Free Rein No More
I finished watching Surviving R Kelly and then watched a documentary called Liberated. R Kelly is in jail awaiting sentencing. He was able to get away with the abuse for over twenty years. The Me Too movement also helped stop R Kelly, finally. It’s hard to understand how this continues to happen. I hope this is a turning point for things to change for the better so it is unacceptable for predators to have free rein.
In Liberated it followed college students partying on spring breaks and explored the casual sex/hookup culture in Panama City, Florida, and Cancun, Mexico. Wow. It was rough. I’m so glad our kids never went on spring break like that. It seemed to be a specific section of the population though, so I don’t believe that’s how college students behave across the board. It was objectification and sexual entitlement, coercion along with boundary violations/assault run rampant.
I’m all for healthy, consensual sexuality with respectful boundaries, but it seems that’s not what’s practiced. The thing about consent is that a person needs to have awareness, the ability to judge and discern healthy boundaries and be on equal footing with no coercion, manipulation, threats, grooming, or pressure. There needs to be a balance of power between the consenting people. That’s why kids can not consent to sex with adults. Just because someone is capable of being sexually stimulated does not mean they want sex. That’s how women can rape men. Yes, our sexual organs feel pleasure all of our lives, but that doesn’t mean kids are ready to have sex or that it’s beneficial for them as pedophiles proclaim. This article was informative and interesting.
I think I will take a little break from my research for a few days. It’s too depressing. I feel like how I felt working in the adolescent psychiatric unit, all of the injustice and trauma inflicted on those who are at the mercy of whatever happens to be their unfortunate circumstances. Kids having to go back to the environments that caused their problems in the first place. All of the abuse goes on behind closed doors in the homes while the abusers put on a charming front, deceiving the world at large and blaming, scapegoating, gaslighting the victims….crazy-making.
We are more than these bodies. There is a consciousness, a spirit, a full, layered, complex, emotional, intelligent, loving being with multifaceted, complicated, unique qualities that deserve care, respect, and reverence. When we reduce others to bodies for our own personal gratification, agendas, and use, it’s dehumanizing and abusive.
Love and hugs
