Jinger Duggar Will Break Another Family Rule for Her Daughters’ Benefit

Jinger Duggar is through fearing a break of her family’s more traditional rules. During an interview with the New York Times, Jinger shared how she’s raising her children, Evangeline and Felicity. As she explained to the publication, she’s going to operate a bit differently from her mother and father, Michelle and Jim Bob Duggar. 

In both her memoir, Becoming Free Indeed, and her interview with the NYT, Jinger spoke at length about the teachings that her family followed. The Duggar family drew much of their philosophy from Bill Gothard’s Institute in Basic Life Principles (NYT noted that Gothard has since been accused of sexual harassment and abuse by dozens of women). Some of those rules pertained to clothing (the Duggars were not allowed to wear “immodest” clothing that could be “defrauding”) and music (anything with a syncopated beat was to be avoided). The Duggar children were also homeschooled and followed some of Gothard’s curricula.

“That was all I ever knew,” Jinger said about her upbringing. “His words, in my mind, were almost the words of God.” She explained that she looked more closely into Gothard’s teachings when her husband, Jeremy Vuolo, was courting her. As a part of their courtship, Vuolo watched more than 60 hours of Gothard’s lectures and, soon, he and Jinger began to compare his words with what the Bible says. Jinger eventually determined, “He’s [Gothard’s] lying.” 

Now, Jinger is forging her own path and she’s doing so with the sake of her daughters in mind. While the Duggar girls were raised to only wear skirts and dresses, she now wears pants and shorts. Jinger also said that she does not condemn alcohol (she does choose to abstain from drinking). When it comes to her daughters, she does not plan on homeschooling them as she once was. 

During an interview with PopCulture.com, Jinger echoed these sentiments and spoke about Gothard. She even explained why she wanted to open up about her upbringing, and her new path, now. “[I] wanted to share my story because I know that these teachings from Bill Gothard that I followed for so many years are so harmful, and I saw how that really affected my life,” she told PopCulture. “And his teachings were based on fear, superstition, manipulation, control. So I really wanted to communicate my story, and I felt like now’s the time, because I’ve had time to work through a lot of the things that I was raised with. So I felt strong enough to speak now.”