WARNING: Graphic Images
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Category Archives: Sexual Assault
The Bunny Ranch – Prostitution Exposed
“The Damned” by Luca Signorelli (1499-1502), Chapel of San Brizio, Orvieto, Source Web Gallery of Art (PD)
The A&E Network has been running a series titled “Secrets of the Bunny Ranch”, an expose of legalized prostitution at the infamous Bunny Ranch in Nevada. Episodes can be viewed online at https://www.aetv.com/shows/secrets-of-the-bunny-ranch.
Marketing v. Reality
Some years ago HBO aired a puff piece on the Bunny Ranch titled “Cathouse: The Series” [1]. Presented as a documentary, this was essentially a marketing and recruitment device which portrayed brothel life as fun, lucrative, and safe. Nothing could have been further from the truth.
By contrast, the A&E series examines the sordid underbelly of prostitution: the grooming, the trafficking, the rape, the drugs, the violence, the financial irregularity, and the law enforcement corruption.
Virgins are auctioned off to the highest bidder. Pregnant women are offered for sale by the hour to those with a fetish for them. Sex workers are regularly abused, and kept in permanent debt bondage.
Many prostitutes already have a history of childhood abuse and/or domestic violence. They are already wounded, their choices severely limited. Continue reading
Feeling Dirty
Showerhead, Author DO’Neill (CC BY-SA 3.0 Unported, GNU Free Documentation License)
- You are scrupulous about personal hygiene.
- You change clothes frequently. You cannot bear to wear the same shirt or blouse a second time before washing it. This has nothing to do with vanity.
- Your clothes fade quickly from overwashing.
- You change the sheets whether they need changing or not.
- The hamper fills up constantly. You do laundry several times a week, though you live alone.
- In the shower, a feeling of relief washes over you, along with the water. A sense that you are clean again, restored. But the relief does not last long.
If any of this sounds familiar, you may be experiencing a little known symptom of Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD).
The sensation of “feeling dirty” – a sense of self-disgust – is now recognized as a result of sexual abuse or sexual assault [1]. The feeling of uncleanliness produces an urge to wash in the absence of physical contaminants. Rape victims have been known to scrub their skin raw, in an effort to remove any last taint of their assailant [2].
But that taint has been internalized. We, ourselves, are the source of contamination. We, ourselves, have become impure.
This is a measure of our violation.
It is not, of course, true that we are any less pure or any less worthy than before we were violated. But we do feel that way, and desperately want to rid ourselves of the literal and figurative filth to which we were subjected. Desperately want to restore our own integrity. Continue reading
CSAM Apps – Monetizing the Sexual Exploitation of Children Online, Part 1
Image “facebook testify zuckerberg”, Author <a href=”http://www.thoughtcatalog.com” rel=”noreferrer nofollow”>www.thoughtcatalog.com</a> (CC BY-SA 2.0 Generic)
“Underlying every sexually explicit image or video of a child is abuse, rape, molestation, and/or exploitation. The production of CSAM creates a permanent record of the child’s victimization.”
-US Dept. of Justice [1A]
The US Dept. of Justice defines Child Sexual Abuse Material (CSAM) as any visual depiction of sexually explicit conduct involving a minor under the age of 18, in other words, child pornography [1B]. Visual depictions would include photos, videos, live streaming, and digital or computer generated images (including AI-generated content) indistinguishable from an actual minor [2].
Scope
Due to rapid technological changes, online child sexual exploitation is daily increasing in scale and complexity [1C]. The violence and sadistic content depicted in CSAM have increased as well [1D].
Child pornography is readily available through virtually every internet technology, including social networking platforms, file-sharing sites, gaming devices, and mobile apps [1E].
On the Dark Web, where anonymity and encryption make it more difficult to trace perpetrators, a single active website dedicated to the sexual abuse of children had over 2.5 million registered users as of 2021 [1F]. The same year the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children (NCMEC) received nearly 30 million reports of suspected online child exploitation [1G].
Smartphones
Modern smartphones are the ideal child exploitation tool for offenders [1H]. Smartphones can be used to photograph, record, or watch live child sexual abuse. They can both store child pornography, and access such stored pornography remotely. They can connect to other offenders worldwide to receive or distribute child pornography, through an ever expanding variety of apps. Continue reading
Fighting Demons
Black Demons, Author Ramya srivastav, (CC BY-SA 4.0 International)
Fighting the demons of anxiety, depression, and PTSD or trauma-related addictions and eating disorders is a little like playing football [1][2]. We make headway then lose ground. But the fight never really ends, not the way a game of football does. There is no score.
We win by surviving another day.
Across Decades
It can be enormously discouraging to wrestle with the scars of abuse, sexual assault, or other trauma, decade in and decade out. Surely, we must after all this time have made progress.
But progress is not linear. Despite the passage of time, and an extensive list of medications – not to mention therapy – familiar demons can resurface.
Factors Impacting Our Success
So, are anxiety, depression, and PTSD or trauma-related behaviors ever really “conquered”? Can they, at least, be fought to a standstill? The answer depends.
The factors include the length and severity of the trauma we sustained; our particular genetics; the quality and extent of our medical treatment; our psychological and spiritual resources; the emotional support we have available; and the other stressors to which we are subjected.
None of these can be quantified. Most such demons can and do vary over the course of a lifetime.
The Struggle
Why not just throw in the towel (to mix sports metaphors)? After all, the struggle is exhausting. The struggle, however, is life. Continue reading
Light from Darkness, Part 2
“One Spring, Gurs Camp” (1941) by Karl Robert Bodek and Kurt Low, Yad Vashem Museum, Israel, Image courtesy of Yad Vashem Collection
WARNING: Graphic Images
Abuse comes in many forms. From 1933 to 1945 in Nazi Germany it was governmental, with the goal being complete extermination of the Jews [1].
The artworks comprising the Yad Vashem Collection were created by artists (Jewish and non-Jewish) between 1939 and 1945 to provide a living testament of the Holocaust [2A]. A hundred works from the collection were exhibited in Germany in 2016, just three years after the Alternative for Germany (AfD) was founded – a far Right party whose leader, Björn Höcke denigrated the Memorial to Murdered Jews of Europe [3][4].
Art in the concentration camps served simultaneously as a witness, a means of self-assertion, and an expression of optimism [2B].
The works are both heart wrenching and awe inspiring. In “One Spring, Gurs Camp” (above), the barbed wire depicts imprisonment and loneliness. The butterfly and the mountains in the background, however, suggest hope.
One of the two artists who collaborated on “One Spring”, 28 y.o. Kurt Low, was released and able to flee to Switzerland. The other, 37 y.o. Karl Bodek, was ultimately murdered at Auschwitz. Continue reading
Dreadful Sins
WARNING: Graphic Images
“Madam, we the women of East London feel horror at the dreadful sins that have been lately committed in our midst.”
–Petition to Queen Victoria by 4000 impoverished women of Whitechapel
In fear for their lives, the women of London’s Whitechapel petitioned Queen Victoria for relief when Jack the Ripper was at large [1][2]. The Ripper is known to have murdered 5 women, but the exact number of his victims is uncertain [3]. These women were all characterized as prostitutes, though they may simply have been destitute women.
Serial Killings
Despite his infamy, Jack the Ripper was not the first serial killer of women. Nor will he be the last. The savagery of such attacks will not be addressed here.
There are, however, men who have no compassion for women — whether they ever become serial killers or not. They do not recognize women as human beings, and feel entitled to use and degrade them. A few celebrity predators come to mind, though fame is not a prerequisite.
Sex Trafficking
Worldwide, of course, there are sex traffickers who exploit women by force, fraud, and coercion for their own financial gain. Drugs are commonly employed to secure control over women in the sex trade.
Rape by Proxy
Dominique Pelicot, aged 71, went a step further. Pelicot was recently convicted in France of repeatedly drugging Gisele (his wife of 50 years), then recruiting 50 different men to rape her over a 10 year period [4A]. The men (who, themselves, ranged in age from 26 to 68) were likewise convicted, though some claim they believed they were taking part in an erotic game [5].
Pelicot took thousands of videos of these men abusing his unconscious wife. Though she was asleep during the assaults, Gisele Pelicot suffered large gaps in memory, hair and weight loss, as side effects of the drugs her husband was surreptitiously administering to her [4B]. She feared she was developing Alzheimer’s Disease or a brain tumor. Continue reading
The Rose Garden, Chapter 15 – Chocolate or Vanilla
Brownie and Ice Cream, Source https://flickr.com, Author Veganbaking.net
“The day for building your walls will come, the day for extending your boundaries” (Micah 7: 11).
A commentary in The Woman’s Study Bible makes an essential distinction between guilt and shame:
“Guilt is a God-given emotion that occurs when a woman’s mistakes and faults are brought to her own mind or publicly exposed…
Shame, however, says that the person herself is bad…that she is hopelessly defective, unlovable, inferior, and worthless. Shame begins externally with a subtle implication through silence and neglect or verbal denunciation through words of abuse. When such messages are repeated often enough, whether through words or actions, they become internalized into a false belief: I must be bad to deserve such terrible treatment. This becomes the core identity and the basis of thousands of future, flawed choices for the one suffering from shame [1A].”
The Study Bible goes on to say:
“Healing of shame begins when a woman identifies the lies she believed about herself…
Sometimes [however] the victimizing acts done to a person may be so shame-producing that she is still emotionally bound by that shame, though she understands mentally her [true] worth in God’s eyes. In these situations, she must bring her shame…to Jesus. Ultimately, only He can bring full emotional cleansing and freedom [1B].”
This is not easy for me, even today. It is an ongoing process.
As victims, we are not the guilty parties. However, it mistakenly feels that way. Therefore, we punish ourselves. Self-deprivation is one means.
Self-Deprivation
The victims of abuse will often deny themselves the essentials. Some children will not wash. They feel dirty and, at an unconscious level, want the world to know. Other children become obsessed with cleanliness, as I did.
Since expiation cannot be accomplished (it is the wrong party being punished), the behavior is difficult to overcome.
My sister and I have more than once bought for each other the blouse, skirt, or coveted bangle we could not bring ourselves to buy. As a result of her early trauma, my mother could not choose between chocolate and vanilla ice cream.
“Which would you like, Ma?”
“Either one is okay.”
“Really, it’s no trouble. I have both.”
“You choose.”
“Do you want both, Ma? A little of both, maybe?”
“Doesn’t matter. You choose.”
This excessive desire to please on my mother’s part may have been the result of codependence. But self-deprivation, also, played a role. We kept for years in a plastic bag at the back of the refrigerator, behind the vegetable bin, a small fox stole my great aunt had given us. It was, after all, too good to wear.
I have, myself, slept on the couch because there were new sheets on the bed. Clothes are somehow more perfect hanging in the closet, clean and untouched. New lingerie can stay in the drawer for months. I have difficulty even today allowing myself the small luxury of a manicure.
There are echoes of my grandmother in this.
I can count on one hand the number of full-fledged vacations I have taken. A friend called mine “Waldherrian” vacations. These are never actualized: all fantasy, no fun.
The best of my vacations — to England — was actually arranged as a surprise by my mother and sister for my 30th birthday. To her great credit, my mother, also, paid for a school trip to Italy which lingers sweetly in memory.
When my grandfather died, college friends called with their condolences.
“We were so sorry to hear, Anna. Is there anything you need? Anything we can do?”
“No, thank you. Not really.”
“We’re calling to find out where the wake is being held.”
“The wake? You want to come to the wake?!”
“Of course. We want to be there for you.”
“It’s all the way up in the Bronx. I don’t want to put you guys to all that trouble. Really, you don’t have to come.”
“But we want to. Everyone’s here. Everyone. Dressed and ready. We just need directions to the funeral parlor.”
“Thank you. I’m grateful. Truly I am. But it’s better if you don’t.”
And so it goes. Our instinct is to deny ourselves comfort in any form. Continue reading
Children of the Damned
View of Mosul in 2019, following war with ISIS, Author Levi Clancy (CC0 1.0 Universal Public Domain Dedication)
In 27 prison camps and detention centers across Syria, some 50,000 of the most dangerous ISIS members and their families are being held indefinitely. CNN was recently accorded rare access, and found these locations a spawning ground for ISIS [1].
Five years after the caliphate was defeated, the ISIS ideology lives on here.
Though ISIS is known for rape and brutality toward women, the women who defected to ISIS came from over 60 countries. They complain of the conditions in these camps, but radiate hostility toward the outside world and continue to profess loyalty to ISIS.
Unauthorized training sessions are conducted to prepare child soldiers for conflict. Young boys are married off to produce the next generation of ISIS fighters. Some 60 births occur each month.
In an effort to counter this, the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) remove adolescent boys from their families, so that they are not further radicalized by their mothers.
Conditions in the SDF rehabilitation centers are somewhat better. But the number of beds there is limited.
Condemned from Birth
These are children of the damned — condemned from birth to lives constrained by their parents’ choices.
Unlike the children in a 60’s science fiction film by the same name, they are not harbingers of peace [2]. Not only are they confined to detention camps by no fault of their own. They are fed hate with their mother’s milk, and raised on a diet of lies.
Statements of moral superiority and contempt for others form the basis of the ISIS ideology [3]. Religious reasoning is used to justify criminal actions. Violent behavior is normalized. Personal grievances are blamed on others.
And so blood begets blood (Ezek.35: 6; Matt. 26: 52).
ANNA WALDHERR A Voice Reclaimed, Surviving Child Abuse 