The Will To Dominate

[Rachel333]

It really makes me mad when people ascribe those kinds of motives to little kids. My parents used to do that to me and my siblings, saying "Oh, she's just being rebellious" or "She just wants to manipulate us", when really I was just upset or afraid.

I can't imagine hitting a child until they can no longer speak. These people make me sick.

[babs]

This makes me sick.

I can not and do not understand how people can justify hitting children. If you did it to another adult, you could be arrested for assault and at least charged with a misdemeanor. But children, who are our most precious resource, can be hit and beat by the people who are supposed to love and care for them and that grown-up probably won't even be charged with a crime. It makes me sick.

I work in a public school as a counselor, I have had to report cases of abuse that had me crying (not in front of the child, never ever in front of the child) on my drive home, and some that haunt me to this day. If the parent (and I use that term loosely) had done the same to another adult, they would have been arrested as soon as the cops found them, but no, because it's a child, the adult has the "right" to hit them? Sorry, it just makes me so angry!

If you can't trust the people who are supposed to love and care for you not to hurt you, how the heck can you trust others to not hurt you or think that you are worth something?

Just reading this thread has me in tears.

[AnnoDomini]

The Pearls and the various child abuse cases linked to them has me seriously rethinking my feelings on spanking.

[bicyclecat]

The thing that makes me the sickest about this is the fact that the weakest and most vunerable have the least protection. Children, the elderly, the disabled and animals have less protection than I do, a 30 something female. If my husband beat me the way that the Pearls advocate beating children, he'd do time in jail for it. But, parents can beat their chldren like this and it's considered "discipline?" Heck, you can kill your dog and it's a misdemeanor in most states, if the police will even investigate.

To protect me more than a child is completely backward.

[Guest Anonymous]

If she can scream "huggie" while you are spanking her, you are probably not spanking hard enough.

What the FUCK? They should spank her so hard she can't scream or speak???

They are saying the little girl is addicted to the will to dominate--that's because her entire life has been turned into a power struggle instead of a loving relationship with cooperation! Completely breaking someone's will is EVIL.

It is all so unnecessary, too. Spanking the kid constantly while they have a temper tantrum? Ridiculous! As a preschool teacher, we usually just put our kids in a timeout when they are having a tantrum and say "OK, you have your tantrum here, and when you're ready to be nice, you can come talk to me." The kids get over it very fast when they realize they won't get to play or do anything fun until they stop the tantrum. They get the message very easily without someone HITTING them while they cry or WITHHOLDING LOVE from them.

I am so pissed off right now.

Does it occur to these shits-for-brains that this little girl may have Asperger's syndrome, or a related form of autism? If this is the case, these bastard parents will never beat it out of her. She doesn't need a spanking, it sounds like she's more in need of physical, neurological and psychological workups. And at the hands of professionals, not some poseur from their church.

[LynnKaboom]

OK, this is getting moved up into the next blog post. I've been working on another Pearl article, but it daunts me, and I've been procrastinating on it because I feel slightly ill whenever I work on it. But this needs to be dissected and disseminated among people. Hopefully I'll have this done in a few days, and I'll post a link when I'm done with it. Holy shit, it's enough to drive me to drink.

Beating people on the feet is against the Geneva Convention. It's torture- straight-up torture. Fuck, waterboarding is more humane than that. If there is a Hell, I hope that Michael Pearl rots there for all eternity.

[mnb357]

The will to dominate is actually a good thing, you ass. It has helped break the U.S. free from England, and has made many Americans very wealthy. (And "you ass" refers to Pearl, not the previous poster.)

[Letgo]

I remember reading an article about a Middle Eastern country...maybe Iraq? The dictator of whichever country it was would have the soles of the feet of the national soccer team players beaten when they lost. The beatings ended their soccer playing days.

Is it even possible to prosecute the Pearls for simply giving horrible advice? If I tell you to rob a bank and you do it, am I also responsible? As hideous as their ideas about manipulative infants are, I am not sure they are criminal. Anyone with a legal background know? I keep wondering about the childhoods of Michael and Debbie. Were they abused as children? It might explain how messed up they are.

[Effie]

Is it even possible to prosecute the Pearls for simply giving horrible advice? If I tell you to rob a bank and you do it, am I also responsible? As hideous as their ideas about manipulative infants are, I am not sure they are criminal. Anyone with a legal background know? I keep wondering about the childhoods of Michael and Debbie. Were they abused as children? It might explain how messed up they are.

I don't know. Here we have something called "instigation of murder". That means that person A who tells person B to murder or harm someone, will also get a sentence. If you have something similar to this "instigation"-thing over there, then maybe it could be possible?

[Austin]

The Pearls have a first amendment right to publish any hateful or awful thing they want to. While they (IMO) share in the moral responsibility of what has happened to children as a result of their writings, I don't think there's a way to make them share in any legal responsibility. White Supremists, for instance, write hateful things about minority groups, and even suggest that harm should come to them, even eradication. And that is not a crime.

If Michael or Debi had met with the Schatz parents and personally counseled them, "Go home and beat Lydia until she submits completely to your will, even if you must cause her serious physical damage", then there may be some case that could be made. But as it stands now, I doubt they have legal liability.

Unfortunately.

[AnnoDomini]

They still share in the moral responsibility, and hopefully these cases will bring them so much bad publicity that their ministry is effectively ruined.

[hoipolloi]

The Pearls have a first amendment right to publish any hateful or awful thing they want to. While they (IMO) share in the moral responsibility of what has happened to children as a result of their writings, I don't think there's a way to make them share in any legal responsibility. White Supremists, for instance, write hateful things about minority groups, and even suggest that harm should come to them, even eradication. And that is not a crime.

If Michael or Debi had met with the Schatz parents and personally counseled them, "Go home and beat Lydia until she submits completely to your will, even if you must cause her serious physical damage", then there may be some case that could be made. But as it stands now, I doubt they have legal liability.

Unfortunately.

Sadly, I agree. I think that the most that could have been done in the Schatzes' case would have been to sub poena Mike and/or Debi Pearl as witnesses, requesting them to testify under oath & under questioning about their materials. Even then, I highly doubt they would have made very helpful witnesses for the prosecution although I also doubt their appearance would have helped the defense much at all.

So, we are really left with public education as the best means of at least reducing their influence over people. In that effort, we have a good ally in AC360.

Are there still churches that promote their materials? If so, that may be a good place to work by shaming these people into getting rid of this shite from any parenting class they run.

[Edited for typos]

[bicyclecat]

I remember reading an article about a Middle Eastern country...maybe Iraq? The dictator of whichever country it was would have the soles of the feet of the national soccer team players beaten when they lost. The beatings ended their soccer playing days.

[TheSassyOne]

I still haven't completely finished the Pearls diatribe on parenting. I try, but I can only read so much and then I truly get sick to my stomach. Do the Pearls and those who follow their teachings [do the Duggars follow them?] believe this is the only way to train a child? Seriously? So by isolating themselves, or more importantly their children, from society, they really have no clue how children behave outside their own community? Other than a few isolated events, usually negative of course to prove their point, it seems they say their way is the only way to raise a child. Of course the kids have no way of knowing that it's not true, because all they know is what their parents teach and their interactions are with other like minded families. It's so sad to read that a child is physically spanked, beaten, whipped...possibly every day of their young life...under the guise of raising them to become good loving Christians. Yeah...right.

Here's my other thought. Sadly, I understand...well I don't understand, but I understand [if you know what I mean] why people like the Pearls and others are able to do what they do. They have power, power as adults, power as the parents, and many would say are misusing that power. They're not the first to do so and sadly, they won't be the last. I've stated before that I'm a Catholic high school teacher, and we have our own issues to deal with. One thing that we've incorporated into our curriculum over the past years are discussions concerning the priest scandals, along with open/honest dialogue of teens' questions, concerning those issues. One of the many things I say to my students, not only about priests, but about anyone in authority, is that if anyone...anyone wants you to do something that goes against God's commandments or Jesus' teachings, that should always - always - always - be a huge red flag that something is wrong. Disengage and move away, obviously if possible. Maybe the person is okay, but better safe than sorry.

So yeah, beating someone with a pipeline...or abusing children in anyway...where again does that fit into Jesus' Gospel message?

[Patsy]

One of the many things I say to my students, not only about priests, but about anyone in authority, is that if anyone...anyone wants you to do something that goes against God's commandments or Jesus' teachings, that should always - always - always - be a huge red flag that something is wrong. Disengage and move away, obviously if possible. Maybe the person is okay, but better safe than sorry.

Rape and slavery and the subjugation of women are a-okay in the Bible. I don't see how that is a great thing to say re: child sex abuse, particularly when God and religion are used as justification in so much abuse in religious settings ("God told me you have to do this", "You have to obey priests", "You have to obey your father"...)

[TheSassyOne]

Hi Patsy,

I can't speak for other Religions, but in our Scripture classes we do teach about the time period/cultures and their influences. Those that you mentioned, are in the Bible, and [slavery] legal throughout the Roman empire for long time. But still when you read the context of Jesus' message, it definitely does not support slavery, nor rape; nothing that is harmful to another human being.

I think we'll agree to disagree on the subjugation of women, I think it's how one looks at the scripture. There was a discussion/possible argument a couple of weeks back about this very issue that I chose to stay out of. I find that we'll probably just go in circles.

[Patsy]

I agree the discussion would probably go in circles, but I feel I should say that I think that is terrible advice that ignores the reality of abuses and the best ways to avoid them. I don't think most twelve-year-old kids are capable of going "Hmm, does this line up with that particular code of conduct? Let me think it through". "Get out of a situation you don't feel safe in and don't let people manipulate you" is a hell of a lot better than "check it against this checklist". By that standard, a gay kid should run away from discussions with their partner (homosexuality!) but have a bit of a think about a situation with an authority figure that scares the everliving shit out of them. Priests raped kids and told them Jesus wanted it; if they'd been trained to trust themselves and know that if they don't want to do something with their body, it's wrong, I think a lot of those situations could have turned out a bit better.

You might teach those kids that Jesus was against any sort of harm, but I don't see how saying "If it's against God, get away from it!" can be any better than "Get away from things that cause you harm". It just puts another level of separation between the situation and what you should do, and allows for more "Well God said you should". If you teach kids to value THEMSELVES, regardless of whether they believe in God or whether someone in authority says that God gives a shit about them, they'll be better and more immediately equipped to identify dangerous situations and feel the courage to defend their own safety.

[Moony]

Disciples of the New World Order line up to drug their children into oblivion,

Are you serious? The guy is a fucking conspiracy theorist. He probably believes in the Reptoid domination thing too.

[jenny_islander]

If by "new world order" he means "I live in a nation that wants to tell the world how to live but can't finance its own schools because our government is too busy providing opportunities for war profiteers and other rich parasites," he has a point. A friend of mine was ordered to medicate her daughter because she was being bullied. The daughter took it as long as she could, then defended herself. The bully got no disciplinary action. The issue was that the bully had taken her victims into corners where the overworked, underpaid, overwhelmed teachers didn't have to look, while the victim who fought back made a disturbance they had to address. They could not take the time to address it because their workload was already insanely huge. Therefore: Medicate that child to make her quiet, or she can't come to our school.

Kids who showed up hungry and became disruptive were medicated. Cheaper than free school breakfast.

This happened in Mountain View, California. The girl was homeschooled until her family was restationed back in our town.

But I don't think that's what he means.

[TheSassyOne]

Hi again Patsy,

Just checked in, I was enjoying my Labor Day holiday yesterday!

Oh my gosh, I guess there's so much to discuss on this issue, I just assume some things are "givens". Yes, yes, YES...students are definitely encouraged to value themselves and their opinions. I teach 17 year olds [young adults really], but our curriculum begins in PreK discussing how unique and special each of us are. I looked back over my post and I thought I said the same thing as You, "don't let someone manipulate you, etc". All the things that you've mentioned are taught and explored and discussed...no, not as a checklist, but as great tools, so that any of us can/should have in building healthy relationships and avoiding unhealthy ones.

The point of my initial post was that "here's one thing to remember" when dealing with others. Mind you, never did I suggest that it was the only response, but one of many valuable lessons that can guide us in hopefully making good decisions and keeping us safe. Sorry if I wasn't clear in my original post!