06/25/2008 – HOLLOWED & BURNED...

My blog today was intended to be something vastly different. Something much lighter but still meaningful to me. Now that will have to wait. Because my mind, heart and very core have been turned and torn in a totally different direction. As I sat here at work getting ready to take lunch at my desk, I thought I’d look at the news online and my eyes caught the headline “Court rejects death penalty for raping children”. Now, I don’t know where you fall in your beliefs about the death penalty, but I believe there are situations that warrant it. Child rape by an adult is one of those situations. Of course I read the article. I can’t say it was a mistake because I want to be an informed person, even about things I find disdainful. It’s just that this issue affects me to my very core, and stirs up in me things I don’t want stirred up. Once again I felt like a child with no voice, trying to scream… and now the supreme court is speaking for me, saying what? It’s not THAT bad? I guess that’s what I got out of the article. Unless the perpetrator kills me – they don’t deserve to die for their crime. I don’t think the supreme court understands child rape or what it means to die… emotionally and spiritually, over and over again. They can’t possibly understand. Well I guess some of them did. The vote was 5 to 4.

"The death penalty is not a proportional punishment for the rape of a child," Justice Anthony Kennedy wrote in his majority opinion.

Keep in mind that there are other crimes where no one has to die and the death penalty is still considered appropriate or “proportional” – they include treason and espionage. Spying! You can rape a 5 year old repeatedly (one of the cases before the supreme court!) and keep on living – but if you spy against the government – we can kill you! I’m just not sure about our priorities right now.

So here I sit at my desk, fucking crying, angry, frustrated and totally NOT professional, trying to figure out how to deal with the feelings that are boiling in me. Too upset to eat. Too busy to leave work. Too scattered to concentrate! I’m sitting here feeling carved up and hollowed out, burning on the inside. So I will try to write and hope to get things out and calm down some. But then there’s the past too… knocking at the back of my head. I try to keep it in the past. Been doing really good too! Until shit like this happens.

I don’t even know what to say or who I want to say it to. What does it take for us to find value in our children? I know many would argue that killing the rapist would not add value to the victim – but I’m not certain that’s entirely true. It won’t undo the crime, but I think it will show the victim and the world that the child is worth MORE than the scum who dared to use the child to GET OFF! Would pedophiles still be as active if they faced the death penalty for even one strike? Maybe not. But I’ll tell you one thing, if the death penalty does nothing to prevent them from attacking the first time – it WILL prevent them from becoming a repeat offender once caught! Dead men & women don’t rape kids! And what about peace-of-mind for the victims? Do you know what lives at the back of the minds of people who were raped (at any age!)? “Where is the person who did this to me?” “When will they show up again?” If the person is on death row, or better yet, dead – that peace of mind is worth more than any amount of money or restitution a rape victim could get.

I hear so often that victims have no rights in this country and that the criminals have all the rights. I don’t REALLY believe it, but on days like today, and with decisions like the one handed down today, it is very easy to see why some people do. It would be easy for me to become polarized around this single issue and throw my hands up in the air and say “they just don’t care!” and give up. But the vote was 5 to 4. Maybe four people get it. Maybe four people care! It was one person away from going the other way.

I just don’t know what it takes for the other five to understand that children who are raped DO die. That child dies and something, and someone else replaces the child – forever! If they are lucky, they don’t stay a victim for the rest of their lives. If they are lucky, they find a way to cope, help themselves or get help and then reclaim their lives as new people and become productive citizens in society. If they are lucky, they don’t turn into pedophiles or other criminal types. If they are lucky, they don’t become self-hating, self-destructive people who crash and burn over a short or long period of time – hurting others along the way. If they are lucky, they do overcome their physical wounds, their emotional wounds and their spiritual wounds. If they are lucky, all these wounds will somehow fade into scars and be hidden under different forms of coping mechanisms, behaviors and personalities – that hopefully – the world will be able to embrace. If they are lucky, they will find someone with whom they can be somewhat open and with that person, find love. To a certain extent, I’ve been lucky. Very lucky.

I don’t have statistics to spout here, but I’ve spent a year in therapy, and judging from what I’ve seen, heard and read, I would say the majority of victims are not so lucky. Most are far from it. But I think we would all benefit from some help from the supreme court recognizing the true severity of the damage done to children when they are so grievously violated. I guess this is my plea. To the other 5.

Peace and Love to the children, and to you all…

WOOF ya later!
~ bbw