Journal: Journal for Biblical Manhood and Womanhood
Volume: JBMW 18:2 (Fall 2013)
Article: Why Homeschooled Girls Are Feminism’s Worst Nightmare
Author: Louis Markos

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JBMW 18:2 (Fall 2013) p. 12

Why Homeschooled Girls Are
Feminism’s Worst Nightmare

Louis Markos

Professor in English

Scholar in Residence

Robert H. Ray Chair in Humanities

Houston Baptist University

Houston, Texas

My dual role as a professor of English and of honors at a Christian university has afforded me the great and greatly-cherished opportunity to teach and mentor scores of homeschooled girls. The thirty years I have spent in the halls of academia have forced me, often against my will, to be exposed to the theories, writings, and agendas of feminism. After many years of reflection, I have come to believe that the former poses the greatest single threat to and antidote for the latter.

Before I explain why, let me define what I mean by feminism. Though many today think that feminism means nothing more than “equal pay for equal work,” the feminism that is taught in our schools and universities has little to do with the rules of fair play in the workplace. Academic feminism rests on the fiercely-held belief that there are no essential differences between the sexes.

Whether or not such feminists accept the Bible as the Word of God, they deny that God made us male and female. He may have made us male and female biologically, but whatever the nature of our bodies, our souls are androgynous. It is society, not the Creator, that “invented” masculinity and femininity.

So strong is this belief, that feminists have replaced the word “sex” with “gender.” Whereas the first connotes an essential link between body and soul, the second points to something that is not inherent in our makeup but constructed by external forces. Masculinity and femininity do not define God-created (or even nature-created) natures that we are born with but man-made, social-political-economic constructs.

Although it can be argued that this distinction between sex and gender has advanced (somewhat) the cause of equal pay for equal work, it has had a deleterious effect on the integrity, nobility, and beauty of God-given femininity. Sexism insists that men and women are different, but then treats femininity as a lesser and less important thing than masculinity. Feminism says that men and women are the same, but then systematically privileges masculine initiative, reason, logic, analysis, compartmentalization, and competition over feminine response, emotion, intuition, synthesis, holism, and nurture.

A century ago, G. K. Chesterton prophetically defined the feminist as someone “who dislikes the chief feminine characteristics.” Today, many feminists not only dislike femininity; they dismiss it as a bourg...

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