Some Stories are Timeless

The image above is from Foley's 'Action Center' web site. Are you laughing yet?

I've been obsessing about this for a few days now, because it's a story that hits close to home. I'm particularly disturbed by these excerpts from a NY Times article from Monday:

"At the White House, Tony Snow, President Bush's press secretary, initially characterized the scandal as 'naughty e-mails,' drawing a blistering response from Democrats who said his words suggested that Republicans did not understand the gravity of the situation....

"'...The first three questions I was asked when I arrived in Peoria,' he [LaHood] said, 'were not about immigration, the war or taxes. It was, 'What are you going to do about the page program?' ...

"...The Foley case also drew criticism from conservative groups. 'It's one of the worst Congressional scandals ever,' Cliff Kincaid, editor of the conservative Accuracy in Media Report, wrote Sunday in an editorial circulated by Gopusa.com, a Republican Web site. 'A top House Republican who denounced sex predators as 'animals' stands accused of acting like one.'
At the news conference Monday night, Roth, Foley's lawyer, denied that Foley had ever had inappropriate physical contact with minors. 'Mark Foley has never, ever had inappropriate sexual contact with a minor in his life,' Roth said. 'He is absolutely, positively not a pedophile.'"
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I'm equally disturbed by some of the "Conservative" bloggers' sites wherein the bloggers accuse the Democrats of changing the definition of 'molestation' to suit their political agenda. {This link redirects to townhall.com, so you have to click on 'Hugh Witt' and scroll to October 4.}

There's so much I could say about this--so many aspects to address, but I'll just cull it all down to a personal anecdote. As usual.

My fourth (and fifth) grade history teacher, Mr. Massey, who had a daughter a year ahead of me in school, loved to fondle little girls at his desk. He'd groom us by acting like Mr. Rogers, then he'd gradually venture fatherly pats on the bottom, which eventually turned into his hands in our panties. He could pick out the girls with "issues," too, those of us whose fathers, for instance, would throw us across the room if we brought home a less than perfect report card. Or those who'd already been raped by our uncles or friends of the family. He could identify the perfectionists, the girls who were sure to ask the questions, and Mr. Massey would make sure we had them. Not one of us, though, realized there were others--until later.

Who knows how long this had been going on when I got my turn, but I know for a fact it hadn't stopped by the time my sister came along two years later. So I started talking. I told a couple of friends about my experience, and I came to find out it had happened to them also, and a couple of their friends, and so on, and so on. Finding our strength in numbers, we eventually went to our parents. We were so relieved. It would all be handled.

Here's what happened: Mr. Massey, being a fine, upstanding member of the community, churchgoing Republican, husband, and father of two, was forced to put a piece of masking tape on the floor from the outward corner of his desk to the wall. The students were instructed, "Do not cross that line or whatever happens is your own fault."

I know you think I'm making that part up, but I'm not. It was more important to protect him, his job, and his reputation, than it was to protect us. Our principal, who masterminded this plan, was the father of four girls himself, friends of mine. We had our seances at their house. His wife made me waffles on the weekends.

I guess it wasn't so bad--that little slide of the finger, and the years of shame that resulted. Or the idea we gals got that we were responsible for it. It must depend on your definition of molestation.

When I read that people want to know what's going to be done about the page program, it makes me livid. That program is NOT the problem. Those young people are NOT the problem. The problem is and always has been adults who choose to make sexual partners of children--in whatever form that activity takes.

Whether it's inappropriate touching, the sharing of explicit images or text or audio, or intercourse--if it robs a child of innocence, if it takes away their right to explore their sexuality gradually, in age-appropriate increments--it is dead wrong.

Foley's attorney can maintain that Foley "never had inappropriate sexual contact with a minor in his life," but I think asking a boy (whose mom is in the next room and who signs off the computer because he's got to go do his reading for his AP class) if he masturbates face down and where he "unloads" it is inappropriate sexual contact.

And I think dismissing this kind of behavior as just some "naughty emails" is exactly what keeps these folks in business--the teachers, clergy, scout leaders, politicians...(Men AND women--I had a perverted gym teacher, also, in the long list of my fondlers and sodomizers.) Over thirty years later, the story's still the same. Only the pervs have more hunting ground.

Frankly, I'm more interested in (and angered by) the public's response to Foley's behavior than I am in/by what he did. Pedophiles are nothing new. They aren't going to go away. They are born and made every day. Lots of them are wealthy; lots of them have power. Lots of them have families and give to charity.

When are we going to start calling them what they are and punishing them accordingly?