How can women be Christian?

[robvalue]

Indoctrination, I think we can all agree, is a huge factor.

If someone is brought up from a small child with certain things taught as fact and continually reinforced, it's perfectly understandable that they would continue to believe them. Especially when they are heavily dissuaded from questioning them. If they never talk to anyone outside this bubble, it's again easy to see how they might never burst it.

It becomes more difficult when the indoctrinated come up against those not in the bubble. They have the opportunity to analyse their beliefs that you could say is unrealistic to otherwise expect, at least from people who are not naturally extremely logical/sceptical.

This is happening more and more, especially with the internet. I don't at all think it's as simple as "they are dumb, it's obvious it's all shit". It's obvious to me, but my brain is able to think about it free from pre conception and mental defences. Being willing, or even able, to combat your own "programming" is no small thing. Is everyone capable of doing so? That's an interesting question, I really don't know.

The comfort of long-held beliefs is an incentive not to analyse them. Considering you may have been fundamentally wrong for a long time is something of a daunting prospect as well. The path of least resistance is to just shut out all objections, even your own. It takes willpower and some sort of motivation to be able to question things at a fundamental level.