Sexual violence pervades every system in our society from the highest governmental institutions to our own homes. It is in our blood. I’d go so far as to say it is the American way: conquest, entitlement, narcissism, survival of the fittest. This epidemic cannot be stopped by policing other people. We each must look inside ourselves and decide how on earth we can allow this to continue among those we know personally.

Predators don’t present as bad people. People who believe they are more deserving, more needy, more entitled to lead TEND to become predators. This accounts for my visceral antipathy toward community and national leaders, those who crave to be in authority. Certainly not all leaders become predators but within that demographic lurks trouble. Why do leaders feel they deserve more deference, more access, more intimacy than other people?

I can’t help contrast the leadership styles of the current occupant of the White House with Greta, the sixteen year old leader of the Climate movement. Where is the humility in our leaders? Where is the desire to serve? Where is the willingness to sacrifice their lives for the cause they serve? Where is the desire to stand up to create real positive change, to mobilize around moral causes? And why instead do leaders feel they have the right to coerce, to take, to pillage the very people they have been entrusted to serve? As a survivor of CSA, the current political climate is very disturbing. How long will we allow ourselves to be oppressed by the madness of entitlement for some but not for all? 

We need solutions from real leaders, with moral authority, and not just those who feel entitled to control us. I can’t help contrast the leadership styles of the current occupant of the White House with Greta, the sixteen year old leader of the Climate movement. Where is the humility in our leaders? Where is the desire to serve? Where is the willingness to sacrifice their lives for the cause they serve? Where is the desire to stand up to create real positive change, to mobilize around moral causes? And why instead do leaders feel they have the right to coerce, to take, to pillage the very people they have been entrusted to serve? As a survivor of CSA, the current political climate is very disturbing. How long will we allow ourselves to be oppressed by the madness of entitlement for some but not for all? 

I fantasized about killing the man who groomed and sexually assaulted me when I was 14. He was a doctor at a Children’s Hospital, an authority. My fantasy resulted in my semi-autobiographical novel, The Fishfly.

Bresha, who killed her abusive father (picture above), is a hero to me in many ways. Horrific, that it sometimes has to come to this.

CSA must end and only WE can end it.

Leaders, those with access to children or other vulnerable people, need to subject themselves to vetting and be evaluated psychologically before we hand them authority. We must have systems in place to detect the conditions for abuse, before it occurs. We need solutions from real leaders, with moral authority, and not just those who feel entitled to control us. We must become Active Bystanders. We must never be silent.