Kendall:

As someone who's spent the better part of the last decade
advocating for survivors of sexual abuse by Catholic priests
and religious and who has along the way gotten to know quite a
few of those fine human beings personally, I find the statement:

>Slag, I was married to a child psychologist. I've known her for 26
>years and I have seen her work. She knows what she is talking about.
>There are always exceptions, but the general rule still is, beaten kids
>will grow up to be beaters, and sexually abused kids will abuse others.
>It's all they know.

...not only to be patently false, but one of the single most
bigoted, offensive, re-victimizing, calumnious pieces of typewritten
crap ever to be posted to this forum.

It contains the classical Archie Bunker-esque appeal to authority
to justify bigotry. Look, I don't care if you shared a bed with
C.G. Jung himself for a couple decades...it's crap. A huge
proportion of abuse victims resolve NEVER to commit such atrocities
as a result of their experiences. Then again, there is an
extraordinary amount of abuse in the world, so it's no surprise
that abusers may have themselves been abused--- but then again
quite a few weren't. When caught, though, there's a pretty good
chance they'll use it as an excuse.

The idea that the abuse victim who does not go on to abuse
is an 'exception' (your words) is as offensive as the notion
of the black man who doesn't rob people on the street being
the 'exception.'

And 'It's all they know?'

Come ON Kendall! The abuse survivors I know seem to 'know'
a hell of a lot more than just how to abuse. I give you
Bishop Thomas Gumbleton of Detroit, one of the most significant
peace activists and scholars of our time. How about Leon Panetta,
congressman, politician, abuse victims' rights advocate, Chief
of Staff to Bill Clinton--- and abuse survivor? The list goes
on.

The fact is that abuse victims mostly go on to abuse THEMSELVES
and damage THEMSELVES as a result of their victimization.

What's worse, such claptrap casts a cloud of suspicion over anybody
who'll stand up and say "it happened to me" or worse yet, pursue

a case for restorative justice. Because the next thing we have
is some bright boy who was 'married to a child psychologist'
suggesting that the local school district not employ teachers
who admit in a pre-screening interview or on some form that they
were abused children, because 'the general rule is...sexually
abused kids will abuse others.'

Or maybe they'll just treat the person like a leper, taking care
to make sure that their own kids are never alone with the abuse
survivor. After all, there is 'the general rule!'

And if your 'child psychologist' REALLY views the world in that
way, then please let us have her name so we can know not to send
anything more sentient than a pet rock or a chia pet in her
direction.

This is a drum you should be bloody well ashamed of beating,
and invite you to stop it right now, lest we turn up something
in your past, or your genetic make up, or something else beyond
your control which 'as a general rule' proves that you're not
to be trusted, either.

It's statements like YOURS that perpetuate the consequences
of abuse, create a sense of an unbreakable 'cycle' and which
heap damage upon damage, and get in the way of healing and
recovery.

Abuse survivors didn't choose to be abused.

Can you say the same about your spouting of this defamatory crap?