How Girls Are Defined: Ideological Coercion of Women in Fundamentalist Christian Subcultures through Online Influencers

• In Event: Online Harm, Just a Single Swipe Away!: Harassment, Coercion, and the Internet

Abstract

This study explores how female Christian influencers discuss the relationship between gender and conservative Christianity through online content, specifically YouTube. A thematic content analysis was utilized in the case study of Girl Defined based on a random sample of 24 videos published between 2021 and 2024. The analysis coded for persuasive techniques and themes of gender performance and women’s sexuality within a religious context. This paper highlights the results of themes of gender, sexuality, and religion through seven codes related to fear, control, sexual purity and fragility, submission to men and God, and women’s relationship to their husbands. The results highlight how Girl Defined focuses on a woman’s relationship with God as a mechanism of internalized misogyny, religious coercive control, and isolation with other codes acting as supports to this mechanism. Findings enhance our understanding of how conservative forms of Christian evangelicalism interact with modern constructions of womanhood and women’s sexuality.

Authors

• Elizabeth C. Carlisle, American University

• Kylie McCarthy, University of New Haven

• Paul Bleakley, University of Kentucky