Thread: Horrific set of circumstances: Josh Duggar Board: Oblivion / Ship of Fools.
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Posted by Tulfes (# 18000) on
:
I hope that this post is not viewed as intruding on private grief but there seems to be a media frenzy going on in the US about a real life family called Duggar.
For UK and other readers, the Duggars are an ultra strict Evangelical Christian couple who have raised, or are raising, apparently successfully 19 children. They feature in a reality TV show which has been going since 2008 following their lives and the lives of their offspring. The couple expound views on homosexuality, abortion, the submissive role of women, modesty in dress etc which I understand are typical of the Evangelical right wing in the US.
Now it seems that the eldest son, now 27, sexually abused possibly 4 of his younger sisters when he was 14 and they were children. [DELETED] until 2006 by which time it was not possible to take formal action against the son due to statute of limitation. Since then, from 2008, the parents have presented the family as a happy and united group expressing Christian values in their lifestyle and an ultra strict attitude to sexual activity out with marriage.
The situation has now been revealed and the family are being mercilessly torn to shreds by the media. [DELETED] the victims (who apparently have not received proper counselling as their brother's crimes against them were kept under wraps) are still part of the family and must be suffering dreadfully.
There seem to be so many aspects to this situation, which seems to have passed by the attention of the UK media (so far as I am aware). The hypocrisy of the parents seems to be the justification for the media's outpouring of venom against them, but there are so many victims (including the perpetrator himself, who was a young teenager at the time) that one does shake one's head in disbelief.
Do our US readers or anyone else have any thoughts on what is going on?
[Sections marked as DELETED above have been removed as being potentially defamatory - Eliab (Purgatory host and occasional libel lawyer)]
[ 31. May 2015, 08:51: Message edited by: Eliab ]
Posted by Eutychus (# 3081) on
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hosting/
Thread closed on grounds of almost inevitable libellous comments. May or may not reopen pending admin consultation.
/hosting
Posted by Eutychus (# 3081) on
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hosting/
OK, after some consultation backstage this thread is now open for business again, subject to the following provisos:
1. Abide by Commandment 7: don't post anything potentially libellous.
2. If you want to discuss the specific case referred to in the OP, please do so using links to reputable news sources for any stated claims of what happened (preferably with the actual claim of wrong-doing posted as a short quote from said news article rather than your own paraphrase).
3. Debate will be able to thrive here if it focuses on the general issues arising rather than specific aspects of this case.
4. If you're feeling Hellish, then take your comments to Hell; don't post them here (note that C7 and other guidelines also apply in Hell).
There is clearly plenty to be discussed here, but whether this can be achieved depends a lot on how it's done. Hosts will be watching this thread closely; don't expect any indulgence on our part before bringing in admins if required.
/hosting
Posted by Enoch (# 14322) on
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quote:
Originally posted by Tulfes:
... There seem to be so many aspects to this situation, which seems to have passed by the attention of the UK media ...
So far as I am aware, this story has not made the attention of the UK media at all. From the summary above, there's not much to suggest any reason why it should. We have plenty of problem families here for our press to write about.
Was the reality show ever shown here? I don't watch them. So I wouldn't know.
Posted by moonfruit (# 15818) on
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Reading all about people like the Duggars is one of my strange little interests - their lifestyle and the whole sub-culture they're part of is something I find weirdly fascinating.
A good round up of links about both this story and the Duggars and their beliefs more generally can be found here for those who'd like to know more: Duggar Family Scandal: A Reader
Posted by Doublethink. (# 1984) on
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It begs the question as to where and how the alleged perpetrator learned the bhevaiour. Children who engage in sexually abusive behaviour have usually been sexually abused themselves.
Not reporting the sexual abuse of your own children would rapidly draw the attention of the police and social services in this country. For example, previous failure to protect your own children would lead the authorities to consider if any children you are currently raising are likely to ne at risk. Test of whether a safeguarding concern is substantiated is balance of probablitlies rather than beyond reasonable doubt - plus a confession would be significant confirmation anyway.
[ 31. May 2015, 08:23: Message edited by: Doublethink. ]
Posted by Tulfes (# 18000) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Enoch:
quote:
Originally posted by Tulfes:
... There seem to be so many aspects to this situation, which seems to have passed by the attention of the UK media ...
So far as I am aware, this story has not made the attention of the UK media at all. From the summary above, there's not much to suggest any reason why it should. We have plenty of problem families here for our press to write about.
Was the reality show ever shown here? I don't watch them. So I wouldn't know.
Yes, the show has been on one of the satellite channels, can't remember which one.
Posted by Doublethink. (# 1984) on
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I note the ostensibly peripheral involvement of a man called Hutchens.
Posted by Schroedinger's cat (# 64) on
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A work colleagues wife used to watch it, so it is clearly available probably on a US-import channel.
His reaction is interesting - he is not a Christian, and he sees it as an image of the US-Right-Wing-Evangelical Christian. In other words, it reflects on Christianity for him, and I am sure for many others.
What comes over is the hypocrisy - they claimed to be protecting their children by their beliefs and their actions, whereas they were actually damaging them. In many senses, the illegality is a matte for the police, the abuse is also for the authorities, but shows that they are as broken and failing as everyone else.
It is the fact that they claim otherwise that seems to be - in the UK - the worst part of it. Not to dismiss the abuse [DELETED], but we have had our fill of abuse scandals. US Christian hypocrisy we seem to be able to deal with more of.
(Potentially defamatory section deleted - Eliab)
[ 31. May 2015, 08:55: Message edited by: Eliab ]
Posted by Eliab (# 9153) on
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HOSTING
Everyone on this thread is requested to read and comply with the warning above.
References to what the Duggans (any of them) or third parties did or failed to do in relation to the incidents under discussion should be supported by citations from a reputable news source. The Purgatory hosts have neither the time nor the inclination to sift every post for allegations made and weigh them against such facts as are in the public domain.
If you want to make a comment on what someone is supposed to have done or not done, and find that it can't readily be found as a clear statement by a reputable source, that is a very good indication that you shouldn't be posting it. General discussion of the issues is to be preferred to analysis of this particular case.
If this thread cannot be controlled within the limits set out by Eutychus it will be closed.
/HOSTING
Posted by Schroedinger's cat (# 64) on
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Apologies - I had not intended to breach the guidelines.
Posted by Robert Armin (# 182) on
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have a look at this and this for more information on the way the Duggars see the world. Keeping things vague to stay on the right side of the law.
Posted by Doublethink. (# 1984) on
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That second link is very depressing.
Posted by orfeo (# 13878) on
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quote:
Originally posted by Tulfes:
Now it seems that the eldest son, now 27, sexually abused possibly 4 of his younger sisters when he was 14 and they were children.
In other words, when he was a child also.
I know very little about this story, but the one thing that irks me about it is that much of the reaction is talking about a 27-year-old man as if he has confessed the faults of a 27-year-old.
In short, the trial by media he is undergoing is the trial of an adult. Which is simply not appropriate. Whatever the rights and wrongs of it, it is not proper to treat this as if an adult man committed an offence.
Posted by fletcher christian (# 13919) on
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The statute of limitations is a farce.
Posted by Enoch (# 14322) on
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I've not read the story, and am probably not going to get round to, but the knee jerk assumption that parents are iniquitous because they didn't betray one of their children to the police/social services for abusing another of them is appalling. I just hope none of us ever find ourselves in a situation where we are faced with that clash of loyalties. It must be a terrible dilemma to find oneself faced with.
Posted by Tulfes (# 18000) on
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quote:
Originally posted by Enoch:
I've not read the story, and am probably not going to get round to, but the knee jerk assumption that parents are iniquitous because they didn't betray one of their children to the police/social services for abusing another of them is appalling. I just hope none of us ever find ourselves in a situation where we are faced with that clash of loyalties. It must be a terrible dilemma to find oneself faced with.
Would a parent who does not "betray" (very strange terminology) an abusing child to the authorities not be failing in their duty to protect the abused child/ren by letting the abuser continue to live in the same home as the abused without seeking treatment for the abuser or taking some other action to prevent further abuse? I'm speaking generally, and not suggesting any failure to act on the part of the Duggar parents.
[ 31. May 2015, 13:26: Message edited by: Tulfes ]
Posted by orfeo (# 13878) on
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quote:
Originally posted by Tulfes:
quote:
Originally posted by Enoch:
I've not read the story, and am probably not going to get round to, but the knee jerk assumption that parents are iniquitous because they didn't betray one of their children to the police/social services for abusing another of them is appalling. I just hope none of us ever find ourselves in a situation where we are faced with that clash of loyalties. It must be a terrible dilemma to find oneself faced with.
Would a parent who does not "betray" (very strange terminology) an abusing child to the authorities not be failing in their duty to protect the abused child/ren by letting the abuser continue to live in the same home as the abused without seeking treatment for the abuser or taking some other action to prevent further abuse? I'm speaking generally, and not suggesting any failure to act on the part of the Duggar parents.
It's simply too general a question to know the answer to. How old? What have they done? How often? Which kind of authorities are we talking about?
I'm with Enoch. I think it would be incredibly difficult to know what to do, as it involves very serious consideration of the interests of multiple children.
Posted by Tulfes (# 18000) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by orfeo:
quote:
Originally posted by Tulfes:
Now it seems that the eldest son, now 27, sexually abused possibly 4 of his younger sisters when he was 14 and they were children.
In other words, when he was a child also.
I know very little about this story, but the one thing that irks me about it is that much of the reaction is talking about a 27-year-old man as if he has confessed the faults of a 27-year-old.
In short, the trial by media he is undergoing is the trial of an adult. Which is simply not appropriate. Whatever the rights and wrongs of it, it is not proper to treat this as if an adult man committed an offence.
Yes, he was a child himself when he committed the alleged offences and yes, the trial by media is shocking. I don't seek to defend the perpetrator's actions or the media reaction, but I suspect that the reaction is mainly driven by alleged hypocrisy by the parents in presenting the family over seven years to the media in a particular way and also by alleged hypocrisy by the perpetrator in pursuing as an adult a career in a right-wing political pressure group condemning gays, transgender people, women seeking abortions or practising birth control as sexually immoral sinners.
Posted by Curiosity killed ... (# 11770) on
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Young people who are convicted of sexual offences under age at the sort of levels reported are placed on the sex offenders register and a whole range of restrictions are placed on what they can and cannot do. They tend not to be able to attend school as the risks are perceived to be too high. Low risk young offenders tend to have to serve community sentences under the Youth Offending Team (YOT).
It is very complicated assessing their future risk. There are a couple of places that provide support - the NSPCC has an assessment service and SWAAY is one of the few places that provides therapy and assessment in the UK.
Posted by Schroedinger's cat (# 64) on
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[Treading VERY carefully]
The betrayal of one child over another is a difficult moral question to address. One would imagine that the betrayal of one over four would be less of a challenge.
[DELETED]
There would seem to be an element of purity culture that argues for women keeping themselves pure, and men will be men.
[Treading more carefully still - Eliab]
[ 01. June 2015, 11:18: Message edited by: Eliab ]
Posted by North East Quine (# 13049) on
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Michelle Duggar (the mother) campaigned against transgender women, on the basis that trans women could be "men with past child predator convictions" just pretending to be trans women in order to access under age girls.
There was a Change.org petition some months ago.
(Googling gives multiple hits, but I don't know which sites are reputable, so I went for Change.org. Also, the Change.org petition clearly predates the current news.)
The hypocrisy claims are based on the fact that they have held themselves out to be a family whose strict "Christian" ethos keeps children safe.
Posted by Tulfes (# 18000) on
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quote:
Originally posted by Schroedinger's cat:
[Treading VERY carefully]
The betrayal of one child over another is a difficult moral question to address. One would imagine that the betrayal of one over four would be less of a challenge.
It does seem that only admitting it when there is no longer a chance of legal recriminations gives and indication as to the real reason for not mentioning it at an earlier point.
There would seem to be an element of purity culture that argues for women keeping themselves pure, and men will be men.
(Also treading very carefully)
I don't see how it is the betrayal of the alleged perpetrator to bring the alleged sexual offending of your child (offending which, if committed by an adult, would be deemed criminal) to the attention of the authorities (by which I mean the police or the social work agencies in your country). This will enable other children to be protected (those in the family of the perpetrator and those in the wider community) and will enable the best possible treatment to be obtained for the perpetrator while s/he is young enough to benefit from this to the maximum. This action is in the best interests of the child perpetrator and children generally (whether existing children or future children who might be harmed by the actions of the perpetrator if his/ her behaviour is not addressed). Surely it doesn't depend on the number of known victims or the "seriousness" of the behaviour. Surely any sexual conduct towards a minor is serious.
Posted by Twilight (# 2832) on
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One of Moonfruit's links, "Diary of an Autodidact," was particularly interesting. Written by someone who spent his teens under the same minister who the Duggars follow. This writer says that the teachings make teenage boys very vulnerable to sexual crime. They are taught that thinking about sex is as grave a sin as rape. (The "lust in the heart," words taken to their most literal extreme.) So, teenage boys whose raging hormones are making them think about sex almost constantly feel that they can't really do anything worse than they're already doing. Then of course, being homeschooled and kept strictly away from the cheerleader in science class that typical boys would be thinking about, leaves them always home with sisters.
I've never watched the Duggar's show for the same reason I've never watched the Mormon fundamentalist counterpart, "Sister Wives." The commercials alone make me nauseated. We always see the proud patriarch, smugly smirking and bragging about his big family while the haggard wife, or wives, droop beside them. To me they seem to be hiding behind a façade of godliness when they really just want everyone to see what studs they are.
In spite of the long dresses and freshly washed faces all I ever see are families obsessed with sex. All day everyday it's; wear this so boys won't get erections, have as much sex with the wife as you can so the other men will be impressed, talk about what the LBGT community does in the privacy of their homes and the state of your daughters' hymens. Most of all never let up on that disgusting "quiver-full," concept. I'm so thankful I grew up in a home where I never once had to think about my father's penis.
Posted by Hiro's Leap (# 12470) on
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quote:
Originally posted by orfeo:
Whatever the rights and wrongs of it, it is not proper to treat this as if an adult man committed an offence.
Yes, exactly.
quote:
Originally posted by Tulfes:
(offending which, if committed by an adult, would be deemed criminal)
I'd think the alleged offences are criminal for a 14/15 year old too.
quote:
[Contacting the authorities] will enable the best possible treatment to be obtained for the perpetrator
Keeping this general, does anyone here know what is the likely result is of a 14/15 year old in the U.S. being found guilty of the sorts of sexual offences alleged in this case? Is it going to be good quality treatment, or is it imprisonment, violence and (quite possibly) rape in a young offender's prison? After release, would they be publicly known and tracked as a sex offender, or would the conviction be wiped?
Some 17 year olds in the US have been treated horrendously badly for consensual sex with their 15 y.o. girlfriends. I'm not convinced a slightly younger teenager would get "best possible" treatment.
Posted by Porridge (# 15405) on
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quote:
Originally posted by Tulfes:
For UK and other readers, the Duggars are an ultra strict Evangelical Christian couple who have raised, or are raising, apparently successfully 19 children.
If founded, the allegations of abuse raise questions about the "apparent" child-rearing "success" of this family.
If unfounded, the allegations raise similar questions, as we must wonder what might motivate such accusations.
As to the media frenzy, this is the US, and sharks are drawn like magnets to the faintest hint of blood. It's par for the course.
Finally, and by no means least, I can't help but wonder about the "success" of child-rearing methods which include putting one's family on public view every week for years at a stretch.
Reality shows are well-known to be anything but; they get scripted. Presumably, any typical family does what it does, good or ill, under no such constraints.
What does the religious community to which the Duggars claim allegiance think of this practice -- of putting one's family on display, presumably in exchange for payment, as one means of supporting that family financially?
Posted by cliffdweller (# 13338) on
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To Twilight's comments, I would add the aspect of fear as an overriding emotion. The Duggars apparently did seek help (albeit late) for their son, but instead of taking him to a certified counselor or therapist, they took him to a "Christian" program that consisted entirely of helping a friend with a home remodeling business apparently because they were concerned about the influence of other secular programs. The girls did not seem to have rec'd any counseling/assistance.
The Duggars describe this period as "dark and difficult time" and I would take them at their word. It would be dark and difficult for any of us undergoing such a horrific set of circumstances, of course. But in the Duggars case the fear-based ideology that kept them from accessing the very resources that might have helped navigate such a dark and difficult path. And of course, the isolationism that came with that fear-based ideology is what kept the children out of schools and other sorts of places where they might have encountered other adults (including mandated reporters) who might have helped.
Posted by moonfruit (# 15818) on
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quote:
Originally posted by Twilight:
This writer says that the teachings make teenage boys very vulnerable to sexual crime. They are taught that thinking about sex is as grave a sin as rape. (The "lust in the heart," words taken to their most literal extreme.) So, teenage boys whose raging hormones are making them think about sex almost constantly feel that they can't really do anything worse than they're already doing. Then of course, being homeschooled and kept strictly away from the cheerleader in science class that typical boys would be thinking about, leaves them always home with sisters.
<snip>
In spite of the long dresses and freshly washed faces all I ever see are families obsessed with sex. All day everyday it's; wear this so boys won't get erections, have as much sex with the wife as you can so the other men will be impressed, talk about what the LBGT community does in the privacy of their homes and the state of your daughters' hymens. Most of all never let up on that disgusting "quiver-full," concept. I'm so thankful I grew up in a home where I never once had to think about my father's penis.
This is one of the things that really strikes me about this very conservative/ quiverfull/ patriarchal culture - the obsession with (sexual) purity leads down some very twisty avenues. The bit that concerns me most is how the onus is put so firmly on girls and women: they must be modest and pure because otherwise they can cause the men around them to sin. A good example of this kind of thinking can be found on this post, from a blog belonging to a similar family: Large Families on Purpose
Another thing that strikes me about this emphasis on women and girls dressing modestly, is how it infantilises men, by effectively painting them as unable to control their desires and urges - I have not really read anything that encourages men to not look with lust; the onus is, as I said, on the women and girls to not cause a man to look with lust. This also has the subtle (or maybe not so subtle) effect of making women responsible for any "unwanted attention" they do incur. Overall, I think it's a dangerous and poisonous approach, for both the men and the women.
Posted by lilBuddha (# 14333) on
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quote:
Originally posted by fletcher christian:
The statute of limitations is a farce.
No, it isn't. What it is is complicated.
Time affects so much, both in quality of real memories and what may be false memory. Memory is a less solid thing than we tend to think and time complicates this.
Time degrades evidence of all sorts.
Limiting prosecution time is a reasonable concept that is often poorly applied.
Posted by lilBuddha (# 14333) on
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quote:
Originally posted by orfeo:
In other words, when he was a child also.
He was 14, not 6. Legally adult in many countries and considered functionally adult in many crimes in many countries, including the US. So I don't accept this as an excuse or mitigation.
The problems here are the bullshit "I've asked forgiveness, so now it is over", [DELETED] the lack of treatment for victim and perpetrator and the failure to asses future potential risk.
As Ck points out, risk-assessment is complicated, but failure to consider potential reoffence is rubbish.
[Comment deleted for legal reasons - Eliab]
[ 01. June 2015, 11:16: Message edited by: Eliab ]
Posted by no prophet's flag is set so... (# 15560) on
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quote:
Originally posted by Doublethink.:
It begs the question as to where and how the alleged perpetrator learned the bhevaiour. Children who engage in sexually abusive behaviour have usually been sexually abused themselves.
This is often said, but the data are difficult to come by, due I think to the problem of 'base rates'. If statistics about the frequency of sexual abuse are accurate, we have a very high base rate of people in the general population who have experienced sexual abuse. We will have at least this proportion in any group who go on to sexually assault others.
The data are usually collected from those facing charges or having been convicted of sexual assault, who are motivated to claim sexual abuse and other forms of maltreatment to influence the handling of their cases and them after conviction. Thus, I expect the general idea that sexual abusers as a rule have been sexually abused themselves, and that this alleged sexual abuse is somehow causatively linked to their becoming sexual assaulters is probably a very incomplete understanding. It makes for a good 'just so' story within the life of any sexual offender.
Further, it makes it seen as though sexual abuse victims are at significant additional risk to become sex abusers themselves. I am also unwilling to accept that being drunk gives someone the excuse for bad behaviour, or being a refugee, or have been harshly disciplined as a child, or other such things.
quote:
Not reporting the sexual abuse of your own children would rapidly draw the attention of the police and social services in this country. For example, previous failure to protect your own children would lead the authorities to consider if any children you are currently raising are likely to ne at risk. Test of whether a safeguarding concern is substantiated is balance of probablitlies rather than beyond reasonable doubt - plus a confession would be significant confirmation anyway.
Completely agree. The parents in any such situation are clearly failing to protect children. An investigation would occur in Canada. Further, there are no statutes of limitations for such crimes here. We seem to have at any time several cases where the offences were committed 10 to 40 years in the past.
Posted by Schroedinger's cat (# 64) on
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Tulfes - I was talking in more general terms, as I think there is a tendency for the more conservative end of the market to be. It is not the subtlety that you have explored - it is just about Which one do I support, A or B?
The black and white thinking that is endemic in the theologically conservative community seems to also apply to family life decisions, in this case. Rather than carefully thought through decisions, there is a tendency among some people to see everything in terms of simple choices.
Posted by mr cheesy (# 3330) on
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I know nothing about this family, and from what I read am not sure I want to.
quote:
They feature in a reality TV show which has been going since 2008
Apart from anything else that alone seems really awful.
Posted by Porridge (# 15405) on
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quote:
Originally posted by no prophet's flag is set so...:
The parents in any such situation are clearly failing to protect children.
A friend of mine works (off-camera) for a pubic television station. While PBS doesn't (AFAIK)produce reality shows per se, they do produce nature documentaries and the like, and my friend's work often gives her an up-close-&-personal view of both filming procedures and the unedited film for some of these. Those "natural" scenes aren't always so natural as we'd like to believe.
One could argue that a family whose patriarch has invited a film crew, producers, script-writers, assistants, scene managers, prop personnel, etc. etc. etc. into his family's life, to be "managed" and tweaked and re-arranged and re-interpreted in ways likely to keep audiences interested without distressing corporate sponsors could be said to have abrogated their responsibilities to "protect [their] children" long before any abuse allegations surface.
[code]
[ 31. May 2015, 18:15: Message edited by: Eutychus ]
Posted by Brenda Clough (# 18061) on
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It is extraordinarily lucrative for the Duggar family to be on TV. Most 'Quiverful' families have difficulty togging out the kids in matching outfits, or buying vehicles enough to transport them. (The movement calls for women to stay and home and not work, so it is in theory Dad who is the sole support of all of them.)
The power of TV means that they are, alas! One of the public faces of Christianity in the US. Between these people and the Westboro Baptist Church it is a wonder that Jesus has any followers at all. An account
Posted by Lamb Chopped (# 5528) on
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quote:
Originally posted by Schroedinger's cat:
The black and white thinking that is endemic in the theologically conservative community ...
Okay, this is bugging me. I have seen as much black-and-white thinking among my liberal friends (sometimes more) as I have among my conservative friends. Black-and-white thinking is a human problem, not a theologically conservative one.
And it seems to me inappropriate to take this family and hold them up, even by implication, as an example of theological conservatives. They are extreme outliers, just as the Flat Earth Society are extreme outliers not to be taken as representative of skeptics in general. (If they weren't extreme outliers, why would anybody offer them a reality show?)
Posted by rolyn (# 16840) on
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quote:
Originally posted by Tulfes:
There seem to be so many aspects to this situation, which seems to have passed by the attention of the UK media (so far as I am aware). The hypocrisy of the parents seems to be the justification for the media's outpouring of venom against them, but there are so many victims (including the perpetrator himself, who was a young teenager at the time) that one does shake one's head in disbelief.
The UK media have rather had their fill of sensational sex abuse scandals since savile.
If one was too shake one's head over hypocrisies surrounding Christians down the ages the head would soon come separate from the body. Also abuse within families is sadly not unheard of, nor is the matter of other family members staying silent over it.
If people are paraded around as model Christians happily dishing out condemnations re. the lifestyles of others then the media are pretty likely going to go for the jugular with something like that.
Posted by Tulfes (# 18000) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by rolyn:
quote:
Originally posted by Tulfes:
There seem to be so many aspects to this situation, which seems to have passed by the attention of the UK media (so far as I am aware). The hypocrisy of the parents seems to be the justification for the media's outpouring of venom against them, but there are so many victims (including the perpetrator himself, who was a young teenager at the time) that one does shake one's head in disbelief.
The UK media have rather had their fill of sensational sex abuse scandals since savile.
If one was too shake one's head over hypocrisies surrounding Christians down the ages the head would soon come separate from the body. Also abuse within families is sadly not unheard of, nor is the matter of other family members staying silent over it.
If people are paraded around as model Christians happily dishing out condemnations re. the lifestyles of others then the media are pretty likely going to go for the jugular with something like that.
Sorry for not expressing myself more clearly. I wasn't (just) shaking my head in disbelief at the hypocrisy but also at the young victims who have been (apparently, allegedly) unprotected.
[ 31. May 2015, 18:34: Message edited by: Tulfes ]
Posted by Penny S (# 14768) on
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That family's shift to long skirts to keep men's eyes off the crotch has ignored a couple of things.
One, inhibition of movement - OK, she discusses doing housework like women at th ebeginning of the last century, but they weren't wearing hobble skirts. I want to be able to move fast if I want to, and clothing which stops women running has been around for forever. Why?
Two, they don't seem to have spotted that their styles involve V-necked tops, and I sould tell them a few things about where men's eyes go with those. The church youth club put me right off V-necks.
I can't see why trousers with a long top wouldn't be modest enough - doesn't have to be so long it's like shalwar kameez, and they can still be active.
It's to do with control.
Posted by saysay (# 6645) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Hiro's Leap:
quote:
[Contacting the authorities] will enable the best possible treatment to be obtained for the perpetrator
Keeping this general, does anyone here know what is the likely result is of a 14/15 year old in the U.S. being found guilty of the sorts of sexual offences alleged in this case? Is it going to be good quality treatment, or is it imprisonment, violence and (quite possibly) rape in a young offender's prison? After release, would they be publicly known and tracked as a sex offender, or would the conviction be wiped?
Some 17 year olds in the US have been treated horrendously badly for consensual sex with their 15 y.o. girlfriends. I'm not convinced a slightly younger teenager would get "best possible" treatment.
I know little about the Duggars or this particular case (and what I know I don't like), but I completely understand why they may not have believed that "contacting the authorities" would result in the best possible outcomes.
Adult prison as a juvenile, registration on the sex offenders list for the rest of his life, severe restrictions on where he can live and what he can do for the rest of his life, etc. were all possible outcomes.
Posted by rolyn (# 16840) on
:
No problem T. I was being a little flippant.
Thoughts are indeed for those who suffer over abuse.
Posted by Tulfes (# 18000) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by saysay:
quote:
Originally posted by Hiro's Leap:
quote:
[Contacting the authorities] will enable the best possible treatment to be obtained for the perpetrator
Keeping this general, does anyone here know what is the likely result is of a 14/15 year old in the U.S. being found guilty of the sorts of sexual offences alleged in this case? Is it going to be good quality treatment, or is it imprisonment, violence and (quite possibly) rape in a young offender's prison? After release, would they be publicly known and tracked as a sex offender, or would the conviction be wiped?
Some 17 year olds in the US have been treated horrendously badly for consensual sex with their 15 y.o. girlfriends. I'm not convinced a slightly younger teenager would get "best possible" treatment.
I know little about the Duggars or this particular case (and what I know I don't like), but I completely understand why they may not have believed that "contacting the authorities" would result in the best possible outcomes.
Adult prison as a juvenile, registration on the sex offenders list for the rest of his life, severe restrictions on where he can live and what he can do for the rest of his life, etc. were all possible outcomes.
I concede that I may be guilty of underestimating the harshness of the US system. From a Scottish perspective, both the 14 year old alleged perpetrator and his young alleged victims would have been treated as youngsters in need of treatment, care and protection. What was required for each victim and for the perpetrator would have been considered individually and a judgement reached as to what was in their best interests by an impartial children's hearing. Maybe someone familiar with the Arkansas system could explain if a 14 year old would seriously face jail time.
Posted by Hiro's Leap (# 12470) on
:
A 17-year old sentenced to 10 years (without possibility of parole) for consensual oral sex with his 15 year old girlfriend.
I suspect this isn't a typical sentence, but I can understand U.S. parents being scared - especially for more serious charges like those alleged in this case.
Posted by Porridge (# 15405) on
:
There is, in addition, the potential for lifelong listing on a sex offenders list.
Given the range of laws which severely restrict listed sex offenders' choice of jobs, living quarters, leisure activities, and volunteerism, this is no small matter.
Posted by lilBuddha (# 14333) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Lamb Chopped:
quote:
Originally posted by Schroedinger's cat:
The black and white thinking that is endemic in the theologically conservative community ...
Okay, this is bugging me. I have seen as much black-and-white thinking among my liberal friends (sometimes more) as I have among my conservative friends. Black-and-white thinking is a human problem, not a theologically conservative one.
Spot on. It is more easily processed and assigned cause. High contrast images are easy to resolve. The hazy edge of reality is much less comfortable to view.
Posted by mousethief (# 953) on
:
Referring to the hand-wringing about "trial by media."
It's not like being a mayor or an actress or something who didn't really want people looking at their personal life. The Duggars begged people to look at their personal lives. They invited cameramen into their home so they could show the entire world their personal lives. It's a little hypocritical to then turn around and complain if the entire world draws conclusions about their personal lives based on what they see in the media. Sow the wind, reap the whirlwind.
[ 31. May 2015, 21:16: Message edited by: mousethief ]
Posted by Lamb Chopped (# 5528) on
:
yes! [crosspost: that yes was to lilbuddha.]
I have no decent knowledge of Arkansas or how conditions are there. But I will say that for my city, I'd go a long way to keep a child out of the social service system--both victims and offender. Keep in mind that they would be facing the possibility of having the victims removed as well--and possibly all children (the concern would be, "What kind of family environment made this possible?"). And not necessarily to a safe or healing environment. Social services and the judicial system can function excellently, or they can be total hellholes. And you don't have any guarantees which you're going to get, nor do you have very much recourse at all if it all goes to hell.
Certainly in the same position I would be seeking megadoses of help for everybody in the family, and safety would be priority one. Yet I would be very much tempted to do it some other way besides handing my nearest and dearest over to the doubtful processes of the state.
The thing I don't get is how anybody with such a skeleton in the closet decides to become media stars. I mean, it's like running for president. Someone's bound to dig up every crime, sin, and disaster that has ever occurred to anybody remotely connected with you, just for the gossip value. Why risk it?
Yet I know people do, all the time (witness our politicians). Just.Don't.Get.It.
[ 31. May 2015, 21:25: Message edited by: Lamb Chopped ]
Posted by Tulfes (# 18000) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by mousethief:
Referring to the hand-wringing about "trial by media."
It's not like being a mayor or an actress or something who didn't really want people looking at their personal life. The Duggars begged people to look at their personal lives. They invited cameramen into their home so they could show the entire world their personal lives. It's a little hypocritical to then turn around and complain if the entire world draws conclusions about their personal lives based on what they see in the media. Sow the wind, reap the whirlwind.
True, but their children, including some of the alleged victims of the alleged abuse, did not give valid consent to the media intrusion. Admittedly some of the older children who are married (and forisfamiliated) have continued to participate in the programme and may therefore be exempt from the previous sentence.
Posted by mousethief (# 953) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Tulfes:
True, but their children, including some of the alleged victims of the alleged abuse, did not give valid consent to the media intrusion.
Raising an interesting question: can parents legitimately invite the world into their homes to show off their children? If so, does their right to thus exploit their children come with veto power over airing negative aspects of their family life?
quote:
Admittedly some of the older children who are married (and forisfamiliated) have continued to participate in the programme and may therefore be exempt from the previous sentence.
Indeed; the alleged perp was head of some organization chartered to make public noise about families -- in large part based on his cred as a Duggar -- so he was hardly trying to retreat from the media spotlight.
Posted by Pomona (# 17175) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Penny S:
That family's shift to long skirts to keep men's eyes off the crotch has ignored a couple of things.
One, inhibition of movement - OK, she discusses doing housework like women at th ebeginning of the last century, but they weren't wearing hobble skirts. I want to be able to move fast if I want to, and clothing which stops women running has been around for forever. Why?
Two, they don't seem to have spotted that their styles involve V-necked tops, and I sould tell them a few things about where men's eyes go with those. The church youth club put me right off V-necks.
I can't see why trousers with a long top wouldn't be modest enough - doesn't have to be so long it's like shalwar kameez, and they can still be active.
It's to do with control.
The Duggar girls tend to wear knee-length skirts nowadays - certainly even when they wore long skirts, they weren't hobble skirts but normal denim ones. Secondly they and many other fundies regard trousers as inherently male clothing, going by the verse in Deuteronomy.
Posted by Pomona (# 17175) on
:
I would question the Duggars as being typical right wing evangelicals. They are quiverfull fundamentalists - not the same.
Posted by Brenda Clough (# 18061) on
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They are indeed quite different. But it is a difference without a distinction, from outside the faith. Unbelievers do not make these fine distinctions. It is no wonder that Christianity is losing adherents by the millions.
Posted by SvitlanaV2 (# 16967) on
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quote:
Originally posted by Schroedinger's cat:
A work colleagues wife used to watch it, so it is clearly available probably on a US-import channel.
His reaction is interesting - he is not a Christian, and he sees it as an image of the US-Right-Wing-Evangelical Christian. In other words, it reflects on Christianity for him, and I am sure for many others.
I'm surprised that American Christians, who are apparently so numerous and influential, haven't funded or supported more representative programmes about Christian life in their country. There's no obvious reason why the unusual Duggar family should be taken by non-Christians as normative.
(As for the UK we're probably due for another series about non-fundamentalist vicars, either a reality show or drama, since they're always popular.)
Posted by Lamb Chopped (# 5528) on
:
Because we're NOT freaking powerful or influential. Despite what the media suggests about us dastardly conspiratorial Christians of whatever dull mainstream stripe. We just aren't. (And you don't run into movie stars on every corner if you live in L.A., either. And there are actually people in Texas who do not own guns. These are all media-driven illusions. Sorry to spoil things!)
Remember that TV is all about the sell. Interesting/freaky/oddball/horrifying SELLS. Ordinary dull boring Christian does NOT sell. Which means no advertisers, no sponsors, no nothing.
I have no doubt we could get a "reality" show about so-called Christian swingers into production in a heartbeat. It would appeal to the same people who like "UFO stole my two-headed baby" stories.
Something balanced? Ha.
Posted by mousethief (# 953) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Brenda Clough:
They are indeed quite different. But it is a difference without a distinction, from outside the faith. Unbelievers do not make these fine distinctions. It is no wonder that Christianity is losing adherents by the millions.
This.
And Lamb Chopped, however unpowerful you feel, Christian groups like The Family and the National Prayer Breakfast people exert a powerful influence over our nation's polity. I can't see how it can be denied that Christians exert power when state after state adopts laws restricting abortions, access to birth control, etc. This isn't coming from atheists or the non-religious.
Posted by Lamb Chopped (# 5528) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Brenda Clough:
They are indeed quite different. But it is a difference without a distinction, from outside the faith. Unbelievers do not make these fine distinctions. It is no wonder that Christianity is losing adherents by the millions.
[tired sigh] This may very well be true. But there's very little the "normal" Christians can do about it. We do try to push back against weirdo-ism, yes. But we're nowhere near as powerful as the companies and people whose interests lie in publicizing the freaky.
What can we do about it? Well, we can be non-freaks. We can live like followers of Christ and hope the non-Christians around us take notice in spite of the media image. We can try to make the best of political choices at voting, choices which are usually between rotten and worse. We can protest (and usually go unheard) when lurid, half-true stories get into the press. (Which usually don't get corrected or retracted, but who wants to spend valuable media space on boring corrections?)
That's basically all that I can do and manage to get on with my life at the same time. Trying to fix the media image of the church is maybe somebody's crusade, but it isn't mine. I'm called to do other things. And God help the poor person who IS called to this job, it's a monster.
Really, in the end, all I can do is put my trust in God to cope with it.
Posted by Lamb Chopped (# 5528) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by mousethief:
And Lamb Chopped, however unpowerful you feel, Christian groups like The Family and the National Prayer Breakfast people exert a powerful influence over our nation's polity. I can't see how it can be denied that Christians exert power when state after state adopts laws restricting abortions, access to birth control, etc. This isn't coming from atheists or the non-religious.
I'm sorry, Mousethief, I don't even know who the hell those people are--and it's not like I haven't been in media/publishing for years and years. That either says something about me or about the relative "known-ness" of the groups across the country. Possibly me.
I'm also thinking that these groups you mention are maybe not so much Christian as political-with-a-Christian-flavor-on-top. Because if they were more than that--if they were "mere Christians," as Lewis put it--why are they not doing anything about issues that are not popular pocket specialties? Anybody who wants the public spotlight can pick up on the Dead Horse of the moment and ride it into media attention, and sometimes political power. And flavoring it with Christianity (not too much, mind) makes them seem vaguely respectable while they do so.
But then, what? If these are Christian groups interested in politics (as opposed to political groups with a Christian banner), where are the other concerns their Master went on and on and on about? Are they doing anything about poverty, hunger, or immigration? What about disease, family and relationship dysfunction, mental illness? What about the non-sexy topics that ordinary Christians try to help with in quiet, non-televised ways?
If I see one of those groups do more than simply Dead Horse flogging, I might start to listen. If they would try riding a live horse, we might get somewhere.
Posted by Brenda Clough (# 18061) on
:
No, one of the biggest train wrecks in American politics in our lifetime is the way that conservative politicians have seduced conservative Christianity.
One of many examples
Having gotten into bed with the princes of this world, the church now discovers that it's being screwed.
Posted by mousethief (# 953) on
:
The question was whether Christians have power, not whether the good, true, right, OUR KIND OF Christians have power. Yes, these so-called Christians in power aren't terribly Christ-like. But they command the votes of enough pew-warmers to stay in power and do great damage in Christ's name. Also, what Brenda Clough said.
The Family (listed in Wiki as "The Fellowship (Christian Organization)")
[ 01. June 2015, 02:39: Message edited by: mousethief ]
Posted by orfeo (# 13878) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by lilBuddha:
quote:
Originally posted by orfeo:
In other words, when he was a child also.
He was 14, not 6. Legally adult in many countries and considered functionally adult in many crimes in many countries, including the US. So I don't accept this as an excuse or mitigation.
If you're seriously suggesting that 14 is an appropriate age to label someone as fully adult, then I'm just going to vehemently disagree with you.
I didn't say he was 6. I didn't say he should be treated as a 6-year-old. I implied he should be treated as a 14-year-old. Which is not an adult in my book. Suggesting that my soon-to-be-14 nephew has reached adulthood strikes me as completely absurd.
Posted by orfeo (# 13878) on
:
ADDENDUM: As for 14 being adulthood in "many countries", Wikipedia lists just two: Iran and Saudi Arabia.
Every other country listed is 18 or higher.
Posted by lilBuddha (# 14333) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by orfeo:
quote:
Originally posted by lilBuddha:
quote:
Originally posted by orfeo:
In other words, when he was a child also.
He was 14, not 6. Legally adult in many countries and considered functionally adult in many crimes in many countries, including the US. So I don't accept this as an excuse or mitigation.
If you're seriously suggesting that 14 is an appropriate age to label someone as fully adult, then I'm just going to vehemently disagree with you.
I didn't say he was 6. I didn't say he should be treated as a 6-year-old. I implied he should be treated as a 14-year-old. Which is not an adult in my book. Suggesting that my soon-to-be-14 nephew has reached adulthood strikes me as completely absurd.
Personally, I think 18 isn't really an adult. However, that isn't quite my point.
14 is old enough that child doesn't quite work either.
And we are talking about molestation. That does not fit into the childish misunderstanding model. It is true that a 14 year old will generally have poorer impulse control than an adult, but fiddling about with your siblings is not an impulse most people have to control.
Whether a person is 14 or 40, it is imperative to determine the level of threat, to seek/provide assistance to prevent recidivism.
A person who lives in a patriarchal, God's forgiveness fixes any sin sub-culture [DELETED] is in a position which could well heighten the chance of repetition.
[Edited to remove potentially defamatory statement - Eliab]
[ 01. June 2015, 11:15: Message edited by: Eliab ]
Posted by orfeo (# 13878) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by lilBuddha:
And we are talking about molestation. That does not fit into the childish misunderstanding model. It is true that a 14 year old will generally have poorer impulse control than an adult, but fiddling about with your siblings is not an impulse most people have to control.
I don't know what PRECISELY we're talking about. "Molestation" is just a label. It's one you won't find in any sexual assault law that I know of.
You seem to be bordering on saying "he did something that a child wouldn't normally do, therefore he's not a child", which is rather circular. The fact is that all criminal law is about things we don't think people "normally" do. I imagine that it was felt that children wouldn't do certain murderous things before a couple of children did them to James Bulger.
[ 01. June 2015, 05:22: Message edited by: orfeo ]
Posted by Eutychus (# 3081) on
:
I think one of the difficulties with this subject is the huge range of behaviours which can get a person qualified as a sex offender, as well as the range of victims.
I suspect minors groping their younger siblings or half-siblings is way more widespread than reported. That's different from minors groping non-siblings, which is different again from violation with an object, which is different again from oral sex, penetrative sex, and so on. And all of these are different from the inmate I once knew who freely and cheerfully admitted to me that he raped a random girl at knifepoint - as proof that he wasn't such a bad guy, because he hadn't used the knife to kill her.
None of these is right, but the motivations and circumstances are probably quite different.
I think that in the popular imagination, 'sex offender' conjures up visions of people in the last category above. This is not helped by politicians using such extreme cases to make bad laws and popular media reporting of them.
This extreme and monolithic view of all sex offenders fuels our fantasies and conveniently puts distance between 'sex offender' behaviour and, most often, anything we might have experienced. It's a way of reassuring ourselves that 'we could never do something like that' or that 'it could never happen in our family'.
The case referred to in the OP is a sad indication that whatever our family's proclaimed sexual mores, the possibility of some form of abuse is never absent. Dealing with it in real life is indeed rarely a black-and-white matter.
Posted by lilBuddha (# 14333) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by orfeo:
You seem to be bordering on saying "he did something that a child wouldn't normally do, therefore he's not a child",
No, I am saying that I do not think age is as much a mitigating factor as you appear to.
Posted by Penny S (# 14768) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Pomona:
quote:
Originally posted by Penny S:
That family's shift to long skirts to keep men's eyes off the crotch has ignored a couple of things.
One, inhibition of movement - OK, she discusses doing housework like women at th ebeginning of the last century, but they weren't wearing hobble skirts. I want to be able to move fast if I want to, and clothing which stops women running has been around for forever. Why?
Two, they don't seem to have spotted that their styles involve V-necked tops, and I sould tell them a few things about where men's eyes go with those. The church youth club put me right off V-necks.
I can't see why trousers with a long top wouldn't be modest enough - doesn't have to be so long it's like shalwar kameez, and they can still be active.
It's to do with control.
The Duggar girls tend to wear knee-length skirts nowadays - certainly even when they wore long skirts, they weren't hobble skirts but normal denim ones. Secondly they and many other fundies regard trousers as inherently male clothing, going by the verse in Deuteronomy.
The family I was commenting on, in one of the links, was wearing very narrow long skirts. They looked like what you would get if you undid the seams of a pair of trousers, cut out the crotch shaping, and reseamed them. Which I have done, once, with some nice slubbed silk ones which had worn where they rubbed. Not very mobility favouring.
Of course, in Deuteronomic times, men wore skirts. Just different styles of skirt. And in a number of societies, trousers are female clothing. It's stupid, and to do with control.
Posted by itsarumdo (# 18174) on
:
Something similar happened to an ex g/f of mine and I can tell you, the lifelong emotional effects can be pretty bad. And that was in a busy, moderately large, moderately chaotic but fundamentally loving family.
I also saw some effects of "consensual" incest, and the effects on one or both parties is also not necessarily benign.
Ignoring age issues, this man/boy/child thought he could force himself on his siblings - the "with impunity" bit is secondary - because already he had lost his sense of their boundary - an therefore had necessarily lost his own sense of boundary. That's family dynamics and/or some degree of sociopathy.
The legal issues are not necessarily anything to do with what may or may not have been the correct response to this for the family, and the "wasn't it terrible - they are supposed to be a model family" bit is just tabloid hype and salacious gossip.
And I think the "let him who is without sin cast the first stone" is a good basic principle. If this happened in our/your family, how would we respond? It's a valid question. The fact that no-one here chooses to place their family in a TV show is beside the point.
Posted by orfeo (# 13878) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by lilBuddha:
quote:
Originally posted by orfeo:
You seem to be bordering on saying "he did something that a child wouldn't normally do, therefore he's not a child",
No, I am saying that I do not think age is as much a mitigating factor as you appear to.
Actually you denied it was a mitigating factor at all.
Which is precisely what I'm reacting to.
Posted by Eliab (# 9153) on
:
HOSTING
Please take this as a further warning about potentially defamatory comments on this thread.
From my (most unwilling) reading of background to this incident, the basic facts have been admitted, but the question of when and to whom it was reported appears to be less clear, as are the details of and motivation for the reaction to the incident of other family members.
If you are making any sort of comment that such-and-such a response to this incident was wrong, then you have all been requested, clearly, and at least twice, to cite a reputable news source which says that the facts you are referring have been reported as having taken place. There have been several comments on here which, as far as I can tell, the reported facts do not justify. Two of them by lilBuddha.
Basically, it's not my job to hunt down the articles that say whether your speculations are right or wrong. If you can link to a source that says "this happened" then knock yourselves out in quoting it and saying "if that did happen, then it's wrong/dangerous/inadvisable/whatever", but don't post allegations of possible misconduct based on what you think might have happened. Link to it if it's been reported. Otherwise DON'T POST IT.
Do not post on this thread unless you have understood and intend to comply with this warning, or the thread will be closed.
/HOSTING
Posted by Tulfes (# 18000) on
:
Here is a timeline from a reputable source. The period of concern appears to relate to over a year, between March 2002 and July 2003. In the latter month the concerns were brought to the attention of a law enforcement official.
Posted by Brenda Clough (# 18061) on
:
I am the mother of a daughter, so my motives are elementary.
How Josh Duggar accounts for himself to his God is his problem. (My idea is that Jesus, a bearded man of over 30, is well able to defend Himself from unwanted sexual propositions even putting aside any of His other considerable attributes.)
But I would never let Duggar near my daughter, or my grand-daughter. Go for it. Pour out the forgiveness like water -- but never, not near my kids, till the end of time and the heat death of the universe.
Posted by lilBuddha (# 14333) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by orfeo:
quote:
Originally posted by lilBuddha:
quote:
Originally posted by orfeo:
You seem to be bordering on saying "he did something that a child wouldn't normally do, therefore he's not a child",
No, I am saying that I do not think age is as much a mitigating factor as you appear to.
Actually you denied it was a mitigating factor at all.
Which is precisely what I'm reacting to.
Speaking to the general topic of sex offences, they are not in a category where youthful indiscretion is a factor.
It isn't bullying gone too far, it is not joining a gang or shoplifting.
The expected difference between a teenager and a full adult would be impulse control. But what impulse is being controlled is the issue. In both a teen and an adult the basic action should be the same. Assessment, treatment and management. The penalty phase is trickier.
ETA:Apologies to Eliab and the thread. I shall try to keep my replies general or more carefully worded.
[ 01. June 2015, 15:08: Message edited by: lilBuddha ]
Posted by Crœsos (# 238) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by itsarumdo:
And I think the "let him who is without sin cast the first stone" is a good basic principle. If this happened in our/your family, how would we respond? It's a valid question.
I'm not sure why, but in a lot of cases like this there seems to be a lot more sympathy for the perpetrator than his victims.
(Question for Hosts: In light of Josh Duggar's confession are we still required to refer to him as an "alleged child molester" or can we simply refer to him as a "child molester"? Or given that Josh Duggar's statement confines itself to vague statements of generalized wrongdoing and half truths [analysis based on police report here] are we to consider his confession as not really admitting any specific wrongdoing? If the latter, consider the word "alleged" to be inserted before "perpetrator" in the previous paragraph.)
More to the point, the obvious pitfalls of concentrating sympathy on the [alleged] perpetrator at the expense of his [alleged] victims is clearly shown in the Duggar police report. The first indication the Duggar parents had that anything like this was going on was [allegedly] in March 2002 (see p. 14), the first mention of Josh being "disciplined" was in July 2002 (see p. 15) and the first report to any kind of legal authority wasn't until July 2003 (see p. 15-16). In other words for a period of about a year (March 2002 to March 2003, when Josh was [allegedly] sent away) Josh continued to [allegedly] molest his victims (and possibly start on new ones, the timeline on that is unclear), including at least one outside the Duggar family. (Narrative #11 pretty clearly indicates a parent unwilling to submit/subject their child to a police interview, something not true of the other [alleged] victims who are pretty clearly members of the Duggar family.)
So coming back to the "what if it was your family" question, I'd hope that the primary focus would be helping the victims, not protecting the [hypothetical] perpetrator from consequences.
quote:
Originally posted by itsarumdo:
The fact that no-one here chooses to place their family in a TV show is beside the point.
I think it's a related but still important question. In this case I think the principle of "live by the People magazine profile, die by the People magazine profile" would seem to apply. More to the point, in most of these high profile molestation cases we've seen over the past several years there seems to be an underlying assumption that it is the duty of the press to conceal the wrongdoings of the powerful and/or famous. If it's legitimate for the media to publicize every Duggar wedding and birth, it seems like an enormous double standard for the press to deliberately conceal unflattering information, like the police report in question. Given that the police report we have now is the result of someone on the Oprah Show contacting authorities after being notified of an alleged problem (see p. 12-13) in 2006 it seems legitimate to question the degree to which the producers of 19 Kids and Counting (which started in 2008) were aware of this and willing to 'airbrush' it out of the family history.
[ 01. June 2015, 15:47: Message edited by: Crœsos ]
Posted by Tulfes (# 18000) on
:
On the last point raised by the last post, just a correction on the timeline of the TV programme. Although 18/19 Kids and Counting started as a series in 2008, there were 3 or possibly 4 "specials" starting in 2004 when Michelle Duggar was pregnant with number 15, Jackson Duggar. Later specials dealt with her 16th, 17th and 18th pregnancies (Johannah, Jennifer and Jordyn, in 2005, 2007 and 2008) before the series proper got underway in 2008. So the TV producers were well involved with the family before the police report of 2006 came into being. I haven't provided source material for the above, as it does not go directly to the allegations revealed in the last week or so, but will gladly do so if directed by a host. The point I am making is that the TV producers were already well involved with the family before 2006 and there may have been commercial considerations holding them back from dropping the show (speculation, but not going to the subject matter of the allegations)
Posted by Gwai (# 11076) on
:
Croesus,
I'll check in behind the scenes, but considering the possible disagreements about what is implied by various words, I'd say that the word alleged would be good to continue. It may be unnecessary, but there's no cost to staying safe.
Gwai,
Purgatory Host
Posted by orfeo (# 13878) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by lilBuddha:
Speaking to the general topic of sex offences, they are not in a category where youthful indiscretion is a factor.
This is your assertion. I don't see why that's true.
You then go on to talk about "impulse control". What's the difference between "indiscretion" and "lack of impulse control"?
Your line of argument now seems to be that there is some kind of line such that "sexual offences" involve activities that are wholly different in kind from anything that children would normally do, not just different in degree (let's leave aside the question of why bullying is only a problem when it's gone "too far").
I am not at all convinced by this. It is not true, for example, that children would only ever come into contact with each other's genital areas in an inherently abusive context.
Kids do in fact do things like "play doctor" and explore each other's bodies. This appears to be considered normal - after Doublethink said that most children who commit abuse have been themselves abused, I did a bit of online research and confirmed that this is the case, but the material I found went to some length to distinguish between normal childhood behaviour and abnormal, abusive behaviour.
In any case, I don't see how any of this tells against age being a mitigating factor. Even if I accepted your notion that the difference between a 14-year-old and an adult has to do with "impulse control" rather than "youthful indiscretion", why is that NOT a relevant mitigating factor when considering how to deal with a sexual offence by a 14-year-old as opposed to one by an adult?
I'm not sure you even understand what "mitigation" means. Sometimes it feels as if you're treating me as having said that a 14-year-old is automatically innocent and should face no consequence at all. At no stage have I actually said that!
[ 02. June 2015, 02:46: Message edited by: orfeo ]
Posted by Crœsos (# 238) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by orfeo:
It is not true, for example, that children would only ever come into contact with each other's genital areas in an inherently abusive context.
Kids do in fact do things like "play doctor" and explore each other's bodies. This appears to be considered normal . . .
Once again we see the lengths people will go to in order to excuse the actions of abusers. While "playing doctor" is fairly normal, that sort of thing typically involves children of roughly the same age who are both willing participants. This does not seem to be the [alleged] case with Josh Duggar. According to the police report Josh Dugger [allegedly] assaulted all his victims while they were asleep, and the basic math of the Duggar family indicates that if we accept the police report's timeline and assertion that Josh Duggar [allegedly] molested four of his sisters, his youngest [alleged] victim would have been 4 or 5 years old at the time. A fourteen or fifteen year old boy [allegedly] groping an unconscious five year old's chest and vagina (again going by the police report) is not what most people mean by "playing doctor".
Posted by lilBuddha (# 14333) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by orfeo:
I'm not sure you even understand what "mitigation" means.
mit·i·gate
ˈmidəˌɡāt/
verb
lessen the gravity of (an offense or mistake)
quote:
Originally posted by orfeo:
Sometimes it feels as if you're treating me as having said that a 14-year-old is automatically innocent and should face no consequence at all. At no stage have I actually said that!
Kinda felt this way to me. If you say you are not, I will accept that. I have not spoken of consequence, just of culpability.
Crœsos gives a solid explanation why a teen sexually touching a small child is not normal behaviour.
Posted by orfeo (# 13878) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by lilBuddha:
Crœsos gives a solid explanation why a teen sexually touching a small child is not normal behaviour.
I'm not suggesting it's normal. I'm just pointing out that the difference between "touching" and "sexually touching" is not so simple and black-and-white that we can declare that any child who touches another child between the waist and the thigh must be placed on the sex offenders list.
I thought that this resource was rather good at setting out the difference between normal and abnormal behaviour.
As for the definition of "mitigate": exactly. It says "lessen". Not "remove".
[ 02. June 2015, 04:27: Message edited by: orfeo ]
Posted by Curiosity killed ... (# 11770) on
:
lilBuddha, in my experience, teenagers (and children) who sexually abuse are often very confused and suffering from stress, shame, worry about the rest of their lives and access to college. An 11 year old who has been abused may not realise that boundaries are being crossed, may not be able to express what happened in their past that has changed their perceptions.
I've only found one of the students I've worked with with high risk assessments for sexually abusive behaviour emotionally challenging. He was so unashamed of what sounded like very predatory behaviour, from his own account: a 15 year old with a history of sexual relationships with 11 / 12 year old girls. He was awaiting trial for the offences, with bail conditions, which were incredibly difficult to enforce and educate him.
Posted by SvitlanaV2 (# 16967) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Lamb Chopped:
[American Christians are] NOT freaking powerful or influential. Despite what the media suggests about us dastardly conspiratorial Christians of whatever dull mainstream stripe. We just aren't. [...]
Remember that TV is all about the sell. Interesting/freaky/oddball/horrifying SELLS. Ordinary dull boring Christian does NOT sell. Which means no advertisers, no sponsors, no nothing.
I have no doubt we could get a "reality" show about so-called Christian swingers into production in a heartbeat. It would appeal to the same people who like "UFO stole my two-headed baby" stories.
Something balanced? Ha.
Yet a large proportion of Americans claim to be Christians, and the proportion of churchgoers in the USA is apparently higher than it is anywhere else in the West - and there's probably much more Christian diversity there too. Hollywood makes biblical films in the hope that all the Christians will flock to see them. Potential presidents are expected to display their Christian credentials. All this suggests that there should be interest in programming that reflects faith in its variety.
As outsiders to the USA, we're given rather schizophrenic cultural visions of a strident right wing evangelicalism on the one hand, and hedonistic abandon on the other. It doesn't make a lot of sense that the many American Christians who exist in between these two extremes are hardly ever given a public face. British TV, for all its faults, doesn't assume that extremism represents the only face of Christianity.
[ 02. June 2015, 12:04: Message edited by: SvitlanaV2 ]
Posted by lilBuddha (# 14333) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Curiosity killed ...:
lilBuddha, in my experience, teenagers (and children) who sexually abuse are often very confused and suffering from stress, shame, worry about the rest of their lives and access to college.
Being a teenager is being confused, suffering from stress, shame and worry about the rest of their lives.
It is not an automatic pass.
As I'm sure you are aware, most people who have been abused do not go on to abuse. Having been abused can be a contributing factor, but it is not an excuse.
Posted by Doublethink. (# 1984) on
:
True, but it does also mean that often when we are talking about a perpetrator - especially a minor - we are often also talking about a victim in one and the same person.
Over sexualised behaviour exhibited by a child is one of the things one looks for as a sign that that child may have been - or may be being at that time - sexually abused.
Consequently, in many cases, in child on child abuse - both children may need protection and treatment. And the authorities may well need to be trying to find an adult abuser in the immediate social circles around those children.
Likewise, child soldiers who are involved in war crimes are both victim and perpetrator - but dependent on their age, post-conflict intervention may centre on treating the effects of their victim-hood rather than treating them as adult murderers.
It not that that such things should not be reported, and safeguarding shouldn't happen, it is that the public interest is not always served by a solely punitive response after that reporting has happened. (Not least because it may lead families not to report, and therefore a lack of effective safeguarding and the creation of further victims.)
[ 02. June 2015, 15:41: Message edited by: Doublethink. ]
Posted by lilBuddha (# 14333) on
:
I don't disagree with any of that, Dt.
BTW, I haven't mention punishment beyond stating that is is a difficult thing.
Posted by Crœsos (# 238) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Doublethink.:
It not that that such things should not be reported, . . .
And yet one of the most predictable reactions to child molestation scandals that we've seen in recent years is that there always seems to be a series of apologists arguing why in this particular case the [beloved religious leader / famous entertainer / powerful politician / noted moral scold / whatever] in question shouldn't be (or "have been" for those cases discovered long after the fact) subjected to the normal procedures set up to handle such cases. And despite the fact that there are numerous well-known examples where the culture of silence and non-reporting made the situation much worse in the long run, the argument is still made. We've got numerous examples on this thread alone of exactly this argument. Are the various social service and law enforcement entities tasked with handling these sorts of things perfect or above criticism? Absolutely not. Are they better than trying to maintain a veil of secrecy that's more intent on hiding abuse than dealing with it? Almost always the answer is 'yes'.
Posted by Jengie jon (# 273) on
:
A minor detour into probability theory. Please remember that P(A|B) ~= P(B|A)
The probability that a white cat is deaf is not the same as the probability that a deaf cat is white.
Jengie
Posted by Doublethink. (# 1984) on
:
I suppose my point is that alot of this thread appears to focus on whether an alleged offender evaded punishment - my primary concern is that alleged victims were not safeguarded (and that may include the alleged offender himself).
Without knowing a great deal more than we do about the circumstances of the alleged offences, it is not possible to know if criminal prosecution would have been proportionate or appropriate.
Much as I dislike the version of Christianity the Duggars stand for - the fact that someone may have comitted a crime at some point in the past, whatever it may be, it does not mean they can have no moral view in the future. Nor does it mean they are incapable of rehabilitation.
One could argue that consciousness of one's own guilt should mean you never become a public moral crusader, but it is not rational to argue that a person can do so but only for specific moral positions.
[ 02. June 2015, 16:51: Message edited by: Doublethink. ]
Posted by Eutychus (# 3081) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Crœsos:
We've got numerous
That one specifically says the comment is nothing to do with the celebrity status. quote:
examples
And this one doesn't make the "celebrity trumps investigation" argument either. It says we simply don't know enough. quote:
on
Nothing about immunity for celebrities but, "keeping this general" a reflection, not a judgement, as to the wider potential consequences quote:
this
No celebrity plea. An indication of what can go wrong later. quote:
thread
Ditto.
In short, none of those links seeks, as you imply, to argue quote:
why in this particular case the [beloved religious leader / famous entertainer / powerful politician / noted moral scold / whatever] in question shouldn't be (or "have been" for those cases discovered long after the fact) subjected to the normal procedures set up to handle such cases.
quote:
Are the various social service and law enforcement entities tasked with handling these sorts of things perfect or above criticism? Absolutely not. Are they better than trying to maintain a veil of secrecy that's more intent on hiding abuse than dealing with it? Almost always the answer is 'yes'.
Perhaps. But sometimes those trying to maintain the veil of secrecy are the various social service and law enforcement entities, imbued with the notion that they must know the right answer, exactly as misguidedly as some parents/churches/etc can be.
Unfortunately, neither side has the monopoly on incompetence here, and neither side has the monopoly on the least bad outcome, either.
Posted by Lamb Chopped (# 5528) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by SvitlanaV2:
Yet a large proportion of Americans claim to be Christians, and the proportion of churchgoers in the USA is apparently higher than it is anywhere else in the West - and there's probably much more Christian diversity there too. Hollywood makes biblical films in the hope that all the Christians will flock to see them. Potential presidents are expected to display their Christian credentials. All this suggests that there should be interest in programming that reflects faith in its variety.
As outsiders to the USA, we're given rather schizophrenic cultural visions of a strident right wing evangelicalism on the one hand, and hedonistic abandon on the other. It doesn't make a lot of sense that the many American Christians who exist in between these two extremes are hardly ever given a public face. British TV, for all its faults, doesn't assume that extremism represents the only face of Christianity.
I wish you'd come here, stay for a while, and see for yourself. Look, ordinary Christians are not the only faceless group when it comes to TV. You are also not going to see depictions of the average family, for instance--the one with bills, ordinary worries, ordinary joys. What you will get are shows about extreme situations--polygamy, teen mothers, people living with dwarfism or cancer, people from extreme subcultures like the Duck dynasty stuff. Not average Joe and Jeanne, married or not, with a kid or two, with a car that breaks down, with worries about a job and a house and relatives--but nothing out of the ordinary. It would never sell.
Similarly you're not going to get coverage that focuses on moderate Republicans, or moderate Democrats, or moderate anything. Nobody's going to be shown on TV saying, "Ay, Obama, well, I disagree with him on some things, but by and large, he's not so bad." No school is ever going to get profiled for having quite decent grades and behavior standards, really. What you'll get instead are either apocalyptic doom-n-gloom (guns brought to school! Undercover police! Yes, it's ALL like that!) or else the way out there (Let's use quills for writing! Everyone takes Latin in first grade! Our students beat the whole US on test scores, because we have a Latino female fire-breathing dragon for a principal!)
And since the TV/media in the US is almost completely market-driven, why should we expect to see anything else? We just don't HAVE any major paternalistic or maternalistic agencies out there to say "You really ought to have THIS kind of programming, instead, it's more socially beneficial (to say nothing of more true)." Where's the money to come from? PBS (public nonprofit TV) has to do major fundraisers all the time, and grant money is hard to come by, and it's a minority who watches it at all anyway. The rest of TV production depends on advertisers. Who want eyes on screens, and to hell with social benefits and equal representation.
This is why parents spend so much angst on the issue of trying to drag kids away from the boob tube, and why we focus so much on teaching them in our schools to filter out bullshit from TV/internet. I've had to do a LOT of that in my alternate lives as an English teacher/professor. It's fast becoming a primary function.
I have no idea where British TV gets its funding from. But I rather suspect you have sources and resources not available to US TV. Not to mention a number of general social attitudes that plain don't exist here.
Anyway.
Let me address the first bit of what you wrote. Lots of Christians? Well, maybe. Enough to make a market for the very occasional biblical film (though NOT, you notice, without the usual Hollywood "spiffing up" aka distortion in the interests of sensationalism). Which a lot of watchers, including Christians, won't catch, as so many are biblically illiterate.
Presidents having to show Christian credentials? Meh. What you have to do is show alleged MORAL credentials. Which is why a Mormon made it as far as he did in the last race, and why Jimmy Carter got bagged on all the time for actually believing all that stuff and letting it affect his actions. (Mustn't go that far, of course!) Basically what you must have is church membership in a mainstream denomination, the duller the better (we're not looking for much more than that as an electorate, and we'll get squeamish about active activity such as teaching or preaching, or even membership in some of the denominations with a more "active" reputation.) and an ability to make broad sweeping statements that can't offend anybody (for example, Muslims/Jews/extreme patriots/other Christian groups, which means avoiding a lot of potholes, most notably all but the most glancing of references to Jesus). So no praying in Jesus' name or mentions of Christian doctrine where anybody can hear you, which includes your private life (which won't be private, of course). But you can quote him as a great human teacher all you want, and it will add to your moral cred (don't ever come out and say that, but do act from that perspective and you'll be all right).
TL;DR version: If you're getting your understanding of America from our media, God help you.
![[Killing me]](graemlins/killingme.gif)
Posted by fletcher christian (# 13919) on
:
Posted by LB:
quote:
No, it isn't. What it is is complicated.
Time affects so much, both in quality of real memories and what may be false memory. Memory is a less solid thing than we tend to think and time complicates this.
Time degrades evidence of all sorts.
Limiting prosecution time is a reasonable concept that is often poorly applied.
For those who have suffered abuse or rape, I would suspect that the event is forever burned in their brain; much as they might love to try and forget it. It takes enormous courage to pursue a case and parents are unlikely to want to put a rush on it and drag their already traumatised child through the court and legal system. The passing of time would seem to me to be a crucial factor in enabling abuse survivors to reach a point when they are able to face it enough to go to court.
Posted by Crœsos (# 238) on
:
Eutychus - Celebrity is only marginally relevant to my point. There are always those who argue against reporting abuse, regardless of the fame of the [alleged] perpetrator. Any detail will be grasped at to justify this conclusion. It's only more obvious with celebrity cases because those are the [alleged] perpetrators we hear about unless we're personally acquainted with one of the [alleged] parties in a much less well known case. One of the factors that might contribute to this tendency is that the [alleged] perpetrators are at least marginally known to us, if not by celebrity then simply by the reporting of the case at hand, while the [alleged] victims are very often unknown and faceless.
Posted by lilBuddha (# 14333) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by fletcher christian:
Posted by LB:
quote:
No, it isn't. What it is is complicated.
Time affects so much, both in quality of real memories and what may be false memory. Memory is a less solid thing than we tend to think and time complicates this.
Time degrades evidence of all sorts.
Limiting prosecution time is a reasonable concept that is often poorly applied.
For those who have suffered abuse or rape, I would suspect that the event is forever burned in their brain; much as they might love to try and forget it.
Yes. The event(s) for the victim. Corroborating evidence, behaviour and witnesses, not as much. There is also perception of others. "Why did you wait so long"?
But, the false memory I was speaking of was not for real victims, but referencing "repressed" memory. No saying that one cannot repress a real memory, but that the abuse of the concept is especially susceptible to time.
quote:
Originally posted by fletcher christian:
It takes enormous courage to pursue a case and parents are unlikely to want to put a rush on it and drag their already traumatised child through the court and legal system. The passing of time would seem to me to be a crucial factor in enabling abuse survivors to reach a point when they are able to face it enough to go to court.
Yes, it takes courage. Yes it is difficult. But time is still a negative factor.
I can tell you from direct experience that a traumatic event can leave permanent scars. But just as with physical scars, the edges can get soft. I have mental images and experience physical sensations based on the events. And they are sharp, and they are vivid. But on either side and in between, things are not as defined. In an official complaint, there is more to dealing with trauma than the actual event. Time elapsed is rarely a friend in a courtroom.
[ 02. June 2015, 18:04: Message edited by: lilBuddha ]
Posted by Porridge (# 15405) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by fletcher christian:
For those who have suffered abuse or rape, I would suspect that the event is forever burned in their brain; much as they might love to try and forget it.
I am a survivor of rape (as a young woman) and of physical and emotional abuse (in childhood). I have also spent part of my professional life assisting other rape survivors through recovery from the initial trauma and through, in some cases, the further trauma of the criminal justice proceedings when they reported.
The amount of stigma and consequent secrecy which surrounds rape, especially, has led, IMO, to a great deal of utter nonsense about its aftermath. Of course, every case is different, because the victims, circumstances, and perps are different too.
There are undoubtedly some rape survivors who remain permanently damaged by the trauma. So much depends not only on what she was put through, the nature of the perp and his triggers, the victim's own beliefs and attitudes about rape before it happened and what it means for and about her going forward, her own coping resources, and above all, what support she has from those near & dear to her, her ability to access that support and their ability to provide it, and on and on, we simply cannot generalize about the long-term effects of rape on those who have survived it.
I have known some survivors to pick up the pieces and move on with their lives six months. I have known two who killed themselves within a year of the event. I have known plenty who fall between these extremes.
IMO, it's less than helpful for all of us who deal with sexual violence and its survivors to carry in our heads the notion that "the rape is burned in their brains" or "they're forever scarred."
Let survivors be who -- and how -- they actually, really are as they work, in their own good time at their own pace, through recovery. They have their own sh*t to deal with and do not need the added burden of coping with others' headfuls of rubbish about them.
I am some three decades past an assault which lasted several hours, resulted in both stab wounds and emotional damage, and a trial which resulted initially in a hung jury.
I hardly ever think about either the rape itself or the trial. For me, it only comes up when the topic of sex assault comes up. After the rape, I married (and divorced); I returned to school to pursue a grad degree; embarked on a career which I've both pursued and changed successfully, and (aside from being now single and also childless in middle-age-getting-on-for-seniordom) am pretty much indistinguishable from other women of my age and class. No one can tell, from observing me as I traverse a dark parking lot or city block all alone to my car, that I am a quivering mass of terrified nerves teetering on the brink of panic, hypervigilant and awaiting attack, because, guess what? I'm not.
Many of us not only survive, we also recover. Some of us don't. We are not all necessarily fragile emotional teacups, sans saucers, perched on a loose shelf, needing only a breeze from an open window to topple us into helpless pieces.
Posted by Eutychus (# 3081) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Crœsos:
[alleged] perpetrators are at least marginally known to us, if not by celebrity then simply by the reporting of the case at hand, while the [alleged] victims are very often unknown and faceless.
Let's talk about [alleged] a bit.
I know plenty of people who I'm quite satisfied are abuse victims and not making it up.
I also know a poor sod who is a) an actual victim of child abuse b) whose testimony, with that of others, [in my and many many others' view] aided, abetted, and coerced by deluded investigators and badly trained social workers, helped put a large number of other wholly innocent people [as ruled on appeal] in jail. I'm obviously not going to go into details here, but the evidence putting them in the clear is overwhelming (e.g. being on the wrong continent at the time of the [alleged] offence). One of them died in prison before they were all acquitted on appeal.
And I know another poor sod who is a) an actual, confessed perpetrator of child abuse b) whose testimony also helped achieve all of the above.
I'm all for victims having a voice. What I'm not for is their voice being exploited by other people with conscious or unconscious agendas, sometimes to the extent of getting them to make stuff up. I'm also in favour of perpetrators being held to account and dealt with accordingly.
While I think criminal proceedings can and sometimes should play a role, I think sentences and sentencing measures are very often shots in the dark and that all too often, neither victims, nor perpetrators, nor society at large are well-served as a result. I am definitely not in favour of there being no statute of limitations on such cases.
Also in my direct experience, well-publicised cases may create scope for discussion, but they are terrible starting-points for setting precedents in practice. They are usually extreme cases, which are commonly held to make bad laws.
[ 02. June 2015, 19:29: Message edited by: Eutychus ]
Posted by cliffdweller (# 13338) on
:
dipping in to thank both Lamb Chopped and Porridge for their very different-- but both very helpful in brining insight/awareness-- posts.
Posted by Crœsos (# 238) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Lamb Chopped:
Presidents having to show Christian credentials? Meh. What you have to do is show alleged MORAL credentials. Which is why a Mormon made it as far as he did in the last race, and why Jimmy Carter got bagged on all the time for actually believing all that stuff and letting it affect his actions. (Mustn't go that far, of course!) Basically what you must have is church membership in a mainstream denomination, the duller the better (we're not looking for much more than that as an electorate, and we'll get squeamish about active activity such as teaching or preaching, or even membership in some of the denominations with a more "active" reputation.)
Which doesn't explain why so many Republican presidential hopefuls were so eager to be pictured with Josh Duggar (at least until recently). I'm not sure I'd call the Duggars' quiverfull version of evangelicalism "a mainstream denomination, the duller the better", but it must be since that's the image a whole lot of candidates, both declared and potential, were seeking to be associated with. It's also not the kind of description I'd apply to Jerry Falwell's Liberty University, Ted Cruz's chosen backdrop to announce his candidacy. The ironically misnamed Liberty University doesn't seem like the kind of place that's "squeamish about active activity such as teaching or preaching", and yet at least one party's candidates seem to be rushing to be associated with it. I mean, if we take your assertion at face value we'd expect presidential hopefuls to avoid places like Liberty U. like the plague, but the opposite seems to be the case.
Posted by Lamb Chopped (# 5528) on
:
Reread it and you'll note I was discussing which denomination to belong to, if you are a presidential hopeful--not which photo ops to take (all of them, basically. It takes some doing to have candidates turn you down).
Posted by orfeo (# 13878) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Crœsos:
quote:
Originally posted by orfeo:
It is not true, for example, that children would only ever come into contact with each other's genital areas in an inherently abusive context.
Kids do in fact do things like "play doctor" and explore each other's bodies. This appears to be considered normal . . .
Once again we see the lengths people will go to in order to excuse the actions of abusers. While "playing doctor" is fairly normal, that sort of thing typically involves children of roughly the same age who are both willing participants. This does not seem to be the [alleged] case with Josh Duggar. According to the police report Josh Dugger [allegedly] assaulted all his victims while they were asleep, and the basic math of the Duggar family indicates that if we accept the police report's timeline and assertion that Josh Duggar [allegedly] molested four of his sisters, his youngest [alleged] victim would have been 4 or 5 years old at the time. A fourteen or fifteen year old boy [allegedly] groping an unconscious five year old's chest and vagina (again going by the police report) is not what most people mean by "playing doctor".
I thought it was sufficiently clear I wasn't talking about a specific case, but in the abstract.
Apparently it wasn't sufficiently clear, so let me say it to you explicitly: if you read any of my references to "children" as "members of the Duggar family", you're reading it wrong.
Posted by orfeo (# 13878) on
:
I also want to say that, thinking about this thread overnight, I came to views that I think are similar to Doublethink's.
Why is there such a heavy focus on Josh Duggar?
Let me just accept here that he did something wrong at age 14. He's admitted that much himself in his own words, whatever the precise details are.
Is there any evidence that he continued to do something wrong afterwards?
Is there any evidence that he has proclivities to do something wrong NOW?
As far as I'm aware the answer is 'No' on both counts.
Which is actually the most important thing in relation to what he did. The primary purpose of dealing with a person who, at age 14, does something improper or criminal isn't to see to it that they're permanently labelled as a sexual predator or thief or whatever, it's to see to it that they don't grow up still doing it or escalate the wrong behaviour.
That's what seems to be missing from the conversation here. I get that there's a reason why certain procedures are in place, and they are (or should be!) based on best practice, but amongst all the criticism of what his parents did do or didn't do is missing a recognition that, in terms of Josh's behaviour, the right outcome appears to have been achieved.
This is striking, because normally when a whole lot of finger-pointing and blaming is going on it's because there's been a bad outcome. Here, it's... I don't know, I think it's because this family is dispensing moral advice and we only accept moral advice from people whose flaws we're unaware of? I haven't got a damn clue why these people are "famous" in the first place so I have no opinion of them as a TV family.
I think it's far more relevant to be asking whether the right outcome has been achieved for the Duggar's other children. I've no idea. Because everyone's so focused on saying "look at what the parents did/didn't do with Josh" without actually linking it to how he turned out, we've no real idea whether his siblings have turned out okay or not.
[ 03. June 2015, 03:10: Message edited by: orfeo ]
Posted by Curiosity killed ... (# 11770) on
:
There are so many assumptions in the reactions here:
- that the children involved in child on child sexual abuse know what they are doing is wrong (if it's happened to them they don't necessarily know - that's why abusers are often abused);
- that because the prurient world hasn't been told something is happening, nothing is actually happening - there are a lot of very good reasons, said prurience being one of them, for not telling the world about the treatment of the victims and the sex offenders;
- that once a young person has done something that is seen as being sexually offensive they are unable to change, ever.
Confidentiality rules apply in all sorts of directions - if someone is on bail awaiting trial they may well be found innocent so anyone working with that person cannot broadcast unfounded accusations at that stage. That doesn't mean that things aren't put in place. All activities have to be risk assessed to ensure that others are not put at risk. The bail conditions may limit access to other children - which can mean insisting a teenager has no access to mobile phones.
There are risks to the young person of being placed on the sex offenders register, without actually being lynched by the public and the media if that becomes public. It can affect their future employment and these days it can also affect anyone living with them.
The possibilities of treatment: I am no expert, but I really don't feel comfortable that a single event or a few events when a child is 14, 13, 12 or 11 means that they are labelled for life without a chance of treatment and rehabilitation. Particularly if that young person has been previously sexually abused themselves to skew their understandings.
Posted by Eutychus (# 3081) on
:
CK: I agree with much of what you say here (as, I think, do many other posters, so not sure who you think are making these assumptions) but I had to respond to this: quote:
Originally posted by Curiosity killed ...:
(if it's happened to them they don't necessarily know - that's why abusers are often abused)
Firstly, it may be true that abusers are often abused, but in my experience it is not true that all abuse victims go on to abuse or that all abusers were themselves abused. I suspect good statistics are hard to come by. Especially if the assumed victims-turned-perps don't even know they've been abused.
Secondly, while it may be true that victims can be abused unawares, the way you've put that makes another assumption - that in certain situations, abuse has happened even when it's not recalled.
I've followed at close quarters a case in which investigators were so convinced wide-scale abuse had happened, by their actions and their questions they contributed to alleged child victims and alleged perpetrators actually making stuff up to tie in with their fantasy.
I seem to remember something like this happening in a case in the UK about 20 years ago, too.
Of course it is terrible to have been an actual victim and not be believed or given a voice.
But I find it equally terrifying that investigators can so easily become enthralled by the "delicious terror" of abuse that they allow their own fantasies to override professional ethics and practice.
I have seen the results of both.
[ 03. June 2015, 07:02: Message edited by: Eutychus ]
Posted by Curiosity killed ... (# 11770) on
:
Yes, sorry I was being unclear, and I totally agree that most abusers do not go on to be abused - in fact, from experience, I could probably put anecdotal numbers on that one.
But ... from where I'm sitting, having worked over the last 7 or 8 years with children that cannot be placed in schools for various reasons*, there is a big question mark over very young abusers as to their previous experiences. There the suggestive evidence is the abusive behaviour - as hinted at by Doublethink earlier in the thread. And in those cases those youngsters may not realise that their behaviour is inappropriate as it is normal to them.
* A significant proportion are on the sex offenders register.
[ 03. June 2015, 07:16: Message edited by: Curiosity killed ... ]
Posted by Eutychus (# 3081) on
:
OK. And in my experience re: kids like that, I would be just as likely to suspect any foster family as the kids' home family.
Followed not too far behind by a working theory that such kids get canny quickly to survive, and pick up ways of grabbing attention, more easily than adults might suspect, simply by hanging around social workers' offices and clients a lot and eavesdropping on what's said.
[ 03. June 2015, 07:24: Message edited by: Eutychus ]
Posted by Curiosity killed ... (# 11770) on
:
Yes, definitely - care placements raise their own issues. However, sometimes patterns arise that make allegations sound more realistic. (If the same accusations keep coming up about the same places, for example.) The other problem is that allegations can be a testing of the water to see the reaction before making the real accusation.
However transient stepfathers followed by aberrant behaviours can raise big question marks too.
Posted by Crœsos (# 238) on
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quote:
Originally posted by orfeo:
Why is there such a heavy focus on Josh Duggar?
Let me just accept here that he did something wrong at age 14. He's admitted that much himself in his own words, whatever the precise details are.
Sort of. As I've already noted Josh Duggar's confession and apology [FB] is almost entirely an exercise in PR and damage control. The clincher for me was that his most direct analysis of the consequences of his actions was "I understood that if I continued down this wrong road that I would end up ruining my life". Yep, it's all about him.
quote:
Originally posted by orfeo:
Is there any evidence that he continued to do something wrong afterwards?
Is there any evidence that he has proclivities to do something wrong NOW?
As far as I'm aware the answer is 'No' on both counts.
Since we're not aware very far at all about this, the answer would seem to more along the lines of 'we don't know'.
At the moment the evidence that Josh has [allegedly] stopped abusing consists pretty much of his assertion that he has (see the previously linked confession/apology/press release) and his parents' assertion of the same (ibid). The big problem with this is that according to the police report Josh was [allegedly] caught abusing three times before he [allegedly] stopped (see p. 14-15). While we can't be absolutely certain, it seems incredibly likely that Josh also said he was sorry and would stop the first two times he was caught. Why is the present statement of contrition and reform much more reliable than the first two?
This seems so incredibly familiar. How many child molestation scandals have we had recently that were exacerbated when the perpetrators' highly self-motivated statements of contrition and promises to never re-offend were taken as completely reliable? While I agree that youthful [alleged] molesters are less likely to re-offend than adult ones, I'm dubious that constitutes a reason to take their promises on the subject as completely reliable.
quote:
Originally posted by orfeo:
That's what seems to be missing from the conversation here. I get that there's a reason why certain procedures are in place, and they are (or should be!) based on best practice, but amongst all the criticism of what his parents did do or didn't do is missing a recognition that, in terms of Josh's behaviour, the right outcome appears to have been achieved.
Moved your bold to the appropriate word for you. You're welcome. [DELETED] I'm not sure judging by appearances is a good idea in this case. It's possible that the apparent outcome is the actual one, but just assuming appearance = reality is part the reason of why these situations can get so out of hand.
[If the allegation you are making in the deleted section has been reported then link to it. Otherwise, see warnings above - Eliab]
[ 03. June 2015, 15:10: Message edited by: Eliab ]
Posted by Crœsos (# 238) on
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quote:
Originally posted by Lamb Chopped:
Reread it and you'll note I was discussing which denomination to belong to, if you are a presidential hopeful--not which photo ops to take (all of them, basically. It takes some doing to have candidates turn you down).
Political analysis of tangential topic here, in a more appropriate thread.
Posted by Tulfes (# 18000) on
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Suggestion here that the Duggars may continue on TV. And why not.
Posted by orfeo (# 13878) on
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Croesos, all I have to say in response is that I think "innocent until proven guilty" means something. If the answer is "we don't know", then it's not appropriate in my view to say "we know he was doing something 13 years ago as a child, so let's err on the side of presuming he's still doing something".
It is actually this attitude towards sexual offences that makes genuine rehabilitation so damn difficult. Society seems to have concluded, based on some cases of lifelong offending, that this is just true for everybody. We make life hell for former offenders on that basis, in a way we don't seem to do for any other kind of criminal offence.
Posted by North East Quine (# 13049) on
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The Duggar's believe that women should dress "modestly" because of the effect "immodest" dress has on men.
Here Michelle Duggar (the mother) explains that:
quote:
And in general we don't do a lot of swimming events where swimming suits are worn because it's just too hard for the guys to try to keep their eyes averted in those situations.
and here Jim Bob Duggar (the father) explains that:
quote:
when a guy sees a girl dance, it really can be defrauding to a guy, especially if they're dressed immodestly. The definition of defrauding would be building up sensual desires that you cannot rightfully fulfill.
Whilst the message about "modesty" is aimed at the girls, I wonder what the impact is on a male teen, being told that men can be helpless in the face of an "immodestly" dressed woman? Especially given that "immodest" includes normal swimwear in normal swimming situations.
( Not specifically talking about Josh Duggar here, but the whole set up, in which the responsibility for male sexual desire is placed on the females.)
Posted by North East Quine (# 13049) on
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Double posting because I've just found another:
Here Michelle states that "even though they have leggings on underneath" (their dresses) her small daughters were discouraged from headstands etc at quite a young age. No mention of restricting the boys rough and tumble, "modesty" only impacts on the girls at this age.
Posted by Athrawes (# 9594) on
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As a general point related to this, does anyone more familiar with 'Purity Culture' know what attitude prevails with regard to sexual assault victims? Are they held to be partially responsible for what happens? Or considered to be unpure? Genuine question, but not specific to the OP
Posted by fletcher christian (# 13919) on
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Posted by Porridge:
quote:
I am a survivor of rape (as a young woman) and of physical and emotional abuse (in childhood). I have also spent part of my professional life assisting other rape survivors through recovery from the initial trauma and through, in some cases, the further trauma of the criminal justice proceedings when they reported.
The amount of stigma and consequent secrecy which surrounds rape, especially, has led, IMO, to a great deal of utter nonsense about its aftermath. Of course, every case is different, because the victims, circumstances, and perps are different too.
There are undoubtedly some rape survivors who remain permanently damaged by the trauma. So much depends not only on what she was put through, the nature of the perp and his triggers, the victim's own beliefs and attitudes about rape before it happened and what it means for and about her going forward, her own coping resources, and above all, what support she has from those near & dear to her, her ability to access that support and their ability to provide it, and on and on, we simply cannot generalize about the long-term effects of rape on those who have survived it.
I have known some survivors to pick up the pieces and move on with their lives six months. I have known two who killed themselves within a year of the event. I have known plenty who fall between these extremes.
IMO, it's less than helpful for all of us who deal with sexual violence and its survivors to carry in our heads the notion that "the rape is burned in their brains" or "they're forever scarred."
Let survivors be who -- and how -- they actually, really are as they work, in their own good time at their own pace, through recovery. They have their own sh*t to deal with and do not need the added burden of coping with others' headfuls of rubbish about them.
I am some three decades past an assault which lasted several hours, resulted in both stab wounds and emotional damage, and a trial which resulted initially in a hung jury.
I hardly ever think about either the rape itself or the trial. For me, it only comes up when the topic of sex assault comes up. After the rape, I married (and divorced); I returned to school to pursue a grad degree; embarked on a career which I've both pursued and changed successfully, and (aside from being now single and also childless in middle-age-getting-on-for-seniordom) am pretty much indistinguishable from other women of my age and class. No one can tell, from observing me as I traverse a dark parking lot or city block all alone to my car, that I am a quivering mass of terrified nerves teetering on the brink of panic, hypervigilant and awaiting attack, because, guess what? I'm not.
Many of us not only survive, we also recover. Some of us don't. We are not all necessarily fragile emotional teacups, sans saucers, perched on a loose shelf, needing only a breeze from an open window to topple us into helpless pieces.
I appreciate your honesty in sharing your own story, but you assume a lot; nine paragraphs to be exact, none of which I actually stated yet you have imputed I believed and held to. I have to be honest, I found it quite offensive.
All of my post was in reference to the statute of limitations where an actual crime has been committed (not an inferred one, nor a repressed memory brought out under hypnosis with gross suggestion). I went on to state that trauma tends to get indelibly burned upon our brains. This is pretty much common to all human beings, whether that trauma be through abuse or the death of a loved one, or whatever. We also have the capacity to remember in particularly vivid terms, strange and curious details and we may not be sure why we have that detail written large in the memory. In rare circumstances the trauma is so great that the mind removes (or cuts off access) all memory of the event and in some cases this takes the passage of time before details of it begin to trickle back; in rare cases it never does. I agree that everyone reacts differently to trauma. Some people have incredible coping mechanisms and deal with trauma extremely efficiently - others don't. Hence, the statute of limitations is deeply flawed as a 'one rule fits all' scenario that in fact ends up denying a significant proportion of the victims of crime a right to justice. The fact that you have dealt efficiently and well with trauma does not mean that everyone in the same circumstances will react in exactly the same way you did and regardless of the reaction afterwards, the memory is still there and a part of the make up of the person, in exactly the same way that the death of a loved one becomes a part of that person and their experiences and a memory that is burned in their brain. My suggestion that a memory is planted permanently in the brain does not mean they live the rest of their life as a gibbering wreck - that was your implied suggestion, not mine.
There is also a perception among the general public that in the courts a conviction is possible based on the statement of the victim/survivor alone. While I can't speak for the American justice system, this is certainly not the case where I live. The statement of the victim/survivor is taken into account with corroborating evidence. Where that corroborating evidence is absent, no conviction can be made. The corroborating evidence in some cases may require evidence and further statements by other parties, who for various reasons may not (or should not) give that evidence or statement until a later stage; thus the passage of time is a necessity. On that basis and considering what I have already stated, I find the statute of limitations to be a farce.
Posted by itsarumdo (# 18174) on
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There are quite a few misconceptions there, Fletcher
One is that "trauma is burned indelibly in our brains" - there are clearly defined approaches and techniques for de-traumatising high end trauma even years after it happened, to the point that Dutch researchers have seen using brain scans a 70% recovery of hypothalamic volume following "successful" therapy - i.e. the event is a memory, but no longer an emotionally traumatic or dissociative one. And the functional areas of the brain that were no longer used during decades of traumatised states - are able to be re-connected and used normally. The difficulty is that therapists skilled enough to apply these approaches successfully with most people and in a reasonable timeframe (which may still extend to several years in some circumstances) are in far smaller supply than the number of people already in need of attention.
There are also clearly defined situations and mental states and attitudes that can largely be constructed or cultivated that make people more trauma-proof (i.e. resilient) or diffuse the trauma more effectively. A lot of this was learned (or at least collected) in research programmes following 9/11 and by trauma and resilience research by the US military. One offshoot of it is personality profiling for identifying particularly resilient personality traits for recruiting into special forces. So - only a relatively small proportion of the people caught up in 9/11 are still suffering trauma. Most have it as an unpleasant but otherwise recallable memory that no longer "traumatises" them.
And I can state quite categorically that the decision to think of oneself as traumatised or as some kind of victim is one of the major factors that retains trauma and does "burn it on our brains". OK - it's not quite that simple. Sometimes this is not a conscious decision or even one that can be said to be "made" by the person, or one that they have conscious wilful control over - but nevertheless it is the thinking about trauma that tends to retain trauma, and the focus on normality and what works and provides emotional nourishment in life that rebuilds resilience, or at the very least contains the trauma to manageable levels. People tend to do this naturally by restricting their life so that triggers are not part of their life - but the problem with this is that life becomes narrower an narrower - so one way or another the only sensible way out is finding - proactively or not - ways of being more aware of our own capacities and resources, and signs of external support of various kinds. Big topic. Books by Glenn Schiraldi (a US military-funded researcher) are particularly accessible and a useful place to start.
The complexity of trauma - and the way that individuals are affected (or not) in so many different ways - means that to think of "rape victims" as all in one category is not that far from a slightly re-packaged form of racism. in one of my therapy training courses, the founder of the school gave us serious food for thought with one of his case histories. Here a very young child had been sexually groomed by her father. But aside from the usual boundary issues this causes, the main trauma that affected her adult life was thinking that somehow she had acted in a way that drew attention to her father and got him convicted and imprisoned. "Rape Victims" are a construct of the media and of a legal system that demands there be a victim - in fact - we have a load of individuals who have one common thread in their lives that has caused them to be grouped together. This mass labelling (and its pitfalls) is a vast topic in its own right.
Punishment, atonement, retribution, removal of dangerous persons from society and "justice" via a legal system - will never be perfect as long as we also do our best to make sure that we don't convict innocent people. And will never please everyone, regardless of the outcome. And in the case of personal violence will always be in danger of increasing trauma, because someone has to stand up there and be a witness, and have to be pulled apart to some degree by defence lawyers. But again I see that also acted out with personal injury claims on insurance - the legal battle one way or another pays a premium on remaining damaged until some result is achieved. Some people - when and if they become aware of this insidious motivation creeping in - are able to separate from it. Not everyone.
wrt incest and the case of the thread, one major theme that tends to arise that runs particularly deeply is one of betrayal by the adults who were meant to provide protection and siblings who were meant to be good friends. Being dragged and displayed round the media - and by chat boards like this one all over the internet... whilst a few might feel validated by this public discussion, for most people it just increases the exposure, increases the shame, and adds insult to injury.
Just to finish, wrt to "repressed memory" and suggestion... There are some truly horrific acts regularly committed by apparently respectable people who rely on this "repressed memory = false memory" myth to keep getting away with it. Any therapist who specialises in sexual trauma is specifically trained to neither suggest or interpret. This is a current issue in the UK after an incredibly naive and biased BBC documentary was shown last week. The fact is that society doesn't like to admit that it has a few incredibly rotten apples at its core, and these people often do their best to get jobs which allow them to protect through "the system" both themselves and their "friends". Jimmy Saville was a maverick who attracted unpleasant people around him - but there are far more organised and dangerous groups who these myths protect. Practically speaking, if anyone is driven past a certain point of trauma, they dissociate and lose waking access to memories of "causal events" - sometimes for decades - whilst the trauma still plays out in their behaviour. This fact has been known and used maliciously for a long time.
Posted by Crœsos (# 238) on
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quote:
Originally posted by orfeo:
Croesos, all I have to say in response is that I think "innocent until proven guilty" means something.
Yes, it's a very important legal standard applied by courts. It's not meant to be a rule for the general populace. To paraphrase A Man For All Seasons, a court must construe according to the law but the world may construe according to its wits.
quote:
Originally posted by orfeo:
If the answer is "we don't know", then it's not appropriate in my view to say "we know he was doing something 13 years ago as a child, so let's err on the side of presuming he's still doing something".
It may seem unfair to the former embezzler that he can't have his old job at the bank back, but I don't think it's "inappropriate" for a bank manager to take that position. It seems similarly unrealistic to insist that Brenda Clough, to cite a Ship-based and fairly emphatic example, be required to give someone like Josh Duggar unsupervised access to her daughter. "Innocent until proven guilty" doesn't stretch anywhere near that far.
quote:
Originally posted by orfeo:
It is actually this attitude towards sexual offences that makes genuine rehabilitation so damn difficult.
I'd argue that what makes genuine rehabilitation of sex offenders so difficult is the deep-seated nature of their compulsion. Quite frankly, anyone motivated to commit further sex offenses because people don't trust him after his last string of sex offenses seems downright sociopathic.
quote:
Originally posted by fletcher christian:
I went on to state that trauma tends to get indelibly burned upon our brains. This is pretty much common to all human beings, whether that trauma be through abuse or the death of a loved one, or whatever. We also have the capacity to remember in particularly vivid terms, strange and curious details and we may not be sure why we have that detail written large in the memory. In rare circumstances the trauma is so great that the mind removes (or cuts off access) all memory of the event and in some cases this takes the passage of time before details of it begin to trickle back; in rare cases it never does.
It's my understanding that memories aren't typically repressed in isolated cases of trauma (one time events). It's more typically a reaction to long-term, ongoing trauma on a continuing or constant basis.
Posted by Porridge (# 15405) on
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quote:
Originally posted by fletcher christian:
I appreciate your honesty in sharing your own story, but you assume a lot; nine paragraphs to be exact, none of which I actually stated yet you have imputed I believed and held to. I have to be honest, I found it quite offensive.
Fletcher Christian, it was not my intention to offend you. For doing so, I apologize. That said, I myself was offended by aspects of your post. Specifically, these phrases:
quote:
Originally posted by fletcher christian:
I would suspect that the event is forever burned in their brain; much as they might love to try and forget it.
and
quote:
Originally posted by fletcher christian:
The passing of time would seem to me to be a crucial factor in enabling abuse survivors to reach a point when they are able to face it enough to go to court.
Both suggest to me an image (one you might possibly be holding, whether consciously or not) of rape victims as (A) out-of-control, and (B) permanently crippled in some fashion. That – and nothing to do with the statute of limitations (about which I also have opinions, but that’s another matter) – was what I was responding to.
In point of fact, regaining a sense of control is the beginning part of most survivors’ recovery. What rape generally does to its victims (besides the obvious) is remove, usually but not always temporarily (though temporary can sometimes mean years), a sense of personal autonomy. That is, I get to say whether or not I engage in Activity X.
The first step in this process is often, paradoxically, a form of self-blame. Survivors often search for ways in which they might have avoided / prevented the attack through something they could have done differently. “If only I had left earlier. If I hadn’t said or done X. If I lived in a different place,” etc. etc. Others may interpret this as self-blame (and sometimes it is; God knows, there are plenty of socially-condoned messages Out There which DO blame victims for their victimization), but – provided the survivor is allowed to continue processing her experience – she often, through this process, begins to re-establish the sense of control and autonomy she had before the attack.
So the implication – by claiming that survivors cannot “forget,” however hard they try, something they’d rather not focus on – is that survivors are no longer in control of their own inner workings. This is very hard for this survivor to hear. You have no idea how hard I worked or for how long to regain my own sense of control.
The second issue is about memory. I am old enough, and far enough from this and other significant life events, to know just how fluid human memories are. We aren’t bio-video-recorders. Even as memories are being laid down as events unfold, we are selecting some details and suppressing others. Not only that, but what we recall 10 minutes after the fact will differ markedly from how we recall the same event a week, a month, a year, a decade, later.
As recovery proceeds, we continue processing memories of the event, re-interpreting them, assigning different “weights” and meanings to the bits that make them up, until finally, we have re-shaped the original into something we can live with, or stash, or suppress, or deal with in whatever way we can. And as Itsarumdo also points out, that’s different for each individual.
I have shared my experience IRL with a few selected individuals since I recovered, and have nearly always regretted it. Why? Precisely because most of the time, I find the other party instantly slots me into a “class” labeled “rape victims,” from which I am then never allowed to escape. Suddenly, I find myself handled with kid gloves. Men, particularly, become wary of me, as though I might suddenly, with neither warning nor reason, accuse them of rape. It’s a decidedly unpleasant experience. You had no way of knowing this, but it was this which aroused my ire and colored my response.
Again, my apologies for causing offense, coupled with a respectful request that you might re-consider or re-examine your own beliefs about victims, survivors, and recovery.
Posted by fletcher christian (# 13919) on
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Posted by Itsarumdo:
quote:
There are quite a few misconceptions there, Fletcher
I'm sorry, I'm not following. Where are the misconceptions in regards to the context of the statute of limitation?
Posted by fletcher christian (# 13919) on
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Posted by Porridge:
quote:
Both suggest to me an image (one you might possibly be holding, whether consciously or not) of rape victims as (A) out-of-control, and (B) permanently crippled in some fashion.
I can categorically assure you that I hold to neither of those assumptions in a conscious or unconscious manner.
Posted by Porridge (# 15405) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by fletcher christian:
Posted by Porridge:
quote:
Both suggest to me an image (one you might possibly be holding, whether consciously or not) of rape victims as (A) out-of-control, and (B) permanently crippled in some fashion.
I can categorically assure you that I hold to neither of those assumptions in a conscious or unconscious manner.
I do not doubt your whole-hearted belief in this statement. It does nevertheless sit, at least for this reader, at odds with your use of words like "indelible" about survivors' memories, hence the request.
Posted by fletcher christian (# 13919) on
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Let me explain (and if hosts need to remove any part of this due to the thread it's on, so be it).
Let's put it this way. There's a thing called the statute of limitations that means that someone who is in a situation - let's call it a 'family set up', who may not yet be at the stage in life when they can make decisions for themselves or the means to speak for themselves. This might be their time in life and nothing whatsoever to do with their inner well-being and their sense of self. But it might also be to do with circumstance and the sort of nonsense they are fed where they are deliberately told untruth to stop the truth being told or revealed and being young and impressionable (as we all were once) they might actually believe it. Now lets say there might be a 'random' example of this that would demonstrate fairly clearly that the statute of limitations makes a nonsense of someones ability and right to pursue justice at a later stage. Now, bearing that in mind,and...ahem... a certain thread.....ahem.....you hopefully don't have to look terribly far for an example of why I think the statute of limitations is a farce.
Now that bit above might be removed and so be it if it's too close to the bone of contention and speculation, but then let me try and respond to the other things without gross assumption being inferred.
quote:
Survivors often search for ways in which they might have avoided / prevented the attack through something they could have done differently. “If only I had left earlier. If I hadn’t said or done X. If I lived in a different place,” etc. etc. Others may interpret this as self-blame (and sometimes it is; God knows, there are plenty of socially-condoned messages Out There which DO blame victims for their victimization), but – provided the survivor is allowed to continue processing her experience – she often, through this process, begins to re-establish the sense of control and autonomy she had before the attack.
I understand this fully. Some people are able to answer these questions remarkably quickly; for others it takes a long time and they feel unable to do so without support (whatever form that might take). For some, part of the process is seeking justice and getting it and for some, to do this means being at that point you describe before they make any kind of tracks down that road. The statute of limitations basically ensures that the possibility of the pursuit of justice only and solely lies open to the people I described first, simply because it sets a time limit.
quote:
So the implication – by claiming that survivors cannot “forget,” however hard they try, something they’d rather not focus on – is that survivors are no longer in control of their own inner workings. This is very hard for this survivor to hear. You have no idea how hard I worked or for how long to regain my own sense of control.
I can see how this can be read in this way, but I assure you that is not what I meant. If I had meant that I would also be asserting that someone in a car accident or who had witnessed the death of a loved one was somehow 'no longer in control of their own inner workings'. On the flip side of that I know and have experience of people who repress trauma (whatever it may be) and who would very much like the memory not to be there and the result can be complex and difficult. Granted it may have been a poor choice of words in describing it as burned on the brain (they were borrowed words), but I wasn't using them to infer any kind of moral judgement.
quote:
The second issue is about memory. I am old enough, and far enough from this and other significant life events, to know just how fluid human memories are. We aren’t bio-video-recorders. Even as memories are being laid down as events unfold, we are selecting some details and suppressing others. Not only that, but what we recall 10 minutes after the fact will differ markedly from how we recall the same event a week, a month, a year, a decade, later.
As recovery proceeds, we continue processing memories of the event, re-interpreting them, assigning different “weights” and meanings to the bits that make them up, until finally, we have re-shaped the original into something we can live with, or stash, or suppress, or deal with in whatever way we can. And as Itsarumdo also points out, that’s different for each individual.
Yes, I agree. I was stating this in relation to the statute of limitations and in light of my own experience and that of others. Again, this was not a moral judgement, nor was it a judgement about how people forever will be or be perceived. It was to do with evidence and the clarity of memory around trauma.
quote:
I have shared my experience IRL with a few selected individuals since I recovered, and have nearly always regretted it. Why? Precisely because most of the time, I find the other party instantly slots me into a “class” labeled “rape victims,” from which I am then never allowed to escape. Suddenly, I find myself handled with kid gloves.
If I gave you that impression somewhere in my responses I do apologise that was certainly not my intent.
Posted by Penny S (# 14768) on
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Isn't there some remark by the aunt in "The Towers of Trebizond", in response to being told about dress codes in Turkey, about men needing to learn to control themselves? I would like to post it, but have discovered that my belief that I own a copy is false.
Posted by stonespring (# 15530) on
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Here is a link to the video and transcript of the interview from last night of the parents where they say that the allegations are true (ie, their son when he was 14-15 fondled 4 of their daughters and a babysitter) [DELETED]
http://www.foxnews.com/transcript/2015/06/04/exclusive-duggars-open-up-about-molestation-allegations-on-kelly-file/
[DELETED]
As has already been said, the statute of limitations coupled with their son's age at the time has allowed a judge to purge all record of the events from his legal record permanently.
[Edited as per previous guidelines]
[ 04. June 2015, 19:46: Message edited by: Eutychus ]
Posted by Eutychus (# 3081) on
:
hosting/
In view of the potential libel issues hanging over this thread I have stepped in forthwith to remove material I judge to be over the line.
Stonespring, please read the hosting guidelines summarized here.
In particular, your post falls foul of this: quote:
If you can link to a source that says "this happened" then knock yourselves out in quoting it and saying "if that did happen, then it's wrong/dangerous/inadvisable/whatever", but don't post allegations of possible misconduct based on what you think might have happened. Link to it if it's been reported. Otherwise DON'T POST IT.
There has been further discussion backstage of whether to put this thread out of its misery. If there are any more posts we have to prune like that, it will be locked without further warning.
/hosting
Posted by orfeo (# 13878) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by Crœsos:
quote:
Originally posted by orfeo:
If the answer is "we don't know", then it's not appropriate in my view to say "we know he was doing something 13 years ago as a child, so let's err on the side of presuming he's still doing something".
It may seem unfair to the former embezzler that he can't have his old job at the bank back, but I don't think it's "inappropriate" for a bank manager to take that position.
I think it's unlikely that the embezzler had a job at the bank 13 years ago as a child.
In other words, if you're going to make analogies that are so broad and general as this, I just don't think the analogies will be helpful. I'm focusing on context and circumstances. You seem to be saying that it's the same principle no matter what the context.
Why do we actually have concepts such as a juvenile justice system if it makes no different whether you're a juvenile or an adult?
[ 05. June 2015, 03:12: Message edited by: orfeo ]
Posted by Leorning Cniht (# 17564) on
:
quote:
Originally posted by orfeo:
I think it's unlikely that the embezzler had a job at the bank 13 years ago as a child.
If working at a bank is a reasonable analogy, the question is perhaps this:
13 years ago, as a 14-year-old, a boy on several occasions took loose change from his siblings bedrooms / bags / whatever. Should he be employed in a bank now?
Maybe, maybe not.
In this case, of course, we can dismiss the "harm" to his victims - having had a few dollars pocket money stolen several years ago doesn't have long-term consequences for anyone.
The fact that he used to go through his siblings clothing for loose change would certainly speak to his (lack of) character at the time, and one might suppose a correlation between being a dishonest teenager and being a dishonest adult. I don't know how big that correlation is, though.
Now let's consider Josh Duggar. His sisters Jill and Jessa have apparently spoken to Fox "news" about the fact that they are two of the victims of their brother's actions. From that article, the actions involved are touching of breast and groin areas over clothing.
Obviously this isn't OK; on the scale of sexual assualts, it's at the mild end. So far as I am aware, neither Josh Duggar nor his relatives have spoken about his motivations. One can imagine different motivations for his actions, ranging from "curiosity about girls" to sexual gratification. The unusual environment in which the Duggar children were raised seems to me to make the "curiosity" motivation much more likely than it would be in a "normal" child - let's just say that I imagine that neither human biology nor sexual ethics and consent issues were very high on the Duggar curriculum. Purity cults are notoriously bad at dealing well with issues of consent.
To the extent that "curiosity" explains his actions, he's not a paedophile, and there would be no reason to suppose he poses any increased risk to children.
Posted by orfeo (# 13878) on
:
Thank you, Leorning.
You have pretty much hit upon my key objection, the risk of assuming a strong correlation between behaviour at age 14 and behaviour as an adult.
I think it flies in the face of all practical experience to treat a person at age 14 as fully formed in terms of all their behaviours. We simply don't treat normal teenagers of that age as all grown up. Nor should we. They are still developing, physically, mentally, emotionally.
Posted by Martin60 (# 368) on
:
Until he stands up naked with his head bowed, chops off a pinkie and wraps it in a napkin and passes it to his sisters at a press conference, there can be no truth and reconciliation.
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