An Examination of Right-Wing Hypocrisy with Valerie Tarico

Fall of Roe

Today on the Fall of Roe podcast, Chris meets with Valerie Tarico, a reformed fundamentalist and author, to talk about right-wing hypocrisy in the fight for the right to an abortion. As an ex-member of the Evangelical church, Valerie is very familiar with the blame game, in that people are quick to judge others but make exceptions for themselves. Republicans fight for less gun control and fewer mask mandates, but when it comes to female rights to an abortion, it’s no longer acceptable. From the notion of abortion being explicitly mentioned in the Bible to information about spontaneous abortions, Valerie provides examples of moral Evangelical contradictions here today.

Together, she and Chris go on to discuss the polarization and isolation of far right and fundamentalist groups. This debate about abortion, however, ultimately begs questions we’ve been asking for centuries about definitions of personhood and the inherent value of human DNA. After all, the fight for control over women has existed since the Iron Age. Valerie closes out the episode on a hopeful note by thanking the generations of women before her that fought the good fight for the sake of progress.

The Finer Details of This Episode:

• The blame game
• Pro-life hypocrisy
• Abortion in the Bible
• Spontaneous abortions
• Moral Evangelical contradictions
• Traditional examples of female fights for control
• Ostracism
• Pinning hopes on human DNA
• Attributes of personhood
• Other political fights for control (gun laws, COVID mask mandates, etc.)

Quotes:

“So my background, as you pointed out, is in Evangelical Fundamentalism. I attended Billy Graham's alma mater, Wheaton College, by choice and actually found it to be more theologically diverse and liberal than the church I grew up in. I also went on to get a PhD in counseling psychology. So the intersection of those two things leave me not at all surprised about the way that people are able to compartmentalize different aspects of who they are and their values and make exceptions for themselves that they don't make for other people.”

“You know, there are people who get married on a whim in Las Vegas, right? There probably are people who have abortions on a whim, but that is not the majority case.”

“Can you honest to God call yourself pro-life if you just threaten the life of a walking around living person?”

“In the United States, something like 70% of women who have abortions, they self identify as Christian. But within that, a significant percent belong to mainline Christian denominations, not evangelicals, not Catholics.”

“I accepted Jesus as my personal Savior probably several times during childhood just to be safe, because Hell was a scary place. By my own choice. I went to Wheaton College of Billy Graham fame. But even while I was there, I was struggling to hold together the rational and moral contradictions within evangelicalism.”

“It all just sounded like so many rationalizations and justifications; they were making excuses for God. I finally got to the point where I said, ‘I'm not making excuses for you anymore.’”

“They are convinced they're being compassionate towards women, because they only hear the stories of abortion regret.”

"The Bible that talks about sexual intimacy and pleasure as one of humanity's most treasured cherished experiences right, apart from this question of procreation. And so… when you talk about people being able to live their best lives, that very often gets left out of the equation and or cheapened.”

“When young evangelicals are having sex, they're more likely to not think about it ahead of time, because they feel guilty. It's better to kind of commit spontaneous unexpected sin than premeditated sin.”

“Because of that, just like in small cults, the smaller, the more countercultural it is, the more they have to come up with these ways of structuring their own society, kind of being standoffish, creating a set of rules that keep people apart from the world outside, and one of those is getting married young.”

“The Bible has human handprints all over it. You can see kind of how it was formulated if you look closely, and it is clearly man making God in the image of man.”

"We can do way better. We just know a lot more. We've got the privilege of kind of having had generations of folks kind of participating in this struggle before us.”

Links:

Fall of Roe Homepage

Valerie Tarico Homepage