Linda Kay Klein

<p>This week’s radical is Linda Kay Klein, author of the memoir <em>Pure: Inside the Evangelical Movement That Shamed a Generation of Young Women and How I Broke Free</em>, and founder of the nonprofit Break Free Together, which helps people who have left the purity movement to find closure and a sense of community by sharing their stories with others.</p><br><p>Over the course of our conversation, we discuss what purity is, how it impacted a generation of women (and men), the path that led Linda to a new understanding of the world, and how she’s worked to help others find the same healing she has.</p><br><p><strong>Some Questions I Ask:</strong></p><ul><li>What was the spark for your book, <em>Pure</em>? (1:21)</li><li>What does it mean to be expected to go from no sexual contact whatsoever, to being hypersexual? (13:32)</li><li>Tell me about your nonprofit, Break Free Together (16:44)</li><li>What brought your family into the Evangelical church? (27:41)</li><li>What led to you leaving the church? (34:15)</li><li>What was the path that led you to New York? (41:29)</li><li>How did your parents handle your shift away from the purity movement? (44:14)</li></ul><p><br></p><p><strong>In This Episode, You Will Learn:</strong></p><ul><li>The rise and fall (and transformation) of the purity movement (4:12)</li><li>What purity culture entails (6:17)</li><li>How pornography (poorly) fills the void left by the absence of meaningful sex education (16:04)</li><li>How the everyday practice of purity culture is traumatizing to those who experience it (20:44)</li><li>The factors that made the purity movement so successful (32:54)</li><li>The events that started to chip away at the narrative of purity for Linda (36:36)</li><li>How Linda coped with her mother’s fear that she would go to Hell (45:38)</li><li>How the language around purity is shifting and becoming more insidious (48:47)</li></ul><p><br></p><p><strong>Resources:</strong></p><p><a href="https://lindakayklein.com/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Linda’s Web