To preface this, Nara Smith is Mormon and Mormonism is harmful nonsense. She’s also probably MAGA or MAGA-adjacent, which as a Christian I feel obligated to say that if you still openly support Trump in this day and age, you clearly do not value Biblical values.
However, the religious right cherry-picking the convenient parts of a religion is par for the course.
And this is about her tradwife views, which aren’t specific to Mormonism.
So, is Nara Smith a robot aka a tradwife? Is being a robot tradwife a bad thing from a Biblical perspective? What even is a tradwife?
Loosely, the definition of a Traditional Wife appears to be a married woman who believes in traditional gender roles. These gender roles, which are found nowhere in the Bible, says that the woman stays home, takes care of the kids, and does most (all) of the cooking/cleaning, and household labor.
The husband works a job usually outside of the home in such a way where he does less actual work and gets breaks during the day, and gets paid money. Maybe he mows the lawn and takes out the trash.
Consequently, there’s this unspoken notion that the husband deserves to rest once he gets home and not cook, clean, etc. because he’s making money and the wife is home all day with the kids “doing nothing.” His wife should have dinner waiting for him and also be joyfully available.
Ideally, the husband pays all the bills, but even this appears to be optional for traditional men given the number of trad wife influencers who are exploiting their children online for monetary gain *see SarahTherese, Morgan Olliges, SolieOlie, Ballerinafarm, Nowthatimamother/family, Misformama, etc.*
This dynamic is not Biblical.
Proverbs 31 talks about a woman who works and makes money and owns things. The Bible says, “And I will stretch over Jerusalem the line of Samaria, and the plummet of the house of Ahab: and I will wipe Jerusalem as a man wipeth a dish, wiping it, and turning it upside down.“(KJV). So, even in Old Testament times men were cleaning up after themselves.
Now, the Bible does say men who do not care for their families are worse than unbelievers, which tracks because during that time women could not work. So, if a man was lazy that man was basically dooming his entire family to starvation and homelessness.
That said, I’ve found little evidence Nara is a trad wife. She may be a robot though (jk).
Nara is a model and social media influencer with young kids, and she doesn’t have a crazy amount of children. Nowhere does she encourage women to get married young and have kids; nor is she regularly calling women who go to college sinners.
In fact, her channel is basically Tini in a dress. However, nobody is out here calling Tini a trad wife because she cooks from scratch and has a kid.
Furthermore, Nara’s channel is like a circus show. Nobody is making mocha peppermint pie and Sunday roast whilst wearing a peacock gown. Not even Nara unless it’s for social media, because what she presents online is unrealistic.
That’s part of the show though; it’s not meant to be realistic, but entertaining.
This seems to be the real issue with Nara: that she doesn’t seem authentic. Her voice is fake, her baking in cute dresses is forced upon her by her husband, she seems unhappy and miserable.
This obsession with authenticity isn’t limited to influencers, but has crept into all areas of entertainment. Musicians who don’t write their own music are looked down upon by those who exploit their personal experiences for gain. After all, my girl Taylor has built an entire empire making her private life a public spectacle to entertain the masses.
Authenticity is a good thing, but choosing to be private about your personal isn’t deceptive. Proverbs 17:27-28 says, “[w]hoever restrains his words has knowledge, and he who has a cool spirit is a man of understanding. A fool takes no pleasure in understanding, but only in expressing his opinion.”
Proverbs was probably onto something here. It’s perfectly fine to choose how to present yourself online. If netizens are too dimwitted to clock that what Nara presents is meant to be entertaining and maybe a little helpful, but not necessarily real – well, that’s on them.
That said, this whole thing brought me back to the trenches that is femininity. Despite the dedication conservative Christians spend on this topic online, Christian men and women really shouldn’t behave any differently from each other.
Proverbs 31 outlines a wife of noble character. She’s resourceful, intelligent, hard-working, and wise, and she also was not real. Proverbs 31 is written King Lemuel (probably Solomon) in which the writer is encouraging Lemuel to look for a woman of character. It was not written as a rubric for Biblical womanhood.
Furthermore, Proverbs 1-31 outlines how men should behave. Rarely, do I see Christian men talk about being a Proverbs 1-30 husband, but everyone wants a Proverbs 31 wife?
Anyway, is Nara Smith promoting a harmful message?
Yes and no. Her channel is mostly innocuous, but every so often she’ll sprinkle in something inane like:
This is fairly obvious propaganda and proof Nara may in fact be a robot.
In reality, Nara lucked out by marrying Lucky who happened to be a good man that stuck around after knocking her up. She was also wealthy enough to afford a certain, affluent lifestyle at a very young age. And she literally works a lot.
She models. She creates and posts content regularly. Even if she has someone cleaning up after her, nannying, and editing her videos, she’s still cooking, filming, creating content, modeling, and taking care of her kids.
Her husband appears to be equally involved in childcare, and again nobody accuses Tini of being a tradwife because she cooks for her husband and he works. It seems only if you present as conservative that the label of tradwife is applicable.
This is why it’s important to read your Bible. When you read your Bible and see that the Bible doesn’t say anything about marriage and motherhood being a requirement for Christian women, you will be less susceptible to tradwife propaganda even if you see it.
If you want to live a traditional lifestyle, go for it. But you aren’t holier or more sanctified than working women, women who choose not to have kids, women who go to college, and so on because you married young and stay home with your kids.
What sanctifies us is a relationship with Jesus Christ. A belief in Him, that He died for our sins and rose from the dead. This is what makes us Christians and what makes us holy.
So, ditch trad wife jargon and pick up the Word of God. It’ll do you far more good than any recipe from scratch or TikTok video will do.
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