On Friday, June 22, 2012, the verdicts were announced in two important child molestation trials that had been going on simultaneously in Pennsylvania:
Jerry Sandusky, the former assistant football coach of Penn State University, was convicted of 45 of the 48 child molestation charges against him. And, Monsignor William J. Lynn was found guilty of essentially contributing to a cover-up of sexual predators among Catholic priests in the archdiocese of Philadelphia. The priests had been molesting children for years. Lynn was the first high-ranking church official to be prosecuted for failing to protect children.
The Philadelphia Inquirer has reported on both of these cases extensively. You can read more about them here:
Complete coverage: Scandal at Penn State
Complete coverage: Clergy abuse case
In both of these cases, sordid details of men using their positions of prestige and power to seduce and manipulate children were aired in public. The eight young men who testified in the Jerry Sandusky trial were incredibly brave, and prosecutors in the church trial were able to introduce into evidence decades worth of rape and molestation charges. For victims everywhere, many of whom probably thought they would never be believed or see any modicum of justice, the verdicts are great victories.
But here is the real change brought about by these trials: Big, powerful institutions are now on notice. They can no longer sacrifice the innocents in order to preserve their reputations and protect their treasuries. Whether it is the Holy Roman Catholic Church or Penn State Football, the hierarchies will be held responsible for the crimes of their representatives.
According to the Inquirer, since priest abuse allegations first started surfacing in the mid-1980s, more than 3,000 civil lawsuits have been filed, and the Catholic Church has paid out more than $3 billion in settlements. Dioceses have closed parishes and sold property to cover the costs. The Diocese of Wilmington, Delaware, filed for bankruptcy.
Read Sex-abuse crisis is a watershed in the Roman Catholic Church’s history in America, on Philly.com.
Penn State University, with two officials already indicted for perjury related to the Sandusky case, anticipates more criminal proceedings and an onslaught of civil suits. The university has already embarked on damage control. As soon as Sandusky was declared guilty, the university announced a program to offer cash settlements to the victims.
Read: Bob Ford: In Sandusky case, Penn State tries to get ahead of civil actions, on Philly.com.
(By the way, more Sandusky victims, besides the 10 listed in the trial, have come forward. Read: Jerry Sandusky trial did not include all of his alleged victims, on ABCNews.go.com.)
So, for all of us at Lovefraud, all of us who have been manipulated, molested and abused, these verdicts are worth celebrating. Evil was exposed. Evildoers are going to prison. Enablers of evil are paying the price for averting their eyes, shutting their mouths and failing to act.
All of us who are fighting the good fight should feel encouraged. Perhaps the time is coming when we can go up against the rich and powerful—and win.
I can’t really say that my mother made me feel shame, but I do know that she prized obedience. Doing what I was told to do was huge. In a world where everyone is trying to work together as a team this is probably not such a bad thing. But being obedient and not questioning authority… combined with love bombing and initial flattery is a predators dream target
My mother in law has had attacks of “pancreatitis” for many years. They coincide quite nicely with holidays, vacations, confirmation, notable events where she would like and needs more attention.
Ha, Honest, that’s exactly what my stepmother does. She used to walk with a cane, then my dad and I caught her practically jogging in the mall one time. Priceless. She doesn’t use the cane any more.
Oh yes, dream target for sure. I still feel like I always have to ‘do as I am told’. Even if the person doing the telling obviously does not have my best interests at heart. Brainwashing.
My mother has Ménière’s disease, which affects the inner ear. She would get acute attacks of dizziness, nausea, and loss of hearing.
Remarkably (ha!,) this happened multiple times when she was supposed to meet with me and my then therapist.
My therapist and I took this to mean that she didn’t want to hear what we had to say a la the Louise Hay school of thought.
That really seemed to be true because these attacks always seemed to coincide with other things, not related to me, that she didn’t want to hear.
This cannot be a coincidence.
The military is telling the troops to speak up if they are sexually assaulted or raped.
It’s about time.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/47960915/ns/us_news/
Using the “sick role” to avoid things one does not want to hear or to do is a time-honored way to get what you want and use guilt on the part of the injured party….”you can’t do that to me because I’m SICKKKKKK” What a crock of cr4p!
Our society does not expect the the “sick” person to live up to their otherwise expected roles….of worker, wife, husband, etc. so the manipulator will use this as a way to avoid responsibilities.
On the other hand, those of us who are the “worker bees” will keep on with our responsible roles even when we are gravely ill.
I have gone to work when I was running a fever…when I should have actually been hospitalized because that was what was “expected” of me.
Hospitals are the worst I think for “requiring’ that employees come to work no matter how sick they are…and you’d think that they would not want a sick employee there caring for others and spreading their germs…but I digress.
One of the psychopaths I know also claimed she had Ménière’s disease and boy did she ever milk her “dizzy” days when there was something she did not want to do. She even managed to quit her job and eventually get Social Security disability…she found a doctor that would believe her tales of her dizziness and give her plenty of valium. Her husband also went to this same physician and got enough Rx drugs that he became an addict. They eventually separated when he became physically abusive to her.
Funny now that they are separated (this was a case of two users hooking up together) she is able to work full time off the books for cash. He now mooches off his brother who i s MR and receives benefits and a place to live.
Each one of course smears the other one as the “abuser” when in fact, they are both abusers and users. She is also a thief.
Honest-Obiedence…I was/am my mom’s obedient child. She plays that to this day, but just like my n/h, she uses it to get what she wants. She’ll start a conversation calling me her good girl then somewhere jabs me with something I did “wrong” 35 years ago. Fortunately, for me, all she wants at this stage in life is to feel important to one of her children. As for conversation about the treatment….ain’t going to happen with her either. Geesh. call her on it and she cries to put guilt on me and divert her responsibility. Lucky for me after 43 years..IT DOESN’T WORK anymore. Just like h’s anger doesn’t work anymore. In big part that is do with this site and all of you.
Wow, I thought who set me about to except physcopath behavior was my dad. Um….it’s looking like I might be wrong.
Geez, Ox, my step mother is on disability too! Amazing. And the doc who was keeping her all doped up was ARRESTED recently for selling drugs, so she was really peeved. She had to find a new doc and go to pain management therapy.
Just – it could be a combination of both parents. In my case, my mom was the malignant N, but my dad totally enabled her. Then they divorced and my dad disappeared (abandonment) until I hunted him down when I was in my 20s and we reconciled. Now he enables new malignant N wife. Ah well.
Just us 5, the thing is as we start to heal from the abuse of the psychopath that brought us to LF…I think we see other abusive relationships in our lives as well. It may be a parent, a sibling, a co-worker, a neighbor or a friend…in learning about abuse from the psychopath, we also learn about the abuse from others.
I am NC with my egg donor, and she did the same thing your mom has done, she damned me because I wasn’t “perfect” to her expectations, tried to control me, and get me to continue to participate in the dysfunction of the family dynamics.
I have come to see that RESPECTING a parental role is not the same as allowing someone who is a DNA donor to abuse and use you. Neither God nor man expects that you should be abused by anyone.
It was very difficult for me to see too that my relationship with my egg donor was very dysfunctional, and I had “forgotten” a lot of the abuse, or been in denial about it…I finally came to see that she had never loved or respected me, or treated me with nurture and care….only control, and I am no longer allowing others to control what I think or what I do.
I am an adult and I am going to acknowledge my adulthood and my responsibility to myself to be treated in the way that I treat others. I will set boundaries and respect myself. Those people who do not respect me and treat me with care are not going to be part of my life…no matter what shared DNA we have.