{"id":73733,"date":"2018-09-18T09:00:43","date_gmt":"2018-09-18T13:00:43","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/kendallharmon.net\/?p=73733"},"modified":"2018-09-18T19:16:54","modified_gmt":"2018-09-18T23:16:54","slug":"atlantic-the-tiny-blond-bible-teacher-taking-on-the-evangelical-political-machine","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/kendallharmon.net\/?p=73733","title":{"rendered":"(Atlantic) The Tiny Blond Bible Teacher Taking on the Evangelical Political Machine"},"content":{"rendered":"

Moore was flying home<\/span>\u00a0from a ministry event in October 2016 when she decided to compose the tweets that changed her life. That weekend, she had glimpsed headlines about Donald Trump\u2019s 2005 comments on the now infamous\u00a0Access Hollywood<\/i>\u00a0tape. But it wasn\u2019t until that plane ride, with newspapers and transcripts spread out in front of her, that Moore learned the full extent of it\u2014including the reaction of some Christian leaders who, picking up a common line of spin, dismissed the comments as \u201clocker-room talk.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI was like, \u2018Oh no. No. No,\u2019\u2009\u201d Moore told me. \u201cI was so appalled.\u201d Trump\u2019s ugly boasting felt personal to her: Many of her followers have confided to her that they\u2019ve suffered abuse, and Moore herself says she was sexually abused as a small child by someone close to her family\u2014a trauma she has talked about publicly, though never in detail.<\/p>\n

The next day, Moore wrote a few short messages to her nearly 900,000 followers. \u201cWake up, Sleepers, to what women have dealt with all along in environments of gross entitlement & power,\u201d she said\u00a0in one tweet<\/a>. \u201cAre we sickened? Yes. Surprised? NO.\u201d Like other women, Moore wrote, she had been \u201cmisused, stared down, heckled, talked naughty to.\u201d As pastors took to the airwaves to defend Trump, she was trying to understand how \u201csome Christian leaders don\u2019t think it\u2019s that big a deal.\u201d<\/p>\n

The tweets upended Moore\u2019s cheerful, feminine world.\u00a0Breitbart News<\/i>\u00a0claimed that Moore was standing \u201cin the gap for Hillary Clinton,\u201d borrowing a turn of phrase from the Book of Ezekiel. Moore did not support Clinton; she told me she voted for a third-party candidate in 2016. But she was horrified by church leaders\u2019 reflexive support of Trump. To Moore, it wasn\u2019t just a matter of hypocrisy, of making a deal with the devil that would deliver a Supreme Court seat, among other spoils. Moore believes that an evangelical culture that demeans women, promotes sexism, and disregards accusations of sexual abuse enabled Trump\u2019s rise.<\/p>\n

Read it all<\/a>.<\/p>\n

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The Tiny Blond Bible Teacher Taking on the Evangelical Political Machine | Interesting article in @TheAtlantic<\/a> https:\/\/t.co\/GG09ygg5oN<\/a> pic.twitter.com\/fYBhobJUdr<\/a><\/p>\n

\u2014 Sean McDowell (@Sean_McDowell) September 18, 2018<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n