So Much More - The Good

In one of my literature classes, I heard that you should always point out what you agree with so that when you disagree with something the disagreement has more weight. I found that to be a good idea, so that is what I'm doing today.

So Much More was published in 2005 by the Botkin sisters, Anna Sophia and Elizabeth, through Vision Forum. We saw how well that ended. I did enjoy a lot of their stuff, both from the girls section and the boys section. Even though she dislikes it now, I still like Joyfully at Home by Jasmine Holmes, which was also published by Vision Forum.

SMM has caused a lot of stir in the Christian community. Normally I would tell you to read it for yourself, but there are a lot of good books out there and I want you to read those first. So I'm taking this bullet for you. 

  The Good

    1. The relationship between fathers and daughters are important.

This is something that has become neglected over the years, and they are right. On page 5, they right that space between fathers and daughters are "dangerous," and to an extent I do agree. I do believe that they had good intentions with this book.

    2. They recognize that family is important. 

This is a point that is scattered through all of the book. The authors are writing this book after listening to many stories of women who have tried to find fulfillment outside of God's will (translated as: outside the home) and they want to show that there is another option for women. One of those options is to focus on the immediate family and growing the bonds between members; more specifically, the father/daughter bond.

    3. They understand that traditional college is not the greatest thing ever and is not always necessary.
This follows point 2. One of their main points in this book is that for women (though it's unwritten, the same thought applies for men) traditional college and the subsequent 'college experience' isn't necessary for a fulfilling life. They lay out that there are possibly two other options women can follow: correspondence college (AKA, online schooling) or just focusing on learning the finer points of running the home.

I (as of January 20th, 2018, the date of posting) am doing "correspondence college," first through Lumerit Education, Unbound Program and now Liberty University Online. This was the best fit for me. Honestly, if I would have had a boyfriend in my last year of high school, I probably would not have focused too hard on college because I do eventually want to be a stay-at-home-mom.

However, as the book goes on 'traditional college/traditional college experience' simply becomes 'college/college experience' and starts to say that all college institutions are evil and are trying to destroy Christians. This is where I believe they are wrong, and possibly have First-World Christian Paranoia. More on this later.

    4. They understand that courtship is a uniquely personal experience and therefore cannot give any arbitrary rules.
I unfortunately do not have the specific page number, but they do specifically say that they should not and will not give any rules or tips about courtship, as each person is different. Considering this whole book is full of rules/oddities/weirdness, I'll gladly take this statement as a win.

Now these next few point are still ones that I believe are good, but are pretty much negated by what they say in more details later in the book.

    5. They recognize that men and women can each do a lot, but in different ways.
A lot of books either say that both men and women do can similar things equally well, or just say that a gender can do things well and the other gender can't do a thing well. The authors do write multiple times about how they believe each gender can do things differently and that it's perfectly ok. This would be a great thing, if not for the points we'll read about later utterly destroying what they say. (First discussion of this topic is on page 97.)

    6. They bring up the (valid) point that Feminism does have ties to Marxism, and that Feminism isn't always great.
This is a topic scattered throughout the book. Appendix B is full of examples/quotes (along with citations) of how bad it can get. I have personally witnessed it; people who claim to be Feminists have said horrible things to women I consider friends.

However, I do not agree that Feminism is the Most Evilest Thing Ever and there has been some good to come out of it -  the right to vote, for example. I personally will never be a Feminist, but a) as long as you are respectful to others, I could not care less about whether you are or not, and b) I see that  (mild) Feminism could be helpful to women in countries that are not first-world countries.

Finally, our honorary mention:

    7. The authors state (once) that a woman's worth is in Christ.
This a good, true statement. However, everything in this book negates it. There's a lot of statements in the book that imply that this is not the case. It's frustrating as this book started off so well and then lets legalism take control.

So Much More has a lot of heart, but that heart is not truly in the right place. Even though it has all of these good points, there are a lot of worrying/wrong statements mixed into these good points.