More Eyes—and Ears—Turn Toward Moscow, Idaho

Podcast Extremely American turns to Christian patriarchy and Christian nationalism

Some time in the spring of 2021, I caught a story lead: there were growing tensions in Moscow, Idaho, over a small, YouTube podcast in which women were sharing stories about their experiences in a local church. As one does, I started looking into it, asking questions, and fell down a rabbit hole of research and reporting that has consumed my thoughts for massive chunks of time ever since. I met bold, brave people. I met intimidated, frightened people. I met folks who lost their faith and others who described how they defiantly held onto scraps left after confrontations with the church and its pastor, Douglas Wilson.

My first encounter with Moscow led to this story for VICE—which I’m told locally is still referred to as “the VICE story.” Later, I’d write three chapters in Disobedient Women about Moscow and its Christ Church.

So, I’ve been curious for over a year, since a former source told me ‘this NPR podcaster guy’ had started asking questions. That podcaster (different from the one in 2021) is Heath Druzin of Extremely American, who paired up with Boise State Public Radio reporter James Dawson to report on philosophical and property tensions within Moscow, the impact of Christian patriarchy, and the broader aims of Christian nationalism that flow from this city and its various church and parachurch entities. The whole thing is now being distributed by NPR.

I recently chatted with Druzin about the podcast. The interview appears below, condensed for length and clarity.

Sarah Stankorb: How did you jump into this world that some people are very aware of, that has such influence in some pockets, but about which most of the country is less aware?

Heath Druzin: The short answer is, I live in Idaho, so I had heard about this battle for the soul of Moscow. I'd heard of Christ Church, and I kind of knew the broad brushstrokes. They're this fundamentalist church, and they want to make things more Christian.

I realized this might be the perfect story because all of a sudden Christian nationalism really started coming to the fore. The rabbit holes that I was going down [in Season 1 of Extremely American], with armed groups and the Proud Boys and far-right groups, all of a sudden, Christian nationalism started entering that space more and more.

And I started seeing more elected officials either parroting the talking points or just straight-up saying I'm a Christian nationalist. That's when I thought, maybe this is perfect because I think it's starting to matter a lot more.

I don't want to tell a story about a fringe group that doesn't matter. I want to be really careful about not doing that, because I don't want to be the newsmaker for them if they're not very important. Does that make sense?

Stankorb: Oh, it does. You have to think, what’s a warning versus what’s giving oxygen to the wrong people?

Druzin: Yeah, I mean, I know we're in the same world. I'm sure you struggle with that balance.

For me, I want to tell people an interesting story, an important story, but, I don't want to just give them their broccoli. I want it to be riveting, and I was riveted when I started digging into this cultural kind of civil war going on in Moscow and just how diametrically opposed Christ Church and the majority of Moscowites were in their worldview.

To me, this was a really good story, and it gets at the broader national story of Christian nationalism becoming important and getting mainstreamed in politics.

Stankorb: These are people I've spent a lot of time getting to know as well. I wonder what it was like for you not really being part of this world, getting to know the rules placed on women, and how women's submission works in the church.

Druzin: I am a total outsider when it comes to this. I didn't grow up Christian, let alone, being in a fundamentalist world. So, for me, it was an education, a steep learning curve, and very eye-opening. I kind of knew a little bit about wives being obedient to husbands in fundamentalist circles.

But what I definitely didn't realize is how structured and baked-in it was to day-to-day life, how vital that was to the ethos of this movement. It’s foundational, and especially in modern Christian nationalism—I mean, Christ Church, of course, but even the broader movement—it's so foundational to how they want society to be structured.

And that to me was eye-opening because that's when I started realizing, this is not just an interesting detail. This is arguably everything. This idea of women being subservient to men. And when you grow up like that, it has a cascading effect where you're just not equipped to push back.

Stankorb: I agree that the Christian nationalist project is very dependent upon women in these roles, producing as many children as they can and normalizing submission to authority. Because, in a lot of ways, what happens in the home is a microcosm of what's supposed to be happening in the church, and beyond that, what's supposed to be happening in the “Christian government.” So, it's vital, training women within the church to abide by that authority. Otherwise questioning that, they show the weakness in the whole structure.

A different thread I wanted to ask about that you covered in this series—Classical Christian education. It’s a form of education that many people don't know about, but it can be a gateway to some of the worldview flowing from Moscow. There are families involved who just like the idea of classical education, and they're excited for their kids to learn Latin, but they don't necessarily get the roots or connections. I thought it was great that you talked to Susan Wise Bauer. Did you talk to families that were involved in the movement? Were people even aware that Wilson was connected to the movement?

I know a lot of people that come in are not aware of him.

Druzin: Susan was great. I mean, she literally wrote the book on classical education. We did talk to people who were involved, and we talked to people who used to be involved and weren't very happy with it in the end. But you're right. I mean, part of the draw is sort of understandable, right? It’s like your kids are going to get a serious, rigorous education.

I bet the vast majority of families outside of Moscow don't know who Doug Wilson is, which in some ways, I think, is very effective for Doug Wilson, because Doug Wilson has a draw for a lot of people, but I think he also can repel a lot of people, including devout Christians. I don't know for sure, but I have a feeling that that might actually be very savvy. Whatever the pros and cons of that, he's obviously done a really good job of expanding this universe and getting a lot of students into his classical schools.

What Susan talked about and the thing he's really done well is he has made a lot of people think that Classical Christian education the Doug Wilson way is classical Christian education, as opposed to schools that are in this mold. You know, Susan says for her, it's a welcoming education, where different viewpoints can be together in the classroom and have discussions and not necessarily agree. Where obviously in Doug Wilson's world, there's a pretty strict belief system that is the foundation for everything.

Stankorb: I think it's interesting, that it could be advantageous for certain populations not to know Wilson's connection. On the flip side, something Wilson and his supporters have been really extraordinary at is building this media infrastructure. You mentioned this in one of the episodes: the streaming service, the publishing arm, all of these modes of communication. It's really just a flood of polished-looking product.

Druzin: I think his media operation is extremely effective, and it's effective for a reason that can be a little annoying for me as a journalist because it's so hard to quantify. But it's polished, and it has high production values. These guys aren't the type who are like ‘Let's go make a podcast in our garage.’

It looks good. It sounds good. And when I say it looks good and sounds good, I'm not making a value judgment. I think it's effective because these ideas, they percolate out into the world and you see them popping up with Christian nationalist thinkers who aren't connected directly to Christ Church. I think when you have a serious sit-down interview where people are wearing suits, and you have a professional-looking studio, and you're talking in serious tones, for example, about the 19th Amendment being a mistake, I think it can sort of shift the Overton window, for some people, you know, the bar for what is an acceptable idea to kick around.

He's been so good at creating this media empire where you can just hang out in that echo chamber. He’s not the only one, obviously. We've got this very compartmentalized media world where everybody can just agree with themselves all the time online. But you can hang out in the Doug Wilson universe and never leave, and all you're hearing is that ideology. And I think that's a powerful tool, right?

There's a whole parallel world that they're trying to create. I'm not even talking about government. I'm talking about media. I'm talking about—

Stankorb: The Seven Mountains. I mean this is one of them.

Druzin: Yep. When I was at their conference, Fight, Laugh, Feast, you had people who were like, ‘Hey, join a Christian version of LinkedIn! Join a Christian version of Netflix, a Christian kids’ book company that doesn't mess with any of this (quote-unquote) ‘woke garbage.’”

You're creating an entire separate ecosystem that people can go hang out in and ideally do all of their business.

Stankorb: In a way, it's like everything from the 80s got a chance to grow up, right? The 700 Club was very effective at putting a polish on news ‘with a Christian lens.’ And there, Pat Robertson could say abominable things about queer people and divorced women and so many things. Now, it’s a whole set of productions and media across the board.

Back to an earlier topic though, if we could. I wanted to return to something you covered toward the end of the series. I'm wondering what you learned about Christian patriarchy and Christian nationalism. You did a very good job explaining how they're connected and really how patriarchal ideas are at the root of it.

Druzin: I think a buzzword people should look out for is household voting. I’d never heard of this idea before. Basically every Christian nationalist I talked to wanted to disenfranchise almost all women (with few exceptions), but that's not how they say it. They say, ‘Oh, I'm in favor of household voting.’

And I'm like, ‘Well, what the hell is that?’

It's very interesting how they put it. You mentioned before that there are these different levels of governance in Christianity and the family is one, and so household voting is one place where they do kind of sugarcoat it a lot actually because they're like ‘Well, no, no, no, no, women will get to vote in consultation with their husbands,’ and I did have to push and said, ‘But wait. That's not true because the husband votes. Whatever the consultation is, ultimately only the husband gets to vote.’ And they're like ‘Well, yeah, she gets her say through the household discussion.’

And what it means is that women don't get to vote. Or you have to wait until you're widowed and then you're the head of your house. So they've left the door open enough where you can't say all women lose the right to vote because it's not exactly true. What this really means is that women don't get to vote.

I thought that was very important because you could say a sneaky term, household voting. Oh, that sounds benign. It's a radical idea. It's the 19^th amendment.

Stankorb: Yeah. It's also parallel to the idea of a house church or a home church.

I feel like it's already in the lexicon.

Druzin: I have one more thing about the patriarchy. I think what's interesting about all of that is that these Christian nationalist ideas are not popular.

Sometimes I think in this country we have this sort of fatalistic view, as if these things are so popular because we see them a lot. But, if you look at polling, these far-right ideas, in general, are not popular and don't win at the ballot box. But, if you start cutting out the electorate that doesn't vote these ways… If you cut out women, for example, that's a lot of voters.

You've just changed the voting pool if you then cut out people who don't believe in what you believe. If you cut out the LGBTQ community, well, then these ideas start to gain a lot of power because the people voting for them have been sort of pre-selected. So, I think that's an important thing about these patriarchal ideas and voting where it's about patriarchy, but it's also kind of a pragmatic move where you're changing part of the electorate that votes in a different way, for different outcomes than you want if you're a Christian nationalist.

Stankorb: Yeah, and to me it's gerrymandering by identity instead of by district.

Druzin: That's a good way to put it.

Stankorb:  I live in Ohio. We live with gerrymandering every day. And it makes the politicians who thrive here more extreme. It’s all getting more extreme.

Actually, I thought one detail in the series was really interesting. You interviewed Gabe Rench, considered an acolyte of Wilson’s, and you had a very frank conversation about your being Jewish. It was telling and uncomfortable, how he was being so polite and also ready to say as a non-Christian, you would have fewer rights under his view of a Christian government (such as not being able to run for office).

These things can be said so politely, even to your face. And that's also what happens with headship and patriarchy. How did you process this? You handled it very well.

Druzin: First of all, I think you made an important point. These guys don't get mad, I mean, in public.

They're very good at keeping these pretty extreme ideas very conversational. In the moment, the way I approach is—and it can be difficult—but what I try to tell myself ahead of these interviews is that the most important reason I'm doing this is to learn about their ideas so that I can help other people understand their ideas.

And me getting flummoxed or mad in the moment is not gonna help achieve that goal. Now that's easier said than done. And you can be concerned and worried, especially about your daughter losing her rights later.

It's one thing for me, but I’ve got a little kid. It's scary for her. I don't have to be objective about wanting my daughter to have full rights of citizenship. I'm a journalist, but I'm a human being and yeah, I don't think we have to both sides that part. I want my daughter to be able to vote.

So, when Gabe said that to me, I was a little stunned, but I'll be honest, as an audio reporter, I was also pretty glad he said that into my microphone.

Stankorb: Yes, yes, absolutely. Afterward, did it shake you at all? There's something disconcerting to be told, you're not worthy of God or whatever rights in the way that I am. Or did you kind of put that on a shelf and say, I got radio gold?