19 Kids and a Big Controversy

Last Tuesday, "19 Kids and Counting," the TLC reality show that follows the Duggar family, wrapped up its season. My wife loves the show, so I've seen it occasionally, including watching the finale. Most of the finale — which ran two hours — was asking the Duggars — including three married children — about their values, their lifestyle, and their approach.

The Duggars have long been targets. I can't say I totally agree with their take on everything, but I appreciate their attempt to raise their family with a certain set of values, and their work to share that approach with the world via their show. It's not always my cup of tea, but it's certainly not the worst thing on TV. In fact, one could argue it offers some constructive advice to most of our society.

Of course late in the week a scandal broke. It turns out the oldest Duggar child — Josh, whose now married and has three kids of his own plus one on the way — wasn't a great teenager. He did something that's very wrong, and it led to a police investigation. Of course the events occurred in 2002-2003 (more than a decade ago) and the investigation resurfaced in 2006 (almost a decade ago).

In the wake of the scandal, Josh Duggar has lost his job, the show's re-runs have been pulled, people are clamoring for the show to be cancelled, and the family has lost a little of its reputation.

In reading the details of the story, I've gone through a variety of thoughts and emotions. But basically, I think it comes down to this — no one comes away from this story clean, and it's a shame that people are using a deeply personal and tragic situation as a political ploy to take a shot at a family — and a belief system — they don't like.

We are in election season. Sure, the Presidential election is more than a year away, but the campaigning has begun. Josh Duggar worked as spokesman for a conservative group that's very politically active. I can't help but think that has a lot more to do with this scandal than anyone's genuine interest in justice.

Which leads me to a couple other thoughts. First, in reading the accounts it's possible mistakes were made. By all accounts Josh's parents made him apologize, sought treatment, and turned to their church leaders for guidance. As someone who works for a church, and has for some time, I wonder why no one at the church reported these revelations at the time. I think they should have.

You don't really know what you would do until you're in that situation, but after thinking about it for some time, I think I would have gone to the police — so I can see why people are upset the Duggars didn't. Though I would point out that Jim Bob Duggar reported it to a friend who was a police officer, which you could argue is the same thing. Because that officer was — later — convicted of crimes, is in prison, and didn't alert his superiors is beside the point, I think.

My other thought is that the motivations for this revelation — and the fact so many liberal pundits are taking a victory lap — seems to be more about politics than justice, and that's a shame. You can't help but wonder if this is just an excuse to disgrace a man and a family by dredging up something that happened more than a decade ago. And without knowing the whole story — which I don't think has been made clear in any of the "reports" on this — it's hard to see the value in this approach.