Jim Bob and Michelle Duggar are back in the news:
The Duggar family is under investigation again by the Arkansas Department of Human Services and police were called when the family refused to cooperate, In Touch magazine is reporting exclusively in its new issue that hits newsstands today. A representative from the Washington County DHS called 911 on May 27 at around 11 a.m. asking for police assistance when DHS was not allowed to see the minor they were concerned about. In Touch, which broke the story of Josh Duggar’s sexual molestation scandal, has the full transcript of the emergency call in the new issue....
The Duggars made no mention [during their Fox News interview] of the fact that they have been under investigation again, but In Touch discovered what they are hiding via another Freedom of Information Act request that produced the 911 call. After identifying himself as a Washington Country DHS employee and stating the Duggar family address, the caller tells the 911 operator, “We have an investigation and I guess they’re not being cooperative. We have to see the child to make sure the child is all right. So we just need police assistance.”
DHS records can't be released, In Touch notes (and they shouldn't be released, Dan notes), so there's no way of knowing what was going on—which kid DHS wanted to check on, what they thought had been done to that kid, how or whether the case has been resolved. But it's possible that there's another Duggar kid being abused on Jim Bob and Michelle's watch. No, strike that. All the Duggar kids are being abused. Religious indoctrination, sexist dogma, being isolated and lied to every day of your life—Jim Bob and Michelle's approach to parenting is inherently abusive. As Mark Joseph Stern wrote at Slate...
Although TLC goes to great lengths to mask this fact, the Duggar family is a cult. They forbid their children from exploring outside ideas and expression, carefully monitoring every word and image they are exposed to. They forbid them from wearing shorts. They homeschool them in order to indoctrinate them with backward beliefs. They refuse to let their adult daughters kiss or hold hands before marriage and demand to read every text between their daughters and their suitors. They adhere to a fringe Christian movement called the “Christian patriarchy,” which commands total female submission to men and limited education for women. The Duggars do everything they can to control their children’s minds, then brainwash them with misogynistic dogma.
Josh Duggar grew up in this sexist milieu. He was told that women exist to serve men—to show them “submission,” “obedience,” and “reverence.” He was barred from seeking out any differing views about men and women. His mind was warped from childhood. Is it any surprise that, by the time he reached adolescence, he believed girls’ bodies were his to touch however he pleased?
The story of Josh Duggar—of the whole Duggar family, really—is a tragedy.