To find joy in someone’s misery is not a good or admirable thing. But, viewed in a certain light, Bernadine Bluntly’s story offers much of it.

For those of you blissfully unaware of the tradwife phenomenon, a brief outline: tradwifery is the practice of following traditional, conservative, Christian norms when it comes to marriage. The wife is submissive; fertile (a baby a year appears to be the ideal and, I presume, prolapsed uteruses are what God wants); keeps an immaculate house; cooks beautiful meals for her husband and ever-growing brood; and feminine (long hair, floaty dresses, doesn’t “let herself go” even after birthing the eighth child while nursing the seventh and a sourdough starter). The husband goes out to work and comes home to dinner on the table and eats it surrounded by perfectly behaved children and a smiling spouse.

This is all showcased online, and the women who do it best can amass large and lucrative followings. High-end brands fall over themselves offering sponsorship deals in order to be associated with the glossy, aspirational content. Until very recently, Bluntly was one of those women. She had six children, a six-figure YouTube audience, and she spread the tradwife gospel with passion.

“Reject delusions,” she once posted over a video that superimposed her face over those of men performing various feats of strength at work in hard physical........

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