0:00 Intro 2:00 Chapter 8: Beauty The Doesn't Need A Runway 8:13 Hair Extensions BAD 18:55 You're Insecure Because You're Not Christian Enough 23:27 Chapter 9: When True Love and Femininity Collide 29:15 Stop Kissing Boys! 37:33 Love is Sacrifice: Man Lead, Woman Follow 42:08 Romance Books BAD Too 47:27 Chapter 10: Hard Working Women Doing It Right 54:04 Why Should Women Need To Look After Ourselves?! 56:32 What Even IS A Social Construct? 01:02:41 A Proverbs 31 Wife
Funnily enough, my church had a service today about marriage, and it was pretty solid. It was basically about how feelings of romance fade and you need to be able to love each other in the way that people love their children: Making sacrifices, being with people whether it benefits you or not (on a more materialistic/self centered sense, not in an abusive one), showing love through actions, communicating and setting groud rules, etc. Etc.. Well, my pastor actually brought up that verse about "wives being subservient", and brought up the sexism and abuse the church has levied with it. He spoke about how BOTH partners need to be subservient to each other, how BOTH need to love and respect each other and how the deference thing came in because of social roles at the time. I just find it funny that a godly, bible-adhering person like him was able to grasp these easy concepts while these two can't. What's so difficult about not perpetuating your own oppression?
Dear Rachel, please keep the scrapbook content coming. I loved seeing all of the pictures of you and Kyra. Your creative and artistic side really showed. You’ve inspired me to go into my storage and pull out all of my old scrapbooking materials. It was very therapeutic watching you put things together so I’m excited to do some myself. ♥️
They claim to be so pure, but sex is literally constantly at the forefront of their mind! I mean what kind of horndog cannot read a romance novel because it feels like cheating on their spouse?
Those red flags are warranted. They have a past relative who was a mayor is Austria during the Nazi occupation. Of course none of us can change our family history but they won’t talk about it and Bethany posted pictures with his grave on her Instagram after her trip to Austria. The denial and cover up they are willing to do (they delete comments asking about it) in order to not come to terms with their family history is a problem at best and a sinister choice at worst.
It's as if they've read the bible but never paid attention to the places that are mentioned. Typical environment to find blond woman. 🧐 Maybe they read the same children bible I had. Where Jesus had white skin, rosy cheeks and blond curls. Edit: It's clear they read the bible and didn't pay attention though.
re: Women and office jobs. I had a friend (cis woman, early 30's). She was one of the only childfree (by choice) people in her office and what happened was that often, she was the last to be allowed to put in for vacation time. She was almost never allowed to take vacation time in summer, because that's when school's out and those coworkers with children would be given preference, no matter when the request was made. Sometimes her Christmas vacation was cancelled, because a parent "needed" it. Point is, people, especially women, without children will be looked down upon and treated worse. "You don't need the money, you don't have children", "you have the time (to work overtime) since you don't have children", etc. As if oneself didn't matter. Sorry for the rant, but as someone who also chose long ago to not have children, this is a huge pet peeve of mine.
Yes! This is particularly annoying when the choice to not have children was financially and chosen due to health. I have chronic health issues and realized I'd never be able to get enough PTO for myself and my hypothetical kids.
I'm aromantic asexual female. From the very young age I was not interested in the romantic princess stories, like I'd enjoy it but anything related to the prince and romance around him just seemed boring and unnecessary to me. I never dreamt of the relationship and family like my peers did, I was way more interested in other, science and nature related things. I never saw myself as a romantic partner in a relationship, it felt like a distressing compulsory future scenario more than anything. And when the puberty hit, I couldn't relate to literally any of the crush/sex/desire/dating talk, though I tried to look like I did. Anyway, I can't count the numbers of times people have implied their concern about my singleness despite me being completely happy with my life (they don't even ask if I'm unhappy with my life) - in reality, I don't feel unhappy by not being in a relationship, but I do feel unhappy for people pitying me or wanting to push me into their idea of successfull and happy. Ever since I was a kid, people have talked like I should prepare to find someone to make responsible over my happiness, like that was the single number one greatest goal in life. I've always felt alienated by the idea of relying others on your personal contentness in life, that seems both very selfish and insecure and immature to me. I mean, I have people in my life who absolutely bring happiness and joy to it, but it's completely unconditional from the both sides, like you are there for me if you want to and I'm there for you I want to, but it's a free choice and not a dependency. And if anything changes so that either of us doesn't feel good about spending time together, we're free to go or take our time until we interact again. So, I'm very thankful for you talking about voluntary nature any relationship should have, and how a relationshipper se shouldn't be the obvious goal of life for everyone for ages, ever since you're a kid, before you even know the candidate for your partner
As a panromantic repulsed Ace female myself, I don't know why allos insist that you need to screw. No thanks?? There's more to humans than their bits?? Also not sure how I'm not allowed to be in a romantic-only relationship without screwing because 'I'm not being a good girlfriend/a girlfriend at all', but platonic friends can screw and not get 'oh well why aren't you in a relationship ew that's wrong be girlfriend and boyfriend now!!!'?? I'm all for having friends and stuff and I agree, they should stop trying to push THEIR version of happiness on us. We're fine?? We accept you guys, you kind of need to accept us. It's not difficult. Just... all of the yes from you XD Also I think I've figured out why I hate having screwing in media - It's THEIR PRIVATE MOMENT. Why are they shoving it in my face??? Ew no bugger off. Can I not have something that's not solely aimed at children that is Ace Safe please??? I'd like something adult (violent, serious etc) but that stays out of private icky romantic stuff or assault. Sorry I'm asking for too much, media, lol.
The frustrating thing about Girl Defined and their content is that you absolutely CAN use a Christian lens to send out good messages to women and girls. For example: -You don't need other people to define your beauty, because God made you the way you are and he doesn't make mistakes. -Don't be afraid to express yourself, whether that's through conventional modesty or sensuality, because in the end, all are welcome in Christ. -It's okay to feel insecure sometimes because struggling is a part of human nature. Even Christ had his suffering, so it's okay to have your bad days. -It's okay to find your prince (or princess) charming immediately or hop from relationship to relationship. Love is the best quality we inherited from God, and you should trust your instincts that you'll find what you need in time. But instead, they're using their faith and their platform to promote a reductive and harmful agenda that sets women back centuries.
They remind me so much of my Christian grandpa. Everything that happens somehow needs to be twisted into a message by god. "Oh your hair wasn't ruined because you didn't took proper care after your extensions. Its god punishing your Vanity".
So they would tell me I have a learning disability because I am NOT good enough for God. Give me a break. I believe in jesus our God and know that's NOT truth.
Hey girlie!! I'm a Christian who absolutely agrees with you! There's a book in the Bible called Job and in the chapters, many of Job's friends said that God was punishing him. In this story, the closest people near Job said that he was being punished when in reality, Satan was testing Job. This story contradicts Girl Defined and as a Christian we should base our life for God. No hate to them but they seem quite judgemental on controversial topics.
The more I hear about the Girl Defined books the more I come to the realization that they’re talking points are very juvenile. It’s like their worldview stopped at the age of 15 or 16 and they never grew past any of that and that’s how they decided to guide their entire life. They had one or two semi negative experiences (hair extensions, seriously?) and somehow that became the big swinging factor in their life that would go on to dictate years and years and years of experience. These two just never seem to have grown up.
I wonder if its not that they themselves haven't grown up, but they know their target audience is teenage Christian girls, so they'll use analogies that resonate with that group, which as their content is designed to mould the behaviour of their target audience, doesn't make it any better :S
It's a pattern I've noticed with a lot of Fundamentalists. Morgan from Paul and Morgan acts in a similar way and she and her husband try to shill content for married couples. The woman always presents this almost childlike quality because she's meant to follow the husband in all things so she's got to have an almost childlike mindset to stop any thoughts that aren't "of God" like Implicitly believe everything, question nothing.
Thank you Rachel, I was one of the victims of Girl Defined.I bought the book about 5 years ago because bc I grew as a fundamental christian, so I self indoctrinated me and resulted in a lot of cognitive dissonance and pain (psychosomatic pain also) , this video is like therapy to me because I can revisit and deconstruct the garbage and damaged , but also because of Girl Defined being so radical I could open my eyes and leave mentally the cult I was born, I have currently a lot of self sabotage in pursuing financial freedom and being independent, those are key for my mental health but this kind of video help me untangled and spot deep old believe that unconsciusly stop me from getting ahead in life. (sorry if I don´t spell words right, english is not my motherlanguage).
If you grew up fundamentalist, you didn’t self-indoctrinate; your parents brainwashed you from childhood. I grew up in a similar household (Southern Baptist,) and I escaped as well.
So glad to hear you’re doing better! I hope you continue to do well as I know it’s difficult to escape indoctrination but yes this channel is so awesome for that purpose.
I hope you're okay. Just be careful not to call any faith a cult and anyone who disagrees with a certain thing a radical, or it shows your lack of comprehension in the terms.
your english is perfectly fine. even native speakers/writers make mistakes.
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You guys were definitely not meant for each other as friends if she's complaining about buying the same top. Me and my friend just got matching shoes last week lmaooo.
Yeah I think matching clothes is cute! Also you can always incorporate the same clothing item into different outfits and give off very different vibes, so you won't necessarily look like twins just because you're wearing one identical article of clothing if that's not what you're going for.
sorry if this sounds weird in any way, but i really enjoy you as a person. your personality is calming and very comforting, not exactly in a motherly way, but like an older sister way. your opinions on topics align perfectly with mine so i assume this helps, but it’s just really nice to come to your channel nearly every day and feel comfortable and safe in how i’m feeling and thinking. thank you for making content, seriously, you’re amazing.
In another timeline it's hair bleaching that wrecked Kristin's hair and she swore it off because she saw it as a punishment for vanity. But then Alternate!Kristin has extensions that she excuses as "expressing godly femininity." Because Alternate!Kristin is also a hypocrite. 22:50 it honestly never hit me until Rachel read this aloud how much they (K&B) give themselves a pass on *their* hair bleaching, hair styling, makeup application by just saying "we're doing it the *right* way because it's using our God-given looks for femininity and Jesus!" If they spoke more on not being hung up on insecurities (as Rachel does!) and feeling comfortable in your skin, but also being able to take healthy steps to improve your self-image, I feel it would be a much better message than the muddle of "anything you do to look better is vanity, but also some of it is okay if it's just to be feminine!"
I find it honestly sad how they realise that the beauty standards placed on woman are so ridiculous but at the same time don't understand that replacing a 'modern' standard to a 'biblical' one isnt going to solve the problem
A lot of the things they say sound reasonable at first and it leaves you wondering how they got from "society dictating your self worth is bad" to "god should dictate your self worth instead" but what you need to keep in mind is that they don't start out from observing the way society currently is and then try to use reasoning to figure out a better solution. They start out with the conclusion that your life should revolve around god and then come up with whatever reasoning they can to support that conclusion. It's a huge difference because at first it may seem like they're on the right path but are a little misguided but I think it's more likely that they don't really see the actual problems with beauty standards, they just see that it's different from what the bible tells them they should be so that's why it's automatically bad.
Friendly reminder for everyone who needs to hear it today: it's okay if you like to wear make-up or if you don't like it at all. Just do what makes you happy and what makes you feel most comfortable 💜🌼✨ P.S. i hope you're doing okay, Rachel 💜
In fact the only thing not ok to do is to force others to conform to your own preferences. Like making people who don’t want to wear makeup wear makeup, or the other way around.
“I can wear makeup and bleach my hair, but if YOU do, you’re an ungodly evil sinner :)” “I can have a career, but any OTHER woman who does is a terrible person that deserves to be shamed and shunned :)” of course I’m exaggerating but that’s the gist lol. makes total sense, no hypocrisy here. 🤡 edit: the romance novel thing is weird to me. of course everyone has their own preferences, but bethany (I’m p sure it’s bethany) refusing to read romance novels bc she thinks it’s cheating on her husband is WILD. if you’re one romcom away from breaking up, maybe you should just break up lol (or just talk abt your relationship and the changes that should be made to improve it).
Yeah I don’t get the romance novel thing either. Your basically reading about someone else’s relationship. It’s not like the character in the book starts having an actual conversation with you and gets you to meet them in a seedy hotel room by the airport. It’s just fiction
dear rachel, i usually don't comment but i just wanted to say i enjoyed this crafty video a lot as well and i think it's great you listened to your feelings
I couldn't handle that this video has no background music for some reason, so I put on a 1 hour loop of Fallout New Vegas ambient music and accidentally made the tone of this video sound way more sinister than it needed to be.
You're one of the few TH-camrs I know of who actually take this content head on and give a logical and rational response. I've seen so many commentary channels bashing Bethany and Kristen with basic insults/petty slander, someone who shares their point of view on certain matters isn't going to learn or mature from name calling, only push their head further in the sand. I know because I've been there. Your content offers a different perspective and can help people who hold some of the views in the book to reevaluate their values. Thank you.
Her hair extension story was so dumb. I had extensions for over a year and knotting is normal, but once you get used to them, they become easier to take care - so they won't knot. It sounds like she didn't take care of them and/or didn't go back for upkeep. I had the tape in ones (not even as durable as the ones she had) and i had to go back every 8 weeks to get them reapplied. I loved them!
I'm on the "beauty doesn't need a runway" part, and I realize that that's exactly how they reel people in, they sprinkle in some genuine truths in there. I also wanna say that I love your knack for crafting and it's very relaxing to watch!
"Not all of us can live with our parents until we're 30 waiting for a man to make the first move." Exactly! I have a friend who is even more religious than Girl Defined (pentacostal, so wears only skirts, etc). But we live in a small town, so there's not a husband immediately available to her. So she has to go to college for something practical and to be able to make money. She would love a husband and to be a stay at home mom, but she hasn't had the opportunity.
Proof I wear makeup for myself instead of to look pretty for others: I never stopped wearing lipstick, even though no one could see my mouth for over a year. *I* knew it was there, and that’s what mattered to me.
I do the same. Even if I’m not leaving the house I still put on a little makeup. It is for me. I feel better. But I also feel that women who don’t do this is great too. They are so judgmental.
If they truly believed what they claim, they wouldn’t dye their hair, heat style it and wear makeup. They clearly aren’t comfortable with their natural look and are buying into patriarchal ideas of beauty. I’m sure they shave as well. It’s so nonsensical.
Yep... Because thats what is all about.. Its not about God at all.. Its about man pleasing.. So focused on what others think.. It so weird how they both push the agenda of appeal but also reject our in born sexual nature. Stay pretty (by our standards) but also, dont be sexy.. You lustful sinner.. So reject the feelings you have.. But make sure to keep that lipstick fresh.
I wouldn’t go so far as to call those things “patriarchal” ideas of beauty, I think that’s pushing it. But I do agree they are being hypocritical on the topic
So I’m getting that they think you shouldn’t live your life for yourself. Instead you should live it for some guy. A guy who might have existed, but not the way he’s talked about, and has been dead for thousands of years. Yeah...I don’t think I’m gonna do that. None of that sounds good...
I love your videos, Rachel, especially the poetry ones! You’re videos are actually what made me read poetry for fun and that gave me the confidence to start writing my own poetry! I even found the self confidence to write poems about coming out and sharing them with my family- that’s how I came out!!! All because your videos began my love and appreciation for poetry! Thank you. 🏳️🌈❤️
This is truly sad. Not in a relationship, nor do I care much for romance books, but wouldn't someone in a healthy relationship read something they wanted and, I dunno, use that to spice up their lovelife? This self induced gaslighting is horrifying
About Kristen (or Bethany?) not reading romance novels, it reminded me of PhilosophyTubes video about ignorance and especially what she said about doxastic anxiety: being scared of learning something that might in a way change your world view. Like maybe she's scared of seeing how a relationship could be better than hers? Basically Rachel already said that
This reminded me of a conversation i had with a friend recently about eventually starting a family of something (we're both about to finish high school, for context) and she's more religious than me but she also said that every couple / family works different and she might be happy about being a stay at home mum as long as the children are small while i might never have kids. Live and let live, let people live in a way that makes them happy, there's no one way of living that works for every one
@@Roadent1241 “don’t provide for other people that you share the earth with” this is no way meant to be offensive to you as you’re just explaining what it means and I appreciate that but I grew up Christian (didn’t pay much attention) and I’ve left that now for multiple reasons but does that also apply to people I need because from what I remember Jesus was all about helping those in need and things such as that so it would contradict Christians beliefs as well and I presume it does include those in need as we do share the earth with them, again if this comes across as attacking or something I really really don’t mean to just looking for some clarification?
@@soniax8964 No worries, I was just wondering what she meant by "no jobs unless it's for god" but God isn't going to want weekly milk and bread and Frosties? XD
My coworker went straight to marriage with his now wife cause he was jaded by the dating scene and she had a 2 hour conversation explained why she wanted to be with him. They did do marriage counseling at their church first though to make sure they were on the same page and had realistic expectations. Together 7+years
Oh the “no same clothing” rule...hahaha I’ve got a bunch of clothes the same as family members and close friends, we just let each other know if we’re wearing it to an event we’re both going to. Weird aspect of the video to fixate on, I know, but there you are hahaha
If it helps any in regard to feeling uncomfortable in front of a camera today, I, and I assume a lot of others, don’t really watch you when we are listening to a video. Having videos like this are the only way I clean because I’ll get distracted and bored otherwise, so you’re just kind of a podcast keeping me company, an old friend. You on camera would have been the equivalent of singing to yourself in the shower or writing poetry in a diary that you will never share, if that makes any sense.
I appreciate you sharing a story about your own social struggles when you were younger. I have autism and the most difficult aspect of that can be the social struggle.
I think it's a really interesting point you bring up about romance novels or other couples being threatening to these women in case it shows up flaws in their relationships, and would explain a lot about them...
It's funny they say they wouldn't go near a woman who has slept with x number of partners, but I don't think a man has ever stopped to ask how many partners I've had before we slept together
These videos are really helping me to process all of this toxic bullshit that I grew up in. I was definitely taught this stuff, I went to conferences and Bible studies on biblical womanhood, I read books on how to be a good biblical wife. I was certainly putting a lot more thought and effort and prayer into being a good wife than my abusive ex (who was and still is a minister) was at being a good husband. I harbor a lot of anger with the church environment that taught me it was my job (and mine alone) to make our home a warm and loving place, and that being confined to that role made me special and set apart, rather than something akin to a hostage. But I'm out now, and working through my shit. So thanks for this. 😊
29:15 Stop Kissing Boys Me a lesbian : ...pretty sure I can do that But like one thing I don't understand with that high body count thing is when men say stuff like "Men don't want a women who isn't a virgin " they do realize that OTHER MEN must have slept with the women after she wasn't a virgin anymore in order for her to have a high body count . Idk if that made any sense englisch isn't my first language
I think their logic is that men are fine sleeping with a woman who has a "high body count" (I hate that phrase, honestly), but they would never want an actual relationship with her. I've seen statements like that from a lot of incels, interestingly enough. seems like there's a concerning amount of overlap between these types of christians and icels in terms of how they view women
This why I hate channels like Girl Defined. Their condemnation and lack of tolerance drive people away from the faith. You can’t come up to someone and say if their dress is too short they’ll burn for all eternity. If only Girl Defined got out of their little bubble but they reject anyone who thinks differently. Your insight has helped me a lot! Keep up the great work Rachel
Can I just say I loved the story you told about that top and how your "friend" told you you couldn't buy it. I felt that story is so relatable and can help more people then anything in the entire girl defined book !
That point you made about how Girl Defined just gave stats and didn't tell us why they were bad happens all the time in Christian teaching settings. I grew up going to church multiple times every single week and going to a Christian school. For an example, one thing out of hundreds, this happened in my history class in 10th grade. My teacher went on a tangent about gay people. It's seen as not a bad thing, but a huge turn off to other people if you were to outright say "10% of people are gay! Look how horrible and degenerate that is! They're all going to burn in hell!" So instead, he just said "I mean, 10% of people are gay. Look at where *that's* brought us." He was referring to how the end of the world is coming because so many LGBTQ+ people are out and accepted now. It's a tactic that's used so they don't have to outright *say* what it is they're thinking - they just use inflection, expressions and context to tell you what they believe and to get you to think and infer these things for yourself. This also means they can't be quoted directly later on. As always, wonderful video Rachel. Take care, love you 💙
37:33 Actually there IS a middle ground between self-sacrifice and self-care in christianity and it's one of the main rules: Love your neighbor as yourself. Where I live it's explained every year at chirch. It's good to actively love and do good things for other people. But it's also important to take care and protect yourself (giving too much money to charity is a good example of what not to do). After all... "sad saint, bad saint" as it is often said here in Slovakia :D. I can't believe Girl defined totally ignored that. That rule was created by Jesus himself.
i’ve never heard the “sad saint, bad saint” saying, but i absolutely love it. i think in the US, wealth’s relationship to christianity is either prosperity gospel (the more money you have, the more holy you are) or poverty fetishization (if you’re poor, homeless, starving, etc you are closer to god). donations (and sometimes volunteering) are the only way to help people who “have less” instead of advocating for actual support systems. imagine if every christian pushed for free housing and food. there’s enough of them to have that influence.
It is really amazing that they can make really soild points and immediately after that ruin it. I love to see Kyra on the beach going after the stick but then don't want to let go of her ball. "why can't I have ball and stick?!"
I just wanna tell you how much your intro meant to me. I used to scrapbook when I was little. It was so fucking important to me. As I've aged I guess I've gotten lazier, the passion kinda died for it. But thank you, your intro reignited it. Your scrapbook is beautiful.
they say we shouldn't change the appearance that "god gave us" but they dye their hair. well okay do what you want you rock they look amazing but it is conflicting with what they say.
i usually get so heated by their content, and it still gets to me, but for some reason hearing you talk about it makes it more palatable. thank you for continuing
My brother said well about editing photos. If you want to edit your photos, edit only the things that are not a daily part of you. Like pimples - they come and go. Scars, body etc. - let them be!
About the part where they talked about the regret many women felt for pursuing a career and then being stuck with student loans: I think that every decision we make comes with an upside and an downside. When we’re starting to face the downsides, it is easy to regret the decision that led to us experiencing those negative consequences. It is therefore easy to believe, had we only made a different decision back then we’d be content now. However, this completely disregards the fact that the other decision would have led to other negative consequences. I think this is perfectly illustrated by Rachel’s example of women regretting not getting an education. These women are now stuck with all the possibilities they did not take and are left to wonder what they could have done had they pursued their career dreams. Whereas the women in girl defined’s examples did pursue those options but had to face the financial repercussions. None of these women know how their lives would be had they chosen differently. It’s easy to glorify the other decision and to diminish the downsides when they’re only hypothetical and you don’t actually have to live with them on a daily basis. Also, maybe crippling debt after studying at a university doesn’t have to be a God given thing. So I think it’s rather wild to interpret the suffering put on people from having to repay giant debt for a few years of college as the consequence of women being too selfish and not prioritizing their families rather than a consequence of a broken political system.
Why are we still going through this book? Because we enjoy tormenting ourselves, apparently. But listening to you makes the pain bearable. You deserve an award for this.
I’m really enjoying your videos on Girl Defined! As a (nonconservative and recovering fundamentalist) Christian, I love hearing your thoughts and critiques of Rachel and Bethany (with whom I frequently disagree on issues of loving and following Jesus). Great work!! Keep it up.
Love the series, but also, i genuinely do enjoy the like, work-along style. It’s like body doubling, or chatting with/listening to a friend while we work on individual tasks
The footage of your dog sitting in your chair by the microphone while your voiceover explains what a social construct is makes me think "Damn, Kyra is spitting all facts, no printer" 😂😂
Two videos 1h+ videos in a row! Feels like Christmas!!! ❤️ (I wrote that phrase without even thinking about Christmas being “Jesus’s Birthday” & now I am cracking up because this was a Girl Defined video)
Tangenetal to the conversation of the video but WHERE DID YOU GET THOSE MASSIVE BOOKS OF STICKERS?!?!?! They are so bloody cool I couldn't stop thinking about them.
when i clicked on this video to watch while scrapbooking i didnt expect u to be scrapbooking too lol, this video feels like a scrap with me vid/dish sesh on this book
Rachel, where did you buy your big sticker book from please? I'm from the UK too, wondered if it's available anywhere, I have a lot of scrapbooking to do too!
Thank you for always using your platform to spread a positive message to women and girls. Your face is lovely despite how you felt when you filmed this, BUT the scrapbooking is lovely too! 😍😍
Rachel, I’ve always thought you look great in your videos. That being said it’s good you don’t force yourself to do something you’re not comfortable with. I think that’s empowering to many of us. There’s nothing wrong with not being confident 100% of the time. I hope you get your confidence soon though!
I live in a country where most people don't speak my native language. If I waited for men to make the first move, I'd be doing a lot of waiting since plenty of men are interested, but they tend to assume "oh, she probably doesn't speak Japanese." Me being willing to chat up men (or women, or anybody else) isn't about being aggressive, it's literally just practical for my circumstances. Again, the Girl Defined girls' experiences aren't universal, part 89900000
The Hair anecdote makes no sense. So you had one bad experience with cosmetics and concludes the entire thing is bad? I was shit at using Eyeliner when i was 12. Does that mean Eyeliner is evil? I have an allergy against Mascara. Does that mean noone should ever wear Mascara? And that everyone who wears mascara is too vain and should trust God more? Considering that Girl definedost definetely wear THOSE products, they would probably disagree with those statements. But they essentially do the same thing.
I don't think you need to worry about not appearing on screen; plenty of TH-camrs don't do it at all and I'd never have the confidence to do it. Personally I liked the commentary with crafts approach today. Great series too, thanks for making this!
Thought I would watch this again while I scrap book for my friend's rainbow puppy. She had to put her down a couple weeks ago so I wanted to suprise her
I must say, I really really enjoyed this style of video!! It felt like having a chat over a craft project (and the dog videos are always a 14/10 for me!!) and I love that it let you take care of yourself without needing to compromise your job.
Rachel, I hope you're feeling better soon, and wish you peace and joy; thank you for giving us so many thought-provoking videos over the years. You are always beautiful to us on any day; I wish you could see yourself as we, your devoted fans, do.
I love your videos and really appreciate that you are real with your audience ( both in what you say and that you do not always want to be on camera but give us something else to see). There is so much "fake" presented online, thank you for being an actual person- self care is so important- take care.
Girl Defined might suck but the scrapbooking process in this video is incredibly engaging, I usually just listen to vids like this but I couldn't look away Edit: Not to say that the usual video format is bad! I just find art and crafting processes super interesting
I absolutely LOVE your commentary and your perspective on things! You are so articulate and I agree so much with everything you said. I found myself thinking “yes exactly!” to so much of it! 🙌🏻
For me, trying new things is actually part of my self-love journey. I'm just not confident with making changes to my appearance because I'm too worried I'll make the wrong choice - if I'm trying something new, it's probably a good sign, it means I feel more confident
Why do they need to equate insecurity and vanity? It's not the same thing! In some ways, vanity can and should be criticised, an example would be to only look at surface-level aspects of the way someone presents themselves (like, for example, psysical apperarance) and judging their entire being based off of only that. Or, perhaps, are they trying to equate insecurity and self-centeredness? That makes even less sense. Insecurity is an intrinsic part of being a human being, and feeling bad about some parts of yourself should not be pathologized, it is not some sign of selfishness or an inherently bad character trait.
I think ideas and thinking like this can be very damaging to young girls. I’m 33 with no husband or children & also no desire to have either. I decided to concentrate on my career instead and for me it has been the right path. I do not believe that makes me any less of a woman than people who have or want those things. We as people all have different wants and values and whatever they are is okay & valid (as long as your not hurting anyone else). I do believe happiness comes from within and not some external force. Maybe that’s just me.
6:26 I agree with you but I would argue that 70% of it is the effects of the male gaze and if the patriarchy didnt exist most of the extras either wouldnt exist or it would be completely diff. I feel like the whole "I do *insert something men like* for me alone!!" Is half lying to yourself. Yes you can like things and do things for yourself of course but I feel like too much of that makes it easy for men to not take accountability for the way were expected to live.
39:50 I (a straight woman) meet someone (a straight man). I am outgoing and he is very shy. I notice him glancing at me from time to time, even blushing when we make eye contact, I find him cute and actually like his shy personality. So I can't go up to him and start a conversation and ask him out? Like whaaaaaaaaaaat???
hey rachel! i’ve watched your content for a really long time and i just wanna say you are such a light on this platform. you give off such kindness and good vibes and always do your best to be fair. i’m so sorry about the recent drama; i can imagine it’s been overwhelming and stressful. i hope you know we can all tell how genuine and loving you are
34:28 I laughed so hard at the line "practicing abortion as a National Sport". What would that even be, some sort of race to see who could perform an abortion the fastest. I don't think that would be safe.
It was fun watching you do your craft-y thing in the background. I could never work with that many options, my autistic brain would be utterly overwhelmed xD
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0:00 Intro
2:00 Chapter 8: Beauty The Doesn't Need A Runway
8:13 Hair Extensions BAD
18:55 You're Insecure Because You're Not Christian Enough
23:27 Chapter 9: When True Love and Femininity Collide
29:15 Stop Kissing Boys!
37:33 Love is Sacrifice: Man Lead, Woman Follow
42:08 Romance Books BAD Too
47:27 Chapter 10: Hard Working Women Doing It Right
54:04 Why Should Women Need To Look After Ourselves?!
56:32 What Even IS A Social Construct?
01:02:41 A Proverbs 31 Wife
Rachel what are these chapter names. You sound so done 😂😂😂
Funnily enough, my church had a service today about marriage, and it was pretty solid. It was basically about how feelings of romance fade and you need to be able to love each other in the way that people love their children: Making sacrifices, being with people whether it benefits you or not (on a more materialistic/self centered sense, not in an abusive one), showing love through actions, communicating and setting groud rules, etc. Etc.. Well, my pastor actually brought up that verse about "wives being subservient", and brought up the sexism and abuse the church has levied with it. He spoke about how BOTH partners need to be subservient to each other, how BOTH need to love and respect each other and how the deference thing came in because of social roles at the time. I just find it funny that a godly, bible-adhering person like him was able to grasp these easy concepts while these two can't. What's so difficult about not perpetuating your own oppression?
Dear Rachel, please keep the scrapbook content coming. I loved seeing all of the pictures of you and Kyra. Your creative and artistic side really showed. You’ve inspired me to go into my storage and pull out all of my old scrapbooking materials. It was very therapeutic watching you put things together so I’m excited to do some myself. ♥️
They claim to be so pure, but sex is literally constantly at the forefront of their mind! I mean what kind of horndog cannot read a romance novel because it feels like cheating on their spouse?
Horndog 🤣🤣💀
My husband loves when I read erotica novellas 😆 romance novels are rarely PG13
Lmao, they're projecting so hard...
Wait when did this happen? Lol I can"t anymore they are all over the place.
love your profile picture :)
Me: I've only kissed one man
Girl defined: That's good!
Me: The number of women on the other hand...
Girl defined: o_o
The plot twist that will haunt girl defined. Lol.
Ah yes, the girls who define other girls, even though apparently only God...can...define...
*confused math meme intensifies*
Yak
Oh gosh kk
Oik
Ikr
Ok but the obsession with tying 'biblical womanhood' to blonde hair gives me major red flags.
Those red flags are warranted. They have a past relative who was a mayor is Austria during the Nazi occupation. Of course none of us can change our family history but they won’t talk about it and Bethany posted pictures with his grave on her Instagram after her trip to Austria. The denial and cover up they are willing to do (they delete comments asking about it) in order to not come to terms with their family history is a problem at best and a sinister choice at worst.
It's as if they've read the bible but never paid attention to the places that are mentioned. Typical environment to find blond woman. 🧐
Maybe they read the same children bible I had. Where Jesus had white skin, rosy cheeks and blond curls.
Edit: It's clear they read the bible and didn't pay attention though.
Lol I would love to see their faces once they discover Jesus isn't white
yeah like wtf?!?!
It's clearly tied to white supremacy and Nazi idealology.
"Sex is tossed around like a toy we must restore purity!"
*Literally can't read a romance novel without feeling dis content
*Are you sure about that*
lol. sounds like hubby is not up to the task.
re: Women and office jobs. I had a friend (cis woman, early 30's). She was one of the only childfree (by choice) people in her office and what happened was that often, she was the last to be allowed to put in for vacation time. She was almost never allowed to take vacation time in summer, because that's when school's out and those coworkers with children would be given preference, no matter when the request was made. Sometimes her Christmas vacation was cancelled, because a parent "needed" it. Point is, people, especially women, without children will be looked down upon and treated worse. "You don't need the money, you don't have children", "you have the time (to work overtime) since you don't have children", etc. As if oneself didn't matter.
Sorry for the rant, but as someone who also chose long ago to not have children, this is a huge pet peeve of mine.
That is disgusting and discriminatory
This should be illegal. This IS illegal.
@@j.c.2240 not enforced all the time unfortunately
Yes! This is particularly annoying when the choice to not have children was financially and chosen due to health. I have chronic health issues and realized I'd never be able to get enough PTO for myself and my hypothetical kids.
I'm aromantic asexual female. From the very young age I was not interested in the romantic princess stories, like I'd enjoy it but anything related to the prince and romance around him just seemed boring and unnecessary to me. I never dreamt of the relationship and family like my peers did, I was way more interested in other, science and nature related things. I never saw myself as a romantic partner in a relationship, it felt like a distressing compulsory future scenario more than anything. And when the puberty hit, I couldn't relate to literally any of the crush/sex/desire/dating talk, though I tried to look like I did.
Anyway, I can't count the numbers of times people have implied their concern about my singleness despite me being completely happy with my life (they don't even ask if I'm unhappy with my life) - in reality, I don't feel unhappy by not being in a relationship, but I do feel unhappy for people pitying me or wanting to push me into their idea of successfull and happy. Ever since I was a kid, people have talked like I should prepare to find someone to make responsible over my happiness, like that was the single number one greatest goal in life.
I've always felt alienated by the idea of relying others on your personal contentness in life, that seems both very selfish and insecure and immature to me. I mean, I have people in my life who absolutely bring happiness and joy to it, but it's completely unconditional from the both sides, like you are there for me if you want to and I'm there for you I want to, but it's a free choice and not a dependency. And if anything changes so that either of us doesn't feel good about spending time together, we're free to go or take our time until we interact again.
So, I'm very thankful for you talking about voluntary nature any relationship should have, and how a relationshipper se shouldn't be the obvious goal of life for everyone for ages, ever since you're a kid, before you even know the candidate for your partner
As a panromantic repulsed Ace female myself, I don't know why allos insist that you need to screw. No thanks?? There's more to humans than their bits??
Also not sure how I'm not allowed to be in a romantic-only relationship without screwing because 'I'm not being a good girlfriend/a girlfriend at all', but platonic friends can screw and not get 'oh well why aren't you in a relationship ew that's wrong be girlfriend and boyfriend now!!!'??
I'm all for having friends and stuff and I agree, they should stop trying to push THEIR version of happiness on us. We're fine?? We accept you guys, you kind of need to accept us. It's not difficult.
Just... all of the yes from you XD
Also I think I've figured out why I hate having screwing in media - It's THEIR PRIVATE MOMENT. Why are they shoving it in my face??? Ew no bugger off.
Can I not have something that's not solely aimed at children that is Ace Safe please??? I'd like something adult (violent, serious etc) but that stays out of private icky romantic stuff or assault.
Sorry I'm asking for too much, media, lol.
The frustrating thing about Girl Defined and their content is that you absolutely CAN use a Christian lens to send out good messages to women and girls. For example:
-You don't need other people to define your beauty, because God made you the way you are and he doesn't make mistakes.
-Don't be afraid to express yourself, whether that's through conventional modesty or sensuality, because in the end, all are welcome in Christ.
-It's okay to feel insecure sometimes because struggling is a part of human nature. Even Christ had his suffering, so it's okay to have your bad days.
-It's okay to find your prince (or princess) charming immediately or hop from relationship to relationship. Love is the best quality we inherited from God, and you should trust your instincts that you'll find what you need in time.
But instead, they're using their faith and their platform to promote a reductive and harmful agenda that sets women back centuries.
They remind me so much of my Christian grandpa. Everything that happens somehow needs to be twisted into a message by god. "Oh your hair wasn't ruined because you didn't took proper care after your extensions. Its god punishing your Vanity".
So they would tell me I have a learning disability because I am NOT good enough for God. Give me a break. I believe in jesus our God and know that's NOT truth.
@@jilldurham5498 I'm not sure. They explained my disability with god having another plan for me than the job I wanted to have before that
@@FillaneAmmisto God loves you. I will pray you come to believe again
Hey girlie!! I'm a Christian who absolutely agrees with you! There's a book in the Bible called Job and in the chapters, many of Job's friends said that God was punishing him. In this story, the closest people near Job said that he was being punished when in reality, Satan was testing Job. This story contradicts Girl Defined and as a Christian we should base our life for God. No hate to them but they seem quite judgemental on controversial topics.
Just wait until Girl Defined find out how many girls I've kissed.
*whispers* I'm a lesbian
~GAAAAAAAAAAAASP~
But be you happy?
::clutches pearls and faints::
No you're not
Do tell ☺️
The more I hear about the Girl Defined books the more I come to the realization that they’re talking points are very juvenile. It’s like their worldview stopped at the age of 15 or 16 and they never grew past any of that and that’s how they decided to guide their entire life. They had one or two semi negative experiences (hair extensions, seriously?) and somehow that became the big swinging factor in their life that would go on to dictate years and years and years of experience.
These two just never seem to have grown up.
I wonder if its not that they themselves haven't grown up, but they know their target audience is teenage Christian girls, so they'll use analogies that resonate with that group, which as their content is designed to mould the behaviour of their target audience, doesn't make it any better :S
It's a pattern I've noticed with a lot of Fundamentalists. Morgan from Paul and Morgan acts in a similar way and she and her husband try to shill content for married couples. The woman always presents this almost childlike quality because she's meant to follow the husband in all things so she's got to have an almost childlike mindset to stop any thoughts that aren't "of God" like Implicitly believe everything, question nothing.
"Well, if you sleep with X number of men, don't expect to have a CHANCE with ME"
Oh, gee, what a terrible loss, whatever will we do
Thank you Rachel, I was one of the victims of Girl Defined.I bought the book about 5 years ago because bc I grew as a fundamental christian, so I self indoctrinated me and resulted in a lot of cognitive dissonance and pain (psychosomatic pain also) , this video is like therapy to me because I can revisit and deconstruct the garbage and damaged , but also because of Girl Defined being so radical I could open my eyes and leave mentally the cult I was born, I have currently a lot of self sabotage in pursuing financial freedom and being independent, those are key for my mental health but this kind of video help me untangled and spot deep old believe that unconsciusly stop me from getting ahead in life. (sorry if I don´t spell words right, english is not my motherlanguage).
If you grew up fundamentalist, you didn’t self-indoctrinate; your parents brainwashed you from childhood. I grew up in a similar household (Southern Baptist,) and I escaped as well.
I'm so sorry! Glad you're doing better now! Lots of love❤️
So glad to hear you’re doing better! I hope you continue to do well as I know it’s difficult to escape indoctrination but yes this channel is so awesome for that purpose.
I hope you're okay. Just be careful not to call any faith a cult and anyone who disagrees with a certain thing a radical, or it shows your lack of comprehension in the terms.
your english is perfectly fine. even native speakers/writers make mistakes.
You guys were definitely not meant for each other as friends if she's complaining about buying the same top. Me and my friend just got matching shoes last week lmaooo.
Ok, that is adorable! ☺️
I would have seen sharing clothing fashions as a bonding thing?? Or maybe I'm just wierd.
Yeah I think matching clothes is cute! Also you can always incorporate the same clothing item into different outfits and give off very different vibes, so you won't necessarily look like twins just because you're wearing one identical article of clothing if that's not what you're going for.
yesterday me and my friend bought matching earrings!
@@Roadent1241 i agree!
sorry if this sounds weird in any way, but i really enjoy you as a person. your personality is calming and very comforting, not exactly in a motherly way, but like an older sister way. your opinions on topics align perfectly with mine so i assume this helps, but it’s just really nice to come to your channel nearly every day and feel comfortable and safe in how i’m feeling and thinking. thank you for making content, seriously, you’re amazing.
Same here!!!! Her videos and personality are so calming and I love listening while doing side work at my job lol
Yes agree! She feels like a calming older sister and feeling safe
Well put, I feel the same!
Agreed.
i feel the same way
"It's almost like different people have different experiences."
Hunh. Imagine that...
Impossible.
In another timeline it's hair bleaching that wrecked Kristin's hair and she swore it off because she saw it as a punishment for vanity. But then Alternate!Kristin has extensions that she excuses as "expressing godly femininity." Because Alternate!Kristin is also a hypocrite.
22:50 it honestly never hit me until Rachel read this aloud how much they (K&B) give themselves a pass on *their* hair bleaching, hair styling, makeup application by just saying "we're doing it the *right* way because it's using our God-given looks for femininity and Jesus!" If they spoke more on not being hung up on insecurities (as Rachel does!) and feeling comfortable in your skin, but also being able to take healthy steps to improve your self-image, I feel it would be a much better message than the muddle of "anything you do to look better is vanity, but also some of it is okay if it's just to be feminine!"
I find it honestly sad how they realise that the beauty standards placed on woman are so ridiculous but at the same time don't understand that replacing a 'modern' standard to a 'biblical' one isnt going to solve the problem
They’ve missed the point entirely...like, the point went so far over their heads that they’d need a telescope to see it 🤦🏻♀️
A lot of the things they say sound reasonable at first and it leaves you wondering how they got from "society dictating your self worth is bad" to "god should dictate your self worth instead" but what you need to keep in mind is that they don't start out from observing the way society currently is and then try to use reasoning to figure out a better solution. They start out with the conclusion that your life should revolve around god and then come up with whatever reasoning they can to support that conclusion. It's a huge difference because at first it may seem like they're on the right path but are a little misguided but I think it's more likely that they don't really see the actual problems with beauty standards, they just see that it's different from what the bible tells them they should be so that's why it's automatically bad.
Friendly reminder for everyone who needs to hear it today: it's okay if you like to wear make-up or if you don't like it at all. Just do what makes you happy and what makes you feel most comfortable 💜🌼✨
P.S. i hope you're doing okay, Rachel 💜
Thank you for this. I often feel a bit lesser than for not wearing it.
In fact the only thing not ok to do is to force others to conform to your own preferences. Like making people who don’t want to wear makeup wear makeup, or the other way around.
“I can wear makeup and bleach my hair, but if YOU do, you’re an ungodly evil sinner :)”
“I can have a career, but any OTHER woman who does is a terrible person that deserves to be shamed and shunned :)”
of course I’m exaggerating but that’s the gist lol.
makes total sense, no hypocrisy here. 🤡
edit: the romance novel thing is weird to me. of course everyone has their own preferences, but bethany (I’m p sure it’s bethany) refusing to read romance novels bc she thinks it’s cheating on her husband is WILD.
if you’re one romcom away from breaking up, maybe you should just break up lol (or just talk abt your relationship and the changes that should be made to improve it).
I mean seriously! Oh the irony!
I wonder if she is the one who brags she isn’t attracted to her husband but married him anyway 🤷🏼♀️
Yeah I don’t get the romance novel thing either. Your basically reading about someone else’s relationship. It’s not like the character in the book starts having an actual conversation with you and gets you to meet them in a seedy hotel room by the airport. It’s just fiction
dear rachel, i usually don't comment but i just wanted to say i enjoyed this crafty video a lot as well and i think it's great you listened to your feelings
That sounds like a lovely night @anna
I couldn't handle that this video has no background music for some reason, so I put on a 1 hour loop of Fallout New Vegas ambient music and accidentally made the tone of this video sound way more sinister than it needed to be.
You're one of the few TH-camrs I know of who actually take this content head on and give a logical and rational response. I've seen so many commentary channels bashing Bethany and Kristen with basic insults/petty slander, someone who shares their point of view on certain matters isn't going to learn or mature from name calling, only push their head further in the sand. I know because I've been there. Your content offers a different perspective and can help people who hold some of the views in the book to reevaluate their values. Thank you.
That’s true. I would rather watch her videos than those of other atheists. As a Christian, I’m able to relate to her on so many things.
Her hair extension story was so dumb. I had extensions for over a year and knotting is normal, but once you get used to them, they become easier to take care - so they won't knot. It sounds like she didn't take care of them and/or didn't go back for upkeep. I had the tape in ones (not even as durable as the ones she had) and i had to go back every 8 weeks to get them reapplied. I loved them!
I'm on the "beauty doesn't need a runway" part, and I realize that that's exactly how they reel people in, they sprinkle in some genuine truths in there. I also wanna say that I love your knack for crafting and it's very relaxing to watch!
"Not all of us can live with our parents until we're 30 waiting for a man to make the first move."
Exactly! I have a friend who is even more religious than Girl Defined (pentacostal, so wears only skirts, etc). But we live in a small town, so there's not a husband immediately available to her. So she has to go to college for something practical and to be able to make money. She would love a husband and to be a stay at home mom, but she hasn't had the opportunity.
Proof I wear makeup for myself instead of to look pretty for others: I never stopped wearing lipstick, even though no one could see my mouth for over a year. *I* knew it was there, and that’s what mattered to me.
More proof: even women in prison still wear makeup, purely because looking good makes you feel good :)
I do the same. Even if I’m not leaving the house I still put on a little makeup. It is for me. I feel better.
But I also feel that women who don’t do this is great too.
They are so judgmental.
Absolutely love your content! Hope you're doing okay and taking care of yourself
Thank you so much! :)
Watching Kyra play at the beach made me giggle like a kid. She's so smiley😊
If they truly believed what they claim, they wouldn’t dye their hair, heat style it and wear makeup. They clearly aren’t comfortable with their natural look and are buying into patriarchal ideas of beauty. I’m sure they shave as well. It’s so nonsensical.
Yep... Because thats what is all about.. Its not about God at all.. Its about man pleasing.. So focused on what others think.. It so weird how they both push the agenda of appeal but also reject our in born sexual nature. Stay pretty (by our standards) but also, dont be sexy.. You lustful sinner.. So reject the feelings you have.. But make sure to keep that lipstick fresh.
@@Xer031 the abrahamic gods were created by men to be a model for how women should treat men
I wouldn’t go so far as to call those things “patriarchal” ideas of beauty, I think that’s pushing it. But I do agree they are being hypocritical on the topic
So I’m getting that they think you shouldn’t live your life for yourself. Instead you should live it for some guy. A guy who might have existed, but not the way he’s talked about, and has been dead for thousands of years.
Yeah...I don’t think I’m gonna do that. None of that sounds good...
I love your videos, Rachel, especially the poetry ones! You’re videos are actually what made me read poetry for fun and that gave me the confidence to start writing my own poetry! I even found the self confidence to write poems about coming out and sharing them with my family- that’s how I came out!!! All because your videos began my love and appreciation for poetry! Thank you. 🏳️🌈❤️
Thank you so much! That’s so lovely to hear! Congrats on writing your own poetry and coming out! ❤️❤️❤️
Congrats, this is amazing 🥰 i am also more interested in poetry because if her videos than i was when learning about it in school
Oh, I love comments like these!❤ So happy for you!
This is truly sad. Not in a relationship, nor do I care much for romance books, but wouldn't someone in a healthy relationship read something they wanted and, I dunno, use that to spice up their lovelife? This self induced gaslighting is horrifying
Sorry you weren't feeling comfortable. On a happy note, watching you scrapbooking pics of Kyra was soothing.
About Kristen (or Bethany?) not reading romance novels, it reminded me of PhilosophyTubes video about ignorance and especially what she said about doxastic anxiety: being scared of learning something that might in a way change your world view. Like maybe she's scared of seeing how a relationship could be better than hers? Basically Rachel already said that
This reminded me of a conversation i had with a friend recently about eventually starting a family of something (we're both about to finish high school, for context) and she's more religious than me but she also said that every couple / family works different and she might be happy about being a stay at home mum as long as the children are small while i might never have kids.
Live and let live, let people live in a way that makes them happy, there's no one way of living that works for every one
Wouldn't that be amazing if we could?? It's almost as if that's what the whole problem with GirlDefined is..
“No jobs unless it’s for god”
What on earth did I just read?
So they're basically saying be a waste of space and a burden on everyone. I'mma work and I'mma be the Boss B!tch of the place!
So.... Don't provide for the other people that you share the earth with? What's God gonna want from a supermarket?
@@Roadent1241 “don’t provide for other people that you share the earth with” this is no way meant to be offensive to you as you’re just explaining what it means and I appreciate that but I grew up Christian (didn’t pay much attention) and I’ve left that now for multiple reasons but does that also apply to people I need because from what I remember Jesus was all about helping those in need and things such as that so it would contradict Christians beliefs as well and I presume it does include those in need as we do share the earth with them, again if this comes across as attacking or something I really really don’t mean to just looking for some clarification?
@@soniax8964 No worries, I was just wondering what she meant by "no jobs unless it's for god" but God isn't going to want weekly milk and bread and Frosties? XD
@@celeste3100 they think popping out children is productive. 🙄
If I could roll my eyes any harder at this rhetoric about how progressivism bad I think I could see my brain..
My coworker went straight to marriage with his now wife cause he was jaded by the dating scene and she had a 2 hour conversation explained why she wanted to be with him. They did do marriage counseling at their church first though to make sure they were on the same page and had realistic expectations. Together 7+years
Oh the “no same clothing” rule...hahaha I’ve got a bunch of clothes the same as family members and close friends, we just let each other know if we’re wearing it to an event we’re both going to.
Weird aspect of the video to fixate on, I know, but there you are hahaha
If it helps any in regard to feeling uncomfortable in front of a camera today, I, and I assume a lot of others, don’t really watch you when we are listening to a video. Having videos like this are the only way I clean because I’ll get distracted and bored otherwise, so you’re just kind of a podcast keeping me company, an old friend. You on camera would have been the equivalent of singing to yourself in the shower or writing poetry in a diary that you will never share, if that makes any sense.
I appreciate you sharing a story about your own social struggles when you were younger. I have autism and the most difficult aspect of that can be the social struggle.
I think it's a really interesting point you bring up about romance novels or other couples being threatening to these women in case it shows up flaws in their relationships, and would explain a lot about them...
It's funny they say they wouldn't go near a woman who has slept with x number of partners, but I don't think a man has ever stopped to ask how many partners I've had before we slept together
YES. THIS.
These videos are really helping me to process all of this toxic bullshit that I grew up in. I was definitely taught this stuff, I went to conferences and Bible studies on biblical womanhood, I read books on how to be a good biblical wife. I was certainly putting a lot more thought and effort and prayer into being a good wife than my abusive ex (who was and still is a minister) was at being a good husband. I harbor a lot of anger with the church environment that taught me it was my job (and mine alone) to make our home a warm and loving place, and that being confined to that role made me special and set apart, rather than something akin to a hostage. But I'm out now, and working through my shit. So thanks for this. 😊
29:15 Stop Kissing Boys
Me a lesbian : ...pretty sure I can do that
But like one thing I don't understand with that high body count thing is when men say stuff like "Men don't want a women who isn't a virgin " they do realize that OTHER MEN must have slept with the women after she wasn't a virgin anymore in order for her to have a high body count . Idk if that made any sense englisch isn't my first language
I think their logic is that men are fine sleeping with a woman who has a "high body count" (I hate that phrase, honestly), but they would never want an actual relationship with her. I've seen statements like that from a lot of incels, interestingly enough. seems like there's a concerning amount of overlap between these types of christians and icels in terms of how they view women
This why I hate channels like Girl Defined. Their condemnation and lack of tolerance drive people away from the faith. You can’t come up to someone and say if their dress is too short they’ll burn for all eternity. If only Girl Defined got out of their little bubble but they reject anyone who thinks differently. Your insight has helped me a lot! Keep up the great work Rachel
Short shorts?! Straight to hell for you
I love the bit somewhere around the 45th minute where you touch on the intersectionality between womanhood and a working class background
That’s been a thing for awhile. A “lady” historically was middle class or upper class.
i am a simple girl. i see rachel posts, i click
Can I just say I loved the story you told about that top and how your "friend" told you you couldn't buy it. I felt that story is so relatable and can help more people then anything in the entire girl defined book !
That point you made about how Girl Defined just gave stats and didn't tell us why they were bad happens all the time in Christian teaching settings. I grew up going to church multiple times every single week and going to a Christian school. For an example, one thing out of hundreds, this happened in my history class in 10th grade. My teacher went on a tangent about gay people. It's seen as not a bad thing, but a huge turn off to other people if you were to outright say "10% of people are gay! Look how horrible and degenerate that is! They're all going to burn in hell!" So instead, he just said "I mean, 10% of people are gay. Look at where *that's* brought us." He was referring to how the end of the world is coming because so many LGBTQ+ people are out and accepted now. It's a tactic that's used so they don't have to outright *say* what it is they're thinking - they just use inflection, expressions and context to tell you what they believe and to get you to think and infer these things for yourself. This also means they can't be quoted directly later on.
As always, wonderful video Rachel. Take care, love you 💙
37:33 Actually there IS a middle ground between self-sacrifice and self-care in christianity and it's one of the main rules:
Love your neighbor as yourself.
Where I live it's explained every year at chirch. It's good to actively love and do good things for other people. But it's also important to take care and protect yourself (giving too much money to charity is a good example of what not to do). After all... "sad saint, bad saint" as it is often said here in Slovakia :D.
I can't believe Girl defined totally ignored that. That rule was created by Jesus himself.
i’ve never heard the “sad saint, bad saint” saying, but i absolutely love it. i think in the US, wealth’s relationship to christianity is either prosperity gospel (the more money you have, the more holy you are) or poverty fetishization (if you’re poor, homeless, starving, etc you are closer to god). donations (and sometimes volunteering) are the only way to help people who “have less” instead of advocating for actual support systems. imagine if every christian pushed for free housing and food. there’s enough of them to have that influence.
It is really amazing that they can make really soild points and immediately after that ruin it.
I love to see Kyra on the beach going after the stick but then don't want to let go of her ball. "why can't I have ball and stick?!"
I just wanna tell you how much your intro meant to me. I used to scrapbook when I was little. It was so fucking important to me. As I've aged I guess I've gotten lazier, the passion kinda died for it. But thank you, your intro reignited it. Your scrapbook is beautiful.
Watching you make the scrap book just reeeeally makes me wish there was an ASMR video of the process 😍😍
they say we shouldn't change the appearance that "god gave us" but they dye their hair. well okay do what you want you rock they look amazing but it is conflicting with what they say.
I find watching you scrapbook so relaxing, I would love more filmed like this in the future!
i usually get so heated by their content, and it still gets to me, but for some reason hearing you talk about it makes it more palatable. thank you for continuing
we've been gifted an hour long video, cheers mates
My brother said well about editing photos. If you want to edit your photos, edit only the things that are not a daily part of you. Like pimples - they come and go. Scars, body etc. - let them be!
Yes! This is great advice :)
About the part where they talked about the regret many women felt for pursuing a career and then being stuck with student loans: I think that every decision we make comes with an upside and an downside. When we’re starting to face the downsides, it is easy to regret the decision that led to us experiencing those negative consequences. It is therefore easy to believe, had we only made a different decision back then we’d be content now. However, this completely disregards the fact that the other decision would have led to other negative consequences. I think this is perfectly illustrated by Rachel’s example of women regretting not getting an education. These women are now stuck with all the possibilities they did not take and are left to wonder what they could have done had they pursued their career dreams. Whereas the women in girl defined’s examples did pursue those options but had to face the financial repercussions. None of these women know how their lives would be had they chosen differently. It’s easy to glorify the other decision and to diminish the downsides when they’re only hypothetical and you don’t actually have to live with them on a daily basis.
Also, maybe crippling debt after studying at a university doesn’t have to be a God given thing. So I think it’s rather wild to interpret the suffering put on people from having to repay giant debt for a few years of college as the consequence of women being too selfish and not prioritizing their families rather than a consequence of a broken political system.
Well said! Also, there are countries where you get zero student loan, what about women there?
Why are we still going through this book? Because we enjoy tormenting ourselves, apparently. But listening to you makes the pain bearable. You deserve an award for this.
'One of those days where you don't like your face' me everyday lol
I’m really enjoying your videos on Girl Defined! As a (nonconservative and recovering fundamentalist) Christian, I love hearing your thoughts and critiques of Rachel and Bethany (with whom I frequently disagree on issues of loving and following Jesus). Great work!! Keep it up.
Love the series, but also, i genuinely do enjoy the like, work-along style. It’s like body doubling, or chatting with/listening to a friend while we work on individual tasks
The footage of your dog sitting in your chair by the microphone while your voiceover explains what a social construct is makes me think "Damn, Kyra is spitting all facts, no printer" 😂😂
Two videos 1h+ videos in a row! Feels like Christmas!!! ❤️
(I wrote that phrase without even thinking about Christmas being “Jesus’s Birthday” & now I am cracking up because this was a Girl Defined video)
I love your content! I'm excited to see more on Girl Defined. I'd love to see you remake the Debi Pearl book videos.
I honestly think it's weird to specifically want a virgin as a partner. Seems like a red flag to me.
Tangenetal to the conversation of the video but WHERE DID YOU GET THOSE MASSIVE BOOKS OF STICKERS?!?!?! They are so bloody cool I couldn't stop thinking about them.
when i clicked on this video to watch while scrapbooking i didnt expect u to be scrapbooking too lol, this video feels like a scrap with me vid/dish sesh on this book
Rachel, where did you buy your big sticker book from please? I'm from the UK too, wondered if it's available anywhere, I have a lot of scrapbooking to do too!
Your skills at searching the internet are scary.
Thanks!
@@zimbu_ a black belt in the ancient art of Google fu
Thank you for always using your platform to spread a positive message to women and girls. Your face is lovely despite how you felt when you filmed this, BUT the scrapbooking is lovely too! 😍😍
Rachel, I’ve always thought you look great in your videos. That being said it’s good you don’t force yourself to do something you’re not comfortable with. I think that’s empowering to many of us. There’s nothing wrong with not being confident 100% of the time. I hope you get your confidence soon though!
Like, they recognise that these problems exist, but their answer is Jesus, not inclusivity, not body positivity, but Jesus...
I live in a country where most people don't speak my native language. If I waited for men to make the first move, I'd be doing a lot of waiting since plenty of men are interested, but they tend to assume "oh, she probably doesn't speak Japanese." Me being willing to chat up men (or women, or anybody else) isn't about being aggressive, it's literally just practical for my circumstances. Again, the Girl Defined girls' experiences aren't universal, part 89900000
How can makeup and hair color be ok, but not extensions.....
The Hair anecdote makes no sense. So you had one bad experience with cosmetics and concludes the entire thing is bad?
I was shit at using Eyeliner when i was 12. Does that mean Eyeliner is evil? I have an allergy against Mascara. Does that mean noone should ever wear Mascara? And that everyone who wears mascara is too vain and should trust God more?
Considering that Girl definedost definetely wear THOSE products, they would probably disagree with those statements. But they essentially do the same thing.
I don't think you need to worry about not appearing on screen; plenty of TH-camrs don't do it at all and I'd never have the confidence to do it. Personally I liked the commentary with crafts approach today. Great series too, thanks for making this!
On side note: What a beautiful photo album!! Really makes me want to embrace arts and crafts again!
Thought I would watch this again while I scrap book for my friend's rainbow puppy. She had to put her down a couple weeks ago so I wanted to suprise her
I must say, I really really enjoyed this style of video!! It felt like having a chat over a craft project (and the dog videos are always a 14/10 for me!!) and I love that it let you take care of yourself without needing to compromise your job.
Rachel, I hope you're feeling better soon, and wish you peace and joy; thank you for giving us so many thought-provoking videos over the years. You are always beautiful to us on any day; I wish you could see yourself as we, your devoted fans, do.
I love your videos and really appreciate that you are real with your audience ( both in what you say and that you do not always want to be on camera but give us something else to see). There is so much "fake" presented online, thank you for being an actual person- self care is so important- take care.
Girl Defined might suck but the scrapbooking process in this video is incredibly engaging, I usually just listen to vids like this but I couldn't look away
Edit: Not to say that the usual video format is bad! I just find art and crafting processes super interesting
I absolutely LOVE your commentary and your perspective on things! You are so articulate and I agree so much with everything you said. I found myself thinking “yes exactly!” to so much of it! 🙌🏻
For me, trying new things is actually part of my self-love journey. I'm just not confident with making changes to my appearance because I'm too worried I'll make the wrong choice - if I'm trying something new, it's probably a good sign, it means I feel more confident
Oh no I took my hair extensions out wrong. I have turned away from god.
Why do they need to equate insecurity and vanity? It's not the same thing! In some ways, vanity can and should be criticised, an example would be to only look at surface-level aspects of the way someone presents themselves (like, for example, psysical apperarance) and judging their entire being based off of only that. Or, perhaps, are they trying to equate insecurity and self-centeredness? That makes even less sense.
Insecurity is an intrinsic part of being a human being, and feeling bad about some parts of yourself should not be pathologized, it is not some sign of selfishness or an inherently bad character trait.
Side note but watching you scrapbook makes it much easier to concentrate on the video and is just delightful
I think ideas and thinking like this can be very damaging to young girls. I’m 33 with no husband or children & also no desire to have either. I decided to concentrate on my career instead and for me it has been the right path. I do not believe that makes me any less of a woman than people who have or want those things. We as people all have different wants and values and whatever they are is okay & valid (as long as your not hurting anyone else). I do believe happiness comes from within and not some external force. Maybe that’s just me.
Never understood that unwritten rule about wearing the same clothing. I loved swapping clothes with my friends while we were the same size!
I'm going to sleep now, but tomorrow I'm gonna watch this in one sitting with popcorn
6:26 I agree with you but I would argue that 70% of it is the effects of the male gaze and if the patriarchy didnt exist most of the extras either wouldnt exist or it would be completely diff. I feel like the whole "I do *insert something men like* for me alone!!" Is half lying to yourself. Yes you can like things and do things for yourself of course but I feel like too much of that makes it easy for men to not take accountability for the way were expected to live.
39:50
I (a straight woman) meet someone (a straight man). I am outgoing and he is very shy. I notice him glancing at me from time to time, even blushing when we make eye contact, I find him cute and actually like his shy personality.
So I can't go up to him and start a conversation and ask him out? Like whaaaaaaaaaaat???
hey rachel! i’ve watched your content for a really long time and i just wanna say you are such a light on this platform. you give off such kindness and good vibes and always do your best to be fair. i’m so sorry about the recent drama; i can imagine it’s been overwhelming and stressful. i hope you know we can all tell how genuine and loving you are
34:28 I laughed so hard at the line "practicing abortion as a National Sport". What would that even be, some sort of race to see who could perform an abortion the fastest. I don't think that would be safe.
Positivity vibes being sent your way!✨
It was fun watching you do your craft-y thing in the background. I could never work with that many options, my autistic brain would be utterly overwhelmed xD