Extreme biblical patriarchy and mainstream complementarianism were bound by networks and consumer markets

Evidence

Finn was correct to locate Phillips and the Duggars at the edges of conservative evangelicalism. Yet a decade hence, it is the relationship between the centers and the margins that demands scrutiny. Those who occupy what center there is have largely failed to define themselves against the more extreme expressions of “biblical patriarchy,” and there are reasons for this. With the escalation of the culture wars in the 2000s, stronger affinities—both theological and cultural—bound together “normative complementarians” and “biblical patriarchs” than Finn cared to admit, and this was not happenstance. For decades, networks had been forged and alliances secured, linking the center and peripheries. At the same time, a vast consumer market cared little for such distinctions. One no longer needed to attend a Bill Gothard seminar to tap into his extremist ideology; one could buy Phillips’s latest DVD online. Or watch reality television. The Duggars, after all, were a national phenomenon. — Kristin Kobes Du Mez, Jesus and John Wayne, 661

Categorization

• XREF: Builds directly toward the book’s central challenge to the ‘dominant strand’ question the reader is contesting.