AJ:
I have a question for you. You state a Brooklyn Yeshiva paid a 2.1 million dollar settlement for two victims. I happen to know some details about that yeshiva and the allegations, and I have no reason to either believe their innocence, or to protect them in any way. But that notwithstanding, what was accomplished with the payout? Are the victims healed? Have their trauma effects been mitigated in any way. Did the nightmares stop? How about the anxiety or fears? Did the money solve anything for them?
There is a simple answer. They got revenge, and the moments of joy from the suffering of the yeshiva, its administration, and perhaps the well deserved bizyonos of the perpetrator. But there has not been a single instance of symptom relief to the victims, not from putting them in jail, not rendering them jobless and unemployable, not from money payouts. I am not defending or protecting the molesters. I am directly challenging the notion that revenge has any clinical benefit to the victim. The molesters can rot somewhere away from society, and this protects the public. I support that. But the obsession with lawsuits is both bloodthirsty and greedy. I know today’s world buys that. But I am a rebel here, and believe this is unfair. No, I don’t look to punish molesters. Just protect society. If that means decades in prison, send them. But money solves none of the relevant problems. And such settlements and awards might well punish the wrong people.