Interested in learning about Holdemans

[Josh]

The women don’t seem to want to make homemade clothes for the men.

josh, you seem to have hostility towards handmade clothes. Do you think buying mass produced clothes is morally superior?

[ABC 123]

The women don’t seem to want to make homemade clothes for the men.

josh, you seem to have hostility towards handmade clothes. Do you think buying mass produced clothes is morally superior?

But, even in a Holdeman setting the men's clothing is still mass produced.

[Heirbyadoption]

Women wear dresses, usually handmade, never skirts and shirts. Some people buy store bought dresses if they can find ones that look “Holdeman enough”, but this is looked down on.

Josh/Unworthy, would it be fair to say this deviates a bit by congregation/area? Growing up in CA, Holdeman dresses were pretty standard (as were ankle bracelets and bobby socks among some of the local Holdeman girls in the 90s...), but there are Holdemans near us here in southeastern PA and while there are definitely more Holdeman women in dresses per se, there are also skirts and shirts (and occasionally a jumper) among them. Any thoughts on diversity from congregation to congregation?

[unworthy]

Skirts and shirts? Those are a no-no, and a holdeman girl caught by another holdeman when wearing a skirt and shirt or some other "deviant" form of dress would be questioned (not like interrogation, though, Holdemanism isn't a cult despite what a lot of people think)

Jumpers? What do you mean by a "jumper"?

Such holdemans would probably be embarrassed to be caught wearing something unacceptable.

edit to add: There are different styles from place to place, some places have shorter dresses, others have longer, but they are minor differences in dress from place to place. If you see an increase in skirts and shirts, it's probably happening on a conference level over time, and not just locally.

[Ken]

The women don’t seem to want to make homemade clothes for the men.

josh, you seem to have hostility towards handmade clothes. Do you think buying mass produced clothes is morally superior?

I don't think anyone, Holdeman, Amish, or conservative Menno are actually spinning their own yarns from cotton they have picked or sheep they have raised, and hand-weaving their yarn into homespun cloth. So essentially what they are doing is taking the same mass-produced bolts of cloth from big textile mills and sewing it together themselves rather than buying clothes sewn in clothing factories or shops, most likely in Asia or Latin America. Although for a tiny niche market like Holdemans it would probably be more of a local Etsy type of operation from some tailor shop in the US, probably run by Holdeman themselves.

My limited experience with buying bolts of cloth for projects suggests that one doesn't really save money going this route. One can find a lot of very cheap clothes if one keeps an eye open for sales and such. I doubt there is any moral issue one way or the other. When I lived in Guatemala my next door neighbor hand-made boots and shoes and other leather goods like belts. Why not make your own boots and shoes? Simple enough to do. I could also grow my own potatoes and wheat in my back yard rather than buying potatoes at the grocery store and pre-ground flour.

There is a certain satisfaction that comes with making your own things and growing your own food. But I doubt there is any moral element to it one way or the other. In biblical times there were tailors, carpenters, masons, fishermen, bakers, shepherds, farmers, butchers, etc. etc. I expect the markets of biblical Jerusalem were replete with goods produced from all across the empire. And there is certainly no moral reason why women's clothing are more important to hand-make and not men's. Or why clothing at all as opposed to other things one might make instead of buying.

It sounds more to me like a way to enforce a certain social conformity among Holdeman women, and hold out as superior those who can stay home and do that sort of thing compared to women who might need to work outside the home to help support their families, or women who just aren't interested in sewing. Which is fine. Groups do that sort of thing all the time in all kinds of ways. Upscale urban liberal women get the same group cred by feeding their kids the right organic baby food, enrolling them in the right Montessori pre-schools, and dressing them in Hanna Anderson https://www.hannaandersson.com/our-story. Just see it for what it is. The correct term is "virtue signaling." All groups do it.

[Soloist]

I don't think anyone, Holdeman, Amish, or conservative Menno are actually spinning their own yarns from cotton they have picked or sheep they have raised, and hand-weaving their yarn into homespun cloth. So essentially what they are doing is taking the same mass-produced bolts of cloth from big textile mills and sewing it together themselves rather than buying clothes sewn in clothing factories or shops, most likely in Asia or Latin America. Although for a tiny niche market like Holdemans it would probably be more of a local Etsy type of operation from some tailor shop in the US, probably run by Holdeman themselves.

My limited experience with buying bolts of cloth for projects suggests that one doesn't really save money going this route. One can find a lot of very cheap clothes if one keeps an eye open for sales and such. I doubt there is any moral issue one way or the other. When I lived in Guatemala my next door neighbor hand-made boots and shoes and other leather goods like belts. Why not make your own boots and shoes? Simple enough to do. I could also grow my own potatoes and wheat in my back yard rather than buying potatoes at the grocery store and pre-ground flour.

There is a certain satisfaction that comes with making your own things and growing your own food. But I doubt there is any moral element to it one way or the other. In biblical times there were tailors, carpenters, masons, fishermen, bakers, shepherds, farmers, butchers, etc. etc. I expect the markets of biblical Jerusalem were replete with goods produced from all across the empire. And there is certainly no moral reason why women's clothing are more important to hand-make and not men's. Or why clothing at all as opposed to other things one might make instead of buying.

It sounds more to me like a way to enforce a certain social conformity among Holdeman women, and hold out as superior those who can stay home and do that sort of thing compared to women who might need to work outside the home to help support their families, or women who just aren't interested in sewing. Which is fine. Groups do that sort of thing all the time in all kinds of ways. Upscale urban liberal women get the same group cred by feeding their kids the right organic baby food, enrolling them in the right Montessori pre-schools, and dressing them in Hanna Anderson https://www.hannaandersson.com/our-story. Just see it for what it is. The correct term is "virtue signaling." All groups do it.

It generally isn't cheaper... often its quite costly especially if you don't know how to sew. The problem is that finding things that are modest seems to be near impossible in Oregon outside of the one Menno ran used clothing store. My children are all in handmedowns that are just outside of the standards and there is nothing I can do about it.

[Ken]

I don't think anyone, Holdeman, Amish, or conservative Menno are actually spinning their own yarns from cotton they have picked or sheep they have raised, and hand-weaving their yarn into homespun cloth. So essentially what they are doing is taking the same mass-produced bolts of cloth from big textile mills and sewing it together themselves rather than buying clothes sewn in clothing factories or shops, most likely in Asia or Latin America. Although for a tiny niche market like Holdemans it would probably be more of a local Etsy type of operation from some tailor shop in the US, probably run by Holdeman themselves.

My limited experience with buying bolts of cloth for projects suggests that one doesn't really save money going this route. One can find a lot of very cheap clothes if one keeps an eye open for sales and such. I doubt there is any moral issue one way or the other. When I lived in Guatemala my next door neighbor hand-made boots and shoes and other leather goods like belts. Why not make your own boots and shoes? Simple enough to do. I could also grow my own potatoes and wheat in my back yard rather than buying potatoes at the grocery store and pre-ground flour.

There is a certain satisfaction that comes with making your own things and growing your own food. But I doubt there is any moral element to it one way or the other. In biblical times there were tailors, carpenters, masons, fishermen, bakers, shepherds, farmers, butchers, etc. etc. I expect the markets of biblical Jerusalem were replete with goods produced from all across the empire. And there is certainly no moral reason why women's clothing are more important to hand-make and not men's. Or why clothing at all as opposed to other things one might make instead of buying.

It sounds more to me like a way to enforce a certain social conformity among Holdeman women, and hold out as superior those who can stay home and do that sort of thing compared to women who might need to work outside the home to help support their families, or women who just aren't interested in sewing. Which is fine. Groups do that sort of thing all the time in all kinds of ways. Upscale urban liberal women get the same group cred by feeding their kids the right organic baby food, enrolling them in the right Montessori pre-schools, and dressing them in Hanna Anderson https://www.hannaandersson.com/our-story. Just see it for what it is. The correct term is "virtue signaling." All groups do it.

It generally isn't cheaper... often its quite costly especially if you don't know how to sew. The problem is that finding things that are modest seems to be near impossible in Oregon outside of the one Menno ran used clothing store. My children are all in handmedowns that are just outside of the standards and there is nothing I can do about it.

Sounds like there is a business opportunity there.

[Soloist]

Sounds like there is a business opportunity there.

I can't afford to buy it. There are people who sew and sell.

[Josh]

The women don’t seem to want to make homemade clothes for the men.

josh, you seem to have hostility towards handmade clothes. Do you think buying mass produced clothes is morally superior?

But, even in a Holdeman setting the men's clothing is still mass produced.

I’m asking if making all the women’s clothes also mass produced is somehow an improvement.

[Josh]

Women wear dresses, usually handmade, never skirts and shirts. Some people buy store bought dresses if they can find ones that look “Holdeman enough”, but this is looked down on.

Josh/Unworthy, would it be fair to say this deviates a bit by congregation/area? Growing up in CA, Holdeman dresses were pretty standard (as were ankle bracelets and bobby socks among some of the local Holdeman girls in the 90s...), but there are Holdemans near us here in southeastern PA and while there are definitely more Holdeman women in dresses per se, there are also skirts and shirts (and occasionally a jumper) among them. Any thoughts on diversity from congregation to congregation?

Skirts, shirts, and jumpers are definitely out of line but do happen. Usually such people are on their way out of the church.

In CA this is not common at all at least not in northern CA. The Central Valley congregations tend to be a bit more “liberal”, but I would be very surprised to see jewellery such as you described.

Generally there is not diversity congregation for congregation in a country. Haiti does things differently, and so does Canada, there are simply different prevailing standards of what is acceptable. Most fashion trends start in Canada for some reason. Some people say this goes back to the ancient Flemish - Friesen divide; Manitoba was mostly Flemish background, Kansas mostly Friesen. In past times, people didn’t even intermarry between these groups. The cultures were just too different.