This Quote from Michelle Duggar Says It All

“She [Michelle Duggar] said the fondling devastated her and her husband and made them question whether they had failed as parents.” —Michelle’s comment to Megyn Kelly of FoxNews, on the revelation that her son Josh molested four of her daughters and his babysitter

Yes, Michelle, you failed as parents. Not when Josh initially molested his sisters and his babysitter, but when you learned about it and didn’t move to prevent more abuse.

Yes, Michelle, you failed as parents when you let the abuse continue for sixteen months without getting Josh treatment and without getting your daughters specialized counseling–in fact, ANY counseling–to deal with the trauma they’d experienced.

Yes, Michelle, you failed as parents when you sent Josh to work for a home renovator and then called that treatment.

Yes, Michelle, you failed as parents when you focused only on Josh’s so-called redemption while utterly dismissing what happened to your daughters.

But Michelle, you failed as PEOPLE when knowing all of this you paraded your family on national television proclaiming your vision of family as perfect and superior to so many other families who didn’t erase their own children’s trauma. You failed as PEOPLE when knowing all of this you took to the recording studio to make robocalls in a critical civil rights vote, demonizing trans women for the VERY SAME ACTS your son performed that you so callously disregarded, even though he’s done them against YOUR OTHER CHILDREN, and even though there is no evidence that trans women are ipso facto pedophiles, nor even pedophiles AS OFTEN AS STRAIGHT MEN are. You failed as PEOPLE when you covered up your family history in order to make millions off of your ruse of a family unit. And you failed as PEOPLE OF FAITH when you warped what Christianity means for millions of people with your simplistic, reductive, nonsensical value system that is really just a cover for rape culture, misogyny, patriarchal order, and emotional abuse.

I don’t believe in Hell. And the good old Roman Catholic Church even disavowed purgatory a decade ago. Good thing for you, because I’m sure rotting in your graves will be a lot kinder eternity for you than where you’d otherwise someday go. You and Jim Bob are the worst kind of parents and people I can even comprehend.

EDITED TO ADD: I was texting with a friend about this and he said, “I imagine [the survivors] will need counseling and emotional support.” And I said, hell yes:

First, they were abused, period. Second by their brother. Third, more than once. Fourth, the parents after learning about the abuse did nothing to help them. Fifth, they had to go on national television for eight years and act like everything was hunky dory. Sixth, they had to nod their heads and take it emotionally whenever mom or dad or big brother went on public tv to talk about how great they were as christians and how they needed to stop the child molesting gay and trans people.