like in Western Michigan?  Here are a few stories with names and identifying details changed:

• Darius was a young teenager who liked to talk trash - to everyone.  Seriously, the kid never stopped picking at other students.  In the classroom, he was pretty easy to keep quiet - he wasn't a defiant kid by a long shot - but he'd start jabbering away within seconds of the end of class.  Darius was in my classroom one day when another teen who I'd never seen walked in the room.  The other teen grabs Darius and starts beating the crap out of him.  The other teen had several inches of height and probably 30 pounds on Darius.  Another student, Marcus, jumps up and starts fighting the other teenager which gives Darius a chance to move to safety.  Marcus and the other teen were pretty evenly matched and exchange a few body blows before my principal who was in the nearby room comes in and separates the two of them. (The entire fight happened in less time than it took me to write that paragraph.  Thankfully, no one was armed.)  Long convoluted story short: "Other teen" was snuck into the building by a fellow gang member to beat up Darius because Darius was picking on "other teen's" girlfriend.  Darius would have gotten the crap beat out of him if Marcus hadn't intervened.  Why did Marcus intervene?  Marcus and Darius were in the same gang.
• Jack was a young man I met at that same school a few years later.  He was a slightly older student who had a little girl in OH he doted on.  He's show me new pictures of her frequently.  Jack was also set up to join the military when he graduated.  Since the Iraq and Afghanistan wars were at their peak, I was very worried.  One day, I asked Jack if he was aware of how dangerous Iraq and Afghanistan were.  Jack looked at me and said, "Miss, I know they are both dangerous and that I could die there.  I also know that if I go back to Ohio I will be dead within two years because I'll get dragged back into the gangs.  The way I see it, if I die in the Army, at least I die in a way that my little girl can be proud of me - as a man."  I know Jack made it into the Army and I hope he's still alive.

• Lamont was a fast-talking freshman.  He struggled a bit in school because his reading level was low and he enjoyed running with the gangs. He was there every day while he was on probation and surveillance; his attendance slipped when he got off probation and eventually he dropped out at age 16.    One day, he was in the wrong place at the wrong time and got shot in the head with an injury similar to Kathy Giffords.  He's now paralyzed and has the mental skills of a two-year old.  I doubt he'll live to see 30.

• In one of my first years of teaching, I had a male student named Luis.  He didn't talk much and was always watching the room like he expected something bad to happen.  Luis was also freaking brilliant.  I gave students a chance to test out of courses by exam.  He sat and passed a freshman level Physical Science course and a Biology course. We developed a cordial relationship in part because he had a dark sense of humor and so do I.  He was involved in a local gang and I thought he might be doing drugs. I had asked him if he was doing drugs and he swore he wasn't.  Honestly, I didn't believe him, but he seemed touched that I asked.   He passed my chemistry class without being in class most of the time, then dropped out.  It turns out  I was partially right; he wasn't doing drugs.  He was dealing drugs.  Luis was shot and killed by a potential client according to the police.  The word around school was that the murder was organized by a different gang.  Either way, he was 18 when he died.   

This is in a fairly prosperous area of the USA.  If gang life is this hard here, how much harder is it in El Salvador?

Third main idea:  Badly acted skits by sheltered gringos will not stop gangs.

In the Dillard's photo page, there's a picture of Derick participating in what looks an awful lot like the "Things that Separate Us from Jesus" skit mentioned in Clarissa's blog.  (Both of them have a person wearing the "Scream" costume minus the mask surrounded by poorly staged white people with Hispanic people watching from a safe distance....)

Bluntly, SOS Ministries could be doing these skits anywhere in the USA.  If accepting Jesus is all you need to avoid gangs, why aren't they doing this in Muskegon, Grand Rapids, Detroit, Lansing, Chicago or anywhere stateside?

• They aren't doing them because they would be laughed out of their venue. (Seriously.  My students - even the kids from far less rough backgrounds from later in my career - would have been in tears because they were laughing so hard.)  
•  They aren't doing it because they would be rejected by people living in the areas as amateurs.  Badly acted skits are age-appropriate for junior high students and acceptable (although sub-par) in high school students.  Jill and Derick are in their twenties.  Doing a crappy skit won't win souls for Jesus; you'll simply provide a few minutes of free entertainment while destroying any credibility you had.
• They aren't doing it because the community members who are trying to change lives would call them out as the dilettantes they are.  In the US, someone would have a sit-down talk with Derick and Jill about their lack of suitable training in education, ministry, health care or infrastructure and give them the options of getting more training or getting out of the way.  (In English.)