Churchhoney

I think some people at Free Jinger have. Haven't looked over there lately, but I've seen some stuff before on that one.

Yes. I think they've had two planes for a while. (looks like over a year, according to what's on the page below.) I expect they may make some money on at least one of them, renting it out to other pilots who don't have planes of their own or whose planes are in the shop. Here they are: http://flightaware.com/resources/registration/N734UE https://flightaware.com/resources/registration/N68SY

Ah, Inquisitr writer goes with the "Jinger is secretly a counterDuggaral rebel and critic" theory. Don't think I buy that. She sounds much more like Kool-Aid drinking Jessa to me for the most part, with all her "I've been a hopeless sinner since age 7" thinking. (except for that "city" remark) . If there is any criticism emerging from the Duggar kids, they never express it very visibly. As in this case, where the fam doesn't seem to realize they've been called out.

Bigots of a feather grift together. Isn't that how the saying goes?

I think this is the result of the Duggars' control-freakness (beyond that of people like Gil Bates, who are also control freaks to a degree). Jim Bob and Michelle demand a faceless herd that you can, well, herd. If they encouraged or even just allowed individuality to emerge, it'd be like herding cats. Can't have that. Some of the cats might not look up to Jim Bob and Michelle as their gods. I truly think that the kids' egos have been utterly sacrificed to boost the parents' egos. (but, of course, I'm biased because I've seen this happen in real life ... maybe the Duggar kids' early spark would have died on the vine on its own ... I really doubt it, though.) .... Oddly, I think that reality tv has helped squelch the Duggar kids' individual spark, since I'll bet it's made JB and M even more anxious to snuff out anything that might have looked a bit different from the "basic life principles" they want their perfect family to perfectly embody for the world's edification.

Actually, though, I expect that this is one of the few areas in which the show may actually earn its name "reality" tv. Very much of what they show has been edited out or fudged or prettied up or purely faked for public consumption because not being who you are lest someone notice it is a Duggar thing, in my opinion. But I think the girls having nothing left in them but their heart for Daddy, Jesus and Prince Charming is pure reality. They were made this way, very deliberately, by their evil soul-destroying parents, in my opinion. So while that may not make for a satisfying plot for tv viewers, it's one of the few things about the show that actually reveals a real truth about the Duggar family, I think. So if were looking for reality in reality tv, this is actually it. Documentary truthfulness in at least this area. The audience desire to see multi-dimensionality and growth in "characters," I suppose, is why we all think the girls have hidden depths and desires and plans. But as we've seen with the two who are now married and thus as full-fledged human beings as the Duggs would allow young women to be, once we see them act and express themselves in the world all those suppositions about them turn out to be wrong. They're just as empty, rigid, immature and stupid as they were created to be.

Maybe she posted it because she just knows that everybody wants a shot at a marriage like her marriage with Jim Bob. You know, the kind where sex doesn't take long, your idiot husband thinks he's the smartest person in the universe and you're required to look at him as if you think so too no matter what he's saying, you're late for everything because when it's time to go he always demands that somebody cook him breakfast, you have to keep having babies to feed his ego even as your innards disintegrate and your pregnancies become death traps, and he thinks it's funny to pretend to hump you on a mini-golf course in front of your embarrassed children and, in fact, the entire world. Who wouldn't want that? She should share her marriage advice on a daily basis, I think.

Yes yes and yes. Totally agree. And, once again, it's going to be falseness-to-self that derails the only possible halfway decent ending to this stuff. I wish I weren't just about totally certain that he lacks the backbone to say he now knows that he can't live this way and then go make a different life for himself that suits him better.

Oh, absolutely. ... That's the great thing about the Bible! There's so much of it and so much of it contradictory that lovers of cafeterias can always find stuff to their taste (and then pretend that those things are the whole thing.)

Exactly! If you don't love that stuff, Jim Bob and Jinger, why all the i-equipment, the fancy camera and all those sheds? Not a lot of reflection in this crowd, obviously. And, yeah, too bad about Jinger. But she's just living out what's been drummed into her, clearly. (And, by the way, you are very articulate. More so than I am, in my opinion, actually. So there.)

Yep, I'm sure many if not most people who say this and have said it in the past absolutely mean it. Sorry about your coming 70 years here, though! I was unclear. I didn't really mean that nobody meant this verse, though. The verse annoys me in any case, for various reasons. But when it comes to using it in a manipulative way, I just meant the Duggars (and those of their ilk such as, maybe, Bill Gothard?). Having been raised by very Duggar-like power-trippers whose power-tripping was solely motivated by their own crappy personalities and characters, and not religion despite how much religion they quoted, I just don't believe that the Duggars are motivated by "faith" either. I think they're neurotic, mean, selfish jerks on massive power trips, Jim Bob especially. I do think it probably seemed a lot more apt in, say, Bunyan's day, don't you? At that point for most people day-to-day conditions were pretty unlovable, too, so they probably reinforced the bad vibes of stuff like evil and corruption. Today, though, in the developed world so many of us have time to smell the roses that I think it's a lot harder to swallow. I'd have a hard time not loving the beautiful trees that are outside my window every day and Beethoven's ninth and happy little kids. ... I suppose that's part of why the bible is losing its hold. Fewer people need quite so much reassurance that, yeah, this world is awful and will pass away into something wonderful if you just hold on to this faith. But I firmly believe that the Duggars push verses like this because they're fearful control freaks and therefore want to scare their children -- not to "save" them but to control them. And it's obviously worked pretty well so far.

Well, as we keep noticing, Derick's not an independent thinker or a person who leads the way. He's a follower and now he's a Duggar. So that makes him a Duggar follower. That's why I have little hope for anybody decent coming along to marry Jana or Jinger. You wouldn't want to join the Duggar clan or be allowed to join the Duggar clan if you were the sort of person who asserted yourself. What exactly was in this video and commentary, anyway? ETA: So I gather that it was just the one a few weeks ago where Izzy was drinking from a bottle, and Derick said that he gets mad when the bottle's empty. And then something like "we're going to have to work on that." ....? I actually saw that one. If that really is the one that people are talking about, I kind of think it's being overinterpreted. I didn't hear him saying anything about saucing or even training, although I can't say I was listening with extreme intentness. I'm sure he's parroting Jill -- that's the kind of thing that an instant-obedience devotee would say. And Derick knows nothing about babies, while Jill has been raised in an all-babies--all-the-time atmosphere and is a Jim-Bob-and-Michelle parrot, so I'm sure he looks to her as the authority at this point. I don't like the attitude (which I'm sure is Jill's) when it comes to how you treat babies, but I also don't think it tells us anything about how Derick understands that statement at this point, when he wasn't raised at the Duggars and the "working on that" is still in the future. I don't think it tells us anything about what happens when Jill actually starts "working" on these things ....Sounds to me as if she was parroting her parents and Derick was parroting her and also as if nothing has happened in this vein yet. But maybe there's a later video that says something else? Because that one was weeks ago, so it seems kind of odd that the reaction to it would get him to shut down now.

I'm sure it won't end in Izzy's lifetime. Because the missionary groups obviously think that their not being welcome is a problem with the other country, not a problem with them. The churches have often liked to say that it's local power players and governments who want to keep the good news out, while the people -- left to make their own decisions -- would welcome the bringers of the gospel with open arms. We can say what we want about Derick and Jill, but they in no way invented any of this stuff or are the only ones practicing it today. And every time they see some group or religious leader or institution embrace some lying of fudging for Christ thing, it would clearly strengthen their own resolve to charge ahead, I imagine. If people want to keep you out or are less than wildly enthusiastic about your coming in, then that kind of constitutes persecution of Christ and therefore authorizes any steps you choose to counteract it, I expect. And all of that makes them feel a part of something extremely important, I'm sure, and feeling part of something important is very important to them, I would guess.

Not if you believe his God is real and not a voice in his head, though. And I'm pretty sure he does believe that. Once you start listening to gods a lot, I expect it's next to impossible to know where a god's voice ends and the voice in your head begins. Of course, I kind of think the same can be said of reason. Hard to tell where the voice of reason and the voice of personal rationalization begins either.

And probably a lot of the Protestants who do this look down on Catholics for honoring and petitioning saints. If somebody seems larger than life, all humans seem programmed to look up to them. Once you mostly got those people out of mythologies created by your culture, but now tv creates them..... Not a superior source, I don't think.

Probably got some free clothes, at least.

Definitely. But then you would have to convert people who generally speak your own language, are on a par with you economically and already live in a country that's long been dominated by your sect and similar ones. So you might actually have to converse with them. And you wouldn't get to feel superior for helping the underprivileged and needy by introducing them to your Christ. Plus, how would you get foreign vacation travel? If you weren't going on a "mission," then you might not get to go at all because ... xenophobia. But it's not just the Duggars and Dillards. It's very much an institutional thing. It's just that nobody wants to confront institutions or even admit that big church institutions might promote things like lying and asking for cash for their own purposes and condescending to people. Even though they always have. It's much easier to just throw a lot of rocks at one particular group of silly people, accusing them of being singular liars and cheats, and then go away feeling as if you've done something. Same thing as blaming the Duggars for a lot of things they do that are part and parcel of the the network of cults such as ATI and so on that they've long been a part of. Notice how much traction the (few) stories about the institutionalized embrace of Duggar ideas ever gets. Little to none. But throwing rocks at this one family as if they made all this stuff up on their own and didn't mainly adopt it from others and right along with others? Sure. We and the media will do that all day long.

I kind of suspect that, since it was apparently Jinger who picked those outfits out -- and for fun -- she just thought it'd be cute to have a girl's outfit that looked exactly like what the older girls in the family wear. .... Ultimately, of course, what it boils down to is that they think that female knees "defraud" males, but I doubt that that played any part in her picking this particular outfit. In other words, we'll have to wait until one of them actually pops a girl baby before we find out whether they see defrauding in baby knees as well. Wouldn't surprise me at all if they do. But in this particular case, I think all we see is a brainwashed young woman's -- not wholly inaccurate -- idea about what might make a cute Duggar picture on instagram.

If he was there under "creative access," as I hypothesize, then he's probably given out all the information he can give out. The "creative access" program involves somebody who works with locals as a sort of one-man business incubator for IMB. But the real reason for creating those local businesses is so that they can bring in other U.S. IMB "field workers" who purportedly work with the new local businesses but actually spend their time talking Christianity to the locals who work in or around the businesses. The "creative access" businesses expand the IMB staff on the ground in a country without acknowledging that that's what they're doing. That's why, if you were one of the IMB "field workers" involved with one of these local businesses, you would say you were leading treks. But what you would actually be doing is working a bit in the trekking business so that you could stay alongside a couple of locals all day in hopes of converting them. Just as they say below. Some IMB person acts as a "creative access coordinator," who helps figure out business opportunities for locals that will "provide a legitimate means for field workers" -- who are U.S. Baptist wanna-be missionaries -- "to live in the country" without admitting that they're really there to do conversion work: "Creative Access Coordinator: The Creative Access Coordinator will assist in identifying and creating new business entities for the purpose of providing a legitimate means for field workers to live in a country. This will include developing new business plans, training field personnel on how to run a business and reviewing ways to improve an existing business’s methods of operations. Business background and experience in numerous fields is needed." http://www.imb.org/go/projects.aspx IMB plainly states that they create opportunities for people to enter a country as missionaries while saying that they're entering the country as something else. If you participated in a program like that, you wouldn't come back and say you were an IMB apprentice/volunteer missionary or you'd be blowing the whole program's cover, which is exactly what they don't want to do. Because the program exists to "provide a legitimate means" -- but not really -- "for [missionary] field workers to live in a country."

Well, on my interpretation, he didn't. He was a "field worker" in a missionary enterprise that had worked with the locals to help them set up a trekking business while also trying to convert them. That's how IMB gets "creative access" to the country for a bunch of people -- the "field workers." So his main work was hanging around with the local workers in that trekking business to talk to them about Christ. And then he probably did a little trekking, and a little helping out with the trekking, both in order to keep his cover as somebody who was not in Nepal as a missionary and in order to do his main job -- which was to stick like glue to a couple of locals while talking to them about Christianity. He was a stealth missionary who helped out in a trekking business as a cover. A "field worker" for IMB who purported to be in the country for another purpose -- working with locals to start a trekking business -- in order to get more IMB missionaries in than the government would otherwise allow.

Sorry that I was unclear! I never meant to imply that he ran the IMB's creative access program. I meant that I think he's one of the "field workers" who came in by stealth, under its auspices. To clarify: He wasn't running one of these programs. He was among the "field workers" for whom somebody else sets up the "creative access" program that solely exists "for the purpose of providing a legitimate means for field workers to live in a country." (per your quote above) IN Nepal, it makes perfect sense, to me anyway, that trekking businesses are one kind of "legitimate" business that IMB would help locals set up, so that IMB-affiliated "field workers" could then use it as cover for their conversion work. None of the missionary "field workers" would state that they were there under IMB auspices or that they are acting as missionaries.They lie -- at IMB's direction -- and say that they were there to work in this "creative" cover business that some one person sets up. If they told the truth about it, there would be a big danger that it would be sniffed out by the government quickly and could no longer provide this "creative access" to "field workers." What these "field workers" are actually doing is helping out with the overall IMB conversion effort, either doing support work or simply hanging around with locals to convert them, such as : finding "people who are open and receptive to the Gospel, and stay with them, leading them to place their faith in Christ." or "utilize your giftedness and expertise to do financial and logistical tasks that free the rest of the Strategy missionary force to evangelize/disciple/train." http://www.imbstudents.org/programs/jman/Go_Journeyman.aspx#.VhkFsiuW4o0 What I can't figure out is why you would think it's so clear that Derick -- who is obviously dying to be an IMB missionary -- would then not mention on his LinkedIn that he has worked under IMB's auspices in the mission field, unless he had a compelling reason to deny it? Being a missionary is clearly his big ambition, seems to me. To my mind, his having worked there on the qt as one of the "field workers" in the "creative access" program would certainly provide the reason.

That verse has always bugged me. "Love not the world, neither the things that are in the world." What a horrible sentiment. For all the bad things about the world, there are so many wonderful wonderful things in it. But don't love 'em, or else you'll burn in a lake of fire for all eternity. Yeah, teach that verse to young kids, who don't yet have a concept of things "in the world" that are worth shunning, like greed for a billion dollars or power mania. Good way to exercise your own power urge to lock the kids into confusion, ignorance and fear, the Duggar specialties. I'll bet they do. If you hold them up as role models and think they have the very bestest testimony ever, then you certainly would, I think. What baffles me is not that people would pray for them -- prayers happen pretty constantly, I think -- but that people think their testimony is fantastic. I don't see what that amounts to except Have a lot of kids, Pretty much ignore them and allow them zero agency, Say you love God, and Reality tv will give you a bunch of money. What the heck kind of testimony is that?

Yeah, but she doesn't believe she could. And believing you can do it is the indispensable ingredient. Seeing the self-hatred they'd already baked into her by about age 7 on the basis of her horrible-sinner status says to me that they've not only instilled tremendous fear of the world into Jinger but sucked out any confidence that she could successfully meet the world's dangers on her own. That's what a fear-drenched atmosphere that leaves you in ignorance does to many if not most people, I think. She has no knowledge to suggest that they're wrong. So she thinks all she can do is wait for rescue, I'd bet. (If she even wants to leave...)

It looks to me like what's called a baby bouncer. .... They're supposed to be on the floor. And, yeah, they always come with a harness thing to hold the kid in. I can't imagine where the harness is in this one, though. It seems as if poor old Meredith must be sitting on it or something. But maybe they could just take it out and so they did? It's odd. Aside from the unprecedented lack of a harnessing device, though, part of the reason I think it looks so precarious is the angle. If it were on the floor, you could see that it's very very close to the floor and not elevated much at all, so quite stable on those wide legs. It's kind of like an anchored hammocky- thing for babies, with the position, I guess. Leave it to the Duggars to disassemble baby seats to remove the harnessing straps, I guess. But they probably take the seatbelts out of their cars, too.

Heck, she's got a few daughters with no doubt a surfeit of eggs who could donate some to her to carry. Jana comes to mind.