BrianJarrett.com

So Traci was watching this show on Discovery Health about this hick family who were raising 16 kids, all of which they created and gestated by themselves. My first thought was that it was some crazy religious thing. My second thought was that these were really selfish people. How in the hell can two people raise 16 kids? They can’t and they don’t. These two have the older kids raising the younger kids. Apparently it’s okay to steal the childhood of the older children in order to keep the baby factory going. In order to answer the “weird religious thing” question for Traci I looked them up. Guess what? I was right. It is some crazy religious thing:

Jim Bob & Michelle Duggar married July 21st, 1984. At that time, they chose to use the birth control pill. They thought, “We don’t want children right now. We can’t afford them. We want children in our timing, when we’re ready.” Four years later they decided to have their first child. Then, Michelle went back on the pill, but she conceived and had a miscarriage. At that point they talked with a Christian medical doctor and read the fine print in the contraceptives package. They found that while taking the pill you can get pregnant and then miscarry. They were grieved! They were Christians! They were pro-life! They realized that their selfish actions had taken the life of their child. They prayed and asked God to forgive them, and to teach them to love children like He loves children. They asked God to bless them with as many children as He saw fit in His timing. Right after that Michelle got pregnant with twins! To date they have been blessed with 16 children, (10 boys and 6 girls) Joshua, Jana & John-David (twins), Jill, Jessa, Jinger, Joseph, Josiah, Joy-Anna, Jedidiah & Jeremiah (twins), Jason, James, Justin, Jackson, Johannah (& Jennifer due July 28, 2007).

God has opened many doors for them to share that children are a blessing from the Lord! They have been featured on four Discovery Health / TLC documentaries entitled,“14 Children and Pregnant Again!”, “16 Children and Moving In!”, “Raising 16 Children!” & “On The Road With 16 Children!”. They have appeared on national and international TV shows including The Early Show, The Today Show, The View, Italian Public Television, KBS (Korean Broadcasting System), Discovery Home & Health (UK & Australia), Jimmy Kimmel Live, Fox News Network, CNN, MSNBC and others. They have done numerous interviews with radio talk show hosts around the world as well as magazine and newspaper articles in China, India, New Zealand, Australia, France and Germany. The Duggar’s desire is to make Christ known and for others to see that the Bible is the owner’s manual for life.

As a family project the Duggars built a 7000 sqft. home debt free! Both Jim Bob and Michelle are licensed real estate agents.They often host and facilitate the Jim Sammon’s Financial Freedom Seminar. Jim Bob served in the Arkansas House of Representatives from 1999 to 2003 and was a candidate for the U.S. Senate in 2002.

You heard right; this guy actually goes by “Jim Bob”. Of course the kids are home-schooled and the sheer number of hours of “Bible study” these kids endure is mind-boggling. Debt-free; just look at all the child labor the family receives. They had these kids running power saws when they built that gigantic house! I guess if a couple of them get killed in the process they’ll just make some more that look just like them.

The scary part about all this is that this crew is producing 17 (they’ve got another on the way) evangelical fundamentalists. These kids will never have a chance; they’re not exposed to any science and reason that isn’t filtered through the “Good Book”. Not only will these kids be completely devoid of critical thinking skills they’ll also be voting in another evangelical president (assuming the girls are allowed to vote) and then having more little robots of their own. Menopause can’t come soon enough for this lady.

And “Jim Bob” served in the Arkansas House of Representatives and then tried running for the Senate! That’s a scary thing; our very own oil jihadist had to start somewhere too.

Sometimes I wonder where the country is going. Will separation of church and state continue to exist, the way our founding fathers intended? Or will the right-wing fundamentalists create more and more of these baby factories and eventually outnumber the reasonable and the moderates?

Right now I’m feeling pretty outnumbered.