Reporting Abusers

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  • #1093600
    🍫Syag Lchochma
    Participant

    Joseph – I was not condoning what they do, I was reponding because it seems people are so unfamiliar with this topic and make statements that mislead. The oilam is NOT safe from abusers and their employers have NOT been careful to keep them away from children. Many of the shuls have NOT been cooperative in keeping them out of the bathrooms and the people who run the mikvas have NOT been careful to guard the children. The parents have NOT been careful to accept the danger that exists and watch their kids. If someone does not advertise the danger of these guys, NOBODY is out there taking responsibility for the harm they can do. I will not tell you I know what action is halachically appropriate to take, but don’t tell me it is rare, it is being addressed, it is taken seriously by the authorities, it isn’t as big of a problem as it seems blah blah blah.

    If YOU are not aware of who the molesters are, and if YOU are not careful to keep your kids away from them, your children are NOT safe.

    #1093601
    Chortkov
    Participant

    There are many many halachos about how to tell Loshon Horo which is ltoieles, and “Wall of Shame” is definitely not something the Chofetz Chaim would have approved of. Let that statement suffice.

    #1093602
    zahavasdad
    Participant

    There are many many halachos about how to tell Loshon Horo which is ltoieles, and “Wall of Shame” is definitely not something the Chofetz Chaim would have approved of. Let that statement suffice.

    The Chofetz Chaim would not have approved of abusers either

    #1093603
    mw13
    Participant

    Syag Lchochma:

    mw13 – I know you aren’t the only one who does this but what makes you think that asking on an internet forum is INSTEAD of asking a Rov. If I had an interesting situation that I asked my Rov about, that is totally besides the point of deciding it may make interesting discussion here.

    I fully agree – that’s why I responded myself. I was just pointing out that for a real answer, one that can be relied upon li’maaseh, one must consult a real Rov.

    mw13 – good point regarding the exception to mesira, and regarding people in jail not harming anyone – the people are in jail for what, 3 years? Then they get out and Monsey chaverim takes them right back to join their old team. Wouldn’t you want to know that before you call?

    Hold your fire – I never said that people in jail can’t harm anybody else later on. I was merely responding to a point that was raised about the permissibility (or lack of it) of publicly shaming one wrongdoer with the sole intention of dissuading others.

    yekke2:

    What would you have said if it had been called the “Wall of Awareness”?

    #1093605
    Chortkov
    Participant

    I just saw last week an interesting Meiri who seems to argue with the Halachah quoted in Shulchan Aruch that one is allowed to report on somebody who is a ????.

    The Gemara in Gittin 7a brings a story of Mar Ukva who sent a letter to R’ Eliezer, complaining about a person who was ‘starting up against him’, and asking if he was permitted to inform on them to the government. R’ Eliezer replied by discouraging him from reforming.

    There is a discussion in the commentaries exactly what the story was, and whether R’ Eliezer was giving advice or actually talking from a Halachic point of view.

    The Meiri explains that Mar Ukvas opponent was a Moiser himself. He therefore asks why was it that he wasn’t allowed to report on the moiser – we find that one can kill a moiser!

    The Meiris final answer is that it is better to kill him than to inform on him, and informing is forbidden even on somebody whom it is permitted to kill.

    ??? ????? ?? ??? ????? ????? ???? ???? ???? ??????? ??? ???? ??? ?????? ???? ?????? ??? ?? ?? ??????? ???? ???? ?????? ???? ??? ???? ?????? ??????? ???????? ????? ???? ???? ??? ??? ?????? ????? ???????? ???? ???? ????? ?????? ?????

    (I know we don’t pasken like the Meiri, but I was still surprised to see a Rishon who argues!)

    #1093606
    ☕ DaasYochid ☕
    Participant

    He seems to only say this when their are other options, but would allow it if there were none (as would apply to the subject of this thread).

    #1093607
    sushibagel
    Member

    Most victims cannot bring themselves to report and go through the whole procedure in court reliving the trauma over and over again.

    This is probably one of the main reasons why abusers are able to get away not only in our community but all across society.

    Had we had a system where it was dealt with effectively without reporting we might have been much better off not to mention safer, the trouble is though, that far too often we FAILED to deal with it in any way.

    #1093608
    NeutiquamErro
    Participant

    A common theme in this thread is the blaming of communities or those in positions of authority for abuse. It should be noted that whilst we should all strive to protect children, or indeed those of any age, from abusers, the ones who who are to blame are those who carry out the crime. It should be clear that whilst we are all responsible to help, only the abuser is actually to blame. I say this because I have noticed that many who have a personal gripe against the kehilla or against those in positions of authority, use instances of abuse as a vehicle to air their supposed grievances, and often get undue attention and approbation by doing so.

    It should be made clear that whilst it is certainly an issue, and there are those who wrongly kept silent, or failed to act sufficiently, it is not a conspiracy, it is the actions of a diseased, cunning, handful. And allowing those both within and without of our communities to use these isolated cases as a weapon damages our keilla as a whole.

    #1093609
    lesschumras
    Participant

    Neut,I’ll give you the benefit of the doubt and assume your just naive. Serial abusers, whether Jewish or in the church, got away with it because persons in authority looked away. To this day, the Agudah still lobbies against a bill in New York State that would require private schools to check teacher’s fingerprints against a registry.

    ( public schools are already required )

    Rabbinical and community leaders often strongly discouraged going to police, but did nothing to stop the abuser

    #1093610
    Joseph
    Participant

    Neutiquam: Well stated and 100% accurate.

    #1093611
    The little I know
    Participant

    Joseph & Neut:

    There is one sliver of truth to your agreed upon point. I concur that there is no organized effort to protect molesters, whoever and wherever they are. That idea is launched and reinforced by the “fanatics” who claim falsely to be protecting children. Their extremism is only overshadowed by their sin’as Yisroel. We should know better by now.

    The reality is that people tend to react to horrible news with open and frank denial. It is not uncommon at all that someone would respond to the news of a death by saying, “No, it can’t be.” That individual, sooner or later, needs to face the truth, and the dead person is not returning to life, until techiyas hameisim. Being notified that someone in a position of authority and power, particularly someone of the clergy (including positions in chinuch) is certainly shocking. One would wish to not believe the bearer of these tidings. In contrast to death, where one can personally witness the corpse, there is only the report of the event, and denying that is all too easy.

    In the instances that get the bad press, the others in power wish to deny the truth of the report. Not because it is not true, but because they don’t want it to be true. This occurs individually in so many cases.

    I agree with you both that the conspiracy theory is foolish and irresponsible, and I condemn those who believe it and push it. But the coverups occur, and they are common. I do hold those participating in a coverup responsible.

    #1093612
    Chortkov
    Participant

    It should be clear that whilst we are all responsible to help, only the abuser is actually to blame.

    I disagree. Anybody who has the ability to do something to rectify a situation and doesn’t shares responsibility for the outcome. Of course, the perpetrator himself takes the lion share of the blame, and would have to be either a sick, perverted individual or an ill person. People who can do something about it and don’t are not as bad in the sense that they are not doing deliberate damage; their inaction generally comes from more innocent origins: misguided judgment, cowardice, laziness, a heap of cognitive bias, and often the “bystander effect” (individuals will only take necessary action in a place where it is obvious to them that they are the only ones who can; in a situation where there are others who could do the same, nobody does it). But although you can split up the motives of the people responsible (evil v. misguided), everybody takes blame.

    #1093613
    NeutiquamErro
    Participant

    Reading through my earlier post, it occurs to me that I may have failed to fully explain myself, and therefore appear to contradict myself. Therefore, allow me to clarify.

    As I very clearly said above, “there are those who wrongly kept silent”. My views on those who were aware of abuse and either actively or passively allowed it to continue are clear. They are wrong and complicit.

    But the distinction I perhaps failed to clearly delineate was a more general picture. Unfortunately, in the course of the debate there are those who immediately blame those in authority, despite there often being no obvious reason to. For example, they insinuate or claim that abusers have the support or defence of the ‘Establishment’, be that community leaders or ch’vs rabbonim. That’s not to say that these instances never occur, just that the actions of a handful of individuals should not be presented, as it often is, as a societal problem. It is the problem of the abuser and those who aid the abuser. To unfairly tarnish and entire kehilla, organisation, or sect is wrong. And that is the point I was making.

    WWe should not allow those with an imagined grievance against ‘chareidim’, frum yidden in general or specific organisations/kehillos to propogate unfounded allegations regarding complicity simply due to the actions of a few.

    #1093615
    Joseph
    Participant

    I would just like to add to that that the only conspirators are the ones who use words like “few”, “handful”, “uncommon” and “isolated cases” when discussing abuse, abusers and outright protectors.

    There you go, NeutiquamErro. You have just been identified as a conspirator protecting abusers.

    #1093616
    NeutiquamErro
    Participant

    Syag:

    I’m sorry if it didn’t come across in the right way, but I was in no way trying to downplay the severity or extent of abuse. And, as I have repeatedly said, anybody who looks away or who is lax in protecting victims from their abusers is complicit in their actions.

    My point was simply that most people are not abusers and most people, whether in positions of authority or not, would agree that only the harshest, most stringent meausures must be taken. It simply came to my attention in a recent case that, when covered by the goyshe or non-frum media, unfairly attributed responsibility for the abusers actions to rabbonim and others who had contact with those involved. And, avoiding specifics or course, one particular quote was used, completely out of context, that gave a false impression of culpability that was not correct. If anything, in this particular case the true meaning of the quote meant the exact oppositeto what was implied. But due to those on the fringes of the community with malorous intentions, an undeserved chillul Hashem was caused that was not true to the facts of the case. I hope I have been suitably vague.

    So in summation, I am not in any way attempting to diminish the extent of abuse, or the undoubted culpability of many, of whom there are those in postions of trust and authority, who, whether deliberately or passively, allow the abuse to occur and continue. I simply wish to avoid these cases being used as a vehicle for people with ill intentions towards frum people in general. And, due to the strength of emotion understandably present in these sort of cases, and the media storm that commonly descends, this kind of perfidy often goes unchecked, leading to false impressions.

    #1093617
    🍫Syag Lchochma
    Participant

    Joseph – true to your word altering form, even after a long fast. Nothing I said implied he was a conspirator in protecting abusers. Many people have a need to slip in those words to give the false illusion that these abuse cases are rare, or few and far between. And I have heard it from people who know darn well how false that is. That, my dear, is a conspiracy. Perhaps NE doesn’t qualify and has only fallen prey to the verbiage he has been overexposed to.

    NE – I appreciate your clarification. I have nothing to say in regard to the case, I just find people slipping those words in to make a (subliminal?)point. I apologize if that wasn’t your intent/belief.

    #1093618
    mw13
    Participant

    Syag Lchochma:

    Just out of curiosity, would you also consider deliberate overestimation of abuse and/or cover up of abuse, especially when directed at one particular group (teachers/Rabbis/therapists/”the system”/etc) a conspiracy?

    #1093619
    🍫Syag Lchochma
    Participant

    anything other than truth, especially when it is stated in order to give a false impression is wrong. are you really wondering what i think, or are you just trying to see if im a radical. I think my push for truth in reporting abuse, my push for acknowledging and supporting victims and my push for putting an end to cover ups has been pretty consistent over the years.

    #1093620
    LoIbud
    Member

    Syag:

    Please allow me to clarify my use of those particular terms, such as ‘few’ or ‘isolated’.I wasn’t intending to make any point other than the one stated. I admit that to those who know more than I do about this issue, or victims, the term ‘few’ does sound as if it demeans or diminishes the extent of the crimes. And for that I apologise. In the context of the key point I was trying to bring across, I was simply trying to say, albeit clumsily, that, b’h, in terms of criminal abuse (as opposed to low-key emotional abuse), the vast majority of people are neither victims nor perpetrators, and we should not allow the facts of any particular case to be warped to ascribe blame to those who do not deserve it, an instance of which I have pointed out above. Akcnowledging this in no way diminishes either the crime of the abuser or the responsibility of those who aided the abuser actively or passively. And in most cases abusers are ‘isolated’, in that the patterns of activity found in goyshe cases of abuse, which often include ‘rings’ or ‘gangs’ of many abusers working together, is b’h rare in our communities, where abusers work alone, albeit sometimes with others wrongly covering up for them. I hope I have sufficiently explained how I in no way was attempting to play down the severity of the issue, simply pointing out an issue that often gets lost in the heat of the media storm, that of hostile elements painting an unfair or warped picture.

    #1093621
    sushibagel
    Member

    Lolbud: “the paterns of activity found in goishe abuse cases which often include rings or gangs is bH rare”

    Rare but not unheard of unfortunately, remember that terrible case in Netivot?

    As I pointed out earlier the victims themselves can often not bring themselves to come forward. The least we can do is try and set the conditions that would encourage the victims rather than frighten them even more.

    #1093622
    mw13
    Participant

    Syag Lchochma:

    are you really wondering what i think, or are you just trying to see if im a radical.

    More like trying to see if you’re just pushing an “anti” agenda, or if you actually thought through your positions. I’m glad to see that the latter appears to be the case.

    But still, I would ask you to bear in mind that the overwhelming majority of people do not belong to any vast conspiracy; people just view things differently.

    And just to make absolutely sure that this isn’t taken the wrong way, let me state that I am in no way trying to dissuade “acknowledging and supporting victims and… putting an end to cover ups” in cases where abuse has occurred.

    #1093623
    🍫Syag Lchochma
    Participant

    overall I agree with you. I would change this sentence however:

    “But still, I would ask you to bear in mind that the overwhelming majority of people do not belong to any vast conspiracy; people just view things differently.”

    to – the overwhelming majority of people do not belong to any vast conspiracy; people just don’t want to know about it or believe it is true.

    #1093624
    mw13
    Participant

    While its good to hear that you do not believe that all those who disagree with you are part of a malignant plot, that’s not the entirety of the point I was trying to make. I was trying to point out that there are other people have a legitimate position on this issue which is not born out of either malignance or ignorance. You may believe that abuse and cover-ups are more unfortunately more widespread than commonly believed, but just because somebody disagrees with you doesn’t mean that they have their head stuck in the sand.

    #1093625
    🍫Syag Lchochma
    Participant

    “but just because somebody disagrees with you doesn’t mean that they have their head stuck in the sand.”

    nothing about my posts ever indicated such. all ive ever asked from people is to be honest, speak honestly and stop giving definitive opinions about subjects they are ignorant of. I have always been clear that my position has been about honesty and truth of this subject. interesting how it seems to bother you…

    #1093626
    mw13
    Participant

    nothing about my posts ever indicated such

    “people just don’t want to know about it or believe it is true” sounded to me like you were assuming those who disagree with you are doing so out of willful ignorance. But I’ll admit that I may have misjudged the tone of your comment.

    To be clear, honesty and truth certainly do not “bother” me. I thought I had made that clear in the previous postscript: And just to make absolutely sure that this isn’t taken the wrong way, let me state that I am in no way trying to dissuade “acknowledging and supporting victims and… putting an end to cover ups” in cases where abuse has occurred.

    Listen, I realize that this is a very sensitive subject and that people have strong opinions on it. But all I’m trying to point out is that there are other people here with legitimate opinions. You may believe that abuse and cover-up in unfortunately more widespread than commonly believed (and I’m not saying that you’re wrong), but just because somebody disagrees with you does not necessarily mean that they “just don’t want to know about it or believe it is true” or are bothered by the truth. Not everyone who disagrees with you is doing so only because they are ignorant.

    Of course, you likely disagree. In which case, I’d say that it’s time to agree to disagree.

    #1093627
    🍫Syag Lchochma
    Participant

    I’m not sure if you are reading the responses before answering. I don’t even know what “opinions” you are talking about. someone said there’s a conspiracy exaggerating abuse, I said that it isn’t a conspiracy but people would like to make it seem less then it is. Which post of that is opinion? I am talking from personal dealings with molesters, molested, people who cover up and people who fought them. I wasn’t giving any opinions about this, i was contributing first hand information based on personal dealings to a conversation that seemed to be speaking theoretically. so your complaint against me is baseless asked for all I know part of that same”agenda” you wondered about.

    #1093628
    mw13
    Participant

    I can assure you that I did indeed read all of your comments before responding to them. However, it appears we have reached something in between an impasse and a communication breakdown. I have made my points, and you have made yours; perhaps its time to call it a day.

    #1093629
    NeutiquamErro
    Participant

    Syag Lachochma,

    Sorry to butt in like this, but follwing the above discussions, both with myself and others, the key issue here appears to be that you wish to make it very clear that abuse is an issue in our kehilla, often more widespread than we are aware of or would like to think about, and that there are those who either actively or passively assist abusers in carrying out and getting away with their crimes.

    And on all these points I agree. And, I daresay, so does LoIbud and mw13. Perhaps there may be a minor quibble over the extent, but that has not been the point you have disagreed on. If I may, the only thing you have clearly disagreed on is the manner in which you disagree. I hope this comes across the right way, but in trying to raise awareness and point out that this is a widespread and significant issue, you do appear to be disagreeing with points you don’t necessarily argue with, such as my own point that there is no widespread conspiracy, or my other point that we should not allow this issue to be used by those who wish to damage the kehilla to further their divisive agenda. Perhaps I am wrong and you do disagree with those key points. Please let me know if you do, for nothing you have thus far said indicates this.

    If I may be so presumptious, I would say that in your zeal to raise awareness and draw attention to the issue, an admirable intention, you ascribe motivations to others, including myself, that we do not hold. For example, insinuating that by using the words ‘isolated’ or ‘few’ I was in some way trying to play down the severity of the issue. OUt of context, that would be true, but in the manner that I used it, this was obviously not the case, as I explained explicitely above.

    I hope I have framed my assumptions in the right way. Please do not take this as anything other than an attempt to avoid an argument that I do not think is actually based on a true disagreement. Your strength of feeling regarding this issue, as opposed to others’, including myself, more analytical approach, leads to the appearance of discord that, at least in my view, does not exist.

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