Amish Inspiration?

meritaten

from what I have read - rumspringer tends to happen within the Amish community - its only a few broader minded communities which allow the young to spend its rumspringer year in the wider community.
oh - and while the boys are allowed to 'sow thier wild oats' it isnt with the Amish girls! they are still required to be virgins on their wedding day! they are just allowed a little more freedom than usual - probably to get an nice Amish boy interested in them!

Education is also not seen as desirable - especially for girls. while boys have sometimes been allowed to attend further education it's not so for girls.
yet............most of the documentaries I have seen (but not the before mentioned) show very contented women. which is what intrigued me...........is it just upbringing and not expecting more from life than what they have? or is it an act put on for the cameras?
I dont think I could for one minute live the Amish way of life.........I am too opinionated, too curious, too in love with my computer.........and I do like my modern conveniences!

duchy

I don't think it's an act -but I also think the Amish community probably got to choose which families would be showcased -and human nature dictates they would choose the families who show their way of life in the most positive light.

laurel7172

Then there's the darker side:

http://abcnews.go.com/US/16-amish-arraigned-hair-cutting-hate-crimes/story?id=16174792

Angel_Jenny

Currently watching - http://www.channel4.com/programmes/living-with-the-amish/4od#3281509

It does seem like all the women are very content with their life and role. I like the idea of having total faith and no doubt in God at all.

wondercollie

The Mennonite women seem content. The Hutterites are a very different kettle of fish. The mother-in-law appears to rule the roost and the wife usually is quite waspish out of her home. I work in a hospital that is close to the colonies and we all dread having to deal with the wife when there are Hutterite men on the wards. It's not a modesty thing, it's a control thing. The majority pretty much verbally abuse the nursing staff and attempt to micromanage everything. One of our social workers thinks it's to establish an identity outside of the family and be able to go back and make a point to the MIL that she (the wife) can look after the husband.

Even in WalMart, the women are pretty aggressive shoppers. You have to be there to understand.

Oh, and a couple of years back one of the cocaine rings in Lancaster County was run by some Amish guys.

It's really not all sweetness and light and fear of God.

Butterfly_Brain

I don't think that I could be subservient to any one let alone a man!
It does fascinate me how they live, but then I am nosey, but their life would not be for me.
I actually have an Amish cookbook that I found in a charity shop and it has some good OS recipes in there, but they use an awful lot of pastry, which I can't eat, because it sets my heartburn off.

miasnanny

Thank You all for a very interesting and thought provoking thread. I enjoyed the tv programme very much. In most ways of life there are pro's and con's. Playing at Devils Advocate here, I do think that people with clearly defined roles within their societies are more at peace with themselves. There is quite a bit of gender role confusion in our society now and people generally aren't sure of what is expected of them and some Psychologists believe that the blurring of gender roles has caused some mental instability. Its an interesting theory. I guess that there is good and bad in all societies it would be lovely to Pick n Mix the good things that we desire and ditch the bad.

Thank You again for stimulating my brain cell:T

PipneyJane

Angel_Jenny wrote: »

I was watching the programme where UK teens go to stay with Amish families and it was quite inspiring to me. One lady showed her pantry and it was filled with jars of fruit / vegetables / meat / cordials that she had made. They seem to grow a lot of their fruit and vegetables themselves - I know that the wives are home all day but they have 5 / 10 plus children running around!

It has made me look at how much stuff I have. Things that I think I need like masses of books and magazines. Plus lots of craft stuff that I don't seem to get around to using before buying more. I somehow convince myself that I "need" these things.

In changing to a simpler lifestyle how to you change your mindset not to think of all the things you don't / can't have?

To answer your question: I think the biggest enemies of living OS are tabloid newpapers, magazines and television, partially because they are designed to sell us stuff (the whole point of women's magazines seems to be selling fashion and/or the latest and greatest beauty products), and partially because they occupy time which could be spent more productively.

People who say to me "but, I haven't got time to do xxx" frequently spend hours and hours in front of the idiot box, time which I'd spend cooking or gardening or doing something productive. You can't watch TV and tend your veggie garden at the same time.

This isn't to say that I'm anti-reading or anti-TV. When I get time to read, I'd rather read a good book than some silly celeb magazine. I don't care whether "Cheryl" is wearing pink nail polish this week and it doesn't add to my quality of life to spend time reading that rubbish. Also, if I don't read it, I won't want to buy product xxxx....

I dislike car-crash TV for the same reason - good TV should entertain, inform and leave you with something to think about afterwards, not with a mind that feels like it's stuffed with cotton wool. Of course, there are some productive things which you can do in front of the TV: knitting, hand sewing, rug making and crochet (so long as you don't need to spend every second looking at the screen), and watching TV gives me a good chance to enjoy those hobbies. However, you can spend hours and hours watching rubbish and end up just feeling disatisfied that you haven't achieved anything with your day. We seem to be programed to stare at the screen whenever it's on.

BitterAndTwisted

I acknowledge that there's much to be admired in the appetite for hard work and the self-reliance of the Amish and other similar communities but one has to understand why and how they emigrated to the US. Where they came from they were thought to be insular, dogmatic and almost lunatic extremists and I don't think that was a complete misunderstanding of their beliefs and way of life.

I wouldn't mind their root-cellars and pretty frocks but not much else.

meritaten

lets not forget that white america was founded by 'the Pilgrim Fathers' a rather Puritan sect that left these shores because they found they were considered Lunatics? (oops sorry - they were victims of religious oppression). They sound rather Amish tbh - Puritans I mean.