Inside Purity Culture and Christian Nationalism With Monte Mader  🔗 **Source:** [Inside Purity Culture and Christian Nationalism With Monte Mader](https://share.snipd.com/episode/d108cf26-2896-4446-af7b-d6b869ab82e0) ## Highlights - **How One 90 Second Video Launched A Platform** - Monte Mader exploded from 24k to ~2.6M followers after a 90-second Instagram reply went viral in early 2024. - She recorded a rapid-fire rebuttal, posted it, and returned hours later to find millions of views and mass growth. Transcript: Monte Mader So, yeah. So, I mean, I've, I've obviously had social media for a long time. I was not a big user, especially with Instagram. I typically used it to promote music. I wasn't really a regular creator of any kind. And then as 2024 had continued to happen, there were certain topics that kept coming up, certain talking points that I felt uniquely qualified to have a discussion on with my background. But it wasn't a big thing. But in December of 2024, I made a video kind of cheekily saying, why are we trying to put the Bible in schools when it's not working in churches? And many people were not a fan. And I'm also someone that I don't read the comments very often. Part of it's just time. I'm so busy. I don't have time, but also mental health as well, because for their, you know, good comments, and there's a lot of also really vitriolic ones. But for whatever reason, one day in February of last year, a on that video popped up and it was from this guy named Derek, who's like, when have you been to church? I'm guessing never. Dan Beecher Which is a constant, any one of us who have posted a thing that could even be considered anti-Christian, you're going to get, well, you've never read the Bible. You've never been to church. You don't know anything about it. Yeah. Monte Mader And for whatever reason, that particular day, and again, as someone who had time, I had time and I was not having it. I was not having it. So I set up my phone really quick. Again, I had never shot this style of video in this way before. And I laid out my background and I pulled my Bible into frame and I read him for filth for 90 seconds straight. And I don't even think I breathed at any point. And I put the phone down. I posted it, put the phone down. I went to the gym. I went to work. I was running a personal training business at the time. And I was also a full-time performer. And I came back three or four hours later and it had 15 million views. Wow. And I was like, what? And then it actually, it got deleted off Instagram because when someone deletes their comment, it removes the video. Oh, really? It does. So I ended up having to repost it and it still got millions of views. And so I went from having 24,000 followers in February of last year to I'm almost at 2.6 now, 2.6 million. ([Time 0:03:04](https://share.snipd.com/snip/ba52d4d9-100f-42b1-8fef-07af4530a6b9)) - **Raised On A Militant Christian Nationalist Ranch** - Monte describes growing up on a remote Wyoming cattle ranch steeped in militant Christian nationalism and weapons training. - Her father privately trained her in apologetics, and the household mixed politics and religion with local GOP ties. Transcript: Monte Mader Baby Monty was born and raised on a cattle ranch in Wyoming and grew up very, very remote, very rural. And I grew up in a very, very Christian nationalist environment that skewed very militant. And I will say to my family's credit, which is something that still shocks me so much with what's going on now. If my father had ever seen someone fly a swastika, he would have throat punched them. Yeah. So not in that space, but very much we had stockpiles of arms across the property. We were trained with weapons at a very young age. There was a lot of rhetoric around the Democrats are going to hold you at gunpoint. The government might come for us. It's your obligation to die for your faith. That escalated a lot after Columbine. Dan McClellan I was about to say, when did Columbine happen? Monte Mader I was, I was a kid when Columbine happened. And that's really where I remember that uptick. And it was very much directed at us children more so than hearing it in conversation in the room. Interesting. Dan Beecher So they're specifically going at, going to the children and giving these messages. Monte Mader I mean, I remember journaling at night and fantasizing about martyrdom, like fantasizing about being killed like Cassie and fantasizing about would I be strong enough to say yes for My faith? And I knew I was part of a Christian group that would go to public schools and they would host these like anti-drug rallies and then invite kids out to a pizza party type thing on a different Night where they would share the gospel. And Cassie Bernal's grandparents were part of that. I knew them personally. And I didn't find out until my 20s that that never happened. Like Cassie's story and she said yes isn't real. I don't know her. Dan Beecher I don't know. Dan McClellan One of the victims of the Columbine shooting. Yes. Where he, yeah. Sorry, you go ahead. Monte Mader And she was hiding under a table. And the story was that he came over to her and asked her, do you believe in God? She said, yes, and he kills her. And it didn't happen that way. He just shot her and it happened to someone else. It was just a totally, it was falsified. And they knew very early that it was falsified, but the book was still published. It became this huge part of the youth movement in evangelicalism and Christian nationalism with Acquire the Fire youth groups. But for how I grew up with this militant background already, it really, really escalated this sense of urgency, this sense of persecution. I was used to this idea of you need to have weapons to defend your faith kind of ideology. And I also, I was, my mom left when I was young and left all six of us kids with my dad. And I very much grew up in a patriarchal household, my way or the highway. ([Time 0:08:19](https://share.snipd.com/snip/8e2a61ec-7aab-4387-b3dd-4875a8fb4d7a)) - **Christian Nationalism Teaches Politics As Theology** - Monte learned politics and religion were inseparable in her upbringing: being Christian meant conservative politics and anti-reproductive-rights stances. - Her schools taught creationism, PragerU-style history, and had minimal science on evolution. Transcript: Monte Mader They were married together. You could not be a Christian and vote Democrat. You could not be a Christian and pro reproductive rights. And all of the kind of the dogma and the messaging and the misinformation that we're seeing now was exactly the same for me growing up. And I went to all Christian nationalist schools. So I was only ever taught creation. There's still a very big gap in my knowledge about evolution and natural history. I have a huge gap of knowledge that I'm working on now. Always had a Bible class, always had PragerU style American history. And then I was- That's the good stuff. That's the meat and potatoes right there. It's wild now to think about what I was taught as a kid, knowing what I know now. But outside of school, I mean, we were in church whenever the doors were open. I was privately trained in Christian apologetics by my dad for five years. Privately trained, again, in this very narrow viewing of theology for 10 years before I went to college. And then I was forced to go to Liberty University as one does. Dan McClellan I didn't know they like girls in Liberty. Right? Weird. It's weird. We got to wear pants and stuff too. Monte Mader And in, I did not go to school for theology. I have to clarify that quite a few times with people. It's like, no, no, no, no. I, my dad, ([Time 0:13:56](https://share.snipd.com/snip/6766fb64-1d35-4fc4-8e20-6cb1a0bd0f4c)) - **Kicked Out Of Sunday School And Vowed Never To Marry** - At nine Monte was kicked out of Sunday school for questioning male leadership and later resolved to never marry to avoid submission. - She physically threw her Bible in anger and decided abstinence was her escape from patriarchal control. Transcript: Monte Mader I remember feeling so trapped as a kid and I didn't have the vocabulary to explain what I was feeling. I just remember all the time fantasizing about running away and feeling like my life was over and feeling like I was in this cage. I can look back on it now and realize, well, yeah, you were told that your body isn't yours. You were told you, you can't give consent. Yes. When you're a kid or when you're a young adult, but you can't say no, when you're married. Your body doesn't belong to you. Your body is already property of a man you've never met. And purity culture, I think, is obviously the dominant messaging that I grew up with. But it starts with what I mentioned before when I was nine and kicked out of Sunday school. And then I get my first wives submit to your husband's sermon. And I remember sitting by my dad and I've got my Bible open. And my Bible then was like it is now. It was highlighted and marked and notated. I loved that book to literal pieces. Like it was my favorite thing. And I'm looking at this and I'm listening and I said, I remember starting to get mad. I could just feel like this heat rising up to my face. And I was trying not to cue dad that I was pissed off because I'm re I'm, I'm listening to the preacher and I noticed he skipped the verse ahead of it that says, submit to one another in love. He dives right into the wives and it just so happened that he ran out of sermon time to get to where the husbands are supposed to love their wives the way that. Oh, that's a shame. I'm sure he meant to, I'm sure he meant to get to it. And even then I remember thinking, well, how convenient to be a man. Like I remember as a nine-year being like, this is perilously convenient that you have to do nothing while another person has to submit to you. And again, I didn't have the vocabulary for it, but I remember the rage. I didn't say a word driving home. I went down to my room and I took my Bible and I threw it across the room and against the wall. And I made a decision. I was like, okay, I don't want to piss God off. I don't want to sin. So what I'm going to do is I'm just never going to have sex and I'm not going to get married. That was my solution because I was like, I'm not doing that. I'm not going to submit to some guy. And I had seen how other women were treated in the church. I noticed at a very young age, I was like, no loophole. I'm just not going to get married. Dan McClellan Um, I apparently I'm going to go with Paul's advice in first Corinthians seven instead of, instead of pseudo Paul's advice in Ephesians five. Dan Beecher Although I did see, I did see a thing, a meme recently that was pointing out that if you never get married, you can't have premarital sex. So you can have all the sex you want. Dan McClellan Loopholes all the way around. Yeah, it's extramarital, but not premarital. But not premarital, so there you go. Monte Mader And apparently, as of this juncture in my life, I took the no marriage thing very seriously. With a lot more commitment than I had planned at the time. ([Time 0:26:46](https://share.snipd.com/snip/c2d783a6-8b6d-4663-98cd-a223591414be)) - **Purity Culture Repackages Women As Property** - Purity culture reframes women as property using metaphors like used gum or used cars to police sexuality. - Monte points out that these metaphors erase personhood and normalize lifelong commodification within marriage. Transcript: Monte Mader And the purity culture messaging got much, much stronger because then shortly, I think, I can't remember the exact year though the books came out, but I Kissed Dating Goodbye comes Out. And what was the other book that came out at the same time or around the same? And people would carry these things around like they were their Bibles. So there's this huge cultural resurgence of purity culture. But I remember, you know, all, all the analogies of, you know, if you do have sex before you're married, then you're just used gum. No man wants used gum. You're a used car. All the, and the funny thing, like the, when you take these analogies and really look at them, okay, so my options are to be a used car or a new car, but either way, I'm a car, not a person. And so then what happens when this man buys me as a new car and then 15 years, I'm not a new car anymore. Does he get to trade me in for a new car? Cause I'm an old one now. Dan Beecher Spoiler alert. Kind of, yeah. Kind of, yeah, actually. Dan McClellan And this is really a re-inscription of what's in the Bible, where women are commodities. Their sexual availability, their procreative capacities are commodities. That's what marriage is. It's a transaction where a man is buying that from another man in the form of a woman. Monte Mader Sell your daughter into sexual slavery if you want to. ([Time 0:30:11](https://share.snipd.com/snip/9dea7a0b-54f3-4579-912e-cc3c2e2f8ad6)) - **Purity Culture Erases Consent In Marriage** - Purity culture denies consent and marital rape by treating wives as property whose agency is nonexistent. - Monte connects this directly to biblical and historical practices that stripped women of sexual autonomy. Transcript: Monte Mader And when I would ask questions, because I read the Bible for the first time at nine, cover to cover. And when I would have questions, it would of course get explained away or that's not what it means. It was different in this time. But really the, the idea of purity culture is really just a repackaging of women as property. And it's also why they don't believe in marital rape. And while they inherently don't believe in consent, inherently, because you can't consent. Yes. You then can't withdraw consent when you're married. You at no point get sexual agency. ([Time 0:31:41](https://share.snipd.com/snip/552fb632-7fd8-4988-b421-d1521a9a3d15)) - **Abuse, Fear Of Pregnancy, And Silence In Her Family** - Monte recounts childhood physical and psychological abuse, including living in a dark basement and nightmares about pregnancy from age 12. - She didn't report an assault at 18 because she expected blame and only later found her father's minimising response. Transcript: Monte Mader I already felt worthless. You couldn't convince me I could be any more worthless than I already felt. You know, I mean, there was a period of time where my younger brother and I had to live in a dark basement for two years. We weren't allowed to be upstairs in the house. And the only time we were allowed to leave is if we were working outside for dad or going to school. We were not allowed to be physically present upstairs unless we were eating. And so it was, it was all of this messaging at the same time. And for me, I ended up with a big conflict around 12. I have like, pregnancy is in my top three fears. I would rather swim with sharks. It like terrifies me so much and it always has. But there was also this messaging of, you know, you have to remain pure, you have to remain unstained or whatever, which begs the question because the men were never told that. So who are the men sleeping with on their way to marriage? If all the women are not doing any, anyways. But I would, I knew in my heart at the time that like, well, you have to have kids, you have to have kids, you have to have kids. But there was also this demonization of any kind of sexual contact. It ruins you. It removes your purity. If you were to get pregnant as a teenager, my dad would have thrown me into the street. I would have been a street kid had that happened. So I started having nightmares about pregnancy at 12. I would wake up screaming in a cold sweat. So afraid of if that ever happened to me, what my dad would do to me. Like it was this palatable, terrifying fear. I had no interest in boys until my senior year in high school because I was so afraid of, oh my God, if anything ever happened. And then the problem doesn't end when you get out of the house. I moved out of my parents' house when I was 15, but I was assaulted at 18 and still didn't tell my dad because I knew he'd blame me. Yeah. And when I did eventually tell him years later, because it wasn't P and V intercourse, he was like, oh, okay. So it wasn't a big deal then. I forgive him. Forgive him. Dan Beecher Yeah. That was nice of your dad to forgive him Yeah. Nice of him to forgive him. On your behalf. ([Time 0:38:12](https://share.snipd.com/snip/a7f6124a-1296-4070-af51-7f9557bff334)) - **Study Church History And Let The Bible Be Messy** - Let the Bible be messy and study church history to grapple honestly with harmful texts and doctrines. - Monte runs classes that present historical context, confront slavery passages, and let listeners decide their beliefs. Transcript: Monte Mader Where we kind of attack some of these big things we were all taught together or these talking points of Christian nationalism, and we go through, and I always tell people, I'm like, I Don't want to convert you to anything. That's not my job. What I am going to do is I'm going to give you as much information as I possibly can. We're going to talk about it. We're going to ask questions. You get to decide. You get to decide. And you go to the Bible and you do look at these texts where we have to, you know, we did a whole lesson on slavery saying, yeah, the Bible does allow this. And yes, it is cruel chattel slavery. Yes, it is sex slavery. And we have to wrestle with that. We have to let the Bible be messy. What does that say about the author? Do we believe that a good God divinely wrote that? Because we have to talk about our relationship or our belief system around God, if that's the case. Or we believe that men of a certain era who had really messed up beliefs wrote this? And we get to ask the question, is there a better way? And it is, it's this, it's this wrestling and you have to be, I tell my, the people that attend all the time, I'm like, you have to let it be messy. Let it be messy. ([Time 0:45:23](https://share.snipd.com/snip/022c6529-736f-4299-9814-7cae56a8a1eb)) - **Managing Viral Backlash While Teaching For Free** - Monte receives both supportive messages and intense threats after going public; she filters comments and runs free educational classes for thousands. - She hosts bimonthly free Bible-history classes with thousands attending and saves positive DMs for encouragement. Transcript: Monte Mader Um, so that, I mean, I'm very glad that very early I set the boundary of, I don't spend a lot of time in the comments. I'll still read them. I'll find things to respond to, or especially if people have topics or questions. And I'll say for me, because I have done that and I laid that boundary early, the good far outweighs the bad because a lot of my encounters with followers are in person. They'll see me at an airport or they'll see me. And I've had people come up to me with tears in their eyes saying, I have struggled so much with sexual shame, or I have struggled so much with this, and I didn't understand it. And you gave me the words to understand it. And that right there for me makes it totally worth it across the board. And the people in my class, we held a class yesterday. We're doing a multi-part series on how we got the Bible and what we know historically about the origin of each book. And there were 500 people that attended, locked in. I mean, this was an hour and a half. It was so much information They locked in my biggest class. I did a two part series on around purity, purity culture and women in the church and the history of all of this. There was 3000 attendees and the classes I always do for free. Those are my, I always, I wanted something that remains a gift. I don't want everything behind a paywall. So for me, the classes are my gift. And, but yeah, there's a lot of, I get called trans a lot by men that don't have a strong jawline. But I mean, I get a lot of, a lot of rape and death threats, hundreds a day. I've had to filter my request inbox, of course, from somebody who's typically married with children, has a Bible verse in their profile. Um, and of course, like you're also your generic insults of I'm a demon. Uh, they are obviously clearly very upset that I have a nose ring and more than one color in my hair. Um, it's, it's all kinds of things. It's almost like, listen, dude, like you can also get a nose ring if you like them that much. You can do that. But typically to the same, the guys that get really vitriolic. And of course I'm old, fat and ugly because when they don't have anything else to say to a woman, they attack those things. It's so boring. They should really get more to you. But then they'll show up in my DMs and this happens a lot. I'll have someone be really vitriolic in my comments and then send me a message asking me if I'll dom them. ([Time 0:51:52](https://share.snipd.com/snip/5a77f406-bbe4-4e3c-9edb-d8e386e88817)) - **Doxxed And Threatened Over A Disagreement** - After Charlie Kirk's murder Monte was doxxed, placed on hit lists, and had people waiting outside her building, forcing her to temporarily relocate. - The escalation followed a single video disagreement and demonstrated how targeted threats intensified. Transcript: Monte Mader Fall, it, the, the hate mail did take a dangerous turn for me after Charlie Kirk's murder. Um, I, I, and I had only ever made one video responding to a comment of his or a video. And my whole thing was after, you know, when he died, I was like, listen, that's terrible. I'm not like, I'm not going to celebrate that it happened. I also am not going to cry. I didn't say that, but I very much approached it that way. And so I was added to a list that was released online of Charlie Kirk's murderers. And then I was publicly doxxed in multiple forums, Christian nationalist, white supremacist groups. There were people waiting outside my apartment building for me. And the only reason I caught on, one of my assistants caught the release of the address and I didn't use the front door of my building. I always went out through the garage. And so I ended up having to leave where I lived for several days and leave town because of, there was like an imminent threat on my life because I didn't align myself with Charlie Kirk's Teachings. Good grief. There's some platforms that have really like interacted with a lot of his content. I hadn't, I had done one video disagreeing with something. But I do think there's this level of- I've interacted with a lot more. Yes, you have. I've seen it. You've interacted with quite a bit. I haven't. Yeah. But that's just kind of the tone that it changes, you know? And I also think that a lot of these people threatening me don't realize that I'm five foot 10. And I think if they actually saw me, uh, the, the tone would change a little bit. ([Time 0:57:39](https://share.snipd.com/snip/f98da8f0-5cb6-4a55-9aa3-ef82f9f8137c)) - **Why Transparency Of Extremes Creates Hope** - Monte feels irrational hope because Christian nationalism has become overt and exposed, pushing people to question childhood teachings. - She sees bridge-building across issues like AI and environment as evidence people are redefining enemies and organizing practically. Transcript: Monte Mader Actually, especially lately have had an almost irrational sense of hope that by the measures of what I'm seeing in the world and in the environment, I shouldn't be that hopeful, but I am. Um, one of the things I truly believe that things had to get this bad. We had to see Christian nationalism for what it is. We had to see how poisonous these ideas are and they needed to be transparent and out in the front and gross to shake and shatter people out of their apathy and to get them to challenge these Ideals that many of them have been raised with since they were small children. And so I think that we're seeing that. And I have a lot of people that come to my community who are like, oh my God, the scales just fell off my eyes. And I don't, I don't know what to do with all this new information. I see people showing up to protests who are, they have never done anything like that in their entire life. And they're there and they care because of how bad it got. I'm also seeing a lot of bridge building within communities because people are starting to realize, especially like around, like with AI data centers and all of this exploitation Of communities and the environment, people are starting to realize, oh, you're not my enemy. These people are like, this is a top and bottom issue, not a right and left issue. So I'm seeing a lot of bridges start to be built. I'm seeing people start to show up. And so I have this hope because I think it had to get this bad. And because this, especially Christian nationalism, it took the mask off too quickly. It got power drunk too quickly. And it's exposed to now all the things they denied being for so long. They're like, yeah, yeah, I'm racist. Yeah, I'm this. Yeah. They laid down their hand too quickly because they didn't think it was possible that someone could have a better hand. And so I have a lot of hope because I'm watching people change in real time. I have a lot of hope because this movement is very blatant. It is very clear. And ultimately I, and I believe that, you know, the arc of progress, the arc of justice, it bends the way you bend it. Hope is where your hands are. So the world that we want to have is possible if we build it. And so I, and I'm watching people get their hands in the dirt. And that brings me a lot of hope. And I also know that from a historical standpoint, these type of systems are not sustainable. They're consuming. They have no regard for conservation or restraint. And so they consume themselves. Yeah. And, you know, I think it's going to get bumpier before it gets better. I think that we're going to have fallout to fix. I think we have systems that completely need to change top to bottom. But I think for the first time, it's happening in the open. ([Time 1:00:19](https://share.snipd.com/snip/d845609d-7aae-4877-8a8f-285d57c04dba))