Lizzie Hershberger: The one thing that I highly disagree with, when people talk about Amish in general, and even in, I think, a dictionary and whatever encyclopedia, whatever it says, amish are christians. That is absolutely not. That's just not true.
Chris: So I kind of don't know. Now that we're doing the audio snippet thing, I don't really know how to start.
Kayla: You just jive in.
Chris: Well, because it feels like we should be responding to it, but I don't know what it's going to be.
Kayla: Well, the last time what we did was go. We were like, that was a great clip.
Chris: I know.
Kayla: Good job us.
Chris: We didn't fool anyone with that. There's no way we fooled anyone with that.
Kayla: Well, I think because the audio clip is probably very likely to come from the interview that we are conducting today, you should just go ahead and jump in and go, hey, what you just heard was a clip from the interview that we're doing today with so and so about such and such.
Chris: Yeah. I think maybe in the future, what we do is we just kind of say, like, we just assume that we're not even. Like, we don't even respond to it. Like, we pretend it's not even there. And then we just start talking and I just start saying, hi, I'm Chris. I'm a game designer and data scientist.
Kayla: Hi, I'm Kayla.
Chris: Why are you doing it that way?
Kayla: I don't know. Because I hate saying this. Hi, I'm Kayla. I am Chris's co host. I don't have an identity outside of this.
Chris: No, you're a Hollywood writer. Hi. What are you doing?
Kayla: I'm Kayla. I write for tv and also podcasts.
Chris: And not only are you a Hollywood writer, you have an episode of Hightown.
Kayla: Oh, yeah.
Chris: That is premiering today. That is your first.
Kayla: My first produced episode of television in which I have a upfront written by credit. Everybody clap for Kayla. Go watch stars. Go watch stars. Go watch Hightown on S T A r s. Probably watch a lot of it, but if you just wanna watch my episode, it is. It has cats, season two, episode eight. A cat is heavily featured. I made sure of that. My co writer also made sure that the episode was called Houston, we have a problem. And it's good.
Chris: So there you go.
Kayla: It is good. It's crazy.
Lizzie Hershberger: Super good.
Chris: So that's why you shouldn't feel weird introducing yourself.
Kayla: I just hate acknowledging that I have an identity outside of this show. That's how deep my dedication is to culture. Just weird.
Chris: All right, let's move on. So any business. Before we get into the story, my.
Kayla: Only order of business is just asking my friends listening to this show, take care of yourself this time of year.
Chris: What about your enemies?
Kayla: Listening to this show, honestly, you have many. Yeah. Take care of yourself this time of year. Christmas time, winter time, winter holiday time. It's hard, man. Yeah, it's nice.
Chris: The holidays can be tough.
Kayla: It's also hard.
Chris: So, you know, you gotta take some time outs for yourself to do self care. Do it.
Kayla: And don't be afraid to acknowledge that the holidays are sad. They're happy and they're also sad. That's okay.
Chris: They can be melancholy too.
Kayla: Have yourself a merry little Christmas.
Chris: Have yourself a melancholy.
Kayla: Have yourself a merry little Christmas is a sad holiday song. It is written to be sad. It is from legendary Judy Garland musical meet me in St. Louis. And right before Christmas time is happening, she and her family find out that her dad got a new job. They're all going to be moving away. They're like close knit and family unit that they have. The future that they have developing in this town is going to be ripped away from them. They don't know what the future looks like. And then she sings this Christmas song and that's why it sound. If you ever go like, oh, that song sounds a little sad because it is sad. It's supposed to be sad. It's supposed to be like Christmas is melancholy. We don't have a sense of the future. You know, we can be.
Kayla: Hopefully we'll be all together. We may not be. Somehow we'll muddle through.
Chris: Well, after this episode, then I think I need to go back and listen to have yourself a merry little Christmas again. You know, now that you say it isn't, I'll be home for that feels a little. Yeah.
Kayla: Only in my dreams.
Chris: Yeah, yeah.
Kayla: Christmas is got a melancholy aspect.
Chris: Is that related at all to the fact that like Christmas used to be all about ghost stories?
Kayla: Did Christmas used to be all about ghost stories?
Chris: Yeah. Oh, man. That used to be like a Christmas tradition, like way back in the day in like the 18 hundreds and shit.
Kayla: Let's get back to that. Sorry.
Chris: I know, it's cool. That's why that one song. What was the song? It says, scary ghost stories from Christmas.
Kayla: Is long scary ghost stories.
Chris: It's the most wonderful time of the year. Yeah, yeah. So I don't know if that's related.
Kayla: Christmas Carol. There's ghosts in that.
Chris: That's right. That's from that. Yeah, that's from that era. It's about. It's like, it's a Christmas carol, but it's. It's a ghost story.
Kayla: I also heard something that, like, the reason why we think about, like, oh, white Christmas being all, like, wintry and blustery is because, like, when Charles Dickens was writing some of his most, like, prolific novels, it was like, the coldest winter record in England or whatever.
Chris: Right? Because, I mean, like, December is only, like, sort of cold compared to, like, January, February.
Kayla: Yeah, I don't know. Don't quote me on that.
Chris: Son of a gun. So I guess this is our Christmas special now. I didn't know it was gonna be, but it is. Here's our Christmas special. But during this most melancholy slash wonderful time of the year, what's the reason for the season?
Kayla: Chris?
Chris: For the season. The reason for the episode. Today's story is that we actually have a continuation of one that we began last episode with our historical speed run on the history of anabaptism. So we covered like, a few thousand years over the course of what it was, like, less than 2 hours. Right? Yeah, I'm sure. I'm sure that was. That's fine. We did the topic justice, right. And probably didn't miss any nuance.
Kayla: No, no. Not even a little bit. No nuance. November is over.
Chris: No nuance. November. That's. That's my whole life.
Kayla: That was the thing on TikTok.
Chris: Oh, was it?
Kayla: Yeah.
Chris: That's clever.
Kayla: You just drop your, like, a controversial hot take, but don't give any nuance.
Chris: I mean, at least you're being upfront about it, but.
Kayla: Yeah.
Chris: So the reason I want to mention that up front is because if you are listening now and you haven't heard our previous episode, you might want to go check that out first, because it's part one today's part two. In that episode, we started by talking about christian baptism, then moved on to how it's viewed differently by different communities of christians. We discussed the Protestant Reformation and the printing press. We talked about the subset of the Protestant Reformation known as the Radical Reformation, in which anabaptists are the major players. And we talked about the Munster rebellion, which, just a plug for our Patreon bonus content for last episode, we talk about how Moonster cheese is not actually from that moonster, and it actually gets really complicated as to where it's from and who can call what moon.
Chris: Anyway, then we finally talked about the rise of the mennonite and amish versions of anabaptism and those communities emigration to North America. So the next natural question is all right, what have they been up to since they arrived in North America? What are they up to now? I would like to understand more about this community, of which I kind of know very little, which is partially by design, since they are deliberately very isolated from the rest of society. Why, in fact, there's your first amish fact. They self isolate. And to your answer, we'll get to that. But there's a bit of a conundrum inherent in that, a bit of a pickle. So, obviously, I've done a lot of amateur podcast research on the Anabaptists and the Amish for these episodes, but ultimately, I am an outsider.
Chris: And as you know, we like to try, we like to do our amateurish best to talk to people that are actually involved in these communities that we discuss on the show. It's always better when we can talk to someone who is actually a cicada 331 puzzle solver or a tulpa themselves or was the moderator of the thro alien community. It's always better to talk to those people. We try to observe the nothing about them without them, to the best of our ability. But the Amish, well, as I just mentioned, they're isolated. And they're not just physically and socially isolated. They're also technologically isolated. And again, that's by design. So I was pretty stumped as to how I was going to find someone to talk to that actually lived and existed in that community.
Kayla: I could have hooked you up with TikTok. There are literally secret TikToks that amish people have.
Chris: Really?
Lizzie Hershberger: Yeah.
Chris: Well, this. This a juicy little nugget, Kayla. I feel like we're actually. That's a good thing to lead with, because that's. I didn't know that. Yeah, Kayla is very involved. If you didn't listen to our grab a boy code episode. Kayla spends a lot of time on TikTok.
Kayla: The only reason I get served secret amish TikToks from the algorithm is because I'm. I heavily troll. The not troll, as in, yeah, just be careful. I'm not a troll.
Chris: You are a troll, but this is not it.
Kayla: Heavily frequent the, like, hashtags of, like, exfundi, ex fundamentalist Christian TikToks. And there's a. There's a huge community of people who are, like, ex Mormons, ex fundamentalists, ex this, x that, ex Amish. Interesting, because I've watched enough of those. I've started getting served the, like, secret Tiktoks of the Amish.
Chris: Well, I mean, I could have just been on TikTok for hours and hours for the research for this episode, like me. Yeah. Except, well, we did have a bit of an ace in the hole. So luckily for us, a friend of the show, Molly, Maeve Egan, whom we talked to in episode nine in this season, had someone for us to contact. So just as context, if you'll recall, Molly was the co author of a book called behind Blue Curtains, which was a true crime memoir about the life of Lizzie Hershberger, a member of the Schwarzenstruber Amish community who suffered abuse during her lifetime. And Molly was able to connect us with. Let's see. Checking my notes here. Yeah. So someone by the name of Lizzie Hershberger.
Kayla: Oh, shit.
Chris: Have you heard of her? Is that.
Kayla: I mean, I've heard of her in the context of our podcast. Yes.
Chris: Oh, yeah, that's right. We just. That's right. She wrote the book. It was her story. Yeah. Pretty cool, right?
Kayla: That's extremely dope.
Chris: Yes. So I was lucky enough to be able to sit down for a chat with Miss Hershberger herself in order to help me understand the Amish better and to answer all my little curiosities.
Chris: All right, can you introduce yourself for our listeners?
Lizzie Hershberger: I am Lizzie Hirschberger, and I grew up in Minnesota as a Schwarzenegger Amish. I had a mom and dad and grandparents that lived right next to me. And when I was growing up, that was a very typical amish setting where grandparents lived by their children and grandchildren, and my grandparents had a farm. And I grew up learning how to milk cows and doing things like that. And as I got older, eventually I realized I did not want to be amish. So I left the amish community, but I chose to be non Amish, living still by the community. So that's where I live now with my husband of almost 25 years from the same community, and we had four children.
Lizzie Hershberger: And, yeah, I consider myself a very fortunate person that has been able to overcome lots of abuse, almost every kind of abuse you can think of. But I don't live in a victim mentality state of mind where I want people to feel sorry for me. I just want people to know my story and learn from it and be inspired by it.
Chris: Actually, there's something I wanna ask you that I may or may not put.
Chris: This in the show.
Chris: What is your relationship? I just thought of this, like, what is your relationship with the amish culture now? Because. And the reason I asked that is because I'm curious. Like, I grew up catholic, and I still feel this. Like, I didn't have all the abuse that you did. But in terms of the, like, I still feel this, like, cultural connection to it, if that makes sense. But I'm not really, like, I don't go to church anymore, but does that make sense? Like, is that kind of how you feel, or is it.
Lizzie Hershberger: Yeah, I definitely. I appreciate coming from the, like, I appreciate my amish background, my certain things that I learned. And since I live by the community, I still do some of the same things. I have certain ways of doing things, like canning and gardening things and certain things. And I still go to the community for everything I possibly can, going to their greenhouses, going to the bulk food stores. And I still feel like I'm a little bit part of the community, but yet I'm not under their rules, if that makes sense. So I still. I like that connection, and I love being able to teach my kids about the culture, and I still influence in that language. So if I go around those people, I immediately speak in that language. So I still have.
Lizzie Hershberger: Somebody said once, if they hear me speak a couple sentences, then I have an accent, a heavier accent. It's like I just tend to go back to that Pennsylvania Dutch accent.
Chris: Yeah. Thank you for answering that because, yeah, I kind of have that same or a similar sort of, like, yeah, I still feel some connection to that, like that catholic upbringing. But then there's parts of it that I obviously don't like, and some of those parts are actually pretty similar to things that happen. So I think most of our listeners are probably or they should be familiar with your story. And if they're not, they should pause right now and go listen to our 9th episode of the season called the Blue Curtains. But just in case they don't do that, can you tell me a short version of your story for folks who haven't had a chance to listen to that episode yet?
Lizzie Hershberger: The short version of behind Blue Curtains is I start from when I was a baby. And the reason I could start from when I was an infant or a child is because of my mom's diary in journals that she had. And then I also had went back and talked to my dad when he was in his last days. I knew I was probably going to write a book, so I interviewed him and asked him questions, so I was able to piece together as much as possible. And so I started from there. And the reason was to try to give the readers an inside view of how I was brought into this world. And it was by my mom, who was not. She was not married at the time. She got pregnant with me in 1973.
Lizzie Hershberger: And in those days, you know, it wasn't a common thing for an unmarried girl to be pregnant. So what she did is she went back to the Amish, and she married, I believe, was just basically somebody that she knew and she was familiar with. And she just. She felt like that was her only option. So that's what she did. She got married. She told him I was his baby. And I started, you know, growing up, but I knew I was different. I always knew I was different. Like, I couldn't. You can't pinpoint just one thing. I knew I didn't look like my siblings. I didn't look like my grandparents. I didn't act like my grandparents. And I really got picked on, you know, extensively. And as I got older and especially into my teenage years, I really questioned my mom.
Lizzie Hershberger: And I said, okay, can you tell me more? I said, people have told me I'm not biologically my dad. So that really stemmed a lot of my issues with my mom. And then with that's at the same time when I started working as a hired girl, Maude, for this amish couple that I knew they were my parents, as friends. I knew them. And from there, it's this lengthy grooming process that happened, and I ended up getting raped over extensive a period of time. And the only reason we know how long is because I kept a diary. And then from there, my mom, you know, actually kicked me out of the house, and I left the Amish for a period of time. I came back and then left again after that. So that's kind of the overall thing that happened, I guess.
Lizzie Hershberger: And the other part of it is that as a young child, I was molested by an uncle that lived next door. And I think that just set me up for an easy target in this, where I was a hired girl and I started getting groomed, and I had issues with my mom. And, you know, it's just all these different things. The interesting part was, at the age of, like, I think I was 26 or something, 28 or something, I took a DNA test, and I found out that I have been correct. My feelings for being different was valid. My dad is not my biological father. And with that, when I went back and since I lived by the community, I would see uncles or relatives or something. And it soon became completely known to everybody that I was really not.
Lizzie Hershberger: I was not related to them. And they actually began to treat me actually better, because I think it was something that they were probably doing unconsciously, that they knew that I wasn't like them. Nobody. My mom would keep saying that I was my dad's child, but I really wasn't. And everybody knew it. So after the fact, they actually were better. Everybody was like, oh, okay, we kind of knew. You know, we knew, but, you know, would never admit it. She still doesn't admit it to this day. She says she can't remember. So that's just a cop out of not having to deal with her consequences. Because a DNA test is a. Had it done at a hospital. It's not. You know what I mean? Like, you can't dispute it. She still tries to, but it's a DNA test.
Lizzie Hershberger: Yeah, but the fact is, I go back to, I truly believe that my dad knew my entire life that I wasn't his child. But he never, ever voiced that. He never said anything negative. I actually always say that I was one of his favorite child. He loved my family. He loved my kids. He was very inspirational in them learning about the amish culture and about learning the language. He would talk to them. So I unfortunately, had a couple of bad experiences with him that I had to put in the book. But I think he did the best that he could, and I truly. He made bad choices. He did, but I still chose to forgive him. And I think that had he not been a good father figure to me for years, I wouldn't have.
Lizzie Hershberger: It would have been harder for me to forgive that. But he really was, for the most part, he was a good dada. Grandpa to my kids, dotty to my kids. Yeah.
Chris: So I just was wondering if you could help me understand the term plain people. Because, like, I. I visited Pennsylvania dutch country when I was a kid, and so I've known about Yamish for a while, but I've only recently come across the term plain people. So what is meant by that term?
Lizzie Hershberger: I think, in general, plain people, that has kind of been a new adopted way of talking about Amish Mennonite, because there's so many different ones. Or even, I think even plain people even includes Hutterites. You know, it's people that stand out from the general public. To me, a plain person has. The woman always has some sort of covering, some sort of. Even if it's just a little thing, it doesn't matter. And typically, the women have dresses on. That is what I associate with a yemenite plain person or a plain communities person. It is somebody that's just different from the outside world. And the foundation on all of the plain people is they believe in not being part of the world. They want to be separate. So that's why they choose to have this different clothing and things.
Lizzie Hershberger: The one thing that I highly disagree with when people talk about Amish in general and even in, I think, a dictionary and whatever encyclopedia or whatever it says Amish are Christians. That is absolutely not. That's just not true. That is fascinating. It's just not. I think you think that just because they're wearing a different clothing that makes them a Christian. It does not. It does not. And often, yes, they're going to church and they're. But they're reading out of a Bible that is typically in German, and it's a language that they don't speak. They speak Pennsylvania Dutch, so it's a different language. And so the preachers are interpreting this Bible. So I think that's a really big misconception is that the outside world views amish or plain people as they're Christians. That.
Lizzie Hershberger: No, it's just because you have different clothing on does not, that doesn't show what's in your heart. There are amish and there are plain community members that are Christians, but not all of them. Not all of them. And many of them abuse the Bible. They abuse it. The biggest one is honor thy father and mother. And they want to have it that you listen to your parents, you listen to your elders, whatever they say, and that's where abuse comes in because they, it's an abuse of power.
Chris: Right. Right. When you have that power dynamic, when you say not Christian, is that like, I'm just trying to understand, is that because they don't practice, like, what they preach, you know, so quote unquote? Or is that more of, like here in the, you know, in the english world, you know, there's people of all different sort of beliefs. Like, are there people in the amish community that don't participate in church and religion or is that prohibited?
Lizzie Hershberger: No, they all, they have to go to church. They have to listen to the preachers preach at least every other week. That's what ours was. Every, every two weeks we had church. And the reason I say not a Christian is that you can go to church, religion, whatever it is, your entire life without becoming a Christian, and you can even become a member. You can get baptized without accepting Christ. So to me, it is that whole thing that you think that your works, like, how good of a person you are, how good you follow the rules, how good you follow jortnung, all that stuff. They think that's going to save them. And that's okay.
Lizzie Hershberger: Almost all amish plain people believe that if you follow the ordnance, if you follow the rules, you will get into heaven and you will get a certain status in heaven according to your works. Well, that's not what the Bible says. You know what I mean? Like, that's not what it says. It's not. It's not how much corn I've grown. And you know what I mean? It has nothing to do with that. But that's where they can get confused on, and that's where I say there's many of them, unfortunately, that are only stuck on the works, and they think that's what's going to get them into heaven, and it is not. I don't want this whole podcast to be about Christianity and stuff. I try to stay away from that.
Lizzie Hershberger: I know it's kind of interesting that we win, but I'm just trying to explain how, like, it really bugs me when, and I've had so many people say to me, well, Amish are Christians, they're good Christians. No, that is the outward appearance that amish and plain people want to give, is that you're good christian people. But why are you saying that? Because they have different clothing on. You haven't talked to them. How is their heart? How are they really? How do they treat their children? What happens behind closed doors?
Chris: So there's a lot to unpack there. Maybe we'll start in reverse order, because I just. That lat. The reason I'm stopping it here is just because that last bit was so interesting to me that you could even hear when I was talking to her. I was like, wait, what? Exactly? Yeah. I was like, what is she saying here? Like, this is a very interesting perspective, and what we're talking about is our Amish Christian? And she says, no.
Kayla: Right. I could tell what you were trying to ask is like, are you saying that. Yeah. Do. Do amish people not practice the principles of Christianity? Are they not good Christians? Or is it actually what they practice, a separate faith from Christianity?
Chris: Yeah.
Kayla: Is it a different thing?
Chris: Yeah, exactly. That's what I was trying to get. And then it sounded like her answer was, they all are doing the christian stuff, right? Right. They're all doing that. They have to go to church, and they have to listen to their elders, and they have to do these rituals and the ordnance and the baptism, but that doesn't tell you what's in their heart. So I think it's that type of, like, you're Christian, but are you really, you know, like, do you. Do you do the things that Jesus would have preached? Do you take care of people? Or is it just about, you know, following your elder and being in this strict system of control?
Kayla: It's really interesting because it actually reminds me of a conversation I was having with my family yesterday. We were talking about, so my dad's parents were from a farming community in Canada. So it's different than the Amish, but it was a farming community, you know, rural, but the entire community.
Chris: Was there a juror?
Kayla: There probably was a juror, the rural juror. It was a very rural community, and everybody went to church. Like, that was what you just did. And obviously it was christian, quote unquote, church. And it wasn't about, we're a community and we all believe this, and we walk in the footsteps of Jesus and we feed the hungry and clothe the poor and do good works and spread the gospel with all our joy. But it wasn't that. This is what we do as a community. This is a way for everybody to be in each other's business and to make sure that everyone is in. In line with each other and doing what they should be doing.
Kayla: And if you don't go to church, then, you know, you're going to be getting a call from your mother in law being like, oh, I didn't see you in church today. What's. I mean, it literally to the point that level of scrutiny in this church going community eventually drove my grandfather to have, like, a nervous breakdown because it was so much scrutiny. And it wasn't about how christian are we? It was, are you following these rules? Are you pretending hard enough?
Chris: That sounds exactly like what she was talking about. That sounds exactly like what she was saying. Because she was saying, it's all about, if you follow the ordnance, not like all of the things that you described that should be christian, like community and helping each other and helping the poor and doing good works and spreading joy and yiddi yidda yadda. It's about this sort of like, I don't know, you better stay in lockstep. It's like the christian gestapo, like knocking on your door. Did you do the things? Because otherwise we're taking you away, right.
Kayla: You're gonna be having a nervous breakdown. And that's eventually why. That's why my dad stopped going to church, was because he saw the hypocrite. He saw, you know, people going to church every Sunday, but, like, everybody knew who was having affairs with who and who was doing what and who was doing this, that and the other. And at twelve years old, he went this is bullshit.
Chris: Yeah. Everybody's saying that nobody can have affairs, and this is very bad, but at the same time, that's what everyone. Everybody's doing. I got that from behind blue curtains, too, when were reading that. The other thing that I kind of wanted to unpack here, and you mentioned a little bit, was sort of this definition of good works. Right. That comes up again here. And if you recall from last episode, good works versus faith is sort of like one of the big wedges going down between, at least during the Protestant Reformation, between Catholics and Protestants. And Catholics were, oh, good works and Protestants are, oh, no, it's faith and the basic idea. So good works is kind of easy, right? It's like, make sure you do enough stuff. And then faith is, you must accept Jesus. It doesn't matter what you do.
Chris: You could be your murderer. You accept Jesus good. You could be the best person ever. You could be Mother freaking Teresa. But if you don't accept Jesus not getting into heaven, which that sounds messed up, but at the same time, actually, the way that she was interpreting good works is actually not that great either. Right. Because I think I naturally tend towards. Oh, good works means, like, you give to charity and, like, go to the soup kitchens.
Kayla: Right.
Chris: But the way she was interpreting good works, which I think is, like, a very valid way of interpreting it and kind of shed a new light on the way. I think maybe some anti catholic Protestants back in the day were interpreting. It was good works is not good works. It's following the rules.
Kayla: Yeah. Or tithing.
Chris: Or tithing. Yeah. Like, if as long as you give to the church and you have blue curtains and you check all the boxes and you spy on your neighbors, then you'll get into heaven. And that feels very much more pernicious to me, obviously, than, like, you went to the soup kitchen and you're. And you love your friends and you practice kindness.
Lizzie Hershberger: Right?
Chris: So that. That's a perspective on good works that I don't know if I had until this interview. And it's really interesting.
Kayla: No, good works should be a living expression of the things that Jesus preached to. Do not, are your curtains blue enough? Are you giving enough money to the church? Are you wearing the right skirt to.
Chris: Are you, as a 1314 year old, seducing the grown man that is in your, you know, in his employ? You know. Yeah.
Kayla: Just one thing that I wanted to mention. I just wanted to talk about, since we've talked a lot about abuse in these episodes about the Amish, I think we've talked a lot about abuse in general in this show. And so it feels like a good moment touch on the word victim because it's a word that comes up, obviously, a lot when we're talking about this, and it's a word that comes up a lot just in our society in general right now. And I think it's important to note that the word victim, it has a lot of different meanings. And, you know, Lizzie herself does not take on the identity of victim, quote, unquote. And I think that's entirely valid.
Chris: I think that super valid part of her experience.
Kayla: I think some people are, can be empowered by the word victim. Some people when they realize, oh, I went through an abusive experience or, oh, I was targeted or, oh, I was abused, I was a victim, I can identify as this now. I can, I can say what happened to me was wrong and it shouldn't have happened to me. And, and I was victimized by this. And for some people, that's not empowering. And I think it's, I'm glad that Lizzie pointed out that for her, this isn't an empowering word. I can recognize the abuse that happened to me. I can name it for what it was, and then I can move on with my life in a different direction. So it's as the word victim kind of gets tossed back and forth between, like, warring ideological sides.
Chris: Right.
Kayla: We can just remember that for some people, victim is the word that they want to use and is powerful for them. And for some people, the word victim is the opposite of that. And it's kind of up to the person who went through the experience to determine whether that word is useful or not.
Chris: Yeah. I mean, it comes down to the, like, the agency of, like, they get to decide what they want the rest of their life to be.
Kayla: Right.
Chris: And if they want their identity and the rest of their life to be something that is, you know, comports with that. And like, you know, when you want to talk about, you know, I was a victim and I was do victim advocacy and blah, blah, great. And if you want to say, you know, I, I don't have a victim mentality, that's not who I am. That's not my identity. Like Lizzie said, also great.
Kayla: Right?
Chris: And then the other thing is, we promised that we'll get to that in terms of isolation. So she mentioned that one of the key differentiators for her, for plain communities, is how isolated they are. And this is something that I just wanted to mention also came up in my research, and we'll talk a little bit more about this. But a lot of it has to do with control. A lot of it has to do with, according to Lizzie, anyway, the control that you're able to have in a community that isolated, that you wouldn't otherwise be able to have.
Chris: I will also add to that a lot of the research I did says that is like, just sort of anabaptist thing that's come from, like, a long line of, you know, going all the way back to the stories we told last episode, where Anabaptists were not accepted by larger society for reasons both valid and invalid, or reasons both understandable and not understandable. I won't say valid and invalid. Right. They. They did things that made larger society go, no, go away, your weird monsterite people. Right, right. But then also, there was a lot of persecution as well. So point is, either, whichever way you slice it, Anabaptists sort of have a history of isolation anyway, which just sort of came with them as they emigrated here to North America. Some of, like, the things that they still practice also came with them. Adult baptism.
Chris: I don't know if we talked about. We talked about this a little bit last episode, as a response to the Munster rebellion, Menno Simons and other Anabaptists took the movement in a completely different direction into this non violence, non resistance sort of direction, and that's carried through today. So, like, the amish community now is they don't participate in the military draft, for example. They don't. They don't join the military, and they don't even recognize the validity of the draft. So they won't. They won't go into any sort of, like, fighting. So anyway, so that's something that came with them. So the bottom line is a lot of the stuff that sort of, like, came from that, you know, those OG Anabaptists in the reformation have come with them, with the Mennonites in the Amish here in America today.
Chris: What is the major difference between Amish and Mennonite? Because I hear them mentioned together so often, Amish and Mennonite. What is the major difference between those groups?
Lizzie Hershberger: The biggest difference that I see is Amish only use horse and buggy. They cannot own or drive a car Mennonites. There's lots of different sects of Mennonites from some of the lower ones drive black cars, only some of them have their radios taken out, and they call themselves black car Mennonites. And to all the way where I say that if I see a mennonite guy in a store, I can't tell that he's mennonite, but, boy, if they have their wives with them, I can see that they're mennonite because the women are always more conservative dressed than the men are.
Chris: Do Amish still practice adult baptism?
Lizzie Hershberger: Yes, they do. And typically in the Schwarzenegger Amish that I grew up in, it is more in the age between 17 to 20, somewhere in there. And to be clear, before you're baptized, your parents are responsible for whatever you do. Let's say somebody's seen you at the drugstore looking at some magazine. So some Amish would report back to the preachers and say, hey, I seen Lizzie Hershberger looking at something that was inappropriate, and then the parents wouldn't get in trouble for their child, for my actions. But as soon as you're baptized, then the preachers will directly come to your house and approach you no matter what age it is. But up until the age of 21, whatever money you make, whether it is working at your neighbor's, farmer's market, or whatever it was, that money goes back to your parents.
Lizzie Hershberger: So I think that's very contradicting, I think, is because you're saying that, okay, as soon as you're baptized, then you're responsible for your actions, but yet you have to give your money to your parents until you're 21.
Chris: Disconnect there.
Lizzie Hershberger: Yeah, yeah. Yes. And obviously, I disagree with up until 21 giving everything to your parents. Yeah. You have nothing. And then again, that's control, because they want you to be able to be a part of the amish church before you have access to your own money. So then once you have access to your own money, then you're not going to use it and leave the Amish. So it's all a control thing.
Chris: Yeah. Wow.
Chris: You're right. It does keep coming back to that. You mentioned when you were talking about the Ordnung and how the leaders in the community will sort of interpret the Bible. Is that true for both men and women, for both boys and girls in the community? Or is it mostly true for girls because girls aren't allowed to read the Bible? Or what is the situation there?
Lizzie Hershberger: No, that's really very. It's like an unwritten rule. They do not want, if you're an amish person, whether you're male, female, boy, girl, doesn't matter. They do not want you to be able to interpret the Bible yourself. The preachers and the bishops are the ones that are supposed to be able to tell you what it says, when I was growing up, we could not read an English Bible. You were only allowed to have the German Bible. But the thing about it is with a German Bible, you only had extremely limited abilities of being able to read it. They don't want you to understand it. And as soon as somebody. Because this has happened in the community, as soon as somebody starts reading the Bible too much, they're like, oh, no, let's put the brakes on.
Lizzie Hershberger: Like you are going to read something in there that's going to lead you the wrong way. Because, see, they only want you to hear what they want you to hear. And it's very repetitive. It's every, like, year after year, it's the same thing. They preach. They talk about certain stuff, like Daniel and lions, you know, Dan and things like that, just certain selective things. I think kind of. I think Catholics do similar. I mean, they only talk about certain stuff over and over. Like during Easter season, there's a repetitive thing they talk about. So they don't want you to be able to interpret it because the thing is the. Again, like I said, they're stuck on that. Honor thy father and mother. That's it. They don't talk about anything else.
Lizzie Hershberger: Well, you know, the verse is more than that, but they don't want you to know more than that because it says, honor thy father and mother in the Lord. But they don't add, the rest of that is honor thy father and mother. That's it. That's all there is to it. So they want you to stay in your little box, living in the community, and do not question that is what they don't want you to do.
Chris: That is so fascinating because the reason I ask that is during the Protestant Reformation, where I, you know, Anabaptists sort of got their start. That was like one of the big critiques of the Catholic Church at the time was like, nobody could read because at that time, there weren't even any books.
Lizzie Hershberger: Oh, oh, I didn't know.
Chris: Yeah. Had the monopoly on the Bible, right? So they could, they had to interpret the people. And so that was one of the things that all the reformers were like. You know, the protestant reformers were like, well, now that we all have bibles, we should be able to read it. And the final word is not the church, the final word is the book. And it's really interesting that here we are now, four or 500 years later or whatever, and now it's kind of come full circle to the, you must, you know, only the bishops can interpret that. That sounds like it could have come out of history, of Catholicism from the 15 hundreds. It's really interesting. That's so fascinating to me.
Lizzie Hershberger: Yeah. Yeah, it really is. Because that's. That's just the number one thing they say, and I've heard this in Amish, Mennonite, all kinds of plain communities. As soon as somebody starts reading the Bible, like, on their own, and trying to, like, okay, what does it really say? They will say, well, they're being led astray by the devil. Well, how are you being. You know what? Yes. They seriously say, it's like, hello. Hello.
Chris: So that must be one of the things that makes it feel to you to be not christian, because that makes it feel that way to me, too. If you see the Bible, reading the Bible is being led astray by the devil. That. Yeah, that doesn't. That doesn't look very christian.
Chris: It's like, hello, what are you.
Chris: Yeah, that's.
Chris: That's fascinating.
Lizzie Hershberger: And I don't know if you know this, and we'll get off the Bible subject then, but one of the. One of the main things that the amish stand on is that you cannot know as an amish person that you're going to go to heaven. You only have to hope. You only have to have the hope. Do you know what I mean? That's a huge difference. Like, okay, so I'm never good enough. You know, they want you to think I've never done enough. You know, I'm not a good enough person. I haven't, whatever, had enough kids. I mean, there's all kinds of crap that you can put in there and say, oh, I'm just not good enough. They want you to be this beaten down, especially women. I mean, my goodness, I could go off on a tantrum on that.
Lizzie Hershberger: But they just don't want you have any self esteem. Like, you're supposed to be this beaten down person. Just hope. Like, oh, my goodness, I just hope I'm going to get to heaven. But you can't know for sure, because once you know for sure, then you wouldn't be trying. Do you know what I mean?
Chris: Like, there's a totally mean. Like, you're actually kind of sending, like, tingles in my spinal. That is so insidious. The. You can't know is just basically just setting the table for any kind of abuse you want because. Oh, man. Wow. That is.
Chris: I didn't know that.
Chris: That's.
Lizzie Hershberger: Yeah, yeah. It's a.
Kayla: It's a very.
Lizzie Hershberger: And it's something that they wouldn't like, you almost, I hate to say, but you almost have to be an inside person to know this because they're not going to say that. If you. If you were to be like a, let's say somebody religious comes to your door, it's an amish person, they would be able to technically kind of portray themselves as a Christian and they would never go down to the fact and say, well, you know, I don't know that I'm for sure going to go to heaven. They will never say that. Exactly. But that's ingrained from years and years as a child. That's. You only got to hope that you're going to get there to the, you know, and you're going to have to answer. You just. You can't know that for sure. Like, that's too proud, too. Yeah.
Lizzie Hershberger: Isn't it a warped warp way?
Chris: That's wild.
Chris: That is very warped.
Lizzie Hershberger: Yeah, yeah. It's very scary. Yeah.
Chris: So how about. How about that little fun, little abuse tactic? It's like, that's literally an abuse tactic. Like, not letting somebody know whether they've done the thing or not. Like, that's how you. That is a control and abuse tactic.
Kayla: I hate it.
Chris: It's awful.
Kayla: I hate it. And also, I kind of feel like that's okay. Clearly the explicitness is particular to this, what we're talking about. And also, it feels like it's a little bit kind of just like, baked into religion in general, because it's always like. I was gonna say that you can't know God's will. Like, you never know if you've done, like. I guess it's part of why the, like, if you have faith, you're in is so appetizing. It's not the right word, but, yeah.
Chris: You don't know what enough good works, you know?
Kayla: Right. But it's like faith, then you'll go to heaven. If you have faith, then you go to heaven. If you have faith, then you'll go to heaven. That's very clear. And it kind of feels like what she's taught, what Lizzie's talking about here, is like, wow. That. I'm starting to see it elsewhere.
Chris: Yeah, it definitely sounds like a more. Maybe a more extreme version there. It sounds like a more extreme version of, like. And maybe because it's tied to the, like, the good works as rule set, you know, the ordnance version of good works where it's like, you have to. If you. One time. That could be it, man. Who knows?
Kayla: Right, right.
Chris: But, yeah, I think you're right. Maybe that's part of what's appealing about the, like, the faith as bridge to heaven is that you do feel like you have some sort of, like, internal locus of control there where you can say, like, hey, it's up to me. Like, as long as I have enough faith, I'm good to go. I don't need to worry about whether I checked enough boxes or whether my soul is heavier than the feather or.
Kayla: Whatever, or whether the higher ups in the church are going to say I did enough or whether the priest or the bishop or the whoever.
Chris: So, yeah, I found that pretty insidious because that just, it really does set the table for, like, yeah, of course an abuser can go back to that foundation anytime they want, right? You don't know, like, oh, well, if you report me, then you might not get into heaven.
Kayla: You just don't know.
Chris: You just don't know.
Kayla: Oh, I hate it.
Chris: You don't even have to say anything because you don't know.
Kayla: Yeah, I hate it.
Chris: And then I also thought it was really, we sort of unpacked this, me and Lizzie, already. But the full circle ness of the interpreting the Bible for yourself was like, wait, that's where the Anabaptists came from. That's like, why the reformation happened is because priests of the catholic church had the monopoly on interpreting the Bible for hundreds of years. Then the Reformationists, the Protestants were like, no, that's not good. You should be able to read the Bible yourself. And now she's describing, like, literally that with anabaptist group, with the Amish. And so I'm just kind of like, wait, that was the thing you didn't like, right? I. Oh, my God. Yeah, I very intre. When she said that, I was like, it just twisted my brain around. It was really interesting.
Kayla: What is the solve here? It feels like there's an inherent eternal tension between a church and its people. And it's like, and when there's a book involved and a God and an afterlife, it's like, what is the solve here wherein we're not having this full circle? Like, what is the balance between good works and faith? What is the balance between having some sort of, like, structure and also, like, having it. It's got to be communism. It's got, there's got to be some sort of democratized community. It's got to be anarchy. Okay, I bet you it's anarchy.
Chris: Sort of anarchy.
Kayla: But some sort of, like, here social.
Chris: I know you're going crazy.
Kayla: And socialist version of this. And I'm serious. Where it's democratized but also codified. We got. We gotta. We gotta talk to the socialists.
Chris: Yeah. Yeah. So that's what the episode is really about.
Kayla: Libertarianism.
Chris: It's socialist libertarianism, not the Amish. Because Kayla's taking us on that ride now. No, I. To go back to the origin of.
Kayla: That sentence by the people, for the people.
Chris: Do you need a minute?
Kayla: I need to go put my red shirt on.
Chris: I think the eternal nature of that question that you brought up is sort of like, it's just. It's power, man. It's like some people have more power, some people have less power. And I think with, you know, with religion, there's like an easy framework for that, because there's so many things that religion does for people spiritually, that it's an easy thing to hoard, to have power. Right. Maybe you control the water, and that's the way you have power. Maybe you control the iron mine, and that's how you have your power. Or maybe you control the spiritual wellspring for a community, and that's where you have your power. And I think that's why this stuff keeps coming back and back, because that power is what the problem was with the catholic priests back in 1500.
Chris: And that exact same thing is happening now where you have the bishops and the amish community. They have discovered that if they are the only ones that can interpret the Bible, then they have power over that wellspring of spiritualism.
Kayla: Right, right.
Lizzie Hershberger: They have so much control, and it's very easy for them to keep everybody being amish. You really have to have a little bit of a different personality to say, you know, whoa, what is going on here? You know, I want to know. You can't just tell me, well, this is the rules. You know, you can't question it. No, I want to know. And so that's why I don't remember what percentage it is. Most of them have large families, 12, 14, 16 kids. Most of them stay amish. They do not leave. And think about that population. You know, that's a huge population compared to general. English people don't have that many kids, by far. Or not. And I think I seen the statistics one time on how they said how the Amish and the plain communities, how that's one of the fastest, largest growing populations.
Lizzie Hershberger: Well, that's because they have so many kids.
Chris: Okay. And nobody leaves.
Lizzie Hershberger: Is that nobody leaves.
Chris: Is that part of it? Because I know Schwarzenegger doesn't do rum. Was part of rum. Springer is the Schwarzman stubborn? The only community that doesn't do Rumspringa. And when people do that, it sounds like most of them are going out into the world and then coming back and choosing to remain amish.
Lizzie Hershberger: Yeah. And I think they really, truly believe that it is keeping their kids more in the amish community. But I think that as times are growing, and this is since I've left the Amish, I think that there's more people leaving. And I think if you give somebody just a little bit more freedom and a little bit more ability to spread their wings and things, I think that those people, or I was, I guess I was personally tell people, I said, I think if I would have been born to some family that is not Schwarzenegger, where you have a little bit more, you know, you have a refrigerator, you have a bathroom and a shower, I think I would have stayed. I could have been able to live in the plain community. It's not that bad.
Lizzie Hershberger: But the way we grew up, it was just so restrictive. I mean, my goodness, who can live without a shower?
Chris: I'm like, yeah, actually, that was my next question was going to be about what was it like to grow up with so little access to modern technology. Is it just washing machines? Is that right? Is that was the only thing?
Lizzie Hershberger: But a washing machine is not maytag. A washing machine is, but it's, remember, it has an engine, so it's not like I plug it in the wall and it does. And you don't have a dryer. You have to hang it outside.
Chris: I see.
Lizzie Hershberger: But the thing about it is, okay, you don't realize how you don't have access to things or how bad things really are until you're exposed to the outside world. And then you're like, wait a minute. You know what's going on? My neighbors have a refrigerator. I talked about in the book about that humming sound of the refrigerator. I was like, you just put your things in there. You don't have to walk down to the ice house and put your things in there. Or you throw your laundry in this machine and it brings them out wet and you throw them in the dryer, and, you know, it's all these different things. And the other fascination was the tv.
Lizzie Hershberger: I could live without one now, but at the time, it was like, you know, you have access to look into other people's lives and how are they living? So until you're exposed to the outside. And I think that's why there's so many Amish that try to shelter their kids, and they don't take them out in public hardly, and they don't get them birth certificates. They don't want them educated. They don't want them because as soon if you can control them in this environment, never let them go out. They don't know what they're missing. You know what I mean? You don't know what you're missing because you don't see the outside world. You have no radio, no tv, nothing in the house.
Chris: Right? Yeah. It's like you don't know what. You don't know what was, like, the biggest. When you first were introduced to, like, this piece of technology, the thing that, like, the biggest impact on you that made you go, like, oh, my God, like, how did I live without this?
Lizzie Hershberger: Probably the shower. I don't know. I mean, I. Yeah, I mean, there's a lot of things, but definitely, I just can't imagine anymore having to spend quite a bit of time in heating up the water, pouring it in the bath. Although I do like a bath. But a shower, I mean, there is nothing that compares to going in and turning on a shower. It is. You can turn it to the right temperature and you can stand in the shower, and it just. And I've heard this stated by other people, too, but there is something about, especially people that have come from abuse and things like that, about going in and taking a shower, because it. I don't know, it just leaves you. Yeah. Like, you just.
Lizzie Hershberger: You felt dirty for so long, and you get to go in a shower and you can spend as much time as you want in there getting clean, and you come out and you feel better. It's amazing, you know? So. I don't know. That's one of things I would have a hard time living without as a shower, probably.
Chris: You don't know how perfect that answer was because last episode, because we talked about anabaptism, we talked a little bit about the process, the concept of baptism and ritual washing. And actually, Kayla and I talked a little bit about just having. How a shower can be its own cleansing ritual. So, like, we talked about that. That's like a perfect.
Lizzie Hershberger: Wow, wow.
Chris: Is there anything that makes you ever wish the other way? Like, I know for me, like, there's part of me that's like, well, I would miss a shower in a refrigerator, but it would be nice to not have social media, you know, like, for that where you, like, you kind of miss the. Not having it.
Lizzie Hershberger: Yeah, I do. I miss the family close knit of especially, like, holidays or something, you know, I don't have grandparents I can go to. I don't have things like that. My grandmother, it didn't make the book, but my grandmother was an amazing. Like, she made candies that there's no recipe for, but they were amazing. They were so good. And I miss not being able to go down and have those things. And I miss, like, the slower pace of life. Like, you feel like, you know, we all have the same 24 hours in a day, but yet, you know, when I was growing up, a day seemed a lot longer. You know, I got up and went to school and came home, and, my goodness, we had all kinds of time, yet we did chores.
Lizzie Hershberger: We still ended up having time to do games or fun things. And I read. Oh, my goodness, I read tons of books. As soon as I learned how to read, I was reading. I would have a kerosene lamp in my bedroom, and I would read and read. I would read for hours. My goodness, now I can't even find an hour to read. You know what I mean?
Chris: Yeah. Yeah, I know.
Lizzie Hershberger: So. So, yeah, I miss some of those things. And I miss. Not, like, it's hard to explain, but I told people during this shutdown when we had Covid, I actually enjoyed it because I got more time spent. My kids weren't so busy. They didn't have. Their schedule wasn't so full. So, yeah, I miss some things. I mean, you know, but I try to. Those things I try to hand down to my kids and they can take them or leave them. It's their choice. And I would not want to raise them amish. My goodness, no way. But I do want to teach them some of the traditions and things like that.
Chris: Do you know where the lack of technology, like, why?
Chris: Or I guess it's.
Chris: Yeah, it's less.
Chris: Where?
Chris: It's more why? Like, why is that a thing in the amish community? Why do the Amish try to keep out modern technology?
Lizzie Hershberger: I think it all goes down to, again, the more, you know, the more you're going to want to know. So the less restricted they are. They can control you better, because as soon as you and I remember learning how to read, you know, and then you can start reading, and you're starting to, you know, learn things. And since we're on the subject, I remember even the dictionary, you know, at school, everything was controlled, so there were certain words in the dictionary that were blacked out because they didn't want you to read it. They didn't want you to read it. So, yeah. Trying to answer your question is just everything goes back again to, you're not supposed to live beyond the world, so they don't want you to know these things, what's best for you.
Lizzie Hershberger: You're only, your mom and dad do, so it's kind of hard to answer that question. But they just, yeah. The less you know, the better you are. They view.
Chris: Yeah, I, But it's really curious to me because it's like, I know a lot of faiths, like, a lot, especially christian faiths, sort of have this similar sense of, like, worldly is bad and, like, you know, like, even within, again, to compare it to Catholicism. Like, you know, we have lent, right? And lent supposed to be this, like, time where you, like, up candy or stop using your phone or don't play video games, you know, whatever. Right? So it's like, it seems like a lot of religions, a lot of communities have something like that. I just, I'm not sure what it is about why the Amish have it to such a degree. Right. It would be like if you had lent all year long, and also you had to give up, like, 30 things instead of one thing. You know what I mean?
Chris: So it's like lent on steroids. So I'm like, yeah, why that is. And there may not be a great answer to that. I don't know.
Lizzie Hershberger: I think ultimately it's all about control. They can control you. They control what you view, what you eat. I would say everything is what you eat when you do it, how you do it, and they try to, you know, they put it in your mind. It's what's best for you. You know, we know what's best for you. No, you don't. But they try to tell you, and then almost everything goes back to that, honor thy father and mother, because they try to say, well, this is the way it's been for how many years? You know, like, you should not question it. Like, why would you even think about questioning it?
Lizzie Hershberger: But they are very much able to control, you know, when you can start as a child, you know, you can really, and I've seen it actually, like, some amish kids leave, and they actually can't hardly function in the outside world because there's just too many choices. There's too many, there's too much technology. There's too much. They're like, oh, my goodness, you know, they can't function. And they go back home. And I've seen it multiple times. I've seen it. Some people leave a couple days to a couple years, and they're drawn back into it. They really are.
Chris: I can barely function, and I grew up with all this stuff.
Chris: So, first of all, how awesome was that callback to last week's ablution theme?
Kayla: Oh, man, I love it now.
Chris: Yeah. We literally talked about the ritual of, like, a morning shower. Right?
Kayla: And then she brought that in the damn shower.
Chris: I didn't feed her that answer. She just said it all around. That's how. That's. Yes, there truly, there are great minds involved with this show.
Kayla: I mean, I not named Kayla as someone who is stupid and very dumb and could never make that conclusion.
Chris: Yeah. Yeah.
Kayla: As somebody who enjoys a good bath. No, it doesn't compare to a shower. A bath is a complete. Like, if I had to take a bath to get clean.
Chris: Yeah.
Kayla: I'd be icky. I don't get. When I do. If I do wash my hair while I'm taking a bath, it doesn't get as clean as when I take a shower.
Chris: Yeah. Well, I mean, I remember after some of, like, our, you know, grief things that we've experienced, I've had people say, like, hey, man, like, just take a shower. Like, you know, if you're feeling, like, especially bad today, just that physicality of the water and, you know, the temperature change and it, you know, sort of resets your nervous system. So there's a lot to that. I thought that was really cool.
Kayla: The other cool thing was she said something a little controversial in this section.
Chris: She did. Scandalous, spicy take.
Kayla: No. She talked about how there were enjoyable aspects to Covid and having so much removed from our lives, being unable to access so much of our regular day to day lives because of COVID The.
Chris: Main positive aspect of COVID was playing Hades switched. That game is awesome.
Kayla: I think that in general, most of our conversations about COVID and the ways that it has changed our lives, we talk about the negatives, and obviously, it's had a tremendous negative effect on our lives. People.
Chris: Right.
Kayla: I mean, we've lost. Huge swaths of people have lost their lives. Huge swaths of people have lost their jobs. People are in debt. People lost. Homeless people have experienced grief. Yeah. Symptoms of long Covid.
Chris: This is not about shitty, but it's shitty.
Kayla: We know all the ways that it's been terrible, and I think the terrible ways do outweigh the good ways. But I think that we have also been introduced to a slower lifestyle. We've been introduced to a lifestyle that potentially allows us to be with our families more. A lifestyle that has allowed us to realize, oh, yeah, working 50, 60 70 hours a week is not sustainable, is not tenable, is not how I want to spend my precious time on this earth. And I like being able to go to a doctor's appointment when I need it. I like being able to see my kids at lunch. I like being able to have this close time, this. This. This quiet time with myself or with my loved ones. And I want to hang on to that.
Kayla: And I think that's the good quote unquote of COVID that she talked about is really what's at heart. It's at the heart of this new resurgence in the labor movement that we're seeing the great resignation and with all of these strikes that are happening and people fighting tooth and nail for sustainable wage and benefits and all of that, but for a life that is about something more than working, a life that is about having a family life, having a home life, having something outside of just going and being on an assembly line. Yeah. And that is a good. A good quote unquote thing. Obviously, it's terrible it caused a shift. Yeah. It's terrible that people are still having to fight for these workers rights. But if nothing else, Covid has helped shepherd in that change.
Chris: It was a tweet the other day that was like, the nice thing about America is you get to fight for the same rights every generation.
Kayla: You get to fight for the same rights that every generation before you had. Spot for it. Yeah.
Chris: And we also just want to acknowledge. There's also the element of, you know, we want to acknowledge the privilege that comes with being able to quit. Right. To quit your job and to examine some of these things that we're talking about. You know, obviously, that's not an option available to everybody, and their lives have shifted in other ways. And we want to acknowledge that, too. You know, not every essential worker has been able to do that.
Kayla: Unionize your workplace. Unionize your workplace.
Chris: Yeah. And it's important for those of us who have been able to do that, to consider that and to treat society as everyone and not just other privileged people who can quit their jobs like us.
Kayla: You're talking about the fact that just being able to be like, you should just order your groceries.
Chris: Yeah, yeah, exactly.
Kayla: Necessarily the solve to everything, because somebody has to still go get your groceries and who's giving the groceries to those people.
Chris: Right. Deferred consumption is a big blind spot for a lot of people. So that. That bad? Anyway, thank you for that point. Lizzie and I also talked a little bit about the technology thing. I think this is something that a lot of people associate, just like, if you. If I say Amish, like, you immediately were to associate that with, like, horse and buggy. No, no. Technology. Right? Like, that's. That's one of the things I think that a lot of us just sort of naturally think of when we think of the Amish. Her answer was, good. We chatted about this a little bit more because I wanted to go a little bit deeper on it. And I, and I did a little bit of research, too, before I talked to her. But as it turns out, the.
Chris: The Amish aren't necessarily just like, there's no mandate that says we are anti technology. It's not that we think technology is bad. It's. It actually all comes back to. This is sort of what she was saying with, like, the control aspect of it, but it all comes back to the Ordnung.
Kayla: Okay.
Chris: So it's rather than say, oh, anything, that technology is bad. No, it's actually, the Ordnung must be followed and we are slow to change it. Okay, so the ordnance and the Ordnung. This may sound confusing to us that are not from the amish community, but yes, the Ordnung does include prescriptions in it for what you are allowed to use in your home and your technology. Like, for us, we may think, like, what the religious rules text that doesn't just say when you should go to church on Sunday. No. So think of the Ordnung as, like, all encompassing. Right? It dictates, like, I mean, we talked about this in your window, not just the curtains, but, like, the tint of blue needs to be correct. Okay? So it's dictating everything, including what you are, what tools you are allowed to use.
Chris: And so because that body of rules changes slowly, because you have to get, like, the whole, you know, committee of bishops or whatever, you know, you have to get, like, all the elders and everything together to change it. That's actually what leads to the slow adoption of technology. It's nothing because we're like, you know what? I actually hate radios. It's like, well, radios aren't in the ordnung. And, you know, we got to get together to change it. And that's probably not going to happen until, you know, twelve years from now anyway. So that's what that actually comes from. I thought that was fascinating.
Kayla: It's very interesting.
Chris: And in fact, there's even. So that's why. That also is why certain technology. You're like, wait, why are they allowed to use that?
Kayla: Right, right.
Chris: It's. They're not anti technology. It's just there are certain technologies that they have decided to allow in, certain ones that they haven't or just haven't gotten to. And this. And a lot of that is driven back to the desire to isolate. So one of the interesting things is phones. So, like, they don't like to have phones in the house, right. But there's some debate on maybe cell phones, because the fact is, if you have a phone in the house, it's hard to isolate because you can talk to people and connect to the outside world. But with a cell phone, you might still able to remain isolated in a way because it's not, you know, it's not like a direct line outside. You know, you can have a lot of control over who can contact you and whatnot.
Kayla: Interesting.
Chris: So there's actually some debate over whether, like, cell phones are okay, which is like, when I read that, I was like, whoa, wait. In the amish community, cell phones, like.
Kayla: The number one secret tiktoks are coming from.
Chris: Yes. Well, that's what I thought about when you said that, but I just, I didn't want to drop that little knowledge bomb till later. But I just think it's fascinating because you think of the Amish as, like, the most, like, anti technology, and yet you think of phones as the most technologically advanced thing we have. And they're like, yeah, maybe. Maybe phones. So anyway, weird. The world is weird. Or is it just cult? I don't know.
Kayla: We're here to determine.
Chris: I do have to ask you, our mutual friend told me that I needed to ask you about, quote unquote, the poop case.
Lizzie Hershberger: She's so fascinated about that.
Kayla: Okay.
Lizzie Hershberger: So it's been in multiple states and counties. Amish have gotten in kind of trouble with their local counties on how they're dealing with their waste product. We'll call it waste product. So let's say. Okay, so me, I live in the county I live in. I'm required to follow a certain code of my septic tank on, you know, how it's installed. It has to be inspected. It has to. We have to pump it, you know, all this stuff. Okay, but since you're an amish person, you technically get to fly kind of under the radar. And a lot of counties kind of like, okay, they're Amish. We'll just let them do whatever they want. They forget they have 1516 kids, and they obviously have a lot of waste products, but they let them fly under the radar.
Lizzie Hershberger: But in some states and in our specific county, some local officials became aware of, okay, well, what are the Amish actually doing with their waste products? Because in general, they think that they are having very little running water in the house. So then you think about, okay, so they're not flushing a toilet, they're not having bath water going up. But then all of a sudden, there started to be some issues, and it became really big dispute. And I think it was more probably the general public said, okay, hey, if we're paying thousands of dollars to have a septic system, what are the Amish doing? Why do they get away with just dumping their stuff down the drain? So they got called in, and they.
Lizzie Hershberger: When the Amish came in and said, hey, I want a permit to build a new house, the county refused to give them a new permit. They said, no, you can have a permit if you do a septic system according to our standards. And the Amish, no, we've never done that before. You know, we wouldn't, you know, my grandpa and my parents never had to do one. Why would I have to do one? So they came down to a certain case, and the county just said, no, I'm not giving you a permit. The Amish actually kept building the house, and you can look it up in Fillmore County, Minnesota. But became a big dispute. And eventually what happened is the county and a couple of amish families ended up going to court.
Lizzie Hershberger: And the local da contacted me and said, hey, would you come in and testify? And I explain, because in Amish, what they were saying is that it's against their religion to have a septic system. And the county saying, why would that matter? You can still have church the way you want to. You can do. We're not saying you have to change any of your religious things that you're doing. We're just saying, put a septic system in and we'll be okay. So I came in as the expert on the Amish, and I testified, and I said, well, what would matter if they have a septic system? They can still have church. They can still. So I had to really explain how they worked, and they did. The county ended up winning against the Amish, saying they have to put in the septic system.
Lizzie Hershberger: But it got thrown back to the Supreme Court, and it's actually still in limbo right now. Yeah, but, yes, yeah. To me, I tried to explain it to people. I said, I live in the county. I drink the water that's in the county, and the way the soil is and everything, there was lots of experts that I listened to what goes into the ground. Eventually, I will drink in, like, five days. So let's say 1020 years down the road. How bad is this county going to be in if we continue to let large amish families live here and they dump their waste into the, you know, cricks? And that's what we did when I was growing up. Nobody. They all dumped their stuff wherever they wanted to.
Lizzie Hershberger: I tried to explain that it's not going against a religion because there's no reason it's going against a religion. It's all about control, because the Amish do not want to be told what they can do, and they use religious freedom rights. And that's why they're trying to say, oh, no, we can't have a septic system. There's no grounds for that, in my opinion.
Chris: I imagine they're probably afraid of setting a precedent for the future, because if they can tell us what to do with the septic system.
Lizzie Hershberger: Yep, that's what they tell us what.
Chris: To do with other. Yeah, it's also really fascinating, too, where it's like you were talking before about how the Amish, the big, distinctive factor is that they isolate themselves. Like, plain community isolates themselves from the rest of society. But what this suggests is, like, especially now and the world we live in now, like, we're also interconnected in this case, via the water cycle. Right. It's like, it's kind of impossible to fully isolate yourself.
Chris: And.
Chris: Yeah, you don't deserve to have to drink water that's been contaminated. That is.
Lizzie Hershberger: Yeah, yeah, we're trying to keep it clean here. Yeah, I could be very nasty. Yeah. So we're. Yeah, that. That case is kind of fascinating, and I feel very fortunate that I got to go and explain, but obviously, with that, I also have people that have put out death threats and things against me because I'm speaking out against them. You know, I'm. I'm. I'm saying the truth. You know, it's like. Yeah, it's. Yeah, it's complicated.
Chris: Yeah, it's. It's. It's. Yeah, it's hard to speak out because Daisy will get backlash of some kind. That's unfortunate, but it's cool. We have an expert witness on the show, so that's. Now we can say we've had, like, an expert trial witness. So that's. That's pretty cool. How are boys and girls raised differently from each other in the amish community?
Lizzie Hershberger: Boys are raised to be the head of the households. Girls are raised to be second class citizens, and there's no other way around it. And I tell people, if you don't believe it, go somewhere to Walmart or in a public place. Watch where the woman is. If she's with her husband or with a guy, she's always walking behind him. He's always doing the talking for her. Her eyes are always turned down. They are never making eye contact with you. And that's because you're following whatever male figure is there, whether it's your husband or your dad. You are never taught to be the one. You will never see an amish woman walking in front of her husband. I can just tell you that right now. Let's say you meet two amish women somewhere. It would be the more dominant one that would do the speaking.
Lizzie Hershberger: But usually their eyes are always down. They do not make eye contact with you.
Chris: When you say domino, is that like older sister or mother? If it's a mother type of thing.
Lizzie Hershberger: That'S what I would say. Yep. Yep. Typically the older one. The older, yeah. If it's a mom or grandmother or somebody like that. Yep.
Chris: In behind blue curtains. Is there anything that you wish you had said about your experience or in your story that didn't wind up making it to print?
Lizzie Hershberger: Yes. One of the biggest things that I wish would have put at the end of the book is what my abuser got sentenced with, because what we did is we ended it with the impact statement, and we did not say that he did get charged. He got charged, you know, very minimal. But he did go to jail for about. I think it was nine months or something like that. I don't know. He went to jail for a couple months, but he is on probation for ten years. And that is assuming that he doesn't get off for good behavior. But the thing about it is it's very minimal. But yet I know that it made an impact, because he is the first amish man that went to be sentenced for a crime that he did in my community, and he is a registered.
Lizzie Hershberger: He's a felony. He can't have a gun. He can't. He's restricted. But yet the Amish still let him be a deacon in the church. I mean, that was never stripped from him. Oh, you'd never do that? No, he's still a deacon, but it's only. We're only two years into it. I said, at any time, if he messes up. And the DA explained to me that we could give him more jail time up front. But then. Yet if he violates probation, he wouldn't get as much prison time. So we chose not to do as much jail time. So then if he violates, he would get real prison time. And one of the other things I wish we would have been able to put in the book is that he does not have to register as a sex offender.
Lizzie Hershberger: And that really we didn't know that the day of sentencing because they had to do some more research. But unfortunately, they told me because of the laws that were in place in 1989, he got sentenced with those laws and sex offender rules were not in place then. So unfortunately, he still has access to children. But on the other hand, I know that it send a big impact in a big message to the community because him being a deacon, he was absent from church for a couple months because he was in jail and people had to explain, you know, why is he gone? You know, it doesn't matter whether they, you know, most of them still think that I instigated it. I asked for it. It was an extramarital affair. Ridiculous.
Lizzie Hershberger: The point is he got sentenced and it send a message to people that it doesn't matter because it was a long time. Was it 28 years later he got sentenced for a crime that he committed. And I think it sentence a message to the community that you can get in trouble for your actions years later. So, you know, I guess that's what I live on, is that I hope that it send a message and that some young girl isn't getting abused because an abuser is like, oh, wait a minute, I might get in trouble for this.
Chris: Yeah. I mean, I think just to me, this is just me coming from my own head. I do think even a little tiny bit of accountability is like, is so valuable because what, you know, the situation you are describing, the community you're describing to me that it has all of these things oriented towards control. And also, this is just from, you know, talking to Molly as well. And while I'm having some experience in Catholicism, even the video game industry.
Chris: How.
Chris: Do I want to put this? When there's no accountability ever, then there's this culture that develops. There's this systemic culture. It's really big. I just mentioned it's a really big deal in the video game industry right now where it's like, you hear the exact same stuff of, like, I didn't even know that was wrong. I thought that was just how it was. You hear the exact same stuff in the video game industry that you hear in catholic priest abuse and you also hear in the amish community. So it's just so fascinating first of all, to me that you hear the same things. And second of all, I think that anything that introduces even a tiny bit of accountability is like, just like, will just help stop that. That system where it's just like, I.
Chris: Thought it was okay.
Chris: Yeah, like, no, it's not okay. We have demonstrated it's not okay. You can get in trouble for it. So that excuse is gone. So I think even just like, a little bit of that is great. Yeah.
Lizzie Hershberger: Well, and I think just in general, overall, you know, the extremely rare, like, so few abuse cases, if so few get reported, but even fewer of those will ever see a courtroom. I mean, it is extremely rare that you ever see that. And for this to happen, you know it. And I will just add this. The reason it did is because he was my employer. Even though I was only 14 years old, I was the Maude, and he was paying my parents, whatever, $5 a week. He was my employer. And because of a statue that was lifted in Minnesota, there was a window that was open, and they could charge him during that time because he admitted to being my employer.
Lizzie Hershberger: And his attorney tried to use in court, and this is in public files, that he tried to use it, that he admitted it, and that should give him a little bit more, you know, credibility or something. It ended up hurting him because he admitted that he was my employer. If he would have denied it, I don't know that we'd be here and we would be able to say that he got charged, but he did admit it, but he didn't think he'd get in trouble. That's the thing about it, because they think they're above the law. You know what I mean? They think that they can get away with it. And this just send the message. And one thing I'll just like to add is, you know, my uncle that I talked about in the book, you know, that statue of limitations was way past.
Lizzie Hershberger: There's nothing they could do about it. He is probably one of them. He's one of those people that still lives in the community and that I hope someday I will see in court. Unfortunately, it won't because of me, but it's going to because he's a predator. He has never. I don't believe he ever stopped abusing. He abused me. He abused other people. I know he has been able to fly under the radar, but I know that he's very aware of what I've done and that I reported it. And I hope that he's not abusing anymore. But most of those, it's an addiction in that he's never went to get help. He most likely is still abusing. But I always just hope that someday he will be held accountable. Accountable.
Lizzie Hershberger: And if he's not held and accountable in front of a judge, he will be in front of God. Because he is an abuser. I have no doubt with knowing his children and grandchildren, I know that he's continued to abuse. I am not just some isolated niece that he's abused. I know he's done the talkers.
Chris: That's unfortunate.
Lizzie Hershberger: It's very unfortunate.
Chris: I do hope that if your case even makes one person think twice when they wouldn't have thought twice before, then you've succeeded. That's good.
Lizzie Hershberger: And I think it did from what I've talk to. So what happened? Soon after my book was released, I didn't know how quick it would circulate in the community, but a local store chose to sell it for, and she doesn't take a commission. She just wants to sell it. And I know people come in and buy it from her. And very quickly, or very soon after the book was released, an amish couple called and they said they'd like to talk to me about it. So I went out and they. They were able to tell me that they sat in the church session where my abuser confessed to abusing me. And what that did is just validated that other adults, community members knew what happened and they chose to do nothing. Nothing. Yet I don't. I don't hold them accountable yet.
Lizzie Hershberger: I hold the bishop and the other preachers accountable. They knew what was going on, but they chose to do nothing. But what they did is they were able to, you know, just tell me in their own words. Okay. We heard his side of the story. Now we read yours. We understand abuse so much better now we know how to talk to our kids and our grandkids about it. To me, that was okay. That's it. I've made a difference. I've made a difference. And from now on. And then one of the questions I asked them is, I said, so what do you think is happening in the community now? I said. And she said, well, there was a lot of people that were coming forward and talking about it, but we don't think it's happening anymore now.
Lizzie Hershberger: Yeah, I would love to think that, but I know it's still happening because it can't just stop because of, you know, I do think that I made a difference, but there's still going to be cases because it's a generational curse that's been going on. It doesn't just stop with one person coming out. But I do appreciate the fact that I think that I've made a difference. But will that difference be temporarily keep people from doing bad things and then they'll go back to what they were doing before? I kind of expect so. And I think that there's a good chance, too, that I won't see it in my generation. I might not see it, but my kids and my grandkids might be able to see it.
Lizzie Hershberger: Or the amish kids, the next generation might be able to go back and say, oh, you know, maybe this is. This is what we've learned. This is what we're going to do different.
Chris: So, yeah, you planted a seed, you.
Lizzie Hershberger: Know, and, yeah, there you go, what it is.
Chris: And, yeah, and you mentioned the thing about, like, not facing consequences within the church. That's another thing that is just so enraging, is that it's like, it's almost worse than the original abuse, is that when it comes to light, it's like instead of accountability, instead of even turning another eye, oftentimes it's like active protection. Like, okay, well, why do you think this happens then? Why do you think that they feel empowered and invincible? It's because they know that if something happens, then they will be protected. Even if they don't know that on an intellectual level, like, deep down that they are completely safe, that it's just. Anyway, we could talk about that forever.
Lizzie Hershberger: Yeah. For another episode.
Chris: Yeah.
Chris: Reading your story, and there's been other recent stories, too, like Tears of the Silence is another book about abuse in the amish communities. It's very eye opening to outsiders. So what my question is, is this something that has recently started happening more, or is it just that the.
Chris: Rest of us, the rest of the.
Chris: English world, quote unquote, is just recently finding out about something that's actually been going on for a long time.
Lizzie Hershberger: I truly believe that sexual abuse, emotional abuse, physical abuse has been going on in the amish community for probably as long as the Amish have been in existence. The only reason that the general population is hearing about it is because people like me have started coming out, and there has been local investigators and prosecutors that started listening and prosecuting these cases. I believe there's been women coming out and talking about it for years, but so many times, because of religious rights and all kinds of things, they just swept it under the ruts, including Das and prosecutors and police officers, and leaving it as they're good christian amish people so let's just leave them alone. And I also think that in general, probably the whole me too movement has affected even these small, plain communities.
Lizzie Hershberger: And there's so many more support groups and advocates and trauma informed people and therapists that are helping women and men find their voice. So I think in answering your question is that, yes, it has been happening for years. It's just people are starting to come out more and more. And I see it even in just the general public I'm seeing. People are talking about it more. It's not a taboo thing. It does make some people uncomfortable. I know it does. But yet, more and more people are coming forward and talking about it. And the more you talk about it, the more it becomes something that we're talking about. We're not just hiding it. We're not just, you know, closing our curtains on it.
Chris: And I think. Yeah, you mentioned a good point, actually, Molly, I think mentioned this, too, is that people from different communities, widely dispersed communities, being able to connect with each other on this is really, I think, like just, even just now talking about, you know, working in the video game industry, which is like entertainment technology.
Chris: Right.
Chris: And then the amish community couldn't seem more separate. But here they are saying the same words. I know this was wrong. They're both saying the exact same words, despite being way over here and way over here. And it makes me kind of go like, why am I saying the same words? Something, something's up here. So I, I think that helps, too, is being able to, like, connect with each other now that we have, like, you know, the Internet and all this stuff.
Lizzie Hershberger: I was going to say, and we kind of talk bad about the technology and media things, but yet, you know what? It's really good. It's really good because, you know, we can sit here and have a conversation. Years ago, you know, you made a phone call in a home line. It's a good thing. And I think you just have to, yeah, you have to just use your own discernment. You know what is good? Like, for my own mental health, I don't watch news in general. I quit that years ago because that was just something I needed to do. Other people. Yeah, but other people can do it. That's fine. I don't care. That's fine. And I don't do politics. I don't get into politics at all whatsoever. So I don't want to say that technology is all bad because it really isn't.
Lizzie Hershberger: Because I can't imagine life without a phone, so.
Chris: Right. Yeah, it is a double edged sword, for sure.
Lizzie Hershberger: Yeah, it is. You just have to use your own, like, and that's. With my own kids, I had special rules and special things that. No, you can't have a tv in your room. You can't have your phone in your room when you're a young child. You know, I just make rules. And some of my kids are probably smarter than I am on technology, and they know what, you know what? You post will forever be posted.
Chris: Terrifying with technology. I mean, we have a niece. She's like, two years old, and she's already on the phone going, you know, up and down.
Lizzie Hershberger: I know. I know.
Chris: Oh, my God, you're two.
Lizzie Hershberger: Yeah, I know. I know. I. Yeah, I thank God my youngest is 14, so I'm like,
Chris: Now, you already answered this a little bit when you were talking about, I think when you were talking about how you kind of don't view the Amish as necessarily Christianity, but I do want to ask you sort of like the, you know, the cult gimmick question, right. Is because we're culture, just weird. And cult is not a very scientific term. It's just more of, like, a feel thing most of the time. But I did want to ask you if you have any of that. That feel like, do you feel like there's a cult like vibe from your experience in the amish community? And if so, like, what do you think it is that either now or in the past kind of get that feeling?
Lizzie Hershberger: So when I was growing up in the community, I didn't even know what a cult was. I didn't know anything about it. But after I left and I started looking at some of the cult like behaviors, I truly believe that the Amish I come from are very much like a cult. And the reason I can say that is because the bishop has the final word. A bishop is the head of a community, and the communities tend to, you know, every community has a different bishop, and they're ruled on a little bit, slightly different rules, but that's a cult. When you have one person that has the final say on what's going on, everything's controlled.
Lizzie Hershberger: It's not like the Hutterites, where, like, one person has the money and one person, this or that, each family member is so limited on what they can do and how much money they can have and how much growth they have because of, they're limited on certain things they can do and can't do and things like that. So I really, I try not to say that they're a cult. But I think they absolutely function like a cult.
Chris: I mean, that makes sense that you would want to say that because it is. Cult is sort of like a. It's sort of a pejorative. It's sort of, it's not like the nicest word to use, which we run into that a lot on the show where we don't like using it, but it's also kind of what the show's about. But.
Chris: I get that.
Chris: Is there anything that you would like to say to our listeners that we didn't get a chance to cover or that you would like to plug or talk about or anything?
Lizzie Hershberger: Yeah, I was just thinking in general, I know quite a few amish and former plain people that have a story, and they would like it to be heard. And I would just really like to encourage them to find somebody that can help them. Because the thing is, with our, most of us have limited education, and I am much more of a numbers person than I am writing. And, and I would not have been able to share my story without the help of basically a ghostwriter. And there are different, lots of different ones out there. But I really encourage everybody. And if nothing else, I would encourage victims and things, if they want to go into this healing process, start writing.
Lizzie Hershberger: And it doesn't mean that you have to ever publish your book, but do start writing, because I feel like it's so much of a healing process and I've gain so much knowledge and so much information for my kids to be able to look back on because I won't be here someday and they can look back and they don't have to be as much of an investigator as I was to try to, you know, get down to some of these things.
Lizzie Hershberger: I just encourage other victims to find some sort of process that they can go through of writing or working with a trauma informed ghostwriter that can help them, you know, get your story together and you don't, doesn't mean you have to publish it, but, you know, get it down on paper and leave it for your children or grandchildren or family members or what have you. But I found so much healing in doing that. And even if I wouldn't have published it, I'm still, you know, I would have been glad that I just did the research and had somebody help me. And then also not to be rushed in the process, because it's going to take everybody a different length of time to go through their healing. Some people can do it in way less time than I did. I took my time.
Lizzie Hershberger: So I think that everybody should take their individual time that they need if they want to go through a healing journey of writing and getting their story down.
Chris: So that is the end, of course, of my chat with Lizzie. I thought it was really, like, there was just a lot of stuff that I did not expect there. Like the.
Kayla: Like the poop case.
Chris: The poop case, for sure. I mean, I'm glad we talked about poop, because that's, you know, that's crucial. The poop case did illustrate, though, the challenges of I want to be isolated, but there's really no such thing as isolation. And we. I mean, we're discovering that with COVID right, where it's like, I want my freedoms, but, you know, not. We're like. We're all connected in this way. That, unfortunately, makes Covid really bad for America.
Kayla: Rugged. The concept of rugged individualism is incompatible with, like, what it means to be a human.
Chris: Yeah.
Kayla: Like, the reason why we even exist as animal is because of community.
Chris: But, you know, the Amish have their own community. It's the wider effect that their sanitation has. Right. So, anyway, that's a whole. Another topic. We're not talking about the history of sanitation today.
Kayla: We should be, though.
Chris: We talked about the history of another water related thing last episode, so I think let's. Let's push that off for a bit. But, yeah, I'm glad that she talked about that. I'm glad she talked about how she views the. The Amish in general, whether they are even christian or not. In a way, she called them a cult, so we don't even have to decide on that here. So that's pretty nice.
Kayla: Oh, wait, do we have to do that?
Chris: You don't have to do it anymore. No, because she said. She said.
Kayla: Is that real?
Chris: No, that's not. No, of course we have to do. It's the gimmick, Kayla. We have to do the criteria. That's what the people come to this podcast.
Kayla: That's what they want. My only question coming out of this is, who are the Hutterites?
Chris: Okay, so the Hutterites are just like. They're not. Think of them as, like, a Amish. Cousins of the Amish.
Kayla: Amish light.
Chris: They're not necessarily light, but they are also Anabaptists. They're also plain people. So it's that they're very similar, just a different group. All right, so, as we just said, it's time for the criteria. So after two episodes of discussing, first the Anabaptists and then the Mennonite slash amish communities. Yes. That's that's the criteria page. That's all of our, that's our things. So let's go, let's get to it.
Kayla: Alright.
Chris: So the first thing let's talk about is, because that's actually the last thing Lizzie mentioned and we hadn't really talked about it as much, but charismatic leader. She talked about how the biggest bishops sort of like have control and that's what makes it a cult to her.
Kayla: But the bishops still feel like henchmen.
Chris: Yeah. I mean, there's no real cares. I mean, there's Jacob Amon, but we don't, we know very little about him.
Kayla: There's Jesus, there's God, there's those guys.
Chris: That threw over through the government in Munster in the 15 hundreds.
Kayla: I don't know. Honestly, I don't know. What do you think?
Chris: I think it's funny because. Yeah. Cause I was gonna say low until Lizzie was like, oh, yeah, the bishops control everything.
Kayla: Yeah. Yeah. That changes things.
Chris: I think that makes it sort of like yes and no at the same time. Like there's no, you know.
Kayla: Jim Jones.
Chris: Yeah. So there's no like Jim Jones or, you know, David Koresh or something like that. But you, but there is a, you know, a sense of that from, you know, the bishops having control of everything and they have to interpret the Bible for you and that kind of stuff. So it's not, maybe not mid. Mid. Okay, mid. All right. What about antifactuality?
Kayla: I mean, I think it's pretty high.
Chris: Why is that?
Kayla: I don't even know. I think that anytime you have a group that's trying to suppress information seeking.
Chris: In its people, crossing out words in the dictionary.
Kayla: Yeah. Blacking words out in the dictionary, having a Bible being in a completely different.
Chris: Language, missing and misquote. She said it's, they misquote the honor thy father and mother. Honor thy father and mother in the Lord and they always leave out in the Lord. That feels pretty anti factual to me.
Kayla: Yeah, it just seems. And I feel like sexism. I feel like sexism is antifactual. Does that make sense?
Chris: Yeah.
Kayla: And she talked a lot about how men and women are treated differently and treated as if there is like, you know, this inherent crazy difference between men and women and men are this way, women are this way. And that feels antifactual to me. Like being really into that.
Chris: Yeah.
Kayla: Feels antifactual. And it just, I don't know if antifactual is even the right word, but just the suppression of information seeking, the suppression of knowledge seeking is very high.
Chris: Well, we played pretty fast and loose with how we define anti factuality. It's not really a word anyway, but, like, we usually mean things like, are you using motivated reasoning and other logical fallacies? Sort of fall under that for us. So I think that tracks, actually.
Kayla: Okay.
Chris: Percentage of life consumed, all of it, every single bit.
Kayla: It's a hundred percent. It was more than 100%.
Chris: I don't know. Especially because of the isolation.
Lizzie Hershberger: Right.
Chris: It's like you. Your entire life is in this community and you cannot leave except under certain circumstances.
Kayla: Right. The ornung is all consuming. The. Yeah.
Chris: They tell you what color curtains to have.
Kayla: Right. And even, you know, you two talked a lot about, you know, leaving and coming back or leaving, but still feeling a part of the community or living, you know, like, as she is close to the community. It's still. It is a very big part of identity. So even outside of the, like, it takes over, it's a very big part of identity.
Chris: Yeah. Yeah. The pulling you back in is an interesting thing, too. Yeah. Expected harm.
Kayla: That's a tough one to answer.
Chris: Certainly in the case that we know about.
Kayla: Yes, in the case that we know about high. And, you know, Lizzie and Molly both talked about how this is a widespread thing. This has happened to a lot of people. Abuse is systemic in this community. I think that, you know, I don't have a. Any sort of objective understanding of this community. I'm not sure it's possible to have an objective understanding of any community, but particularly this community.
Chris: Yeah.
Kayla: So as far as I know, the expected harm is pretty high. And I think, again, the things like sexism also indicate expected harm for men and women and people who don't fall into that neat little binary.
Chris: Yeah. You know, I thought, I kind of wish I had saved this criteria for last because I thought that the sort of the defining criterion for this one was going to be, is it niche? Right. Like, because of how isolated they are. I thought that was going to because, like, if you want to zoom, like way out, 10,000ft view right on this show, like, we talk about this a lot where it's like, okay, there's. There's so certain things that really, if you had to, like, boil down the criteria to, like two things, I think I would boil it down to, is it niche and how much. How harmful is it, how abusive is it? Because I think that's what most people are thinking about when they think about cults and if it's niche, then we're like, oh, that's a new religious movement.
Kayla: Right.
Chris: And if it's abusive, then we're like, oh, that's a cult. Right, right. So, like, that's a lot of. I think what we talk about on the show is, like, because nobody would give a shit about Scientology if it wasn't, like, hurting people. You know? Like, if it didn't have people come away and be like, yes, I was kept in a prison and my family was told to let you know, like, if they have family separation and all that shit and suck all your money dry, nobody would care that Scientology was some weirdos, right?
Kayla: If there was harm, it's like, yeah, people go be. Go be weird. Who care more power.
Chris: It's like. Then it's like, tulpas, right? Then it's like, okay, cool. Yeah, you're weird. Awesome. Good job, you guys. So I think that's kind of, like, there's this real balance between, like. And I think there's not just a balance, but also, like, unspoken sort of, like, confusion, conflict, where it's like, that's not a cult. It's just niche, and it's a new religious movement. But then other people are like, actually, they abuse the shit out of me. They're mooney. They're very bad.
Kayla: Right.
Chris: And so I think that's. I don't know. I just wanted to say something about that because a lot of that kind of crystallized for me in this episode was like, we don't care that the Amish are isolated and, like, do horse and buggies. In fact, like, that's kind of cool, you know? Like, that's where the Taurus dollars come from.
Kayla: Right.
Chris: It's not that. It's. It's the abuse. It's the abusive systems that make us go, I think this is pretty cult like, because otherwise I would just say it's different.
Kayla: I think that some of these groups that do rely on abuse tactics then fall back on the. They're just persecuting us for our.
Chris: For being different. Yeah, different.
Kayla: Scientology does that.
Chris: Exactly.
Kayla: It seems like maybe the omnxium does nexium. Does it. They're just persecuting us. They're jealous. They want to tear every MLM. Does it? Yeah, they want to. They're persecuting us. As opposed to. They're mad that we do abuse at people.
Chris: Yeah. Yeah. So, expected harm high and also shed some. Some new light on the entire way of thinking about this. For me. And since we already sort of talked about this, is it niche? Yes, definitely.
Kayla: Heleniche.
Chris: Heleniche.
Kayla: I mean, it's, I think, you know, widely known about in an interesting way. It's like, you know, there's that mythology. There's that mythology about, like, oh, amish barn raising, and we talked a lot, or like, you know, amish products being good. You know, we know generally that the Amish exists, but obviously, they're an extremely insular, isolated community niche. And the history that you talked about in the last episode is not necessarily well known. It's not deeply.
Chris: Well, they were niche at the time.
Kayla: Yeah, they were niche at the time, and they remained niche at the time.
Chris: Both Protestants and Catholics were like, boo. Anabaptists, weirdos.
Kayla: And any sort of deep understanding of it is, you know, that specialized knowledge is not general knowledge.
Chris: Right. So, yeah, I think it's high there. Chain of victims.
Kayla: I mean, Lizzie talked about how the population is growing. We, in our own research, we've learned that the population is growing, even with being such an isolated community. And it seems they don't recruit.
Chris: I was going to say don't recruit.
Kayla: But that doesn't mean your kid can't be a victim.
Chris: No, of course it. But when I think chain of victims, I think of the. The recruitment aspect, again, of, like, something like an MLM, where you were a victim, and then you became the victimizer by recruiting somebody else. I think Lizzie's not recruiting anybody to be like, she's not passing that on. She's stopping it.
Kayla: No, but I think that parents, that people get abused by this system, by this religion, and then they have 14 children, and then those kids live through that same abuse, and then they don't leave the community. It's a very insular, self maintaining community, and then they stay, and then they do the same thing. I think that there is a case.
Chris: To be made that it does.
Kayla: And I don't necessarily want to equate, like, you know, benign indoctrination or just, like, passing along your culture to your children as abuse. That's not abuse. But it seems like there's maybe a culture of abuse here that gets passed down to children.
Chris: She did call it a generational curse. That suggests that there's some chain going on there, a victim chain going on, even if it's not MlM, like, in nature.
Kayla: Right.
Chris: The last one's dogmatic. We're right. Everybody else is wrong. The isolated nature kind of speaks to that.
Kayla: The fact that we didn't know much about it has, like, kind of a little bit of a derogatory, just, like, labels. Like, there's the Amish, and then there's everybody else. And they're the English.
Chris: Yeah. Right. So that aside from charismatic leader, which was, we said, sort of middle of the road, it scores pretty high. And everything else, I think we are comfortable.
Kayla: Are we comfortable? The first religion that we've covered, and I guess Amish is not just a religion.
Chris: Yeah.
Kayla: It's like a weird community. Religious. Religious culture.
Chris: It's like a culture and a religion at the same time.
Kayla: Are we comfortable saying that is a cult?
Chris: I give zero fucks about anything ever, so, yes. But I. I do want to be sensitive. So I will say that in the criteria that we have on this show, it's a cult.
Kayla: It meets the criteria.
Chris: It meets the criteria for being labeled as a cult, which we all know is an imprecise and unscientific term. There's no such thing as a. As a cult. In terms of, like, social sciences, they're not a new religious movement. Cause they've been around a while.
Kayla: Right.
Chris: They do have systems that enable abuse, and they do have systems of high control. And there are a lot of things that you might say that they have in common with other such systems, such as things like Scientology or whatever.
Kayla: Right.
Chris: In that sense. In the sense that we can break it down into these different elements. Yes, it is.
Kayla: There you go.
Chris: You heard it here first.
Kayla: You probably didn't hear it first.
Chris: No, absolutely. You were definitely not the first people.
Kayla: Who have compared the Amish to a cult.
Chris: Not even close.
Kayla: But you heard it here.
Chris: Actually, they probably were calling them that literally back in the tent in the 15 hundreds. So you heard it here last.
Kayla: You heard it here at some point in your journey on this thing we call life.
Chris: So, anyway, thank you again to Lizzie and to Molly for connecting us back with Lizzie. It was a pleasure talking to both of you. It was a pleasure learning about the Amish and the anabaptists and the various communities that come from that. Kayla, is there anything else that you wanted to add before we sign off? Do you have a call to action?
Kayla: No, my call to action is just. Thanks, Chris. Say thank you to Chris for taking us on the history. I just still appreciate the historical journey you took us on last episode so we would have the proper context for this more intimate, nuanced conversation between you and Lizzie. I think that it was enriched by that. And then my call to action, other than that, is go listen to have yourself a merry little Christmas, whatever that song is called, and give yourself a nice cry at this holiday time, because crying is good for you.
Chris: And then if you need to take a shower.
Kayla: Stinky. You filthy devil.
Chris: You dirty listeners. This is Chris, this is Kayla, and this is Ben.
Kayla: Cult or just weird?