Mark Twain on Social Evil

Posted on April 4, 2014 by Elea Lee

Mark Twain said that when he was growing up in a slave state (Missouri) he was never confronted with a single dissenting viewpoint.

Pastors preached the (biblically erroneous) notion that Africans were cursed by God and therefore ought to be slaves.

No one saw any abuse of the slaves.

The slaves kept quiet about their opinion one way or the other.

In the Missouri of Twain’s youth slavery was a de facto good not evil.

A situation he addresses well in Huckleberry Finn.

But it was not true. Slavery was and is an abomination, an aggression against other humans.

What aggressions against humans do you take for granted or even passionately support?

Abortion?

Child sexual abuse?

Human trafficking?

Abortion is legal in the US and many people are passionately supportive of it. But it is a greater evil than slavery.

And while child abuse and human trafficking are illegal, if our government does not enforce their extinction, they will and do flourish in the gap.

What does it cost?

Posted on March 31, 2014 by Elea Lee

I struggle with a voice in my head telling me that a woman in my ramshackle physical condition has no business hitting ramps on a wakeboard.

It is a powerful voice.

And yet I cannot help thinking that challenging that voice and hitting those structures is a victory of the heart.

Victories of the heart are often costly victories. We are challenged to face our deepest fears of loss and humiliation, pain and failure for love.

And so with the even objectivity of a math problem you could say–the measure of our love is the measure of our willingness to overcome our fear.

Or better said by a Braver Man–perfect love casts out all fear.

Tell me you love someone and I will ask you, what dragons have you fought to preserve your beloved?

Always the same reaction

Posted on March 30, 2014 by Elea Lee

I was standing in a Walmart years ago when someone I had known for years told me she had been sexually assaulted.

She told me because I told her what had happened to us. She gave me the fragile gift of a common experience–a tragic common story.

I never knew. She is a beautiful, very together, very articulate woman. I never knew about this heartbreak.

I find my reaction to these stories is always the same. I want to hit something. I want to pound out the anger and hurt that is inherently a part of any crime

Especially against children.

Especially when they trust the person who hurts them.

I say this because if you have one of those stories you need to know you are not alone.

I grieve for you, pray for you, and long for justice for you.

How Pedophiles Groom (everyone)

Posted on March 26, 2014 by Elea Lee

Afterwards the conversation held such dreadful power.

My adopted son, 14 or 15, sat amidst his younger sisters’ dolls and toys, identifying each one. My husband and I marveled at the time. Charles was not very nice to us. Not very kind in general. His attention to his younger sisters’ toys seemed an unlikely window into kindness in his chilly heart.

It was not.

He knew the toys well because for years “playing” with his little sisters had been the sinister doorway to grooming them for abuse.

It was a blow to the gut to know this too late.

My pain over my childrens’ lost innocence will not go away. It shouldn’t. I determined to do what I could to save others from the agony.

I made a commitment to speak out.. More times than I can count I have lost people in the process.

Recently Charles began dating a young woman with very young family members. I let someone know that Charles should not be alone with children ever.

His response was swift and angry. He swore at me and told me to back off or he would file harassment charges against me.

Standard for Charles.

What was shocking was the response of girlfriend and family. Even though Charles went to prison on a plea deal for what he did, girlfriend told me she did not believe me.

She and her family have rallied around a child molester.

What happened next was equally interesting.

Once she accepted his version of his story, he publicly humiliated and belittled her. I knew what he was doing—on one hand he appealed to her naïveté to accept a lie, on the other he pushed the boundaries of their relationship to flex his power.

This is an unfortunately common story. Where is the.outrage in the media over Verizon peddling child exploitive pornography? Where is the department of justice to enforce existing laws against the exploitation of children?

We stay quiet, afraid to rock this broken boat, while our little ones get let out to sea.

Watching all of me

Posted on March 26, 2014 by Elea Lee

PBS has just aired a haunting movie about women in Austin who struggle with eating and weight issues.

I viscerally connect to their food issues, but found myself crying in the middle of the movie because of what they said about community.

The truth is I have been a community-free individual since 2010. I have my family, former friends, and a church or two to thank for that. And my own fear.

Initially my dogged insistence on transparency…

I cried for my children. The older ones create shelter for their younger siblings.

The older ones remember the years of loss.

The younger ones ask questions about family as though the units of extended family–grandparents, uncles, aunts, were classes of dinosaurs or dragons.

Mythical creatures, all of them. Afraid to face the truth on our side.

Contemplating Evil

Posted on March 25, 2014 by Elea Lee

We knew that the abuse had happened, he had been caught in the act. Because he was (and is) a child predator, he was very good at masking evil.

He was not the first child molester I knew who did this. They all do.

All do what? They all do unbearable, unspeakable things to children and then call those things by ordinary names.

It was an ugly conversation.

We went around in circles. He would say he had put his victims on his lap. He would say they played “house” or “husband and wife.”

He subverted the ordinary.

So finally I got a placeholder–an ordinary piece of luggage. In exasperation I gave it to him and said, show me what you are talking about.

He did not want to. Reenacting the facsimile of abuse was too close to the truth for both of us, but it put the lie to his words.

The devil in the details.

He grooms everyone. And he looks for weakness and opportunity the way an addict looks for drugs–relentlessly.

That night I realized how close his words and descriptions were to another child molester who had described sexual assault as “holding” on his “lap.”

Their “innocuous” descriptions of unspeakable evil were the same. The devastation and pain they created in the lives of innocent victims were also the same.

And yet we all look away. We plug our ears and turn away.

If we were brave and faced it straight up we would see the patterns in the lives of child molesters. We would be forced to face how much they rely on adults not intervening.

They count on us looking away. Because when we do we give them all the opportunity they need…

to abuse again.

What makes you mad?

Posted on March 21, 2014 by Elea Lee

Twice today I encountered people who expressed their extreme annoyance at service people.

The first situation involved late food and lukewarm fries and the second involved prescriptions at a pharmacy.

The workers of the world were having a tough day.

I was struck by the gumption it takes to tell a stranger off.

Which led me to remember who we do not confront:

When was the last time you berated a pedophile? When was the last time you raised your voice against a rapist? When was the last time you made a stink about child abuse?

I ask because over the last few years I have watched a lot–lots and lots of people be very polite to some pretty bad men.

It seems to be easy to rant at a waiter or pharm tech, but much, much harder to confront real evil.

…at some point, being so very polite to evil might be a sin of its own. A grievous sin of omission.

Goodbye Baby

Posted on March 14, 2014 by Elea Lee

If I had the picture still
I would be sure to send it to you
The one that survived the fire, your father’s wrath

I know
It is all mythological
Just Zeus
Arguing about what he had for dinner
Who,
Who he had for dinner

Her first words
Carefully recorded by the state of Pennsylvania–

Charles, I am going to kick your ass

Hardly appropriate words for a lullaby

Ask him how your mother lost her
Teeth
Children, like soldiers sewn in a field

You cannot redeem
Yourself
Your life
The smallest act of violence

The crickets and amphibian victims
Of your pitiless mind

Mind your manners broken boy–

Lung cancer is the last stigmatized
Cancer

You say you smoke too much

Too many
Too many victims

Goodbye baby
Read Dante or John
The Beloved for how this will end

Without me.

A Terrible Christian

Posted on February 23, 2014 by Elea Lee

The essay appeared to be heartfelt–urging people to brook the barriers of their resistance to organized religion and find a church, any church…because churches do good things.

Do they?

I spent the better part of my (Christian) life believing this. I still do, generally, on principal.

There was one thing missing from the impassioned church essay. One Person, actually.

You should go to church to see Jesus.

You should do everything to see Jesus.

“Christian” means “little Christ.” What happens to us when we excise Christ from our identity? All that is left is the “little” in us.

It is not easy to follow Jesus. Recently I gave a dramatic depiction of Jesus to someone who would definitely identify as a believer. This person rejected my gift with forthright disgust.

Did not actually watch the DVD….

I thought, huh…not an unusual reaction really.

How many of us would dare stand at the foot of his disfiguring Cross? How many of us have the courage to identify with our naked, broken, bloodied Savior?

I am a terrible Christian, unwashed and unlovely. But no one said redemption would be pretty.

Just absolutely essential for life
Eternal life.

Kayleigh Slusher, Girl in the Refrigerator

Posted on February 5, 2014 by Elea Lee

This is a test. Read just the following sentence then follow the prompt:

3-year-old Kayleigh Slusher was murdered in San Francisco shortly after police responded to reports of violence and abuse at her home.

Her body showed signs of sexual assault and blunt force trauma.

Okay. Deep breath.

Now. What do you think?

How long will Kayleigh’s untimely death remain in your thoughts?

I ask because Kayleigh’s violent death allegedly at the hands of mom and mom’s boyfriend coincides with the death of Kevasia Edwards, the death of Phillip Seymour Hoffman, and a flurry of editorial opinions about Dylan Farrow, abuse survivor.

If you want to take my test a step further google each of these stories then scan for how much air each story has gotten.

Hoffman’s death is a tragedy, no doubt, but while police in New York and San Francisco are scrambling to punt responsibility for Kayleigh and Kevasia, people have been arrested for selling drugs to Hoffman.

Don’t get me wrong. People got arrested for the deaths of the two little girls. People who were known to be dangerous parents? People who had already incited the scrutiny of neighbors, authorities?

What should have been done to save them?

And why wasn’t it?

Should a grown man choosing to engage in deadly behavior warrant more intervention than helpless children? Helpless because we turn away.

Forget.

Don’t want to get involved.

Kayleigh was a citizen of Napa, California. Early reportage placed her brief life and tragic death in San Francisco.

Carrying Light

Words for light

Category Archives: child advocacy