By Joyce Alexander, RNP (retired)
Psychopaths do a great deal of damage to their victims. The fact that there are people who are aware of what they are doing and choose to “look the other way” or to “sit on the fence and do nothing” enables the psychopaths to continue to abuse their victims. If the bystanders would stand up and assist the victims, even acknowledge that they are being victimized, the psychopaths might not be quite so successful.
One of the most famous of these enablers who chose to look the other way was a man named Pontius Pilate, the Roman prefect in Jerusalem in AD 33. When Jesus was brought before him by the Jewish leaders, Pilate stated that he found “no fault” in Jesus, yet he gave Jesus over to the mob to be crucified.
To signify that he had no responsibility for the death of Jesus, Pilate had water and a basin brought and he literally “washed his hands” of what the mob intended to do. Yet, he did nothing to stop it.
The dictionary defines the word “minion” as “a servile follower or subordinate of a person in power.” These people also enable the psychopath to continue to victimize their prey by either helping the psychopath, or by simply “looking the other way” as Pilate did. Minions can also be very active participants with the psychopath in the victimization of the prey.
Examples of doing nothing
A famous case of people knowing a horrible crime was being committed and doing nothing was the murder of Kitty Genovese outside her Queens, NY, home in March, 1964. There were 38 witnesses who did nothing—not even call the cops when they heard her scream for nearly a half hour as she was repeatedly stabbed on that fateful night.
A more recent example of people doing nothing is the Penn State case of Jerry Sandusky’s pedophilia. The head coach and the president of the university knew what Sandusky was doing and chose to do nothing, which allowed Sandusky to continue to abuse young boys sexually for more several years.
Of course not all “enabling” of psychopaths are as “serious” as the crucifixion of Christ, the molestation of dozens of young boys, or the brutal murder of a young woman. But the help and support offered by others does enable psychopaths to “get away with” much more than they would otherwise.
Tattling and telling
We teach our kids not to be “tattle tales” and kids learn not to “snitch” on each other. When my kids were little, I tried to teach them the difference between “tattling” and “telling.” “Tattling” was saying “Johnny called me a doo doo,” but that “telling” was saying, “Johnny is playing with matches and setting fire to the curtains.”
I don’t support gossip or tattling in any way, but we must be aware that when we keep our mouths shut and allow evil to flourish, we are contributing to that evil.
My guess is that most of the people reading this on Lovefraud have experienced people being enablers (either actively or passively) to the psychopath that abused them. People either knew the truth and turned their backs, or actively participated in helping the psychopath accomplish their abuse.
Blame the victim
Psychopaths are also usually very good at the “smear campaign.” When the victim is finally trying to break free, they smear the name, sanity and reputation of the victim to everyone who will listen. Unfortunately, too many times the victim is blamed for their own victimization, or labeled crazy or vindictive for trying to protect themselves. “Yeah he hit her, but she was so mouthy, what can you expect?” Or “well if she’d been a better wife, he wouldn’t have needed to cheat.”
The hurt for the victim becomes double or treble when the enabler or fence sitter is someone the victim counted on for support, such as friend, neighbor, co-worker, relative or even the police and the courts. When someone you have counted on to believe you and validate you, instead turns their back on you, in addition to the trauma from the psychopath, the pain may be simply overwhelming, leaving the victim feeling totally abandoned.
No help
I can’t even imagine the horror that Kitty Genovese must have felt that night as she cried out in terror for someone to save her. Yet, I know that many victims of psychopaths have cried out to people that they expected would help them, would support them, only to find a total lack of concern.
The news reports today are filled with stories of people who “knew” and yet did nothing, or worse, helped the abusers. Whistle blowers are still persecuted relentlessly. Those are facts of life.
For what it is worth, though, even if no one else believes us, it doesn’t change the truth or the facts. While we would appreciate support and validation from others, we don’t always get it, even from those we hold most dear. Learning to validate our own knowledge of the truth may be the closest we come to receiving support.
In my own situation, essentially my entire family, immediate and extended, have either actively assisted my psychopathic son Patrick, stood by silently while he tried to harm me, or washed their hands and didn’t even bother to listen. It hurts when those we have depended on fail us, but it is not the end of the world. In most cases, and we can move on. We can learn to validate ourselves and what we know is the truth.
Fortunately, there is Lovefraud, and the many bloggers here who do support and validate us in our healing journey. I hope that each person here will feel free to reach out to others for support when you need it, and that you will reach out to extend validation and support to others who need your support. That’s what it is all about.
God bless.
And not about Mom or Dad.
Eralyn,
It all goes back to the fact that children are considered “property” not humans….it is about who has a “right” to that “property”
It has not been all that long ago that WOMEN were considered chattel as well. A woman had no right to property or to control her own income or assets, her father or her husband controlled them for her because she was presumed not to have enough sense to do so.
I think we still have a way to go in considering children as something besides PROPERTY that is conveyed with DNA.
There was also a time when a woman who had an illegitimate child (out of wedlock) was PRESUMED to be unfit to raise that child and the father was automatically awarded custody of that child even if he was a married man who had essentially raped the woman who was his indentured servant…plus the woman might receive 50 lashes and have her indenture extended for a year.
How long has slavery been outlawed in the US–yet it still goes on. What is a Pimp but a “slave owner” who sells the body of his property?
There is still a great deal of civil law that is UNcivil.
OxD,
Maybe my mom shouldn’t have kept that secret! 🙂
I thought we were all past that. lol Cause I was… Is that narcisistic? lol.
I knew it was “frowned upon” but I have never paid any attention to that stuff. I just thought I would make people mad if I expected them to care for my child. If I took care of her and worked and did the right thing, I actually thought I was doing something GOOD!! LOL
This is probably why my attorney was shocked (he’s an old timer in the business in his 70’s) when freely said “I wasn’t in love with him. It was a fling!”, in response to his secretary telling me I loved something about spath. I did end up loving a part of him due to my daughter but he sucked that right out of me.
OK i just have to get my 2 cents in on this.
Women and children are considered property because spaths are in charge. When we blame it on culture, we are not seeing clearly. It is spaths and spathy cultures that create that mentality.
When i first left my spath, i had a short “fling” with an old “frienemy”. He had expressed interest many many years earlier and he practically lived next door to my parents’ house where I was. Then he said he had just broken up with a gf because he didn’t have time for a relationshit, but he wanted to be with me. WTF? I responded by making myself clear: I wanted sex, nothing more. He didn’t like that. he wanted to take me out. fine. whatever. when he didn’t see me fall for it, he called it quits.
Men who hate women want us to want them. They want to feel that they have bought us heart and soul. when you tell them they are just a boy toy, they freak out.
Edit: btw, I had been celibate, faithful and loyal to the spath for 15 years. No sex in all that time, so try to understand my POV.
I totally get the rant, Oxy.
I mean… WHO THE HELL invites someone over to sleep who has just been released from JAIL because he hasn’t got a place yet AND THEN lets him “babysit” your daughter and her friend on the night she comes back home from dad AFTER the criminal already pulled his pants off while you were IN THE HOUSE?!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I too suspect at least one of the couple ranging into the spath spectrum. There’s no way that “being snowed and trusting” covers that type of behaviour. And I suspect the judge had the same idea or clues for that, but not evidence and therefore gave them the max he could give them for what could be proven, which was more than the DA had asked for.
Darwinsmom, my belief is that these “parents” in question are just as culpable as the ex-convict perpetrator. They enabled their children’s exposure to a pedophile. And, it’s a screaming “WTF?!” situation that has NO rational explanation.
Here is the problem with this parent issue: anybody can produce offspring. There is no license required to bring a fragile human being into this world. It’s considered a “right to reproduce.” After this, these poor kids are damaged by this incident for the rest of their lives. They will have trust issues, abandonment issues, sexual issues, and a host of other issues to manage as they mature, and ALL because their “parents” virtually allowed a dangerous criminal into their home, SAW the deviant behaviors with their own eyes, and abandoned their children to be molested by an ex-convict.
Good god, but what the hell is wrong with people?!
Thruth,
The article doesn’t explain whether they “saw” much of the deviant behaviour. It only explains that the couple was in the house, and that the girls complained about him.
Interesting to note is the fact that they said they were going for cigarettes. Here in Belgium with short distances, with night shops no more than 5 mins away, that would seem too short a time span for someone to go upstairs, get in the bedroo, etc… Ok, the man had no qualms at pulling his pants off even with the parents in the house, but at least a separation had been ordered. This means to me that the couple had informed the ex-convict that they would be out for a long time, and lied to the girls they were going for cigarettes. The ex-convict knew beforehand he’d had all the time he wanted to rape the girls if he wanted to.
The couple come across as enablers or minions at first learning, but when you think about it, it comes off as being planned and arranged by at least one of the couple, and the ex-convict being the weapon in their hands.
It makes me wonder: how did they know him, who introduced him to whom (the stepfather to the mother or the other way around), how is the relationshit between the mother and the actual father (her ex-partner). Pretty sure there would be red flags in any of these past elements.
Edit: just found another article about it… Emeka U.B. (aka Mike) got 40 months of jail time and fine of 750 euros and was arrested immediately because he has no fixed address. It sounds to me he’s an African immigrant.
The couple is a 40 year old mother and a 52 year old stepfather. They left the girls alone with Emeka from the start. The girls had texted them for help when he started to harrass them as they watched television. The couple returned home but did nothing except ordering everyone to stop “messing about” and sent the girls upstairs to the bedroom and then they left immediately again, citing “going for cigarettes”.
This gives me the impression that the couple is mostly interested in having fun with each other: going out, drinking, gambling, etc… They weren’t a witness or at home at the first efforts by the pedophile and seemed to have expected that ordering the girls to the room and in generally saying “stop this mess” was enough to stop any further harassment. There is more room for interpretation the mother and her partner are stupid neglectful drunks imo who hoped that wishing would be enough to solve the problem, and when it didn’t ended up totally ignoring it because it otherwise interfered with their “fun”. And they probably met Emeka the night before or that day in the pub.
When I worked in the pub there always was one such alcoholic couple who centered around each other (including fights), and there was nothing holier to them than to be drunk together, have a gamble at the pinball machine (where several pinballs have to form a bingo set and then you win money for it) for hours on end. And in their alcoholic state they tended to be generous and regard everyone as someone to befriend. Any interference, call or other breach of this alcoholic cloud would either be ignored or irritably rejected. The mother and her partner seem to fit that type of behaviour to me now: too self absorbed in each other and their outings.
Darwinsmom, the implications that one of the parents, at least, set those children up to be sacrificed makes me ill. The first (and, most obvious) question is, “How could ANY parent DO that?!” The fact is, MANY parents do that, and more.
I imgaine that further investigation will sort out the details about how they knew this ex-con, and the rest.
As an aside, I remember when Susan Smith drowned both of her sons in her vehicle and concocted an elaborate tale of carjacking and so forth. Her televised pleas for the kidnapper to return her children were 100% obvious and so many people were saying, “Poor thing! Her children have been taken!” I watched her on the tube and thought, “Liar.” No need to go into why I knew that she had done something horrible, but I “knew” the moment she opened her mouth in front of the microphones.
I’ll be interested to learn more about the parents in question. I agree with you, Darwinsmom – it sounds like a setup, all the way around.