Feminist Dogma Debunked

by Craig Smith

L-R: Craig and Barbara Smith, Kaitlyn 6, Charmagne 20, Zach 25,

Jeremiah 15, Alanson 23, Jedediah 9 and Genevieve 27. Absent: Grace 2

For years elite opinion has maintained that women are

happier in marriages that represent a union of equals and

where spouses share identical responsibilities in the

workplace and at home. Even as very few couples actually

live this way, a study by two noted University of Virginia

sociologists debunks the feminist spin, finding that women

— even those who espouse egalitarian ideals — are far happier

in marriages that have a traditional division of labor.

Looking at a subsample of 5,000 couples drawn from

the second wave (1992-94) of the National Survey of

Families and Households, Bradford Wilcox and Steven

Nock measured women’s marital happiness, women’s

satisfaction with the emotional attention they receive

from their husbands and the time husbands spend with

their wives against a number of independent variables

associated with various theories of marriage.

Their findings reveal that women are happiest when

they tend to hearth and home and their husbands bring

home the bacon (earning at least 68 percent of family

income). This did not surprise the researchers because

they also found that men who were married to

homemakers are more likely to spend “quality time”

with their wives. These traditional wives also

expressed greater satisfaction with their husbands’

emotional interaction with them.

In contrast, women who aspire to having “companionate”

marriages, thinking “equality” will deliver what they really

desire — the emotional engagement of their husbands —

actually end up spending less time with husbands than

their traditional peers. And these wives are less satisfied

with the understanding they receive from their husbands.

Also contributing to women’s marital happiness is a

dynamic generally missing from egalitarian marriages:

a shared commitment to marriage as a social and

normative institution, where each spouse views

matrimony as a binding commitment that “should never

be ended except under extreme circumstances.” Wives

also reported higher satisfaction with their husbands’

affection and understanding when couples share high

levels of church attendance.1

As we have traveled from Cape Reinga to Bluff (and

fairly large swaths of the USA) over the past 20 years,

talking to hundreds of home educating families as well

as local, state and national home education support

group leaders, a couple of things have become clear: if

dad is alive but not involved, mum is working against

major obstacles. Everything becomes more difficult:

not just the home education endeavours but also the

discipline of the children, getting their cooperation,

maintaining motivation or momentum or consistent

standards, etc. And when dad becomes involved,

exerting his authority (using effective methods, not just

a loud voice and intimidation) as head of the

household, there is an immediate increase in

orderliness and cooperation. And when mum and dad

are both committed to the same vision of training,

educating and discipling their children, working as a

unified team on the same projects, their effectiveness

increases again.

After 28 years of marriage, Barbara and I can say

without a shadow of doubt that it is the commitment to

each other and the children…and the massive amounts

of selfless work which that entails…every bit of it

made possible by the grace of God, that has given us

all more strength of character and satisfaction of life. I

met a heart-breaking loser on our honeymoon, an

emergency dentist in Sydney who was getting married

the next day. When she heard I was on my honeymoon,

she downed tools, pulled up a stool and asked if I ever

had any second thoughts about the marriage. “No

way!” I said. She said she and the boyfriend had been

living together for three years and had decided their

marriage would be based on the understanding that, if

at anytime in the future, one or the other decided –

unilaterally – that the spouse was restricting his or her

character development, the restricted one was free to

leave. I confess that, mindful that she was about to drill

my teeth, I choked back what I really wanted to say

and should have said: that if they wanted to see real

character development they’d commit to each other “til

death do us part.” We all understand that trials and

hardships build character, though we all also

understandably avoid unnecessary trials and hardships.

Great things are achieved through personal and family

disciplines. The Scriptures have been teaching these

things for millennia: “Count it all joy, my brethren,

when you meet various trials, for you know that the

testing of your faith produces steadfastness. And let

steadfastness have its full effect, that you may be

perfect and complete, lacking in nothing,” (James 1:2-

4, RSV. See also Romans 5:3-5 & Hebrews 12:3-11).

The effectiveness of every family member being

committed to the same vision can be enhanced by not

letting “good” things stop you from getting your teeth

into the “best” things. Barbara was plowing untold

efforts into the local home education support group.

This is good. Very good. I was giving my all to the

Home Education Foundation. This is also good. Our

daughter Genevieve, having been home educated, was

pursuing a legal career and the big OE. I remember

thinking that the Feminists and other critics could only

have a go at our Christian faith, but not at our division

of labour and individual pursuits and the fact that I –

the head of the household – wasn’t telling them what to

do. A fascinating series of events caused Barbara and

Genevieve to see that their efforts and mine could be

multiplied if we joined forces. Our second daughter

Charmagne was even quicker to jump in and commit

herself to the “Smith Family Corporation” which

includes our calling for each of us to be full time

working for the Home Education Foundation.

Being thick as a brick, I was the last one to see it. I

partly didn’t want to see it. It came into our

conscienceness somewhere along the line that when

Barbara and Genevieve and Charmagne brought their

efforts back home to make them completely available

to what I had been called to do, that we were starting to

match up with the Biblical model of wives being

subject to their husbands (and by implication, to their

husbands’ calling); children obey your parents (and by

implication, their parents’ calling); and husbands, as

head of the wife, love her as Christ loves the Church

and train up the children in the nurture and admonition

of the Lord. Our Lord does not leave us to our own

devices: He gives us the Scriptures and expects us to

do as it says. To love my wife and train my daughters

means in part to give them the directions of how to be

my help-meet and help-meets in training. I had

swallowed feminist poison for so long that it took ages

to see that encouraging my family members to get out

there and “do your own thing” was neglecting my

responsibility to shepherd them, especially when it was

so easy to get them involved in my calling. Since then

I’ve been trying to take up my responsibility as head to

lead, to provide the guidance and direction required for

three full-time workers apart from myself. It is hard

work: neither my mind nor my shoulders are used to

the increased load, and I am still affected by the

feminist poison I’ve ingested for so long. But the

increased cooperation and effectiveness have been

remarkable. And the unity of vision makes not only the

future but each new day exciting…we enjoy getting

out of bed and tackling each and every day, difficulties,

unpleasant duties, challenges and all.

The extra load feels right. I like the idea that I’ve

relieved my wife and daughters from stresses and

responsibilities they don’t need to carry. More things

seem possible now, for I know I can count on this

massive backing of three of the most profoundly

capable and committed people I know: my wife and

daughters. (And the one adult son in NZ comes home

from the RNZAF most weekends to help out as well!)

I tell you: this home education movement is the

greatest thing in over 100 years at least. The acid is

decidedly not on the children…it is on us parents. We

are forced to get our act together, a very painful but a

very good thing. It is also the best self-improvement

programme you will ever enroll in. Not only does the

acid burn away the junk, you are way outside the box

as a home educator, if not exactly shunned by others

then at least treated to the raised eyebrows and the

pursed lips. But once outside the box, and once you

learn to ignore the negativity of others, you start

looking at other cultural “sacred cows” and are just not

as likely any more to swallow what the feminists and

homosexuals and Marxists and media moguls and other

assorted special interest groups tell you. Indeed, we’ve

started believing what we’ve confessed for years —

that the Bible is our faithful guide through life — by

actually doing what it says and conforming to the

patterns of what it says are the norms. We love it! ?

Notes:

1.W. Bradford Wilcox and Steven L. Nock, “What’s Love Got to Do

With It? Equality, Equity, Commitment, and Women’s Marital

Equality,” Social Forces 84, (March 2006), as quoted in The

Howard Center for Family, Religion and Society, World

Congress of Families: Family Update Online, Vol. 8, Issue 1, 2

Jan 07.

From Keystone Magazine

September 2007, Vol. XIII No. 5
P O Box 9064
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email: craig@hef.org.nz

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