Abuse

It’s been a rough month for teenagers.

This morning I read a story on the Free Press app about a judge who beat his sixteen year old daughter (now 23). One of her many “spankings” was caught on camera 7 years ago and released on YouTube earlier this week. When I came home from school this afternoon I watched the video, one of the most disturbing things I’ve ever witnessed. 

The seven and a half long video shows William Adams, a judge from Texas whipping his daughter Hillary with “the big belt”. William appears to be about six feet or taller, winds up with all his strength and whips his 16 year old daughter EIGHTEEN times. Hillary screams and cries “that’s enough!” but William doesn’t stop. The man beats his daughter “into submission” until she is curled up in a ball on the floor. Her mother also takes one whip at her and tells her to take it like an adult.

The Royal Canadian Mounted Police defines child abuse as

“any form of physical, psychological, social, emotional or sexual maltreatment of a child whereby the survival, safety, self-esteem, growth and development of the child are endangered.”

I realize this story is from Texas, but I’m going by the definition I’ve known as a Canadian. This man was not disciplining his daughter, he was abusing her. 

Oh and why was this girl being whipped like an animal? She downloaded music and games off the internet.

Why this person (I have a difficult time calling him a man) has not been thrown in jail yet is beyond me. If that child was an animal he would be charged with animal cruelty. If that child was not his own he would be thrown in jail so fast the media wouldn’t even have time to report it. If that was his wife he would be charged with domestic violence and thrown in jail immediately. Saying he was disciplining his child and that “it looks worse than it is” is complete BULLSHIT. 

All night I’ve been thinking about this video. 

 *The Daily What has a vieo up of an interview with Hillary as well as the video of the beating.

http://thedailywh.at/tag/hillary-adams/

*YouTube has an age restriction on the original but here it is if you have an account..

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wl9y3SIPt7o
*CTV on their decision to play the video
http://m.ctv.ca/topstories/20111103/lisa-laflamme-blog-texas-judge-beating-video-debate-111103.html

Every time my mind goes blank I picture it. I can’t even imagine the kind of pain both physical and emotional Hillary went through. Even with no personal connection to this story it’s been haunting me all night.

So how did this go unnoticed for 7 years? 

Are her neighbours, teachers, family, and any other adults going to claim they didn’t know anything? How can that go unnoticed? The people in that girl’s life should be ashamed that they didn’t do anything to stop the abuse. I don’t care if there was no “proof”. Suspicion is enough when it’s about a child. Adults NEED to defend children.

Which brings me to Jamie Hubley.

Jamie was a 15 year old openly gay man from Ottawa who committed suicide on October 15^th. Bullying attributed to his decision to kill himself. Jamie had tried in his highschool to start a Rainbow Alliance club to build tolerance amongst the students. His posters were torn down and mocked by his classmates.

And nothing was done.

To tell Jamie to look towards the future because things will get better is not enough. Adults have that responsibility to build tolerance in all children to prevent this from ever happening again. It’s disgusting to see someone kill themselves because they can’t be accepted for who they are. This problem arises again and again, and nothing gets better. No one changes to stop it.

I wish I lived in a world where all types of people were celebrated with children. I want to see gay couples become mainstream in kids books and classrooms. I wish that we could get to a point where throughout elementary kids were taught acceptance of all people. I don’t care what a parents beliefs are about gay people. I don’t care if they get offended by the material, it has to be done.

Rick Mercer on the topic...

 

Two stories that broke my heart in the past month. Being a teenager is hard enough, if you see one in need, give them your love and support. Do whatever you need to do I don’t want to read anything like this again.