“Divine Dignity”
I discovered Women Against Registry in my frantic search for finding others that are filled by the immeasurable pain and suffering created by the blatant social injustice towards those that are on, or are facing the “Registry”. The ongoing attempt to demonize and create a hate group that instills fear in the eyes and hearts of the uneducated masses and to create a future filled with hopelessness, despair and rejection for those who have been labeled as a “sex offender”. Whose punishment includes no love, no shelter, no employment, and no forgiveness or, heaven forbid any hope to regain a scrap of dignity for the rest of their lives. I am not a good Christian woman, but I do live by choice, a good life according to the Ten Commandments. I thought that “Hell” was the “Divine” way to punish those that had fallen, why is it that the faith based community has taken it upon themselves to replace God’s love, grace and forgiveness with their own agenda, perhaps that is why I remain spiritual and not religious.
I have been ostracized from within my own family, a family that has (had) an unbreakable bond of love and support no matter what. We have endured untimely death, drug addiction, alcohol addiction, incest, divorce, cancer, mental illness, homelessness, suicide attempts and betrayals. The heart wrenching realization that those whom love you deeply cannot associate with you any longer because they are pillars in their community and either teach or counsel children, and their silence let’s you know that they would defend you if they could, but in keeping their friendship/relationship could also jeopardize their lives too. That love has now been poisoned by what others think I deserve now that I am the mother of a “monster”, my only child, my son. I have been accused of raising him badly and caring for him to much, for being responsible for my son’s actions and regrettable choices. My husband (not my son’s father) has abandoned me, and told me that he should have killed my son when he had the chance, and has wished upon me a horrible speedy death. I can try to fend off the idea, but the question will haunt me forever, did I give my son the best possible tools to lead a good and happy life.
This in itself is enough pain to fall silent, until I found W.A.R., I realized that I am not alone, and you reading this are not either. I wake up every morning hoping to harden my feelings so that I can endure this journey. We must be strong enough together to make a difference, history is made up of great human beings that chose to heal lives rather than to oppress and hurt lives. We can continue the fight that others have gave or lost their lives to defend what is civil and right. There are days when I want to give up and vanish to stop the uncontrollable streams of tears and sorrow, I have decided to find strength to allow myself to muster up the will and determination no matter the obstacles which I must face to stand up and fight for our voices to be heard, for our loved ones, our family and friends.
I am one of nearly one million people living here in the U.S.A. who has been or currently is impacted by the sex offender sentencing guidelines. Would you be willing to share your story to offer encouragement and hope to others? Terry
Please excuse my typos I’m the worst
Alfred,
Your words outweigh any typing errors. Well said…
OXFAM recently named the top 62 richest people in the world and reported that they owned more wealth than the poorest 3.5 billion. Yes, I said sixty two individuals. That 3.5 billion is half the global population. Also, the top 1% worldwide owns more than the other 99% of us poor suckers and our children.
I think this is the reason for all kinds of crazy laws and cruel punishments and painful non -punishments. You see the ruling classes need mind boggling scapegoats for all the miseries of the general population. They used to use the Jews, the gypsies, or the Indians or the all the other racial victims to confuse and keep the masses poor and tame. How can they have their wealth if the poor cannot bear their poverty. These extremes have a tragic interaction. You can’t have a master without serfs.
They still use that racial tactic but it doesn’t seem to play too well. However, the protection of children from incurable sex crazy boogey men on a public registry, wow! It does seem to serve their purposes of distraction in a tidy way, especially when the establishment is destroying the brains of thousands of children with toxic drinking water in a great city in the richest nation in history.
I have started a Facebook page-parents of sex offenders. Overall, it has been positively received. The occasional negative remarks I see as opportunities to educate and inform, gently and in a respectful manner. All are welcome to post, or to message me directly. Some of you may want to join the discussion !
Is the page private? I would like to join. Thank you.
Yes, I too am parent of an ‘only child,’ a middle-aged son caught up in a sting in Polk County, Florida. His was a first offense, nothing more serious on his record than a speeding ticket… and sentenced to SEVEN years prison time ?
He had an incompetent and indifferent court appointed public defender. So, with no effective defense from the court’s choice lawyer he was sentenced for the grave offense of viewing 10 child porn pictures on his computer, which he was enticed into. His home was broken into by a heavily armed SWAT team. That’s the truth, they literally tore the door off his new house, humiliated him before his terrified wife and two little children !
Considering his police record which, as I say, was virtually non-existent, it seems to this broken-hearted old Father that justice was not served here. Should not Polk County Court have gone a little easy on him ? But, with no defense other than a Court appointed lackaday public defender, they ruined his life.
Surely Justice would have been better served, money and energy saved by the simple expedient of sending a police detective around to ‘investigate.’ A stern ‘talking to’ by a county policeman would have returned him to the straight and narrow. Yes, that would have been effective, money and energy saved, all that was needed to put the fear of God into my naïve Son.
This hullabaloo, this hysteria about sex crime is America’s Century 21 revisit of the Spanish Inquisition. Recalls to mind the madness of a 17th Century witch hunt in New England.
Jarod,
My heart goes out to you and your family, it is unfortunate that laws like The Adam Walsh Law and Megan’s Law, which were aimed at those pedophiles who molested and murdered children, has also swept up in its grasp those convicted of intentional or unintentional downloading of CP. These are not people making and selling CP, alot of these people searched for adult porn and ended up with sharefiles containing CP. In some instances, they were not aware that these images even downloaded to their computers until it was too late and a task force was at their door.
Fancy attorneys or public defenders, makes no difference, they will still end up with 5-10 because of the mandatory minimum laws. Money and a fancey attorney is not guarantee of a better outcome, where you live, what kind of a judge you get, all those things factor in.
You are so right when you say a stern “talking to” would have set them straight. Unfortunately the police are just following the law, it’s the laws we need to change.
Don’t write off your son as having a ruined life. It will be hard for him and your family during the seven years of incarceration, but he needs your support now more than ever, and when he gets out, he will need you to be there while he picks up the pieces of his life and rebuilds, and he will rebuild.
Lives may be forever changed, but the life is still worth rebuilding.
I am a mother in a very similar situation. You are not alone. This sex offender registry has become a joke! Most of people in this damn registry are not even attracted to kids. Why is it so hard for our legislators to understand ? It does not serve any purpose . It only ruins the chance of progress in life such as education and work for people. What kind of nation we have become ? This is inhumane to lable people for the rest of their lives and ruin every chance for their progress and rehabilitation . Let’s put all our efforts together and help other hear our voice .
Sima, I agree whole-heartedly, the registry serves no purpose. It is hard enough for someone to get on with their life when they get out of prison, months or years of probation, then years of supervision and the label of SO for 10 years to life depending on where one lives. This is ridiculous considering as we all know that many sex offences in this day and age are non-contact, internet offences, many of them due to unintentional downloads.
Yes, it is time to gather together in onestrong voice and urge Washington to make humane changes to inhumane laws.
I am in a similar situation with my older son. He was charged with one misdemeanor count of invasion of privacy. No children were involved. It was a stupid prank he pulled on a couple of his cousins and friends at a party. Any way, for this he is now classified as a Sexually Violent Predator for the rest of his life. He cannot get a decent job or rent any place to live now over this. I really think he was WAY over punished for what he did. I believe he was because his cousin had just become a deputy sheriff and this all took place in a court room where she worked. Sooo many things in this case were unfair. I’m devastated over this and cannot afford to pay another attorney to try and get him off of that Megan’s list he is on for life!! Any suggestions would be so appreciated.
What a welcome site to find! More voices like ours every day! God bless you all! My story: my only son who was such a normal sweet kid grew up and for some reason, I always had this odd feeling that something would “happen to him”. Of course I worried about weird diseases, accidents… Never this. My other child has a daughter and wants nothing to do with us. My whole life has completely and tragicly changed…and yet I go on. If we don’t fight, who will? I will be very old or in my grave when D is released. I cannot imagine a peaceful death if my son will come out of prison into a world that would label and put a bullseye on him.
Welcome Leslie, thank you for sharing your story…I am profoundly touched, knowing full well the immeasurable pain and grief that has befallen you and your family. As for my family not associating with me, I have come to the conclusion that uninformed and uneducated people make irrational bias’s, and do not know, or care to know, the degree of trauma the registry creates, or the unjust sentencing terms, because they cannot get past what society is feeding them about sex offenders, and believe the punishment is well deserved. I try to forgive, it is a work in progress. I am so glad you found this website like I did. It gives me hope and faith that as more voices gather and become louder, we can be the catalyst for change in an era already grave with headline controversies involving our law enforcement and judicial systems. The current “one size fits all” sentencing guidelines applied to all sex offenders is in urgent need of reform. As well as the practice of “tagging” a human being, the cost are unimaginable and deplorable, never being given a second chance of a life well lived or the hope to be deserving of love again.
Leslie, welcome to the club that no mother ever wanted to join. Our children make their own choices and mistakes, that includes those convicted and those who choose to exclude family rather than embrace family when these sort of tragedies happen. Yes, life changes, for all of us, courts, prison visitations, etc. become our new “normal”. And you are so right, if we don’t fight for our children, who will? Labels don’t make the world a safer place, in the past we’ve labeled lepers, adulterers and Jews and the world was no better for it. We need to learn from our past mistakes. Let those convicted serve a just punishment and then be released into the world to rebuild their lives without any stigma. Mothers have changed the world before, why not now!
We worry too much about the world and worry how even we should understand society’s fears. We say we should pardon what “society” thinks. This is a paradox because as far as history can tell a fearful thing cannot think. Therefore, someone is telling it what to think and what not to think. Society! the world! What is it anyway? I want to know. We do know that the lovely chronicle of its’s tender sensibilities regarding children is undiscovered yet everyone especially us insist on believing in it. However, one chronicle remains undeniable and its core truth is found engraved on every brow by the finger of God. Society is a thing that scorns! “It victimizes the poorest of the poor and the powerless for the sake of the richest of the rich and the powerful. Remember this “society” is a thing that doesn’t care at all about children and most of all it cares nothing for them if they are born to the poor, except as political props, cheap labor and nice-looking canon fodder. It never did care and it has no qualms about demonstrating this historical fact again and again by starving and snuffing out millions of the poor and their children. You see, regarding all the MANY registries of the powerless in history, this thing “SOCIETY” has always been a thing that only registers the powerless because it always needs another pretext to turn up it’s nose and avert its eyes from the sad eyes of millions of little ones who are poor. Can you deny that the world continues to ignore those billions who are poor and the thousands of little faces that starve and are falling every breathless hour like the sands in the hourglass? No you cannot! So remember this when your skins are displayed and your sins are cannibalized to cover society’s mortification. It doesn’t really care. It only fears its bosses and tomorrow it will forget you and it will be told to find another scapegoat for its greedy prurient masters.
Leslie, I was wondering about your facebook page. I would like to join.
Try to reach to the other side Leslie, where the spiritual world sees all and in a totally different space of the universal mind.
Your boy in the capital system is only one of so many scorned millions of it’s untreated victims . It’s pandemic attacks, even from birth the intellect and spirit in every single psyche and the singing cosmos in everything else too. Even the song of wildlife and the vegetation becomes unnatural in the wind like a dirge wrought on sad out of tune pianos . It seems that way doesn’t it? Even every breath sent to us from nature is commercialized and alienated.
Do we differ much from the disappearing forests in this greedy poison of capital accumulations?
Is your boy whom the Lord is beholding this minute any different from innocent green branches chipped away in someone’s few silver pieces? It’s the Money system. That and it’s capital God who is no Chaste Divinity changes lewd pitches day by day. Whomever wants too much money understanding that that it comes from, want, licentiousness and wars, is to blame, not your son . He who is a system and not a person is guilty. It puts cruel money in the mouth of damn fools and violent power goes to dangerous lunatics somehow. Anything can happen to any of us and anyone of us might do anything existing in these straight jackets of chosen mindless tyrants.
Who was it never kind and a corporation and always scrounging everywhere for copper pennies every murderous hour, waiting for the next filthy profit ? Was it your son? What is your son or this brutal thing who damages everybody’s thinking? Who is to blame for so many endless sins against the music of life?
Remember that someone is in a totally alternate divine space of the universal breast.
You are known there with your son even right now forever . You will know it sometimes and no matter what they do to us. Don’t let our enemies deny it to our faces even if we are drowning in salt and tears.
Terry-
It’s a shame that your family and friends feel that they can no longer associate with you because of whatever your son did. While we “understand” their feelings, it doesn’t make them “right”. True family and friends ralley round and support when bad things happen, they don’t shun and desert to save themselves.
Thru this website and the many other websites on the internet, there is support for families, parents and friends of prisoners, etc. You can derive support from many places if family and friends aren’t there for you and your son.
Does it ever get easier, no, not really, but it does become more manageable and you educate yourself, and others, one step at a time. Often it seems that no progress is made, one step forward, two steps back sort of thing. But every once in a while there is some positive info coming out of the US Sentencing Commission or the US Justice Dept., that makes us think, finally, someone is listening to us.
All I can offer is that staying strong, staying united, speaking with one strong voice may make a difference. It’s better than doing nothing, and it keeps you busy enough to stay sane. Best of luck, stay strong.
Terry-
Your story is familiar to many of us. Don’t let anyone accuse you of having been a “bad mother” if you know you weren’t. (As history goes, they always blame the mother for some ridiculous reason). (Isn’t that the Norman Bates Syndrome?)
I refuse to be ashamed of any family member who makes a mistake, they pay the price, then have to try to pick up the pieces of their life, but that will be with the love and support of all their family.
The world needs to change, sex offender is not a one-size-fits-all label, the more we talk about it, the more people may understand that truth.
And as for the uncontrollable tears and sorrow, allow yourself 5 minutes a day to wallow in the despair, after that, just put your big girl panties on and keep fighting the cause!
Thank you Kat for your encouraging words of support. They spell hope for me. To realize so many others are involved in bringing this issue to the forefront and present the truth about the devastating ripple effect this injustice has created. Terry