Duggar Family Secrets EXPOSED In New Prime Video Docuseries

All the Duggar fans on the reddit snark page must be giddy.

I wonder what ability the Duggar kids have to sue the production company since these people were around them enough to have a good idea as to what what going on, but rather than calling them out, they kept the Duggar grift going. Medical professionals & teachers are legally obligated to report suspected abuse - does that apply to film crews?

It should but people play dumb.

The same corporation that airs these bullshit programs is the same corporation that owns CNN and aired the Trump "Town Hall" travesty several weeks ago.

Is it any wonder?

Anyone watching? Is it good?

It is good insofar as it’s downright scary. The Duggars are kind of the sideshow. The main attraction is this IBPL cult group. They have long range plans ( think generational) to take over. Judiciary. Regional elections. Representatives. They are organized and frightening. Watch. Would love to hear your views.

I watched the first two episode. It’s very well done and fascinating. I knew little around these weirdos apart from the fact that one of the sons molested his sisters.

The documentary digs into very disturbing stuff and interviews one of the Duggars molested plus other family members and members of the creep church they belong to. The parents truly are awful.

And Discovery Channel kept promoting these whackos after the son convicted for kiddie porn

Keep watching R7. The Duggars are the stepping off point.

A patriarchal cult where sexual abuse is rampant and its always the girl's fault, evil 10 yo temptress.

It's interesting, but I'm three episodes in and it's very repetitive. Could have been two episodes instead of four.

The 4th episode is where the scary cult is made clear.

I watch a lot of documentaries… this is a good one. Great interview subjects, well structured, meaningful content. It’s chilling and highly believable.

[quote] It is good insofar as it’s downright scary. The Duggars are kind of the sideshow. The main attraction is this IBPL cult group. They have long range plans ( think generational) to take over. Judiciary. Regional elections. Representatives

Except they always present so freakishly they turn off more mainstream voters. The Duggar dad ran for office at least once with all 200 of his children supporting him at rallies and he looked like a side show freak. Someone who should maybe think about wearing a condom now and again. It was unseemly. If they don’t have hundreds of children per family they all dress alike and groom themselves alike. They look like cult members.

Shiny Happy People: Duggar Family Secrets. WOW. WATCH.

And these “people” want to rule America. All these organized churches. All these religions. ALL RUN BY MEN. All rapes of children. Younger the better. Wife beatings. Children beatings. All about MONEY!!!!! These Men only want power and money. Catholics Protestants Baptists Fundies/Fundamentalist Scienceotology Hindus Muslims Jews Buddhist Amish Mormon Etc

All run by Men. And all abusing children, raping children. Money. I will never understand being involved with ANY churches. I don’t need anyone telling me how I should use my faith. I don’t need a church.

The craziest part to me was their leader, Bill Gothard, gives sermon after sermon, writes book after (self published) book on how important it is to get married and have tons of children for God's army. He has rules on how children should be raised, on how wives should be treated...and this kook has never, in his eighty plus years, even been married.

Why buy the cow?

OMG, I didn't know Gothard was never married! How did he manage not to have his own personal slave? Twisted as his thinking is, maybe he thought he'd be committing adultery by sexually abusing all those women and girls

There was an old episode of Dateline NBC on the other night about Warren Jeffets and his father and how they operated.

If you're interested in the M.O. of these old pervs, I highly recommend it.

Warren Jeffs' face just says "pervert," IMO.

Two episodes in and I am fascinated by Michelle Duggar, who's not at all the meek helpmeet she presents herself to be. Under the affected baby-girl voice is pure steel.

And I can't be the only one who thinks Bill Gothard is gay.

I can't stand Michelle Duggar's voice. Ugh. Sickening.

Gothard seems like a straight freak into young girls.

R19, wonder what that plastic looking face of Jeff's looks like now? The big boys in the Big House will have had a ball with Jeff's too, 'cos as we know they hate 'Rock spiders'!

2019 photo of Warren Jeffs, having a contact jail visit with one of his daughters.

Warren Jeffs' youngest wife, 12 years old.

[quote]Bill Gothard, gives sermon after sermon, writes book after (self published) book on how important it is to get married and have tons of children for God's army...and this kook has never, in his eighty plus years, even been married.

I guess he's a Lonely Gothard.

That's horrifying, r24. She looks like a scared automaton. He probably goes back to his cell and rubs one out.

I really miss the Dominiom Wackiness Troll. I wonder what happened to him. At least Dominionists don't sound as depraved as the Gothard cult.

Shiny happy people 🎶

Love you, R26!

I'm on Season 1, episode 3 or so. I've been fast-forwarding quite a bit. Anyway, it is weird that Gothard never got married and had children. He does appear to be hetero in that he seems to have only sexually harassed girls and very young women.

People are so lost and stupid. They need to abrogate their decision-making powers to obvious charlatans.

Free Jinger!

There's one sister who people don't seem to like. Which one is it and why?

Also, Jim Bob was making something like $800,000 per season. Jill Duggar said that she worked on the reality shows for 7 years of her *adult* life and never got paid. She went to TLC and they said: go talk to Jim Bob. Jim Bob ended up paying them minimum wage for their work.

That nutty family is the darling of the MAGA land voters. scary !

There was some footage, I think in the second episode, of some old guy (not Gothard) onstage at a conference using a young boy to help him demonstrate how to spank and "bless" a child at the same time. The kid was volunteered by his mother. He laid that kid face-down across his lap and repeatedly pantomimed spanking him while telling him various things about behaving and growing up to be a good man, then stood him up and asked for a hug for the formal reconciliation. (All this was him playing the role of the father and the kid playing the role of the son who needed discipline.)

The most horrible part was after the hug, when the man laughingly said to the audience that he didn't think the child "meant" the hug enough and told him to do it again. The kid throws himself at the guy and puts his arms around his neck, and the guy is amused, like, "Whoa! Easy there, fella!"

Imagine the psychological effect of that performance on the boy. You have to hug your abuser, and you have to act like you mean it, and the abuser is the judge of it.

WHET to the Dominion Wackiness Troll? He always had good stuff about these freaks.

Can't these assholes quit selling themselves and go back to Arkansas with the rest of the trash?

$800K a year and JB had his home declared a church to lower his tax burden. A good idea for another documentary might be following the Duggar kids through the process of filing a lawsuit for back wages.

What do the boys 18 or older do for a living? They have limited educations. When Josh screwed the pooch in the Ashley Madison scandal and lost his position with the Family Research Council, he wound up at a shitty used car lot.

R37 What braindead cocksuckers at the IRS allowed him to declare his home a church?

Are these the same cowards who let Scientology, Inc. pretend it's a church?

[quote] There's one sister who people don't seem to like. Which one is it and why?

Jessa I think is her name is. She’s hated because she’s a cold mean bitch. I only watched a few episodes and that was obvious.

PS I wanted to add that she has fully internalized the message that women are meant to be brood mares and is living accordingly, but she never came across as liking children that much.

Here's a big explanatory post about Gothard from 2014, by which time dozens of women had come forward with stories about his abuse. They were undoubtedly just the tip of the iceberg.

I was so impressed with the women who got out of that church and built their lives from scratch.

And the fat guy who dressed all in black had a sarcastic edge to him — I have the feeling he's now an atheist who plays Dungeons & Dragons and has some gay friends.

[quote] When Josh screwed the pooch in the Ashley Madison scandal

Pooch? As in Josh stuck his dick into an actual dog (animal)?

Not a brown face in those Gothard seminars.

Just finished the documentary. It was pretty good and definitely worth the three and a half hours or so. I never watched the reality series because I found the family weird and annoying. A few thoughts.

Everything about this -- from the Duggar family itself to Bill Gothard to Josh being a pedo -- was/is totally fucked up. The family being held up as an example of "good Christian values" tells you how much of a shitshow modern Christianity is.

Jim Bob (stupid name) is a truly ugly man with his helmet hair, too small eyes and permanent toothy smile.

Michelle looks dead behind the eyes. Her body language when Jim Bob speaks to a crowd tells you everything: she's totally focused on him because she's been brainwashed to believe her entire life revolves around him.

Even without the allegations, I could tell Bill Gothard was a creepy old pervert. He probably encouraged -- if not outright told -- Josh to molest his sisters. Anna Duggar, Josh's wife, has the same vacant look in her eyes as Michelle.

Is the Duggar reality franchise dead? I certainly hope so.

Jim Bob wears a wig or a piece.

Jill’s husband is both extremely ugly and extremely sexy.

[quote]Jill’s husband is both extremely ugly and extremely sexy.

Yeah, he's pretty much the embodiment of jolie laide.

I can't stand that soft, baby voice of Michelle's.

I was watching the first three episodes through Freevee, but Amazon took it away for the fourth. Rats.

R38 - I've heard it repeated here a number of times. Reddit users are mixed about the topic.

I think it's scary how shameless and aggressive they are about running for government at every level. Even the few that eventually squeeze through is terrifying.

SCOTUS is the ultimate goal, it seems. And it has worked. Roe got toppled.

By Catholics, r53.

Tampons are devil sticks.

Eejit, selected "Catholics" BTW.

Watching this series with my Catholic parents proved interesting. I feel like deep inside, my parents know whatever they were raised with probably has a similar set of effects on them, yet they decide to continue to feed into their childhood abuse (mother was physically abused by nuns, dad idk) from clergy and poor rearings by Southern Catholics.

I knew from the very beginning on TLC that the Duggars were something very wrong. The "well-behaved" children in particular. I thought they were Quiverfulls, as info for years used to state, but obviously, that was wrong or a lie. The IBLP preys on poor white Southern trash that long for a return of a never-existed Mayberry. It is a cult, with a Nazi-like paramilitary operation. Since Bill Gothard was ousted from the cult for his sexual allegations, websites have pointed out that it is likely Jim Bob is the current leader of the IBLP. The man is just as bad as his pedophile son, if not even worse. If Michelle can ever break free, I'm sure she would admit he, along with Gothard possibly, are helter-skelter rapists behind closed doors. You don't have 19 children with one woman with entirely consensual sex. It just can't be. As my mother said about her: "She was a cheerleader. That girl knows how to scream."

The man with the scary beard who taught you how to beat your child with a switch I believe is literally Satan. If Satan existed on earth, that is. He was expressionless, heartless - cold. Conservative thinking is a mental illness.

I feel the same way about him R47. He reminds me a small bit of my ex who I miss. Though of course, my ex was so much more attractive.

That poor thing Josh is married to looks like she rides the short bus. She's looks hunched over and beaten down. I'm sure they latched onto her as a wife for him because she's a simpleton.

The Holt couple's daughter backed out of the courtship with Josh when they found out about Josh molesting his sisters. Anna and her parents? How much did they know? Anna does look like a zombie.

Mrs. Holt testified against Josh at his trial.

Good for Jill for speaking out, but let's not forget that she and her husband are still fundies who hate gays. They're hardly progressive.

It would be nice if TLC got some kind of legal backlash for promoting these freaks so heavily and allowing them to push their agenda. Good for Oprah and staff for tipping off the authorities.

I want to start watching Fundie Fridays now.

Yeah, Jill & husbo are not heroes of human rights. They're heroes of their own rights.

None of these people are on a show anymore, are they? How many of them have distanced themselves from their parents and how many closed ranks with them? Sounds like the family is fractured.

Oh, and I think one of the girls wrote to Oprah.

Yes, R60. One of the women interviewed on the show, Tia Levings, has said elsewhere that Jill and husband are still part of that same ideology, though I think they don't recognize it themselves. They're part of a "questioning" or "deconstructing" (I can't remember the exact term) sort of post-Gothard movement, but the answers still come out to be basically the same. It's really a cosmetic change.

[quote]Tia Levings, has said elsewhere that Jill and husband are still part of that same ideology, though I think they don't recognize it themselves.

There's a very simple explanation for this, it's called: I only care about the part of the theology that works for me and serves my interests. It's practically the fundie credo.

I agree that the TLC and/or the production company that peddled this shit for years should be held legally liable for at the very least, the way the kids were treated. I vaguely recall that MTV established a trust fund for the kids of "Teen Moms" that their grifter parents couldn't touch, so considering how much $$ that network made off these kids, that's the least (the very least) they could do.

In the final episode, Jill Duggar uncovers contracts with TLC that Michelle signed on behalf of the minor children---after they'd reached the age of majority. It's hard to believe (though I fully do) that those parents deliberately cheated their children. That's what "headship" is all about.

When Michelle addresses a passel of her young children with the teaching that they are to obey her the first time she says something, it's chilling.

Here’s a despicable real life story. Two religious wing nut acquaintances allowed their 14 year old daughter to date a “school teacher” (he wasn’t accredited, it was a fundie school) who was 28 years old at the time. They welcomed him into their home. They were very happy that she married him when she turned 18. He was fired from his “teaching job” when the school found out he was dating the girl.

They have two kids now, a girl and a boy, and the asshole child molester just posted a video where they were going to Florida and he was stroking his young daughter’s hair and shoulders (ignoring his young son) and he was telling people they were done shopping at Target. Because the gays.

Should I report them?

And all in that baby talk R66. That voice and her constant adoring gaze everytime Jim Bob is talking is so gross and fake.

When Michelle talks, Jim Bob stares at her. Not necessarily adoringly, but he does look at her.

When Anna talks, Josh can't be bothered to look at her.

R69 I think it's a control issue on Jim Bob's part. I think they take cues from each other.

It's part of the training to gaze at your husband and look like what he's saying is the most brilliant thing in the world (and to sound like a little girl when you talk).

Michelle Duggar has overbred so many times she’s like a fucking farm animal. There were never any disabled kids? Or like the farm are they killed ?

[quote]It's part of the training to gaze at your husband and look like what he's saying is the most brilliant thing in the world

It's called...the Nancy.

I think Joy Behar (on The View) asked Michelle Duggar if she even needs to push / go into labor anymore.

Isn't the last kid they had developmentally delayed because the brood mare should quit a long time ago?

Josie was in the NICU for six months after her birth and suffered from health complications like “bowel perforation.” The teen is a "micro-preemie," which means she is susceptible to long-term health difficulties like cerebral palsy, blindness, and deafness.”

“How much did Josie Duggar weigh at birth?”

1 pound and 6 ounces Josie was born via an emergency C-section at 25 weeks at the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences, and because of this she weighed only 1 pound and 6 ounces. She was the couple's nineteenth and final child.

There was a twentieth that was stillborn, and maybe that was the final signal they needed that Michelle's dusty insides were a rocky place where Jim Bob's seed could no longer find purchase.

Will he need a sister wife now?

[quote]There was a twentieth that was stillborn,

It probably fell out when she sneezed

Can you imagine being one of the oldest Duggar kids and being around for the last 10 or so kids, understanding that your pumpkin-faced father is a randy old goat who never stops fucking your husk of a mother? Then again, they don't have sex education and aren't even allowed to kiss until they're married, so maybe they really don't know and don't have to keep themselves from picturing it. Well, except for Josh, who probably secretly watched them. The girls probably had no idea.

I think Mama Duggar is just as psycho and deranged as Jim Blob. I'd hesitate to speculate that she's all victim herself....

Josh sure had a lot of younger, pre-adolescent sisters at his disposal. What an environment for a pedophile.

I agree, R81, but as an IBLP woman, she's to submit sexually whenever he wants it. I very much doubt the wives in those marriages are expected, or even permitted, to interested in sex for its own sake.

I'll bet Josh jumped on that poor simple-minded wife and was really rough and probably really hurt her. Like no foreplay.

I think the prostitute he met via Ashley Madison (website for married people seeking affairs) said he was rough. (Ashley Madison's customer list got hacked into & lo and behold ... Josh was a customer.)

I grew up in a nice suburbs with big Victorian houses. When the Wasps died off the Catholics moved in with their broods. We were the smallest family on our block—only 3 kids. Most others had 5-6 and two families had 12! Their homes were run like Army barracks, with older kids parenting younger.

And all those Catholic moms were awful. Angry and resentful and washed their hands of the kids after popping them out. In retrospect, I don’t blame them. They belonged to a church that back then denied them birth control and pressured them to produce .

I remember my mom saying: they don’t have kids. They have livestock. She wasn’t wrong.

I still know many of those kids. Not 1 isn’t happy with their childhood and none have more than 3 kids.

I never watched the Dugger reality show but did watch the documentary. Reminded me so much of the families I grew up with.

Yes, R85, I remember her saying that even though she was there by arrangement, he essentially raped her or it was like being raped, something like that.

I've watched a few Fundie Fridays videos. I think they're well-researched. Nice to see Jennifer get some recognition on the docuseries.

However, I think Jennifer should stop featuring her boyfriend so much. He should just have his own channel. I notice that popular female YouTubers seem to want to put their boyfriends in their videos.

Yeah, I'm not a fan of her boyfriend either, R88.

Candace Owens recently went after Jill Duggar because she’s been criticizing her father for covering up for the pedo brother who molested her. Candace said that Jill was doing the documentary “for the money” and also excused the dad’s actions. Even Candace’s loyal conservative fans are telling her what a disgusting take this is.

R90, honey, it's KLANdace. Her name is Klandace Owens.

More drama:

[quote]JIM Bob and Michelle Duggar’s ex-best friend Bobye Holt has requested a restraining order against her husband, Jim, after they appeared on a docuseries together. The U.S. Sun can also confirm the couple’s son requested a protection order against his father on the same day as his mother.

Another fucked-up fundie family?

What the hell? ^ That's unexpected. They seemed pretty normal.

Though I will say that I thought there was a vaguely strange dynamic between them at times. They were interviewed sitting next to each other. I remember the wife saying that when they heard the verdict against Josh, they hugged for two or three minutes. She was looking at him, but he wasn't looking at her, and he had no reaction. I thought that showed a lack of respect or a disconnectedness on his part, like he was disavowing her.

Whoa! That's some news at R92! The Holts were featured heavily in the documentary. They sat side-by-side on a couch and looked simpatico. One weird thing I noticed is that Bobye (the wife) had her hand on her husband's thigh almost the entire time.

When all is said and done, the men in this religion think they have a right to control women and children. Just because they parted ways with Jim Bob doesn't mean they suddenly became enlightened.

After they cash their check for this show and get a divorce, Jim's going to have to get another fundie wife-unit and commence wearing out her uterus, as God intended.

These ol' boys are never, ever, ever in this life going to find a cushy deal like the one they've had here. You can bet that Jim is on the hunt for wifey numero two (preferably a 17 year old dimwit).

Can someone summarize the Sun story?

The synopsis is pretty much in the preview, R96. Bobye, mother of 11, filed for a protective order against Jim. One of their male children also filed for a PO against Jim.

Warren Jeff's looks like an older Brian Kohberger. I never could stand The Duggars. Especially Michelle, whose their mother and should know better. I can't stand her voice, and the way she hands her newborns off to the next daughter. I can't stand any of them really. The older kids, at least are calling all this BS out.

The older kids are a bunch of breeders, as well. Besides Josh, there's got to be another problem child in that large bunch. As time passes, we shall see.

^True, but since it's AK, so long as the kid isn't trans, they won't care. I'd say they'd have a school shooter on their hands, but since none of them go to school...

Mama Duggar is no victim. She used to be a normal teenager mowing the lawn in her bikini, but then she had some sort of revelation and turned religious. She denounced her former slutty ways when she looked to tempt men with her bikini mowing ways.

Some have speculated that part of the reason she kept crapping out babies is because she was addicted to the hormones released during pregnancy and breastfeeding that can create a sense of peaceful bliss for some women. So she’d breastfeed for 6 months and then hand the baby over to be raised by her other daughters. At any rate, it was obviously an ego thing for her and JB as well. Like her daughter Jessa, Michelle has never come across as being remotely maternal or even liking kids that much. Jana, the eldest girl, was the true mother of all the kids. One of the younger boys said that when Jana was called in you knew you were in real trouble. By the way, her uterus prolapsed three times during her child bearing years.

Jana is a lesbian who will never be free to find love until she escapes that hellish cult.

There was an old lady who lived in a shoe...

...she had so many kids, her uterus fell out!

I've been to Arkansas and if you've never been there you have no idea. It's a festering shithole, one of the most backward places you can ever go not only in the US but in the Western world. I really don't know how Hillary Clinton was able to deal with living there for so many years, it's truly The Land That Time Forgot.

In 1989, a friend and I vacationed in Memphis. We went to an after hours club across the border in Arkansas one night. Absolutely shocked by their state motto on car license plates in the parking lot.

It doesn’t sound like this documentary is bringing anything new to the table. I have read nothing “shocking”, or even surprising in these supposed “secrets”. The Josh scandals have outdone anything I’m reading in this thread.

I love DL - "I haven't seen this show/movie/documentary, but I know everything so I can just judge anyway even though I haven't seen a single minute of it."

R106, the docuseries was a rehash of what's already out there about Josh. I fast-forwarded through a lot of it.

What the docuseries did add was:

1. Jim Bob and Michelle didn't pay the children (even when they became adults) anything for appearing on the TLC shows. (TLC would pay Jim Bob a lump sum and it was up to him to distribute the money.) The girls or young women were the major draw of the shows. Besides Josh, do you even know the names of any of the boys?

2. The IBLP guy, Bill Gothard, was sexually harassing girls (he seemed to be attracted to ~ 14 year olds).

I'd like to see Jim Bob and Michelle's secrets EXPOSED. How did Josh end up molesting his sisters and developing a strong taste for child porn? He was the oldest, so, IMO, he got the most parental attention. He was an only child, for a while, at least.

This happened on JIM BOB'S AND MICHELLE'S WATCH!

There is absolutely no excuse for Josh Duggar's sick and criminal behavior, but I believe that the isolation he and his siblings were forced into by their whack job parents played a role. Jim Bob and Michelle wouldn't allow their kids any friends who were "normal" and they had very limited access to the outside world. They all lived in their sick little fucked up bubble, the parents controlled everything.

This series is way more than the Duggars, it's about the whole corrupt institution that that psycho Bill Gothard ran. He was sick. Former members speak out on the series, and it's harrowing.

I just binged this series. As stated upthread, it could have and should have been condensed. At any rate, how to all the men in this cult manage to support their stay at home wives and a gaggle of kids. And in Arkansas no less. Very bizarre how these families are able to survive. In other news, Jim Boob thinks it's "Godly" to film every aspect of the kids' lives, and then give them no compensation? WTF?

Just watching this now.

I'm sure I'll catch a Summer cold (I always do) and I'll probably binge this then.

It's a lot of Duggar so I'll benefit from being medicated.

I didn't really learn anything new about the Duggars from the series, but I wasn't aware of all the scandal surrounding Gothard himself. Of course, it's hardly surprising. Cult leaders are pretty much all cut from the same cloth.

I would have been interested in hearing more about how those other former members got out, and what their relationships are like with their families now, if there still is one.

I binge watched last night. Since I knew before watching that Bobby filed a PPO against her husband I found their interview segments kind of nauseating. Not to mention they were acting so self-righteous when they were just like the Duggars right? The only difference is they don’t have a child predator in their ranks, presumably.

I think what stood out to me was realizing that yeah, having such a huge amount of children who never acted up the way normal children do required a lot of spirit breaking abuse. I already knew about blanket training, but it was easy to forget about it because the kids were trained to appear so happy all the time.

The fact that these freak shows are organized and aiming to take over the government didn’t faze me because these types have been around forever. The freaky fundies have always been a part of America and this is just another sect of it. Get rid of this group 5 more grow in its place. I mean look at the Mormons. They’re thriving. To me, TLC normalizing extremists like the Duggars was the real threat. So, at least the truth is starting to come out.

Also, was Jimbob kind of suckered by TLC? I mean he was paid a lot —about 900,000 grand a year at peak—but considering he and his brood made the entire network successful was that less than he could have gotten? Just wondering because I have no idea what kind of profit TLC made from them.

Do the kids have any rights when parents use them as a revenue-generator????

[quote] Also, was Jimbob kind of suckered by TLC? I mean he was paid a lot —about 900,000 grand a year at peak—but considering he and his brood made the entire network successful was that less than he could have gotten?

Yeah, even though $900,000 sounds like a lot, it was probably a huge bargain for TLC. Seems like Jimbob could have negotiated more money, esp. considering he had so many kids on camera. So much potential content.

[quote]I really don't know how Hillary Clinton was able to deal with living there for so many years, it's truly The Land That Time Forgot.

I remember an SNL skit making fun of (then candidate) Bill Clinton's presidential run when he proudly announced about Arkansas "we lead the nation in public stonings!"

The thing that gets me: Gothard built his cult over telling people how to marry and raise and family.

But he never married or raised a family. So this guy...who had a "connection to god" never did what god told him to do? Nobody pointed that out to him?

Priests do marriage counselling, so it’s not really a stretch

Jim Bob is the stupidest name I've ever heard.

R120 I'd say there's a big leap between marriage counseling and "this is how you get into heaven, any straying from this path and you burn".

I would've loved if ANYONE just stood up and said "Bill, why aren't you in a godly marriage?"

[quote] Priests do marriage counselling, so it’s not really a stretch

Sure it is. Priests are required to make a promise to remain celibate (unmarried).

Mr. Gothard didn't. In fact, he isn't even a minister.