Years before #FreeBritney was even a hashtag, “19 Kids & Counting” fans started the “Free Jinger” movement with dreams of delivering Jinger Duggar from her iron-fisted Christian upbringing.
In an exclusive interview with Page Six, the former reality star, 29, says that she feels akin to Britney Spears – as the pop icon’s fight to end a controversial conservatorship mirrors her own battle to break free from her family’s “cult-like” religion.
“It’s interesting. I see people who are in the public eye and have stories and I can relate to them at different points, maybe on smaller scales,” Duggar says.
“And I think that’s the beauty of it. You see that so many people have walked through so much pain and hardship and just coming out on the other side, I want to say that we can come out stronger on the other side.”
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FreeJinger.org was created in the late aughts by TLC viewers who sensed that Duggar’s fervent love for big — and predominantly secular — cities meant that she internally rejected her rural, small-town life governed by the word of God and conservative community leaders.
“I’m not upset at the ‘Free Jinger’ movement. It was very kind of the people. I’m sure the people who started it had the best intentions in mind and probably still do today,” reflects the mom of two, who now lives in Los Angeles with husband Jeremy Vuolo and their daughters, Felicity, 4, and Evangeline, 2.
“I’m not bothered by that at all,” she elaborates. “I think it’s kind that they would think, ‘OK, we want to help her be free of what we think is binding her.’ So I think that’s great. I don’t have any hard feelings toward anyone.”
Like the creators of “Free Jinger,” Spears’ fans observed the “Overprotected” singer’s oppression and began passionately advocating for her liberation in 2019. The superstar’s conservatorship had been established by her estranged father, Jamie Spears, in 2008 to control her personal, medical and financial affairs.
Months before Britney, 41, was released from the restrictive legal arrangement in November 2021, she claimed in an explosive court testimony that she was stripped of such privileges as driving a car by herself or simply enjoying a cup of coffee throughout the lengthy ordeal.
Arguably more shocking, however, the Grammy winner alleged that, under Jamie’s watch, she was forced into a mental health facility, to take lithium and have an IUD contraceptive inserted, all against her will.
Duggar says she also spent years submitting to tyrannical authority. She grew up adhering to the teachings of now-disgraced minister Bill Gothard, who founded the Institute in Basic Life Principles church.
As Duggar claims in her latest book, “Becoming Free Indeed: My Story of Disentangling Faith from Fear,” Gothard taught acolytes that listening to music with drums, showing too much skin, premarital sex and eating too many carbs were among countless offenses that could anger God, possibly resulting in death and eternal damnation.
“He built his teachings on fear, manipulation, superstition and control … so the way that I viewed God was that he’s waiting to spite me, he’s waiting to get me at any turn,” she says of the fire and brimstone-style preaching.
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“Even if I don’t know what God expects of me, I’m going to be punished because he just is out to get me.”
Gothard struck so much fear in Duggar that she chose not to believe the dozens of women who came forward in 2014, accusing him of sexual harassment and molestation. (Gothard, who denied any wrongdoing and was not criminally charged, subsequently resigned from IBLP.)
“It was once I started to realize that his teachings were false — and not only false but harmful — and he was a bad man, I started to realize [I believed the accusations],” says Duggar, who makes it clear that she stands behind Gothard’s alleged victims today. “It really shook me.”
Duggar, who eventually departed IBLP in 2017, says that she is speaking out now for ex-followers who feel voiceless and current parishioners who feel trapped. “For so many in these circles, it’s so scary to speak up,” she says. “But it’s necessary.”
The author chooses not to share which of her family members still subscribe to Gothard’s brand of Christianity — “It’s not my story to tell,” she says — but the Arkansas native notes that she is relishing her new life in LA, where she is part of a church that is relatively more progressive.
“The biggest thing has just been my mindset. It has produced so much freedom in my heart to know that God is not out there waiting to destroy me at every turn for things I didn’t know I was supposed to be doing or not doing,” she says, her voice full of relief.
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“It’s really made me a different person because I see that God is loving and kind, and that’s been the biggest change for me personally. I’m not such a fearful person. Overall, I feel like I’m in a much healthier place.”
Though Duggar is proud to tell her story today — and hopes it helps others, such as Britney, find healing — she is looking forward to a future that isn’t underlined by her past trauma.
“Those things don’t have to define us moving forward. So for me, I look at all the stuff in the past and say, ‘OK, now moving forward, how can I possibly be the best version of myself that I possibly can be?’” she says. “I would be interested to look into [Britney’s situation] more.”
“Becoming Free Indeed” hits bookstores Tuesday.