what would you do?

You find out that your son has raped his step sister; do you confront him; tell your stepchild’s father; or do you say nothing?

Naturally, the latter is never the option; however, it was an option exacted by a woman who alleges that her son could never and would never do something like that. The young lady in question was very forthright about what happened and was unwavering in her telling of the story. One would assume that her father would be supportive and protective of his daughter, but instead he did little to aid in a positive outcome. His reasoning was that he didn’t want to disrupt the family and the boy would be put on any form of punishment the daughter deemed necessary. WTF? Is what I hear coming through the bloglines. Yes, that was my reaction and then some.

Naturally, this situation caused a lot of disruption in the household and to add insult to injury the father then began to touch his daughter inappropriately while she slept. Again, the daughter spoke up, but to no avail and her stepmother gave her even more grief than before.

Long story short, the young lady finally spoke up to someone who believed her and in her and provided some much needed support. She moved out of the home and into the home of a caring person. Eventually, the young lady contacted the police and charges were filed.

This story is one that is particularly painful for me to comprehend because there is no reason why the father was so complacent in his roles and responsibilities. Wait, I digress. I guess it was obvious per his own molestation of his daughter, that he had issues and couldn’t be the father he was supposed to be. He shirked his responsibility when he downplayed what his stepson had done as did his wife; citing the boy couldn’t do such a thing. Why could he not. The girl was not his blood relative, she might have been attractive to him, and he could simply be deviant in his behavior traits. Whatever the case, this situation is a illustration of how families downplay and perpetuate sexual assault.

As I stated in yesterday’s post, we must stop acting like these things couldn’t happen to us or our children. We must believe in our children when they say someone did something to them. There is minimal reason why any child would lie about something like that. Yes, there are those who are malicious enough to lie, but for the most part that happens infrequently.

Reinforcing family values, family codes of conduct, and talking about sexual issues is paramount to establishing a good and functional family structure. We live in a society that blurs the lines on so many sexual topics, but this should not be one of them. It is more than important to educate our children and family members about proper sexual tones and overtures. We must teach our children to know the difference between a good touch and a bad touch. Educating males and females from an early age on is essential to their knowing how to conduct themselves and how to be treated by others in spite of the sexual overtones they’re exposed to.

I look forward to the day when sexual abuse is eradicated.

Love!