Beware the Bitterness Brigade

There are people who make a living teaching others not to give grace.

- Influencers who tell women to view everything their husbands do through a critical lens and constantly tell them how put upon they are in their marriages. Sheila Gregoire, Abby Eckel, etc.

- Influencers who tell a man that all women are untrustworthy, even including the one he’s married to. Manosphere bros, MGT0W types.

- Therapists who help clients blame every problem they have on things their parents did wrong, spamming words like “toxic” and “narcissist” to encourage breaking contact.

- FB groups and reddit threads that will tell you divorce and ghosting are the answer to all your problems.

Scroll their pages for a while and you’ll see they are all deeply unhappy people—and remember that misery loves company. Many of them are quite obviously just seeking validation by getting others to make the same choice they made.

Evaluate the influencers and commenters against 1 Corinthians 13 and see how much bearing and believing they’re encouraging. Spoiler alert: none.

You have to be so careful about who you’re listening to. No, you don’t have to ignore every offense a loved one commits, but even in conflict we have to start from a place of love and grace.

Just slamming the door for the slightest offense isn’t the answer, no matter how many maladjusted Redditors say so. We aren’t perfect either, so we had better give the grace we hope to receive on our worst days, too.

If the people who have your attention online are making you more resentful toward the people you are called to love, use that unfollow button wisely.