It has been about half a year since the Mormon vlogging family channel, 8 Passengers, departed from YouTube. The family quit after falling under scrutiny for child abuse allegations that sparked a CPS visit. 8 Passengers parents, Kevin and Ruby Franke, came under fire after they revealed on camera that their 15-year-old son, Chad, slept on the floor for seven months as a punishment for pranking his brother. Additionally, the family also received criticism for making their kindergartener daughter, Eve, go without food all day after she made and packed her own lunch, and forgot it on the way out the door. Eve's teacher's called Ruby to ask her to bring her daughter her lunch, but Ruby refused because she thought Eve deserved to be punished and told her viewers she hoped no one else would give Eve any food.
Now, the mother accused of exploiting and abusing her six children, has started a Mom support group called "Moms of Truth." She co-founded the group alongside disgraced "porn addiction" therapist, Jodi Hildebrandt, who temporarily had her license revoked for blackmailing a client and disclosing sensitive client information to church officials. Ruby has thrown herself whole-heartedly into this new endeavor, confirming she is done posting her children and changing her Instagram username from @8passengers to @moms_of_truth. Of course, the "advice" they have been giving mothers is absolutely abhorrent and encourages abuse, homophobia, and family estrangement.
Recently, Ruby responded to one mother's question and encouraged her to dash her talented daughter's dreams of being a dancer... for no reason.
Mother concerned about dancer daughter traveling alone, missing church
The incident began when an anonymous mother posted a question to Ruby and Jodi's Facebook group, Moms of Truth. The mother explained that her 17-year-old daughter had recently received an enormous honor. This daughter, who is beyond passionate about dance, was awarded Dancer of the Year for a very famous convention circuit. The honor comes with the dancer being granted a tour with the company that includes 8 cities + the dancer's hometown. It also includes having a staff-member-choreographed new solo and attending nationals as Dancer of the Year. It comes with great benefits, as the Dancer of the Year label and acceptance could give her an edge in getting into her dream school - The Julliard School. This daughter's Dancer of the Year honor could potentially get her into one of the leading dance schools in the world, with an acceptance rate of only 8%. It is an advantage the vast majority of art students will never come close to grasping.
However, the mother, understandably, has some reservations about her daughter's incredible opportunity. Her first concern questions how her daughter will adapt to online school, which will be necessary if she is to be Dancer of the Year. She also is concerned about her daughter missing church on the days she dances and whether her daughter will make good choices while travelling to other cities without her family. As on after-thought, the mother adds she isn't so sure about how the family can handle the expenses of the trip. If the daughter doesn't do the tour or choreographed dance, she could lose her title as Dancer of the Year, that she worked so hard to win. Check out the full question below:
Ruby's response to 17-year-old dancer
Now, anyone reading this story, can see what the problem is. The mother has typical reservations about her daughter traveling and some religious concerns about church. Anyone would simply help to reassure her, help her formulate a plan so she's comfortable with her daughter leaving, and encourage her to not take away this amazing honor from her daughter due to a few misgivings. Expenses really don't seem at the forefront of the mother's mind and could easily be worked out with the dance company through various forms of donations/fundraising. Hence, there really doesn't seem to be an actual problem here. The mom should get some reassurance and go support her daughter. However, Ruby immediately begins, basically, encouraging the mother to completely dash her daughter's dreams.
Ruby first latched onto the mother's confusion about "not knowing how to feel" and stated uncertainty is the result of the mother being "manipulated" by someone (presumably the daughter). Meanwhile, Ruby encouraged the mother to ignore her daughter's perspective or the perspective of Julliard. The only perspective that matters, according to Ruby, is the mother's as she determines whether her family lives in truth or not. It is up to the mother decide which values are most important for her entire family. So, if the mom decides that attending church is more important than granting her daughter the opportunity of a lifetime, then the mom's decision reigns.
Ruby then touched on the mother's "fear" of her daughter travelling. Now, this fear of her daughter making bad choices seems to point at a problem within the mother. This fear means she is either extremely untrusting of her daughter, or that she has raised her daughter so poorly that she can't let her out of her sight, lest she do something wrong. However, Ruby somehow interprets it as the daughter not being ready for freedom. So, all an overbearing mother has to do is "worry" or "mistrust" her 17-year-old daughter, and that automatically means the daughter is at fault, is untrustworthy, and isn't capable of travelling alone.
Parents have no financial responsibility for gifted children
Ruby's response only gets more confusing when she gets to the financial worries section. According to Ruby, the 17-year-old daughter is responsible for her own career. This means the mother has no obligations to pay the expenses for her daughter's opportunity and it's up to the daughter to come up with those means. So... a gifted 17-year-old, who has spent hours upon hours training to become competitive enough to potentially receive Julliard acceptance, alongside being a full-time high school student, is now expected to somehow also work and pay her expenses for Dancer of the Year?
Ruby, with a shrug, says "why not?" Why can't this child pay for her own expenses if her career means so much to her? Well, for starters, she spends 8 hours in school 5 days a week. We can't even imagine how many dozens of hours she spends practicing dance every week. Next, coming from a religious household, we can anticipate there are hours of Bible reading, church attendance, and chores every week. Frankly, this 17-year-old appears to have spent hours upon hours every day pouring in all her passion, determination, and dedication into dance. Surely, that has to count for something. Surely, no parent would be so cruel as to say to their daughter, rejoicing after shedding blood, sweat, and tears for her passion, that she has to pay off the expenses of being Dancer of the Year herself. She has already done more than her share by being dedicated enough to nab such an honor and it's now the parents turn to step up and do their part.
So, according to Ruby, the daughter is responsible for her own dance career. This means she has to raise her own money for it, alongside practice and school, and figure out all the details at 17-years-old. Now, say, she does do all of this. She pays her own bills, she finishes her homework, and she practices for hours on end for her title. Surely, this means she can go, right? No. According to Ruby, the daughter is only 17, so the parent still has the authority to say "No" for no other reason than that they're the parent. Even though her daughter is responsible for her own career, her mother can still interfere and say "no," you're not going to be Dancer of the Year, just because she's the mother and she can say so. Meanwhile, Ruby is very obviously pushing for the mother to take this route and to say "no" just for the sake of establishing authority over her daughter. Her entire answer is just about the mom needing to have complete and total control over her daughter's life and to downgrade the importance of a child's career and a parent's responsibility for their child's future.
Um, excuse me, Ruby?!
The only question that remains is - how is this right? Ruby did not answer the question. She did not touch on the mother's issues and fears. She did not show an ounce of sympathy for this immensely talented child. All Ruby did was degrade the child to, basically, nothing. Her mother is the all-powerful, authoritative figure, and everything the mom says goes. If going to church for 1-hour a week is more important than a child's future - that's what goes. If a mother has trust issues with her daughter - it means the daughter isn't trustworthy and can't be let outside the house. If your daughter can, somehow, financially cover her career, the mother can still decide she can't pursue her career.
Does Ruby not realize how much she contradicts herself by stating the 17-year-old is financially responsible for career, but that it's ultimately the mother's choice if the child pursues a career or not? What's obvious throughout Ruby's response, is that she is against the child from the get-go. It's not surprising, actually. There have been multiple instances of Ruby advocating for parents to brutally punish, abuse, and take all happiness from their children's lives. As long a child is under 18, the parents' one and only responsibility is making sure the child lives a wholly godly life. Whether the child is happy, whether they are thriving, whether they are being set up to succeed in life - absolutely none of this matters. The only thing that matters is dragging your child to church every week, forcing them to read the Bible, and making them obey you wholly and completely. Even if you dash your child's dreams, destroy your relationship with them, or lead them to depression - you raised them in the lord's truth - so you did good, according to Ruby.
The mother wasn't wrong to look for advice. It is a totally normal thing for a mother to have reservations about her daughter traveling alone as a teenager. It was up to Ruby to help the mother work through her fears and understand why she's feeling this way. Then, she needed to advocate for that daughter and encourage the mother to not let her own feelings and ideals take away something that could impact the course of her daughter's life. Instead, Ruby is trying to instill in mothers that their children's careers, happiness, and futures don't matter in the slightest. Not only that, but Ruby seems hell bent on ensuring that any mothers who goes to her for advice receives absolutely horrifying advice to, basically, do anything they can to deeply hurt their children for no reason. That daughter should be congratulated, honored, and celebrated, and should have her mother by her side as they work out the details of her tour. Instead, if this mother takes Ruby's advice, she'll be told her career means nothing and will be prevented from partaking in a tour that could allow her dreams to come true, just because her mom has to exercise her power.