Is anybody else experiencing some complicated feelings for Derick Dillard right now?
On one hand, he’s been sharing all sorts of information about the Duggar family lately, which has been really interesting to hear.
He’s speaking out against Jim Bob allegedly keeping all of his children’ earnings for himself and against TLC for exploiting the kids, especially after the news about Josh molesting those girls came out, and that’s nice to see.
But on the other hand … he’s still Derick Dillard.
He’s said some pretty awful things, but for the sake of this new story, let’s focus on the things he’s said about Jazz Jennings.
Jazz, if you’re not familiar, has her own show on TLC all about her experiences as a transgender girl — it started when she was starting high school, though she’s 19 years old now.
And Derick, well, he’s always had sort of a thing about Jazz.
It all started in 2017 when, seemingly out of nowhere, he tweeted “What an oxymoron … a ‘reality’ show which follows a non-reality.”
“‘Transgender’ is a myth,” he wrote. “Gender is not fluid; it’s ordained by God.”
He later followed that up with tweets that read “I pity Jazz, 4 those who take advantage of him in order 2 promote their agenda, including the parents who allow these kinds of decisions 2 be made by a child.”
“It’s sad that ppl would use a juvenile this way. Again, nothing against him, just unfortunate what’s on tv these days.”
Note that he always refers to Jazz as “he,” because “transgender is a myth.”
Despite that, he insisted that he “never bullied anyone, just said I didn’t agree with what is being propagated on my TV.”
He said that “Jazz is being taken advantage of, as part of a larger agenda.”
His comments got his family fired from Counting On, although he’s always insisted that it was his choice to leave the show.
But even after that, he kept on making awful comments about Jazz.
He’s repeatedly referred to her parents’ support of her as “child abuse,” and he always refers to her as “him.”
It’s reprehensible, really.
Derick has managed to go a while now, thankfully, without attacking this poor girl, and instead he’s been focusing his attention on taking down Jim Bob and TLC.
But you know he couldn’t keep quiet for too long!
Just a couple of days ago, Derick did an interview with a YouTuber called Without a Crystal Ball, and he talked a lot about misconceptions the public had about his family and the Duggars.
And yesterday, he reached back out with one more quote.
“Another specific misconception is my comments about TLC and Jazz,” he said.
“The media likes to spin stuff however they want, but my issues were more with TLC and the parents than with Jazz.”
“Jazz was a child at the time,” he explained, “and I have issues with people profitting on areas that are still very much being debated, that children are still being encouraged to make that kind of permanent as Jazz was for the profitability of a network that has a history of making money without much regard for the welfare of children.”
“I’m not the only one who has issues with this, and there are people in the very liberal camps that would agree with that logic.”
“Actuarial scientists rely on some pretty heavy research to determine the effect of developing minds on decision making as it determines what appropriate insurance premiums to set in order to compensate for the risks of young drivers,” he continued.
“Contrast that with a network that carelessly preys on a young teenager trying to figure out life.”
He rambled on with “If Jazz regrets any decisions later in life, TLC won’t care because they got the juicy story when it happened.”
“Alternatively, Jazz might be fine with this kind of permanent decision, but we won’t know until this children are developed enough to make this kind of decision.”
He said that “If a fully developed adult wants to make that kind of decision, so be it. It’s a free country, but don’t prey on the children.”
Derick said that he believes TLC chose to do the show about Jazz because if anyone said anything critical about it, they could just write it off as someone “bullying a child rather than advocating for the welfare of children.”
OK, so those are a whole lot of words to express one pretty simple thing, which is that Derick says he was just trying to advocate for Jazz and speak out against what he perceived as TLC’s exploitation of her.
And that would be one thing … but he definitely did bully her.
He repeatedly referred to her with male pronouns, which is so disrespectful and harmful, and he directly said that it’s a “myth” that transgender people exist.
That’s transphobia.
Without a Crystal Ball did say that she tried to reach out to Derick again to ask him specifically about that part, but he didn’t respond by the time she was ready to share the video.
It’s interesting — throughout the video, Derick is careful not to use any pronouns at all, he just repeatedly refers to Jazz by her name.
In a way, it’s nice that he’s not misgendering her anymore, but it also indicates that he still believes transgender people aren’t real, he just knows now that it will get him a whole mess of backlash to say it.
How are you feeling about Derick these days?
You can listen to his statement in full in the video below:
