Omelas
This is the best post on the Penn State scandal.
the name refers to an Ursula LeGuin short story, where a city is wonderful and beautiful but only can exist that way by torturing a child.
Many pro life people see the story as an allegory on Abortion, where a girl chooses a good education, wealth, freedom, and all she has to do is abort her child. If the story is an allegory, one has to wonder, since I had always understood LeGuin was pro choice...or maybe she is prochoice but her conscience came out in the story, recognizing how women who abort often have done so under duress, and often have to deaden their consciences on that painful " choice", which often haunts them for their entire life.
the other interesting part is that no one bothers to worry about the victim. Much of what is termed "abuse" is touching or mastrubation, but Sodomy, as in this case, in a child causes physical harm, even when it is "consensual"...(ditto for vaginal harm to a pre pubescent girl).
Did no one think to take the kid to a doctor?
As for the "coverup": one suspects that the horror is there because few of us see such things. Yet maybe the lack of horror is because it was gay sex, and gay sex was tolorated and approved of. Yes, a normal guy seeing a child being sodomized would grab the guy, beat him up and call the cops, but a guy who was used to seeing gay sex in a shower might just call the father to take the kid home, seeing a normal activity but trying to get the father to protect the kid.
Another point is in the comments: That reporting such things puts the victim and the witnesses through hell. Several of the adult women who had gone through abuse and a court case said that giving testimony when the abuser was looking at you, and then being "called a liar" by his cross examining lawyer was worse than the abuse itself.
So often the authorities try to get the guy to plea bargain, figuring a lesser charge will punish him but save the child from the horror of a court case.
I remember one case (where the exam showed extensive intercourse in the past) where a father was abusing his older daughter, and then started on the younger one. The older daughter at this point (at age 13) reported him, to protect her sister. We caught him in a lie, and he plea bargained, but for six months the girl was in terror of thinking of the court case.
Finally, no one seems to be reading this report,Sexual Identity, Sex of Sexual Contacts, and Health-Risk Behaviors Among Students in Grades 9--12 --- Youth Risk Behavior Surveillance, Selected Sites, United States, 2001--2009 including the part which says 3 to 10 percent of teenagers claim intercourse below age 12, and 10 to 30 percent of gay teenagers claim the same thing.
One of my friends, a nurse, on the Indian reservation said her AA meeting was full of men who had suffered abuse as children, including sexual abuse in boarding schools or by relatives/ friends of the family.
the name refers to an Ursula LeGuin short story, where a city is wonderful and beautiful but only can exist that way by torturing a child.
Many pro life people see the story as an allegory on Abortion, where a girl chooses a good education, wealth, freedom, and all she has to do is abort her child. If the story is an allegory, one has to wonder, since I had always understood LeGuin was pro choice...or maybe she is prochoice but her conscience came out in the story, recognizing how women who abort often have done so under duress, and often have to deaden their consciences on that painful " choice", which often haunts them for their entire life.
the other interesting part is that no one bothers to worry about the victim. Much of what is termed "abuse" is touching or mastrubation, but Sodomy, as in this case, in a child causes physical harm, even when it is "consensual"...(ditto for vaginal harm to a pre pubescent girl).
Did no one think to take the kid to a doctor?
As for the "coverup": one suspects that the horror is there because few of us see such things. Yet maybe the lack of horror is because it was gay sex, and gay sex was tolorated and approved of. Yes, a normal guy seeing a child being sodomized would grab the guy, beat him up and call the cops, but a guy who was used to seeing gay sex in a shower might just call the father to take the kid home, seeing a normal activity but trying to get the father to protect the kid.
Another point is in the comments: That reporting such things puts the victim and the witnesses through hell. Several of the adult women who had gone through abuse and a court case said that giving testimony when the abuser was looking at you, and then being "called a liar" by his cross examining lawyer was worse than the abuse itself.
So often the authorities try to get the guy to plea bargain, figuring a lesser charge will punish him but save the child from the horror of a court case.
I remember one case (where the exam showed extensive intercourse in the past) where a father was abusing his older daughter, and then started on the younger one. The older daughter at this point (at age 13) reported him, to protect her sister. We caught him in a lie, and he plea bargained, but for six months the girl was in terror of thinking of the court case.
Finally, no one seems to be reading this report,Sexual Identity, Sex of Sexual Contacts, and Health-Risk Behaviors Among Students in Grades 9--12 --- Youth Risk Behavior Surveillance, Selected Sites, United States, 2001--2009 including the part which says 3 to 10 percent of teenagers claim intercourse below age 12, and 10 to 30 percent of gay teenagers claim the same thing.
One of my friends, a nurse, on the Indian reservation said her AA meeting was full of men who had suffered abuse as children, including sexual abuse in boarding schools or by relatives/ friends of the family.
posted by Nancy Reyes at
9:32 AM
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