The news on the morning reported that a mother in Michigan has been arrested for offering her seven year old daughter to an undercover policeman for the purposes of molestation and pornography.
Evil. Wicked. I just can't wrap my mind around something so completely wrong.
The only good thing I can say is that at least the name of the mother has not been released so that her five (!) children can be protected from media scrutiny.
Posted by Jim-Me (Member # 6426) on :
I have a seven year old daughter, and five children... and yeah, I can't get there from here either.
Posted by Rakeesh (Member # 2001) on :
Yeah, I'm completely comfortable labeling that sort of behavior as evil. Totally baffling. Hopefully she'll get sent up the river for a very, very, very long time and never have any parental rights with her children again.
Posted by vonk (Member # 9027) on :
I'm so uncomfortable believing something like that could happen that I'm gonna go ahead and believe that the woman refused to do something for the police and this is a false allegation to get revenge.
But just in case doublethink doesn't work, that is absolutely repulsive and I shudder to think about what she's done prior to getting caught.
Posted by Phanto (Member # 5897) on :
The trouble with black and white think is when you look at that woman and realize that she was abused as a child, or she has a mental disorder, or something. It doesn't in any way condone her behavior; it makes it understandable.
But maybe she's just evil.
Posted by Jim-Me (Member # 6426) on :
Phanto I was abused as a child and I couldn't get anywhere near doing this.
But I do think what you said was good. It is extremely important, when speaking of evil, to remember how horribly bleak and wasted a mind must become to get to the point where things like this are possible. I have little doubt the woman has been in hell, itself, and that she deserves our compassion. She deserves justice as well, but justice does not preclude pity, mercy, and compassion... in fact if it does, it isn't truly justice.
Just my opinion.
Posted by El JT de Spang (Member # 7742) on :
quote:The only good thing I can say is that at least the name of the mother has not been released so that her five (!) children can be protected from media scrutiny.
It's not media scrutiny that those children need to be protected from.
Posted by Rakeesh (Member # 2001) on :
quote:The trouble with black and white think is when you look at that woman and realize that she was abused as a child, or she has a mental disorder, or something. It doesn't in any way condone her behavior; it makes it understandable.
But maybe she's just evil.
Not necessarily. Offering up one's child for molestation and pornography (which implies the idea of financial reimbursement) is quite different. And anyway, still not understandable.
Her behavior can be evil, and still have a reason and a sympathetic source, you know.
Posted by Phanto (Member # 5897) on :
Here's the question that really bugs me.
If Jane is a murderor, but only because she is schizophrenic and voices tell her her to, and a simple treatment of some chemical can heal her disease, is she really blameworthy?
Posted by BlackBlade (Member # 8376) on :
quote:Originally posted by Phanto: Here's the question that really bugs me.
If Jane is a murderor, but only because she is schizophrenic and voices tell her her to, and a simple treatment of some chemical can heal her disease, is she really blameworthy?
Assuming your statement is 100% factually correct, i.e
Jane is schizophrenic to the point that she cannot control her actions, OR she was persuaded by the voices in her head that what she was doing was acceptable, and she lacked the judgment to understand why the voices were wrong.
If a drug can miraculously make all those voices disappear and remove the effects of those voices then yes I would say she is blameless.
IMHO, I think this scenario is extremely unlikely bordering on virtually impossible. I think it is more likely that were schizophrenia used as a defense it is being misused in this instance.
Rakeesh: I think everyone agrees her actions are evil, I think the more interesting question is whether the woman herself is evil.
Posted by Jim-Me (Member # 6426) on :
quote:Originally posted by BlackBlade: Rakeesh: I think everyone agrees her actions are evil, I think the more interesting question is whether the woman herself is evil.
what do you mean by "evil" when speaking of a person...?
Posted by romanylass (Member # 6306) on :
I can't comprehend it either. I hope she has all her rights terminated. Posted by Jim-Me (Member # 6426) on :
I would be shocked if she doesn't.. but then again, I have heard more outrageous things.
Posted by Puffy Treat (Member # 7210) on :
quote:Originally posted by El JT de Spang: It's not media scrutiny that those children need to be protected from.
What purpose would releasing their names serve, then?
Posted by Lyrhawn (Member # 7039) on :
This was on the local news last night, here is the story if anyone wants to read it.
It's always more disturbing when it's just a few miles away.
Posted by El JT de Spang (Member # 7742) on :
quote:Originally posted by Puffy Treat:
quote:Originally posted by El JT de Spang: It's not media scrutiny that those children need to be protected from.
What purpose would releasing their names serve, then?
Huh?
Posted by Puffy Treat (Member # 7210) on :
quote:Originally posted by El JT de Spang:
quote:Originally posted by Puffy Treat:
quote:Originally posted by El JT de Spang: It's not media scrutiny that those children need to be protected from.
What purpose would releasing their names serve, then?
Huh?
You stated they don't need to be protected from media scrutiny, so I'm curious as to why you feel that way. What will revealing their names to the press do, other than invade their privacy at a time when they most likely need it?
Posted by El JT de Spang (Member # 7742) on :
You misunderstood. I'm saying, with a mother that dysfunctional, media scrutiny is the very least of their problems.
I don't see anywhere it that sentence that indicates that releasing their names to the press would be a cause for celebration. Just trying to put it in perspective.
Posted by DevilDreamt (Member # 10242) on :
Yeah, that makes me want to vomit.
I normally hate the police, but I am glad to see them doing their jobs. I'm actually happy to see them posing online and catching people who do things like this.
and releasing their names would have huge consequences. How many kids want it to be common knowledge that their mother sold them for sex? People would treat all of this woman's children differently, no doubt about it.
Posted by Puffy Treat (Member # 7210) on :
quote:Originally posted by El JT de Spang: You misunderstood. I'm saying, with a mother that dysfunctional, media scrutiny is the very least of their problems.
I don't see anywhere it that sentence that indicates that releasing their names to the press would be a cause for celebration. Just trying to put it in perspective.
Since I said the only good thing was their privacy being protected, I already understood that. The first part of my post covers how reprehensible I think what the mother did is.
And I never indicated I thought you were celebrating, so I'm still not sure what you mean. Posted by ClaudiaTherese (Member # 923) on :
This seems to be an offense at a greater level of mental and prosaic organization than I would expect for something like schizophrenia. Getting yourself together enough to go out and find someone who wants to (*wince, gag) molest your kid, arranging a meeting time, and getting there are all at a higher level of processing than I would expect from someone whose thought processes were incapacitated by delusions and hallucinations.
I'm no expert on this, but it doesn't strike me as very plausible.
This is, say, on a far different level of functioning than trying to drown your kids in the bathtub. (Also horrific, but more explainable in terms of delusions and hallucinations -- no more organization or higher-order processing involved than the immediate task.)
Posted by Irami Osei-Frimpong (Member # 2229) on :
I'm surprised it doesn't happen more often. Drugs or degradation will lead people do awful things. Once you've lost your sense of self respect or self worth, you are a stone's throw away from losing those same feelings for your offspring.
[ April 02, 2007, 07:53 PM: Message edited by: Irami Osei-Frimpong ]
Posted by alt (Member # 10326) on :
If any of you learned that this had happened to someone you knew, in person or over cyberspace, what would you think of them? Honestly?
Posted by Jim-Me (Member # 6426) on :
What would I think of the child, or the mother?
Posted by Scott R (Member # 567) on :
Jim:
While I understand the need for pity, understanding, etc., as well as mercy, I'm having a hard time fitting in 'emotional/psychological problems' with this case.
This isn't a case (from the information we've been given) where an adult was sexually attracted to a child. This isn't (as far as I know) a case where impulses drove her actions.
As far as I can tell, this was opportunism. She was offering prostitution services; she threw her young daughter into the bargain.
From Lyrhawn's link, it was all about the money. I'm having a hard time seeing where we should have pity or compassion for her, even while we enact justice.
Posted by Jim-Me (Member # 6426) on :
Someone that devoid of... humanity?... I absolutely think we should have pity on her. Whatever destructive force it was that caused it, it takes a considerable one to teach a human woman that it's ok to sell her children... for any use, much less sexual ones.
When someone does something so repulsive, it means that sometime in the past a human soul was destroyed-- unless you want to argue that she didn't have one to begin with? That is cause for pity in my book.
I don't mean at all that she should be let off easily or anything like that... just that we should remember that once, before that mind became so twisted and that soul so bereft of concern for even her own children, that woman was a human being... once she was even a child like her own daughter... with hopes, dreams, and fears like any of us.
I think it's an important part of not becoming like her.
Posted by MrSquicky (Member # 1802) on :
quote:I'm having a hard time seeing where we should have pity or compassion for her, even while we enact justice.
Basic Christian doctrine?
Posted by Scott R (Member # 567) on :
Okay. I don't see how thinking of what she once was prevents others from becoming like her.
It's like pointing to a shark and saying, "We need to have compassion for that shark in the kiddie pool, even as we hit it with our sledghammers. Because if we don't, we might develop cartiligenous skeletons and multiple rows of teeth, and a soul-killing hunger for human flesh."
Posted by Jim-Me (Member # 6426) on :
Do you think people are just born like that sometimes, Scott? That sometimes people just have a bad heart from the beginning and don't have any consideration for their actions? that they just start out evil enough to overcome one of the strongest human instincts there is without any help along the way?
And the failure in your analogy is that it is truly ridiculous for a human being to become a shark... yet it is not ridiculous (in the same sense) for a human being to turn into a creature capable of viewing all other humans as tools to be used for their own personal gain (which is ultimately what happened here: she dehumanized even her own children)-- there's a much smaller gap between an unscrupulous salesman and this woman than there is between a human and a shark... can we agree on that?
Posted by Scott R (Member # 567) on :
Please elaborate, Mr. Squicky.
Posted by Teshi (Member # 5024) on :
I can't imagine doing the undercover work which deals with this kind of crime.
Posted by Scott R (Member # 567) on :
Jim-me, I'm not at all sure that this woman is precisely human. That's why I don't think my analogy is terrible.
In any case, that's not my question. How does seeing this woman in a compassionate light prevent me from becoming like her?
Posted by Jim-Me (Member # 6426) on :
because her issue is that she doesn't recognize the value of humans around her? Admittedly that's an extrapolation from her willingness to sell here children into sexual predation... but it doesn't seem like a stretch.
What she did was inhuman. What she has become is inhuman. Unlike a shark, however, she was once fully human and that has been lost. As I said-- cause for pity. The specific part of her humanity which seems to be missing is respect for other humans (likely respect for the human that is herself, as well)... hence the need to remember that she was once human, too. Respect for what is/was human is the first step towards not selling your children into sexual slavery.
Posted by Scott R (Member # 567) on :
Hmm...
I'll give it some thought.
Posted by Jim-Me (Member # 6426) on :
I hope I've explained myself well Posted by Amanecer (Member # 4068) on :
Jim-Me, I think your explanations were beautiful. Posted by mr_porteiro_head (Member # 4644) on :
quote:because her issue is that she doesn't recognize the value of humans around her?
That's one possible extrapolation. Another is that she considers her own desires so important that they trump everything else.
Posted by Jim-Me (Member # 6426) on :
quote:Originally posted by mr_porteiro_head:
quote:because her issue is that she doesn't recognize the value of humans around her?
That's one possible extrapolation. Another is that she considers her own desires so important that they trump everything else.
Either way that's an awfully depreciated value of humans other than herself.
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
quote:Okay. I don't see how thinking of what she once was prevents others from becoming like her.
To extend this in another direction, it's important so that we recognize the continuum between the many different ways we all view people more as means to our own ends than people in and of themselves and the ultimate expressions of such dehumanization of others.
She most likely made the journey from human being with human weaknesses to human being with monstrous capabilities in tiny steps, each one not a much bigger deal than the one immediately preceding it. We should pay attention to such tiny steps we might or might not take not only in light of the harm those steps can create in and of themselves, but also in light of the possible destination.
Moreover, we ought to consider how our actions might make it easier for someone to take one of those small steps - not to excuse anyone's personal responsibility for their choices, but to recognize our own contribution to those choices.
Posted by ClaudiaTherese (Member # 923) on :
quote:Originally posted by Dagonee:
quote:Okay. I don't see how thinking of what she once was prevents others from becoming like her.
To extend this in another direction, it's important so that we recognize the continuum between the many different ways we all view people more as means to our own ends than people in and of themselves and the ultimate expressions of such dehumanization of others.
She most likely made the journey from human being with human weaknesses to human being with monstrous capabilities in tiny steps, each one not a much bigger deal than the one immediately preceding it. We should pay attention to such tiny steps we might or might not take not only in light of the harm those steps can create in and of themselves, but also in light of the possible destination.
Moreover, we ought to consider how our actions might make it easier for someone to take one of those small steps - not to excuse anyone's personal responsibility for their choices, but to recognize our own contribution to those choices.
Oh, yes. Yes.
Posted by BaoQingTian (Member # 8775) on :
Seconded. That's one of the coolest things I've heard you say Dag.
Posted by Olivet (Member # 1104) on :
They assigned me a roommate my last year at college who had been pimped out by her mom, reputedly for drugs or drug money. They thought I could be a good influence, a compassionate friend, because of my tendency to seek out people who were socially marginalized for various reasons.
I was completely useless to her, as far as I know. Dear God, there just... I couldn't even begin to imagine what her life must've been like.
Posted by ketchupqueen (Member # 6877) on :
quote:Originally posted by Jim-Me: Phanto I was abused as a child and I couldn't get anywhere near doing this.
But I do think what you said was good. It is extremely important, when speaking of evil, to remember how horribly bleak and wasted a mind must become to get to the point where things like this are possible. I have little doubt the woman has been in hell, itself, and that she deserves our compassion. She deserves justice as well, but justice does not preclude pity, mercy, and compassion... in fact if it does, it isn't truly justice.
Just my opinion.
I love you, Jim. You are so wonderful. (((hugs)))
Posted by ketchupqueen (Member # 6877) on :
quote:Originally posted by Jim-Me: I would be shocked if she doesn't.. [have all her parental rights terminated] but then again, I have heard more outrageous things.
I know of multiple instances where fathers have raped their children, are in prison for it-- but have not had their parental rights terminated. It is, apparently, very hard to do, and in some cases the involved parties just don't see to it that it gets done, or don't realize it has to be done seperately. I have heard at least one horror story of one of these men getting out before his child was an adult and demanding a say in decisions regarding the child. I know at least one more of one of these men demanding a say in his children's lives from prison. (In that case, the judge went ahead and granted the petition by the mother to have his rights terminated.)
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
Thanks CT and BQT. The first part of that is the result of musings triggered by "The Inner Ring" by C.S. Lewis when I was in college. The last paragraph is a concept that was solidified for me when I read Akma's testing by the Keeper in "Earthborn."
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