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Kristin Du Mez
@kkdumez
Historian of gender, faith, politics. Author of JESUS AND JOHN WAYNE. Quote unquote scholar. Next book: LIVE LAUGH LOVE. kristindumez.substack.com
Grand Rapids, MI
Joined April 2015
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    5 years after JESUS AND JOHN WAYNE, I’m thrilled to announce my next book, LIVE LAUGH LOVE. It’s a book about Jen Hatmaker and Joanna Gaines and LuLaRoe and Little House and Elisabeth Elliot and Hallmark movies and Erika Kirk. And it’s a book about power—
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    Me, breaking the news to my kid that I agreed to participate in her school’s upcoming career fair. Kid, sipping drink & not even looking up from her screen: Wow, I’m sure there’s going to be a really long line at the historian booth.
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    Handed poll worker my ID, he scanned it, and then abruptly stopped. “Wait…are you…are you the John Wayne thing?”
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    I cover a lot of controversial topics in my writing, from racism to Christian nationalism to authoritarianism, but nothing draws fire like drawing attention to sexual abuse & coverups in white evangelical churches. Nothing even comes close.
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    One thing that happens when you make a film about sex abuse in evangelical churches is you get letters. Letters from fathers sharing what happened to their daughters, from women you know & don’t know, from women in their 70s & 80s who carried this burden in silence for 50+ years.
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    I'm not an SBC insider by any stretch, but one of the first things I did when I started to write JESUS AND JOHN WAYNE was consult a lawyer because I knew sexual abuse and cover-ups needed to be part of the story. How did I know? Because I'd been listening to women. 1/14
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    Finally caved and bought my 9th grader a phone. He sent his first text.
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    My daughter and I have been joking/not joking about moving to Sweden or Denmark. Just for fun, I picked up this book and we read bits aloud to each other in the evening. This one was a gut punch.
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    I find very little in the political realm funny these days. Except this. 😂
    I approve this message.
    00:00
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    This is such a beautifully reported story of a family venturing away from the world of conservative homeschooling and discovering that the world beyond is vastly different from what they’d been told.
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    So there's this thing on here where certain conservative evangelical men tweet *about* me, but when I respond directly, they ignore me. Every time. Is this a digital Billy Graham rule? Because I swear I'm not smiling at them.
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    Just heard from a pastor of an evangelical church in the Midwest. Their men's group started reading JESUS AND JOHN WAYNE, and by the 2nd week the group doubled in size & it seems on the cusp of producing a revival of sorts. I didn't think I could love this any more, but...
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    It’s not just that the guy wrote those things, but another guy decided to publish it, & another guy thought it should be a book, & another guy said not just a book a MAGNUM OPUS & this is exactly what happens when you put a No Girls Allowed sign on your “gospel coalition.”