A Letter To Baltimore's Mom Of The Year

Dear Mom of the Year,

I saw the video of you confronting your son on the streets of Baltimore. I saw your fury and exasperation as you beat him about the head, holding him with one hand while you slapped him across the ear and temple. I heard the profanity-laced lecture you delivered as you chased him down. I heard you call him stupid and a whole list of other insults.

You caught him throwing rocks at Baltimore police. You didn't want him "to be another Freddie Gray", referring to the young black man who's spine was severed after a confrontation with law enforcement. For that I say, "Good on you."

I get it. I'm a mother, too.

I understand the Mama Bear, gut-wrenching desire to protect your kid from harm. I understand those anxious, bubbling, do-whatever-it-takes feelings. And I understand the sheer anger and frustration a mom experiences when their teen children make stupid decisions.

I won't claim to completely understand where you are coming from, because my children have never participated in a riot, or thrown rocks at police, or worn masks and hoodies during civil unrest in downtown Baltimore. (Believe me, I'm counting my blessings.) Chances are I would physically drag my teen sons away from danger by the ears if I had to, even though they outweigh me by quite a bit.

I'm not anti-spanking. My kids have received a few in their lives. They've done stupid things. Children frustratingly do stupid things (if I were better at science I could spout the reasons, although I understand it has something to do with developing brains and impulse control, yada, yada, yada). I've fought the urge to beat them about the head with nearby blunt objects. Although, I admit that by comparison to yours, my frustrations are relatively absurd.

So, were I in your shoes (and they are quite fashionable shoes, by the way), I might have been desperate enough in the heat of the moment to do exactly what you did.

So maybe this isn't a letter to you at all. Maybe this is a letter for all of those who've laid down accolades like roses at your feet, to the people who are singing your praises like a Hallelujah choir. To people who claim you are the quintessential parent, who have placed you up on a pedestal to stand as an example of what parenting should look like. To the people who've posted and reposted your video so many times it's gone viral, claiming you deserve to be "Mom of the Year". To the people who even laughed at the video like it was a Comedy Central special. Poor kid got completely pummeled by his Mama.

You see people, this isn't funny. It's not funny at all. It's incredibly sad. It's sad that this mother finds herself in this situation, afraid for her son's life. So afraid that he might end up in jail or dead that she not only embarrasses him on the streets and all across every news channel on television, but she physically assaults him.

Why is it praiseworthy for a mother to physically assault her child, even in attempts to protect him?

In no other relationship would this be okay. It would be seen as abusive, not entertaining, and chances are good that the attacker would be hauled away in handcuffs.

I hear people claiming if more mothers beat their children, we wouldn't have the kind of crazy violence that's currently running rampant in Baltimore. But do you really think that was the first time that mother hit her child? Considering her level of ire and her pin-point slapping accuracy, I seriously doubt it. And yet, there he was, masked and hooded and pitching stones at police officers. Physical punishment didn't keep him from making stupid decisions or committing acts of violence.

Don't you see the irony? She didn't want him committing acts of violence, so she violently attacked him. Oh yeah, that should drive home the lesson.

Maybe what kids need isn't a good beating. Maybe what they need is respect. And I'm not talking about respecting their elders or respecting authority. I'm talking about self-respect. A lack of self-respect is what often leads to behavior problems in the first place.

Someone with self-respect doesn't throw rocks at police officers... not necessarily because they are police officers, but because they are fellow human beings.

Teaching kids to respect themselves doesn't come from screamed threats and profane name-calling. It doesn't come from insulting their intelligence while delivering a good wallop to the noggin. It doesn't come from public humiliation.

Self-respect is taught through years of treating the child with respect, even when we're angry or embarrassed or disappointed. It comes from modeling respect for ourselves and others. It comes from holding a positive mirror up for our children so that they can see a positive reflection of what they are.

I'm not saying that parenting should be all roses and pansies and positivity. I'm not saying that we should only praise our children or sugar-coat their shortcomings. Sometimes children need to be punished. Maybe they even need to be punished often.

But when a mother grabbing her child around the neck while delivering blows to the head and screaming profanity becomes a positive symbol of parenting success and not a symbol of desperation, there is something seriously wrong with our society's attitudes about parenting.

So, dear desperate Toya Graham, Baltimore's Mother of the Year, I'm sorry. I am sorry that you found yourself in that situation. One mother to another, I am heart-wrenchingly sorry. You receive no criticism from me. Only aching empathy.

But to the people who have stood up in droves to applaud her, who have made her a parenting role model, who have promoted her despairing act of violence against her son as the cure to society's ills... Shame on you. You don't even understand the problem.

Violence only begets more violence.

And haven't we seen enough of that?


 

Don't Be Fooled By Cute Italian Boys - Why This Domestic Violence PSA is Stupid

"What happens when you put a boy in front of a girl and ask him to slap her?"

Italian website, Fanpage.it attempts to answer this question in their "stirring" PSA-gone-viral against domestic violence.

You can watch the video below, but if you're lazy (like me) here's the Cliff's Notes version:

Young boys are interviewed on the street. (They speak Italian, but lucky for us there are subtitles.)  The boys, ranging in age from 7 to 11, obediently give their names and ages and tell the interviewer what they want to be when they grow up.

Then a pretty young girl named Martina steps into the scene. The boys are all obviously smitten. They are asked to tell what they like about her (Her hair, her eyes, her hands in her pockets). They are told to make funny faces at her. They are told to "caress her", leading to some light stroking of cheeks and arm. Then the interviewer tells the boys to "Slap her. Hard." And they all refuse, because she is a girl. Proving that children are so much smarter than adults.

It's all so sweet and touching, isn't it? It's apparently got a lot of people just welling up with emotion and shedding tears and a whole bunch of other hoopla.

Except that it's stupid.

Like really stupid. Here's why:

1. Even a man with a long violent history of domestic abuse isn't going to stand in front of a camera and slap around a pretty stranger on command. No. Domestic abuse usually happens behind closed doors, where no one can see, generally during moments of intense emotion. It doesn't just happen between random strangers on the street. That's why it's called "domestic" violence...because it involves home and family. (Duh.)

2. One boy comments that he couldn't hit the girl "because she's pretty." This seems to insinuate that punching ugly people is perfectly acceptable. (Maybe we could make that a sport or something.) It also seems to place a rather high value on physical appearance. Do people lose value as they age or gain weight or bear children? (Oh wait... society does seem to think that they do. Carry on then.)

3. Caressing strangers is creepy. Plus it goes against everything being preached rather loudly from consent soap boxes. Did anyone ask the girl if she was okay with it? (She just stands there silently smiling while a man gives consent on her behalf. Super creepy.) Remember "Yes Means Yes"? Unless maybe somebody with a camera tells you to do it. Then it's okay. In a world where college students almost have to have notarized contracts giving express permission to show physical affection, this whole stranger street caressing thing seems incredibly cavalier.

4. Domestic violence isn't only about men hitting women. Why won't the boys slap her? "Because she's a girl." "Because I am a man." How about because you don't just randomly whack people you just met for no good reason? How about because she's a human being and I'm a human being and violence isn't the answer? Plus there's a big double standard here. Maybe the producers could have taken a couple of girls and told them to haul off and hit some attractive dude they just met. I'm betting the girls would be more likely to come out swinging... and no one would probably even care.

5. It's sexist. Not just the double standard, either. The girl is used as a prop, a thing, an object, an accessory. She has no lines. She doesn't speak to give consent or state an opinion. She doesn't deny the boys or defend herself in anyway. She is a victim to their whims and to the whims of the (male) interviewer. She is left voiceless while the males in the video are given supreme power over her, to either hurt her body or love it.

6. It's incredibly cliché.  Does anyone really believe that little boys in Italy want to grow up to be pizza makers?

I will readily admit that I am scrutinizing this advertisement through my own cultural lens. There are undoubtedly huge differences between the Italian context and meaning and my own middle-class American paradigm. However... it doesn't excuse the exuberant praise and unconditional accolades my American friends are laying on in think gloppy coats.

Don't be fooled, fellow Americans. Don't be fooled by the cute boyish smirks or the emotion-stirring background music or a vague promise of decent authentic Italian pizza. This video isn't changing anything. In fact, it's probably cementing some pretty crappy cultural beliefs that are long overdue for ousting.

The Double Standard of Violence Against Women

If you've discovered a way to avoid celebrity gossip, like maybe living under a rock and never engaging in human conversation, you might have missed the scandal of Ray Rice and his NFL suspension (Lucky you). Rice, a professional football running back, is currently serving an indefinite suspension from the league thanks to a TMZ video release of the 212 pound athlete punching his then fiancee, Janay Palmer, in the face.  The video shows the couple arguing, spitting, shoving, and then Rice delivering a blow to the face that knocks Palmer unconscious.  Then there's some embarrassing dragging of the unconscious body and attempts to extricate her limp form from the elevator in which the sparring match occurred.

Thanks to the grainy yet shocking video, football fans and sports media are in a tizzy, and social media is all abuzz over the societal ills of domestic violence. People (especially women) are ranting over the injustice of violence against women on blogs and Facebook and Twitter and every other corner of the media world. Even Vice President Joe Biden inserted his two cents during an interview with the Today Show, saying "It's never, never, never the woman's fault. No man has a right to raise a hand to a woman."

If you are successfully living under that rock, you were probably also lucky enough to have missed the stories about celebrity Kelly Brook and her routine trivialization of domestic violence.  But don't worry; it's not the kind against women.  Brook recently released excerpts from her autobiography in which she reveals her penchant for punching her boyfriends in the face.

Enter the double standard.

While the world is all up in arms about Ray Rice and his brutality and violent nature, hardly a peep has been made about lovely sweet Kelly and her fiery little temper.

In a world where women supposedly want fair and equal treatment, where cries of the injustice of gender inequality ring across the internet and gender-based discrimination is deemed a violation of basic human rights, this situation is drenched in irony.

Apparently domestic violence is only a heinous and vicious issue when the victims are female.

Perhaps all of the social media spotlight attention has been on Ray Rice and his knock out punch because it fits the hot topic issues of violent crimes against women, falling right in line with "rape culture" rhetoric which keeps women perpetually pissed off at men.

I'm a woman, so I should be all kinds of disgusted at Ray Rice and his physical abuse of the women he (supposedly) loves.  And because I am a woman, I should also be at least mildly amused by Brook and her propensity to express her feelings of jealousy and frustration with her partners in the form of swinging fists.

But I am also the mother of sons - two beautiful people who don't deserve the script society hands them.  Our cultural playbook, largely perpetuated by social media rants, opportunistic politicians, and half-blind feminists, keeps us believing that men are problems while women have problems. (Which I could point out keeps women safely tucked in the role of victim... but I might be accused of "victim blaming", so I won't go there.)

For all of the tantrums women throw about the unfairness of a world where women must learn to defend themselves and walk in groups and wear rape-prevention nail polish, they miss the unfairness of the male world - a world where men CAN'T defend themselves, where a woman's accusations are taken as gospel, and it only takes one little lie to ruin a career and a reputation.

Domestic violence has long been viewed as a crime perpetrated by strong and domineering men against small defenseless women.  With that view it's no surprise that feminist organizations have added domestic violence to their long list of society's alleged injustices towards women.  While statistics are hard to gather, research suggests that men are at least as likely to be victims of domestic abuse as women.  Yet last year only seven percent of those convicted for domestic violence were women.

The cards are largely stacked against men, who likely already feel emasculated by a violent female partner.  Plus if he raises a hand in defense against her blows, he automatically becomes the aggressor in most people's eyes (Remember Mr. Biden's comment about no man raising a hand... it's not just Mr. Biden who thinks that way).

Take for example a personal friend who called the police when he was attacked by his drunk girlfriend, who beat him and bit him and attempted to gouge out his eyes.  He never raised a hand against her, yet when he finally called the police... he was the one arrested and charged. Her accusations against him were enough to put his career in jeopardy. He was treated like a criminal by people who knew him until he was able to expose her lies in court thanks to a video of the incident he had the presence of mind to record.

My husband was in an abusive relationship back in college before we met.  His girlfriend, a woman with a fiery red-headed disposition, would hit him and throw heavy objects like lamps and books at him.  He also never raised a hand to defend himself... except once to forcibly remove her from his dorm room in the midst of one of her angry and violent tirades.  Then he was portrayed as the aggressor for laying hands on her.

That's the problem with woman-on-man abuse, there's no defending yourself under the circumstances without being accused of abuse.  No one thinks a man can be the victim... because women have already been cast in that role.

So, Mr. Biden, sometimes it is the woman's fault.

And sometimes women are lying and vindictive.  Cries of abuse or rape from a woman are like a death kiss for men.  It only takes a simple accusation to ruin them.  The burden of proof is never on the woman.  Remember what happened with the Duke Lacrosse scandal, where one false accusation shut down the entire lacrosse program, cost the coach his job, and had three young men's professors and fellow students (Hell! Most of the world!) presuming their guilt.

Women moan and complain on Twitter and Facebook about the unfairness of women's lives - about how they don't want to live in a world where they have to watch their drinks and learn to defend themselves and never, never walk alone at night.

Guess what ladies.  We don't have a monopoly on being wronged.  While women are fussing about "victim blaming" and teaching our sons not to rape, we are forgetting that we also need to teach our daughters to not be spiteful bitches.

Because I don't want to live in a world where my sons can't block a punch because it might bruise their female attackers.

Because I don't want to live in a world where my husband, a high school English teacher, has to constantly concern himself with what false accusations an upset female student might make after getting a bad grade.  He already has to go to great lengths to ensure he is rarely alone in a room with a female student and that the door is always open and there is always a table between them when he is alone with one.  I don't want to live in a world where the mere accusation of impropriety is enough to ruin his reputation, relieve him of his job, and possibly land him behind bars.

Because I don't want to live in a world where I feel the need to advise my teenage sons to avoid situations in which they might be alone with a spurned ex-girlfriend or a woman whose affections they've rejected, because women can be vindictive and crazy and one false accusation could take my sons away from me for a very long time.

Because I don't want to live in a world where my sons have to be careful who they sleep with and worry about all of the varying definitions of mutual consent.  They know that "no means no," but do they understand that some people think "yes means no" if a partner has had a couple of drinks?

It's tough being a woman in this society... but it's also tough being a man.  If we can expect men to stop being patriarchal assholes, they can expect us to stop being crazy vengeful shrews.  It's only fair.

Pro-Gun PSA Masquerades as Everytown Advertisement

Yesterday, Everytown for Gun Safety, a gun control (which, I must point out, is VERY different than gun safety) group founded by former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomburg released a stirring advertisement to drum up citizen support for a new bill proposing some redundant, unnecessary, and useless legislation.

You can view the "disturbing" advertisement here. But just in case you're short on time (30 seconds is a lot to ask, I know) or suffer from severe chromophobia (that's an extreme fear of videos) or are too lazy to just click on the link, I'll sum it up for you.

Creepy man in hipster toboggan bangs on door.  Frightened mousy woman calls 911.  911 dispatcher asks if she has a restraining order.  Mousy Woman begs for help from dispatcher.  Creepy Hipster Dude kicks in door.  Mousy Woman informs dispatcher that she needs to come NOW.  Creepy Hipster grabs crying child.  Mousy Woman screams for hipster to "Get Out Of HERE!"  There is a pathetic physical struggle.  "I'm taking him!" declares Creepy Hipster.  He pulls a handgun from his trendy jacket pocket, points in frantic Mousy Woman's face.  Scene fades to black as you hear a gunshot and a crying baby (one much younger than the kid we saw in the video... but one that stirs a deeper and stronger emotional response).

It's all very frightening and disconcerting... and definitely evokes an emotional response.

Although, I'm not sure Everytown is stirring up quite the response they intended.  What Everytown HAS accomplished is a brilliant and compelling PRO-gun commercial.  Bravo.  Even the normally left-leaning liberal likes of The View talk show hosts were convinced by the advertisement that women need a gun in the house to protect themselves and their children.

Seriously, the NRA couldn't have presented a more compelling piece of pro-gun propaganda.

What this video proves (other than that the morons at Everytown are... well... morons) is exactly what pro-gun, pro-self defense, women's empowerment (the real kind, not the miserably whiny fake kind that feminism touts... which is really just wallowing in victimized martyrdom) proponents have been repeating ad nauseum for years.  When you are confronted by a deranged maniac determined to hurt you, you cannot rely on a flimsy piece of paper, 911, or the local police to stop your attacker.  Remember, when seconds count, the police are only minutes away.

The new legislation that Everytown is attempting to push for will supposedly keep guns out of the hands of abusive partners and convicted stalkers (like the guy in the commercial.  I knew there was a reason I didn't trust hipsters!).  But while Everytown is trying to toy with our emotions and get us all agitated about domestic violence, they seemed to overlook the laws that ALREADY COVER THIS.

The Firearms Owners Protection Act (FOPA) of 1986 and the Domestic Violence Offender Gun Ban of 1996, under penalty of felony, already prohibit the possession of a firearm by:

1. Anyone that is subject to a court order that restrains the person from harassing, stalking, or threatening an intimate partner (i.e. a restraining order)

2. Anyone who has been convicted of a misdemeanor crime of domestic violence.

Further the law also makes it a criminal act to "knowingly sell or give a firearm (or ammunition) to such persons".

So let's review.  Hipster husband/boyfriend/baby daddy presumably beat his wife/girlfriend/baby mama (which is against the law), violated a restraining order (which is against the law), breaks into and enters her home (also against the law), attempts to kidnap a child (you guessed it... against the law), possesses a firearm illegally per the above mentioned laws (obviously against the law).

So heaping a few extra laws on there for him to break helps this woman how?  The poor frightened Mousy Woman has mistakenly placed her trust in the wrong hands.  Laws and law enforcement officers are of little help to her when she's staring down the barrel of a loaded gun.  Better she should take her fate into her own shaking hands.  It would be better for her hands to grip the handle of a Glock 17 and not a phone and a useless restraining order.

Even hands gripping a Ruger are more useful than hands gripping a phone and a restraining order

Because the only reliable way to stop a bad guy with a gun is a good guy (or gal) with a gun.  Had the woman been armed, the result of the dramatic confrontation would have been very different.  Either Creepy Hipster Dude would have fled and eventually been arrested for violating Mousy Woman's magic piece of paper OR he would have been shot in lawful self-defense.  Either way he would have realized that Mousy Woman wasn't the easy victim he thought she was.

Basically the best way to protect women is to give them the knowledge and the tools to protect themselves.  So thanks for the very effective, emotionally charged, and convincing public service announcement, Everytown.  Women everywhere will be wanting a gun... and good for them.