Coping Isnt A Cure.

[Friday]

@Kefira, I was another one who decided not to post. Rants are fine, in and of themselves, but they're solitary creatures. They don't need anyone else for it. Had enough of them myself.

@robotdaily ... You're here for a reason. If that's ranting, that's fine, as long as you don't think you're actually posing questions for people to answer or respond to. If you're wanting to be asking questions for people to thrash out & help with... That's a different matter.

Which is it?

Some from column A & some from column B & even some from an as yet unidentified columnC is fine, but do let us know.

You have the opportunity to actually talk with people who've been through exactly what you've been through, as well as different things on the scale of f*cked-Up-Things... And have lived to tell the tale. Many who've gone on to seriously live-live, good lives they're happy with and have fought for. Many more still in the fight. Very few of us who "fit" in your black and white boxes of 'You're either this or that.' Whole helluva lot of diverse people here, with diverse experience, as a matter of fact.

I could count easily dozen different thread topics in your rants. So, are you ranting (again, fine in and of itself), or is there something in there you'd like to discuss?

 

[Kefira]

You have the opportunity to actually talk with people who've been through exactly what you've been through, and different things on the scale of f*cked-Up-Things... And have lived to tell the tale. Many who've gone on to seriously live-live, good lives they're happy with and have fought for. Many more still in the fight.

I could count easily dozen different thread topics in your rants. So, are you ranting, or is there something in there you'd like to discuss?

Exactly. And we all (well, at least most of us I think) have our moments where we just have to let it all out and rant and even lash out. But if you want to have a discussion you need to be able to do it without invalidating the experiences of others and to understand that just because someone has a different viewpoint/has had a different experience does not mean either of the people in question are wrong.

I am focused on managing my symptoms and living life to the fullest. If I wasn't my fears, depression, and anger would consume me. You apparently classify this as 'coping'. That's fine. It's not the way I see it, though you've also made it fairly clear you don't want to have a conversation about that. Nevertheless, the fact that that is how I experience where I'm at right now and is the choice I have made has no bearing on you, and it doesn't invalidate your pain or mean you need to believe what I do.

I guess the real question is, is there some way that we can help you process something you wanted to get out of this thread or is it a rant? If it's a rant that's fine. If you find it disruptive for people to leave their opinions here perhaps consider using the trauma diary function for rants so that it's clear that it is for your own purposes. Because when you post a thread, people are going to want to try to contribute and to answer that thread, or to provide alternative view points on the situation. I think Ms Spock hit the nail on the head:

And we don't have to agree with each other - but we do have to be civil to each other.

 

[Deleted member 23044]

I will not apologize for what I have said.
The truth is very offensive sometimes, yes it is.

But if there are solutions, steps, and plans that can be expressed and followed which will STOP these evils, and they are effective, then you are no longer a maid with a brush and pan in hand down at your abusers heels. Instead you're a ninja lying in wait, planning to attack and then attacking, hindering, and injuring your enemy until they are brought down officially.

It does not say much about you as an individual to be so well adjusted to a sick society.
So good luck with your happy good lives. But be assured, it is no weapon.
It is a maids position, and they know it.

 

[ms spock]

Everyone who suffers silently is part of the problem.

I never suffered silently. I protected the other children. I told all the people in my family so they could protect their family. I paid a very high price for being so brave. I spoke up about child rapists and sexual abusers in other contexts and paid a high price for it, so please don't make assumptions that you are the only one who has suffered so much pain. You are not the only one to notice and interact with the systemic injustices and you are not the only one who calls for intergenerational social change and is interested in justice.

 

[Kefira]

You are not the only one to notice and interact with the systemic injustices and you are not the only one who calls for intergenerational social change and is interested in justice.

To my mind, there is a difference between seeking to integrate your experiences into a life that you can actually bear to experience (understanding that complete social overhaul takes time and we must work within the structures we have for now) and submitting to abuse/being part of the problem.

It does not say much about you as an individual to be so well adjusted to a sick society.

It is a sick society. And I can do the work that I have been doing for the past decade since my trauma to try to right the parts of it I may have influence over while trying to live as fully as I can. Or I can become bitter, resentful, and refuse to ever be happy over anything on the basis that somehow that would mean they win because I didn't stay angry enough. Personally, I think that if I can heal enough to be functioning, I will accomplish more to change the things that were obviously wrong in my past for others in the future.
But I would caution you from thinking that anyone who is trying to move forward despite horrible experiences is somehow inferior to you or must be part of the problem. Not everyone is your enemy.

 

[ms spock]

The truth is very offensive sometimes, yes it is.

Yes this is true. But you don't have to be offensive and attacking in the way that you present the truth. You can argue passionately and debate in detail but you don't have to be lashing out or claiming that people are just going along with the abusers, because they don't agree with your way of expressing yourself or your opinions. The fact that you are being insulting and degrading towards other members with your assumptions about how other people are living their lives and what social justice and activist things they are doing in their lives is not okay.


It is true that the truth is offensive. People would rather talk about how to punish a child rapist through the legal system (when the majority will never come in contact with the legal system) and talk about whether violence towards a sex offender is justified or not rather than look at the dynamic that means focusing on how evil a sex offender is, means you are blind to the ones in your family, your social and your work networks. It means people, not wanting to see that someone they know/love are related to is sexually abusing their children - so they go into denial instead. And that by saying the sex offenders are evil you are silencing those children who are being sexually abused by their fathers and mothers right now. To me it is a bit self indulgent, but at the same time people need to get their distress and anger out like you are doing in this thread. Often when you are engaging in the sex offender is evil discussion, you are unwittingly enabling the ones that are testing you out through that discussion. Few people seem to get that and perhaps we are a generation or two off dealing with that. It is easier to see them as "other" rather than someone who is integrated into our society that we all need to break down the ways in which they are being enabled. If you attack sex offenders, who are on the whole related to the children that they sexually abuse, then it silences those who are being victimised now. And to my mind the most important thing is to stop the abuse that is occurring now.

But if there are solutions, steps, and plans that can be expressed and followed which will STOP these evils, and they are effective,

So what are these in your opinion?

How do we intervene in the family home to stop fathers and mothers sexually abuse their children? I would be interested to know what you think about this.

It does not say much about you as an individual to be so well adjusted to a sick society.

Insulting people is not going to get people in society to engage in intergenerational social change. And it is very sad that people are adjusted to a sick society - but lashing out at all and sundry is not going to help people understand and really engage with what you are saying.

Just willy nilly attacking abusers doesn't help either - because you don't come across as credible and you make it harder for others to stand up and say "This happened to me." So you have to be careful of the other victims as well and not make their lives harder either. I don't know if you have considered that.

 

[ms spock]

I will not apologize for what I have said.

Fair enough, but you can apologise for the way you said it. You can apologise for being insulting. You can apologise because you are acting like your way is the only way to deal with child sexual abuse, and you are insinuating that people are the "maids" of sexual abusers because they are not jumping to your tune.

Or do you feel because of what you have lived through, do you think that entitles you to be abusive to other people? I would think on that.

 

[ms spock]

And you need to clarify when you are arguing to the abusers in your head and when you are talking to members on this forum. If you write I would say to sexual abusers X,Y and Z - no one is going to mind pretty much what you are saying to them. But people will mind very much if you come across as tarring everyone else with that same brush because they don't agree with other people.

I have had the most passionate and long debates with people on this forum. It doesn't mean I don't disco dance with them in the chatroom. It doesn't mean I don't agree with them in other threads or I don't have an overall general respect with them. It just means I have passionately and debated with them (in usually a most prolonged and verbose manner - but that is just me I am like that.) Occasionally a person might take offence but mostly I do okay (well I hope so anyway.) I have even had a very long and passionate debate with anthony - it was years ago and I can't remember what we were even arguing about - but he was fair - he responded in great detail - and he could have banned me but he was scrupulous in his fairness. I remember being most impressed with that at the time. At one point I thought I shouldn't argue with the owner of the forum, but I wasn't banned - my point is that there is a lot of support and diversity of opinion here. If you show respect you will be given respect even if you get it wrong. So maybe is not the time for you now - but keep that in mind for when all this overwhelm subsides a bit. The community works because people are fair, honest, open and respect a diversity of opinion - the abusers never let us have a variety of opinions and different social spaces - that is what we have to claim for ourselves today. Because each and every one of us deserves it.

 

[Kefira]

Everyone who suffers silently is part of the problem.

I felt personally obligated to stand up and do what I could and to try to set an example for how one could function with serious trauma in their past. Partially because I still felt at least on some level that I had a voice.
Not everyone does. And that doesn't make innocent victims who cannot for whatever reason stand up and speak out part of the problem. We have created a social norm in which it is psychologically, emotionally, and often physically dangerous to stand up and speak out. To say that people who are trying to heal and don't want to open themselves up to that sort of retraumtization are at fault would seem to be enormously insulting and unkind.

 

[ms spock]

Please take really good care of yourself today @robotdaily. You are obviously suffering tremendously today. I feel for you. It is hard when you are being hit by emotions like they are continual lightening strikes. It is hard to sit with why isn't society/all people not doing something about child rapists in our society. That consumed me for many, many years. I so understand what you are going through and what you are feeling. It is not easy.

When you are reliving stuff like this you really need to take care of yourself.

 

[Friday]

No one asked you for an apology.

You have, however, decided what we think & feel, how & why we act. Which is nonsense. We're not imaginary characters you've made up in your head you're having a conversation with, and we're not some faceless mob. If you want to say YOU do ABC for XYZ reasons? That's fine. But you don't know any of us. You don't know what we think or feel about anything. You don't know the choices we've made in our lives, or why. If you'd like to find out? Ask. I think you'd be very surprised. Because the things you're saying may be true for you, (although they sound like what you're afraid of being true, or want to be true, rather than what is true)...because they sure as hell aren't true for me. Much less everyone else here.

You say I'm afraid? I'm not.
You say the truth is offensive? Maybe you think so. Maybe others do. I don't.
You say you might could be able to beat some up? Honey, I've killed people.

You don't know who you're talking to. Meant in kindness... Take a deep breath, and back your shit down. That fight you have in you is useful for more than just flailing about. You can hone it and put it to use, instead of attacking blindly at anyone who happens to be in front of you. Consider for a moment what others have asked of you; that you're talking to abuse survivors, & childhood abuse survivors, soldiers & child soldiers, and many more. People who could help you. Not to live some life you don't want to live, that's just stupid. But to live a life you actually want to live. Whether that's a legal-ninja or something entirely different. Take a second and imagine that for a moment. Not what you think we want for you, or what you think we feel...but what you want for yourself. Now imagine people who could help you get what you want.

 

[ms spock]

To say that people who are trying to heal and don't want to open themselves up to that sort of retraumtization are at fault would seem to be enormously insulting and unkind.

Yes so people get sexually abused as a child, then they get abused because they don't live up to other people's expectations about how a sexual abuse survivor has to act. That is manifestly unfair.