Category Archives: Abuse of Power

November 23, 2014 · 1:00 am

Cubs

ISIS is recruiting and training child soldiers it proudly calls “Cubs of the Islamic State” [1].

The recruitment and use of children as soldiers is a war crime, though not without precedent. Children – often forcibly conscripted – have acted as soldiers in India, Chad, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Uganda, Sierra Leone, Thailand, and Myanmar [2].

In Sierra Leone, boys between the ages of 7 and 14 served in the Small Boys Unit. Some 10,000 are thought to have taken part, in that nation’s civil war from 1991-2002 [3]. These children were involved in rape, mutilation, sexual slavery, murder, and other forms of human rights abuses.

Over 30,000 children have taken part in the decades long conflict in Uganda, a substantial number of these actually abducted [4]. Young girls are subject to sexual violence, or required to serve as “wives” of the rebels and have their children.

And now ISIS.

Boys are taught how to use AK-47s and mercilessly behead captives. An Iraqi security official was quoted by NBC News as saying, “They use dolls to teach them how to behead people, then they make them watch a beheading, and sometimes they force them to carry the heads in order to cast the fear away from their hearts.”

Some children are used by ISIS as suicide bombers; others, as human shields. They are, also, indoctrinated in Shariah law. “It’s being done for the same reasons that Hitler had the Hitler Youth,” stated Charlie Winter of the Quilliam Foundation.

Brainwashing these children is a long-term strategy to assure ISIS’ continued existence. “They have to get used to hearing the sounds of explosions and machine guns and missiles and artillery and aircraft,” Abu Dujana explained. “They should get used to seeing blood,” the ISIS fighter said.

Americans can expect to see more blood, as well.

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[1] NBC News, “ISIS Trains Child Soldiers at Camps for ‘Cubs of the Islamic State’ ” by Cassandra Vinograd, Ghazi Balkiz and Ammar Cheikh Omar, 11/7/14, http://www.nbcnews.com/storyline/isis-terror/isis-trains-child-soldiers-camps-cubs-islamic-state-n241821.

[2] Child Soldiers International, http://www.child-soldiers.org/.

[3] Human Rights Watch, “Sierra Leone Rebels Forcefully Recruit Child Soldiers”, 6/1/00, http://www.hrw.org/news/2000/05/31/sierra-leone-rebels-forcefully-recruit-child-soldiers.

[4] UN.org, Ten Stories the World Should Hear More About, “Uganda: Child Soldiers at Centre of Mounting Humanitarian Crisis”, http://www.un.org/events/tenstories/06/story.asp?storyID=100.

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November 16, 2014 · 1:00 am

Frozen

The Disney animated film “Frozen” has become enormously popular. Rather than telling yet another tale of how a girl finds her prince, the film tells the story of two sisters whose love for each other saves them and their world.

Child abuse victims, too, run the risk of being frozen.

It is not difficult to find stories about abuse in the news. Incest. Child pornography and exploitation. A child tortured to death. A group of children held captive; handicapped children tormented. Systemic abuse with the collusion of law enforcement or the church. The rare monetary judgment against a predator, more often than not unenforceable for lack of funds. Take your pick.

No Disney villain can compete.

The children robbed of their innocence and peace of mind – sometimes their lives – deserve to have their stories told. But as survivors we cannot focus exclusively on this darkness or we will succumb to it. Isolated, immobilized by despair. Frozen.

There is hope in the world. There are those who consider these violations among the worst harm human beings can inflict. There is love waiting to be found. Reach out for your share.

Darkness cannot withstand Light.  It was to conquer darkness that Jesus Christ came into our world.

“In him was life, and that life was the light of all mankind. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it” (John 1: 4-5 NIV).

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November 2, 2014 · 1:00 am

Legacy

As abuse victims, we choose various means of expressing our pain, and seeking comfort for it.  The one thing victims should not do is attack one another for those choices.

Perhaps the most divisive issue for abuse victims is forgiveness.  Many victims view forgiveness as impossible, and forgiveness by other victims of their own abusers as a betrayal.

But forgiveness is, first and foremost, the decision by an abuse victim not to center his or her life wholly on the violation [1].

Forgiveness does NOT imply approval of the violation. Forgiven or not, the abuser should, if at all possible, be held accountable for the criminal act(s) of which s/he is guilty.  That may involve imprisonment, chemical castration, and lifelong monitoring to prevent a recurrence.

Whatever we do, we cannot fully balance the scales once a child has been violated [2].  In most cases, the child must deal with the scars of abuse for a lifetime.  For that very reason, the decision by a victim whether or not to forgive his or her abuser is entirely personal, not subject to a general critique, even by other victims [3]. Continue reading →

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October 26, 2014 · 1:00 am

Witchcraft: Accusing the Innocent

Reports from England and Africa indicate that children are being accused of witchcraft and demonic possession by African fundamentalist Christian groups [1]. Christian beliefs have apparently been corrupted by the African tribal practices with which they are in direct odds.

Cases involving Hinduism and Islam, have, also, surfaced.

Motivated by greed and a desire for power, exorcists prey on the insecurities of others, charging exorbitant fees for their services. Families can, also, use accusations of witchcraft to dispose of an unwanted child without appearing at fault, themselves.

Complaints as vague as bed wetting, rough play between siblings, and trouble in the parents’ marriage may be considered “evidence” against a child.

Children can be starved, beaten, burned, and otherwise tortured (sometimes to death), in the effort to reclaim their souls. If the process is not considered successful, children may be abandoned to the streets. Estimates are that over 20,000 children, teens, and young adults in Kinshasa, Congo alone are homeless, as a result.

Until now such cases have not received much attention, leaving these children little recourse and less hope.
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[1] NBC News, “Reports of Witchcraft-Related Child Abuse on the Rise in London” by Alexander Smith, 10/11/14, http://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/reports-witchcraft-related-child-abuse-rise-london-n222781.

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October 12, 2014 · 1:00 am

Love and Betrayal

A South Carolina man killed his 5 young children this summer [1][2]. Whatever his state of mind at the time, Timothy Ray Jones, Jr. managed to drive across several states in order to dispose of the bodies.

Social workers had visited the engineer’s home a dozen times in the last three years without removing the children. Aged one through eight, the children seemed happy and normal, though their father appeared overwhelmed by the challenge of raising them alone. Jones and his wife are divorced.

Heartbreaking photos of the three boys and two girls appeared in the press. They were smiling.

Meanwhile, the FBI opened an investigation into the abuse of deaf and autistic children at NDA Behavioral Health a/k/a the National Deaf Academy, a 22 acre residential school in Florida licensed for 60 adult and 72 child patients [3]. Patients (some dually diagnosed) have reported physical and sexual abuse, and neglect. Three patients have died under allegedly negligent circumstances since 2009.

Between 2008 and 2013, there were over 500 calls to police ranging from abuse to runaways. Experts consider this figure high. Continue reading →

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June 22, 2014 · 1:00 am

Focus

Reports have been made of abuse by priests, abuse in residential boys’ schools, abuse in church-operated Magdalene laundries, abuse by pediatricians, abuse by police, abuse by politicians shielded by police, abuse by the committees formed to investigate abuse.  The list goes on and on.

Abuse is widespread, generational; the number of victims, staggering.

It is essential that light be shed on this perverted behavior.  It is not necessarily wise, however, that victims focus on the reports of abuse. The sheer numbers can be overwhelming.

We have enough reminders of our brush with evil. The scars of abuse may include perfectionism (and the reaction to it, workaholism), anxiety, depression, sexual difficulties, and weight issues. These pose challenges to many of us on a daily basis. Continue reading →

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June 8, 2014 · 1:00 am

In Plain Sight

Earlier this year, Brian Fanelli, a 54 y.o. suburban police chief, was charged with distributing child pornography [1]. While the charges are being contested, the prosecutor indicates over 800 pages of evidence have been obtained, as well as several videos with sexually explicit images of underage girls.

Fanelli, who is married, is alleged to have confessed that he was first drawn to child pornography while doing research on sexual abuse. The former police chief at one time taught abuse awareness to children. Fanelli was initially suspended from his post. He has since resigned.

The lesson is one we have encountered before. Predators are not easily identified. They do not all wear dirty raincoats. Too often, they can be respected members of the community, hiding in plain sight…priests, police officers, politicians.

We must be vigilant in guarding our children, yet not give way to paranoia. Unfortunately, there is no formula for this.  All we can do is remain attentive to our children’s needs, and sensitive to changes in their behavior.  And love them.
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[1] CBS NEW YORK, “Former Mount Pleasant Police Chief Faces 10 Years on Child Porn Charges,” 5/20/14, http://newyork.cbslocal.com/2014/05/20/former-mount-pleasant-police-chief-faces-10-years-on-child-porn-charges/.

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June 1, 2014 · 1:00 am

Juvenile Justice

According to Mark Twain, “There are three kinds of lies:  lies, damned lies, and statistics.” To most of us, statistics are drier than dust. But numbers can be revealing.

• Earlier this year, the Coalition for the Homeless reported a record-high number of 53,000 homeless regularly spending the night in New York City shelters [1]. Nearly half are children. In March, conditions at two city shelters were found to be so horrific that 400 of these homeless children had to be removed for health and safety reasons.

• Using the “zero tolerance” policy toward school violence as a basis, then popular Pennsylvania judge, Mark Ciavarella, sentenced over 2000 high school students – some without benefit of counsel – to incarceration for offenses as insignificant as swearing at another student’s mother, and creating a false MySpace page. Once in the criminal system, some remained imprisoned for years. At least one committed suicide [2] [2A]. Continue reading →

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May 25, 2014 · 1:00 am

Clerical Celibacy

“Now the sons of [the priest] Eli were corrupt; they did not know the Lord” (1 Samuel 2: 12).

In the context of the Catholic Church sex scandal, it is not unusual to read that celibacy is the root cause of child molestation by priests; that, if only the church would move forward into the modern world and abandon this bizarre requirement of its clergy, instances of child molestation by priests would vanish overnight.

This is in error. It puts the blame for the heinous crime of child sexual abuse on an “outmoded” system of belief, rather than on the shoulders of pederasts, where it rightly belongs.

The vow of celibacy taken by Catholic priests is akin to the vow of fidelity in marriage. There are those who would argue fidelity, too, is a lost cause, a pointless exercise in the face of an overwhelming evolutionary mandate. I am not among them.

The commitment to celibacy is a symbol of the commitment to hold oneself apart from the world, to save our highest and best for God alone [1].

In direct opposition to this, child molestation is, at heart, the abuse of power; an ultimate act of selfishness without regard for the negative impact to victims, in fact, the “sweeter” to the predator because of that impact.

Sex with children is “real” sex. It constitutes a violation of the vow of celibacy, rather than an exception to it. It is certainly a betrayal of the pastoral function.

Grown men and women, whatever their profession or calling, do NOT have sex with children.
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[1] Not all would agree that this is necessary. Protestant ministers of various denominations follow a different model.

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May 4, 2014 · 1:00 am

Common Bond

A rally was held in Nigeria earlier this week to protest that government’s inaction against the Islamic terrorist group, Boko Haram (translated “Western Education Is Sinful”). The group recently kidnapped some 230 school girls, and is selling them into slavery for as little as $12 or “marrying” them to their captors [1].

Though estimates vary, there are as many as 30 million men, women, and children entrapped in slavery, as I write this.

Included among these are forced laborers recruited under threat of violence, by governments and political parties; chattel slaves abducted from their homes – bought, sold, inherited, and given as gifts; bonded laborers whose loans – impossible of repayment – can be passed from generation to generation; child soldiers; child brides in forced marriages; children engaged in toil destructive of their health and well-being; and sexually exploited women and children, now a basis for sex tourism.

If any of this sounds familiar to Americans, it should. The impact of slavery on our country has been immense. It is a lasting scar the extent of which cannot be summed up in a few neat words.

But slavery has not been confined to a single race or nation. Slavery is referenced as far back as the Code of Hammurabi and the Bible [2]. Slavery existed in ancient Egypt, Greece, and Rome; in Ireland, Poland, and elsewhere across the globe. It existed among Christians and Muslims. Slave labor camps in the form of gulags were utilized as a political tool by Russia until 1960. They persist in China (under the name “laogai”) and North Korea today.

By focusing exclusively on grievances of the past – albeit, legitimate grievances – we may overlook the chance we have as Americans of every stripe to make a difference in the present.

The evils (and insidious after-effects) of slavery should, if anything, make America the nation foremost in seeking an end worldwide to that institution, once and for all. Instead, we remain a house divided, consumed by our own pain. Continue reading →

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