News Woody Allen Is Not A Monster. He Is A Person. Like My Father.

[rainy_daze]

@Pencil , Hashi is from the UK, and all of what she listed is enforced here I believe. Sometimes it fails. At least there is a system in place though. We also have abuse helplines for children/young people and crisis lines for people to call if they expect abuse is taking place.

I assume if a person is investigated, charged and convicted then they are subject to the legal restrictions Hashi posted. It would be part of their rehabilitation after prison, I guess.

There are many jobs in the UK which require you to go through checks, and any convictions are supposed to be listed on the system, which means if someone is on the sex offenders register (I think it's still called that) then an employer would know, and not hire them to work at a school, for example.

I'm not sure if the United States has a similar register.

 

[Valentino]

To refresh our memories of what the original article was talking about:

We are left with a problem: The greater the tenor of condemnation against these perps, the higher the stakes in telling our own stories, and the higher their own stakes in defending themselves.

Great point, excess judgement and punishment can be counter productive, as it pushes abusers further into the shadows of secrecy and increases the effects of blame the victim.

Does it make sense to discard an entire oeuvre of work? Or does it simply reflect an inability to live with messiness and ambiguity? To chalk it up as nothing more than the work of a monster, to cast it out of the village, is to senselessly re-affirm the same basic strategy of denial and dehumanization that, ultimately, allows abuse to continue.

People want to live in the fantasy of 'just world theory', it's easier to deny reality and dehumanize abusers. Unfortunately that can indirectly reinforce a culture of silence, which allows abuse to thrive.

Years later, my father broke down on the phone, crying, and acknowledged what he had done. That, the simplest truth, was all I ever wanted.

For the author, hearing the truth acknowledged was all he wanted. Maybe that was more healing than seeking justice or revenge?

Not long after I disclosed my abuse to my now largely estranged sister, she explained her own cold response to me, saying, "I know those memories are real for you but it's a bit like you telling me you lived on a boat for several years as a child." The eye-roll that seizes me as I recall, and repeat, this sentence is lunar in scope. Picture the moon with a pupil, picture it rolling and I will have shared with you some sense of the utter humiliation involved in having your most formative experiences treated as imaginary.

Great example of how painful it was to have a sibling deny and dismiss his truth.

Most of us would sooner discard all parties who have been tainted by this event than we would look at how tenuous the sanctity of children really is, how commonplace abuse is, or see the capacity for the mostly good to do periodic evil. We live in the same universe as those who abuse kids. We walk among them. If we want to end the sexual abuse of children, it will begin with the recognition that we are simply not that different from them.

Relationships are too easily thrown away or given up on these days. It is better to avoid messy real reality, and live in a fantasy world.

"It seems impossible to love people who hurt and disappoint us. Yet there are no other people." - Frank Andrews

 

[Hashi]

The current sex offenders' register in the UK has less reach than most people think. Apart from helping potential employers who need to vet candidates for jobs, the purpose of the register is not to restrict the behaviour of offenders other than enforcing their participation in their own programmes (eg keeping appointments with a social worker). It also makes it easier for police to find people and investigate if more offending behaviour is suspected.

Many people on the register are on it for 10 years or less, possibly as little as a year.

Being on the register doesn't include any kind of restraining orders such as not going within a certain distance of a school. Those are applied separately by the courts, if they are applied.

The current approach is mostly reactive. If someone doesn't get reconvicted within a certain time then restrictions are lifted (except for restrictions around doing certain jobs).

@Pencil, I think in many cases people have been damaged by their own experiences. In those cases it's about breaking the cycle as much as possible.

For the author, hearing the truth acknowledged was all he wanted. Maybe that was more healing than seeking justice or revenge?

I'm talking about protection of other children rather than justice or revenge.

 

[Hashi]

We also have abuse helplines for children/young people and crisis lines for people to call if they expect abuse is taking place.

I think this is an important point, and an aspect that needs to be greatly increased - giving children the message that they can safely talk to someone (and making that actually safe for them).

Edited to add something then decided to make it a different post since this one was already there as it was.

 

[Pencil]

mostly reactive

Yes, and this is what concerns me. They need a 'convincing' number of victims in the immediate vicinity (space and time). And we know what happens in institutions, such as the church (RC), schools, etc., where the victim effectively has to take on a powerful institution and not an individual. Perhaps the battle should be fought on that level. With that I mean that if people such as @Ms Spock want to take up arms, it would be 'safer' for them to do so at the institutional level, and that it would contribute more towards raising awareness. Not sure if I'm clear.

 

[Hashi]

What I'd add to the post above is:

Then the question is... what happens after they talk?

When I lived in Japan, the idea that children were vulnerable to predators was commonplace. In the same way that we have signs on some roads warning drivers that children might be crossing there because there's a school, there would be signs for children in certain places warning them to be careful of "perverts" (the Japanese word) in those areas. They were also taught awareness in schools, and it was a subject which was openly talked about with children. However, without addressing the other side and restricting the behaviour of the "perverts" themselves, this simply put the focus on children managing the situation.

A parallel approach could also be seen with some male adults' sexual harassment or sexual assault of adult women. Women were not necessarily blamed for being targets of sexual assault so much as by default they were expected to be alert and manage situations, or manage themselves in situations. It was expected that women should take more responsibility for their safety than men should take for their actions.

I'm not saying anyone on this thread is advocating something similar, but I think it's something to be careful of. Acceptance without management can produce more openness and integration without any strong safeguards. Someone admitting their behaviour without any future safeguards around their behaviour isn't something I'm impressed by.

 

[rainy_daze]

If we want to end the sexual abuse of children, it will begin with the recognition that we are simply not that different from them.

I liked the article. But that was the sentence that left me confused; I had to read it several times. I'm still not entirely sure I understood the point of it.

The author is using the whole Us versus Them idea, which I do understand, and maybe the author is trying to say there is no "us" and no "them", we're all humans. In my honest opinion though, I'm different from child abusers. I'm so different. The sentence made me angry and sort of ruined the article for me on first reading. If anyone can explain the sentence coherently, maybe I could understand it better and not be left thinking the author is saying that we - the people who want to end the sexual abuse of children - are the same as them - the abusers of children. I don't get the argument.

I walk among them. I don't, however, engage in the same behaviours as them. I'm pretty different in many ways due to that simple fact.

Plus, in viewing this as an Us versus Them kind of way, does that not unite us and make us stronger against the people hurting vulnerable young people? Is this not the way in which we treat criminals, by saying that we as a collective society think that something is immoral and illegal, and so we put them in prison? If we view child abusers as being the same as us, where does this lead? I do agree that awareness is needed that abusers look like ordinary people, and that it isn't something you can tell just by looking at someone. I disagree that just because they look like an ordinary person, that means child abusers are not that different. They are very different.

I found the end to the article so confusing.

I don't want to take the thread totally off topic, sorry, I realise it's a discussion now of how can we [society?] protect other children, rather than solely focused on the article.

Someone admitting their behaviour without any future safeguards around their behaviour isn't something I'm impressed by.

^ I agree.

 

[Valentino]

Valentino said: ↑
For the author, hearing the truth acknowledged was all he wanted. Maybe that was more healing than seeking justice or revenge?

I'm talking about protection of other children rather than justice or revenge.

Sure, there is nothing wrong with focusing on protection.

Unfortunately what is often overlooked is allowing victims to openly share their stories and be fully heard and recognized. Instead of a rush to judgement towards the predators, there's a focus on rescuing other potential victims. But the wounded victims indirectly get overlooked and their tragic stories of suffering get subtly dismissed.

It happened earlier in this thread. Some people were trying to share their own personal stories of pain and suffering. But the only comfortable and acceptable way was to talk about it in terms of protection strategies or by dehumanizing abusers. What was lost in the process was that people didn't feel heard. Partially due to a society that doesn't honor and allow people to openly share their personal stories of victimhood, another by an internal decision to distract from owning our inner wounds by focusing on bigger causes.

Being heard and recognized can be immensely healing for many people. Society isn't willing to recognize it in many ways, extreme by attack the victim methods, less subtle ways by dismissing or devaluing the story, or by simply changing the subject or disengaging. A bigger cause is a great distraction method, people get so busy and lost trying to save the world, they end up forgetting the important reality that they need to save themselves first.

 

[Pencil]

But the wounded victims indirectly get overlooked and their tragic stories of suffering get subtly dismissed. It happened earlier in this thread.

I agree totally.

I realise it's a discussion now of how can we [society?] protect other children, rather than solely focused on the article.

Which means we are totally off topic. I've been waiting to hear from @Lost Pup ...

 

[rainy_daze]

@Pencil , the original post / topic was just the article itself, but it raises so many topics, we would have to start multiples threads for all the topics. Topic overload.

I think the thread is flowing more like a discussion around child protection issues, people speaking out about abuse, the consequences of speaking out (or not), a bit of a discussion about Dylan, some about Woody, stuff about humans, and numerous other things. All of which were reactions or thoughts that came from reading the article. So hopefully we are still on topic, I just meant that where I was posting in the thread it might have been a bit disjointed from talking about what we do with child abusers and related issues. It was good that you put up some quotes from the article @Valentino.

 

[Tswevnz]

It is a very emotionally charged subject - thus the strong opinions.
However, claiming someone is a pheadofile based on a News paper article, without legally being sentenced or trialed, is unjust.

Yes we can judge morally Woody Allen's choices, but technically he hasn't legally (as of yet) been deemed to be a criminal.
I don't like the guy , marrying your girlfriends adopted child is twisted, but who are we to judge since the only info we have is sensationalistic media? Why hasn't the accuser gone via police instead of Ny times?

 

[Pencil]

I think the thread is flowing more like a discussion around

Yes, I agree, and when a discussion is allowed to be 'organic' it is often more interesting. I yanked the thread the various directions, so I'm not pointing fingers :).