Hello all,

It has been some time so I just wanted to check in again because we are all very scared nothing meaningful is going to be done about what has been allowed to happen in our public schools. I want to re-assert at least one more time that the only contextualization that would allow the clear abuse to not be labeled as such would require blaming the kids' responses to the abuse - on a social level, I can see where a number of community members sort of have this sentiment that as long as the kids thought it was a "fun game" that it should be considered OK. To me that seems like a pretty obvious form of blaming the victims' responses and interpretations of the abuse for the abuse itself, and moreover, not all the kids did think it was a fun game (again, not that it should even matter). 

There is direct testimony that these women used either their hands, or handheld implements such as sandals or pool noodles, or all of the above, to make contact between adult hand and child buttocks, for years, and also that they encouraged children to make contact with their buttocks. If it wasn't done for punishment it was done for pleasure - like they said, they did it for fun.

Children cannot consent. They can not consent. Kids can't consent. So asking them to participate in an activity to which they do not have any legal ability to participate in without their parent or legal guardian's approval cannot be considered consensual, or mutual. Adults have responsibilities to children that children do not have to adults. Adults have a responsibility to not engage with children in reciprocal touching of bodies games, and an adult falling back on a child's participation in such a game as justification for why the adult should not be in trouble is despicable. 

The only reason there are so many adults who don't understand consent is because they themselves have had the issue of consent confused for them - for many people, as children, when they were still learning, so they internalized maladaptive conceptions about who is and isn't capable of consent, under what conditions and in what contexts. Continuing on a path of essentially trying to establish if an event was abuse or not based on if the kids "liked it" or "had fun" is condemning a whole new generation to believe how they react to abuse justifies their abusers' actions. That is such a disservice and harm to the kids who, statistically, will be abused and who are already being abused in their lives away from school. For some of these kids, school is the only safe place where they are not being abused. I understand that I have been vocal a bunch of times and maybe sound like a broken record at this point, but I will say it as many times as I have to until the abuse stops. And sadly, I'm afraid there will never be a time at which it isn't necessary.

But you know what. It sure as hell could be less prevalent. It could be made less prevalent by us in the here and now upholding the responsibilities that we should very much all, as adults, understand are ours to uphold. 

Please, please do not sweep this under any rug or teach any children that their autonomy over their own bodies is not as important as their abuser's income or reputation.

Thank you.