Amish wife accused of not reporting sex abuse

17 thoughts on Amish wife accused of not reporting sex abuse

1. I’m also conflicted with the case against the Amish woman. It looks like she reported the abuse to church elders. Obviously they aren’t the police or children’s services, but she has spent her whole life in that community and that’s how things are handled. It may not be right, but wouldn’t it be better if the authorities continued working on educating the Amish community members concerning the proper channels for things like this? Maybe theft and property crimes can still be handled by the elders without involvement of outside autorities, but crimes against people–abuse, murder, rape–are police matters. I know it’s probably hard to get through to very insular communities, but I think the prosecution of this woman could make other Amish people less likely to involve outsiders.
   Also, the church elders aren’t being prosecuted, but they knew about the abuse. The Hasidic rabbis (different circumatance, I know) who knew about the sexual abuse in their communities aren’t being prosecuted. I also have a hard time believing the Amish woman “let” the abuse happen. I’m not sure women in that community are very empowered.

2. I’ve read several times over the last few years that sexual abuse is traditionally covered up or lightly punished in the Amish community http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amish#Abuse_controversy

   Basically, as I understand it, the offender is made to apologize, and is maybe shunned for a short while. Everything is at that point forgiven, and if the victim keeps on pressing it, she gets shunned. What they need to do is arrest some church elders.

3. I believe that the Amish are peace-church Christians. Turning someone over to the police would mean turning them over to arrest, possible police brutality, and possible imprisonment, with all the violence inherent in it. I believe I would rather die than inform on my worst enemy. I have survived police brutality and, years later, it still haunts me. … I don’t want to think of it.

4. In my area recently, there is a man being prosecuted for abuse and neglect of a baby that resulted in death. The mother is also being prosecuted for neglect and something else (like “failing to protect from harm” or something), though not for the death of the baby, but because she didn’t report the abuse even though she was clearly a victim herself (there were several domestic disturbance calls to their home and the hospital noted that she had two black eyes the day she did bring the baby to the hospital were it died). I understand she was under an obligation to protect her child, but how was she to do that if she was also being abused and threatened?

5. When mothers *do* try to protect their kids from abuse, they are often accused of alienating them from their fathers during custody hearings. They can’t win. And that’s “out in the world,” outside of a very insular community where (depending on the community) reporting someone will get you completely disowned and shunned by your friends and family. And it’s not as if your average Amish person has the degrees to get a very well-paying job right off the bat.

   Also, apparently, the Church knew about this and didn’t report it, either. They “took care of it” within the church–a temporary shunning, then forgive and forget. Anyone going after these folks?

   It’s about “forgiveness,” and that is often used as a bludgeoning stick against the children who are victimized repeatedly. In the case of certain sects of the Amish, it’s not just about protecting a wrongdoer from police brutality. He said he was sorry, he was shunned for six weeks, now shut up and stop making waves.

   Certainly, in *some* sects, people can be very brutal to a rape survivor who wants justice and safety–Anna Slabaugh’s family pulled out all of her teeth when she refused to stop seeking help for the repeated sexual abuse she endured for years at the hands of her brothers–and she repeatedly went to the authorities (to no avail for a long time) and endured beatings and imprisonment in her home as a result before the tooth-pulling. She suffered a broken eardrum after one such beating (not particularly forgiving or peaceful). They finally broke her into recanting at a hearing, but she eventually escaped. Women whose husbands beat them are excommunicated and shunned by their friends, families, and their own children if they go to the cops.

   That kind of brutality, coupled with the community’s condemnation of the person who suffered it, tends to haunt the survivors.

6. Oh, and I want to add–if the survivor is going to be treated so brutally by the community, I imagine her mother would be if she went to the cops as well. Just sayin’.

7. “Also, the church elders aren’t being prosecuted, but they knew about the abuse. The Hasidic rabbis (different circumatance, I know) who knew about the sexual abuse in their communities aren’t being prosecuted. I also have a hard time believing the Amish woman “let” the abuse happen. I’m not sure women in that community are very empowered.”

   This is pretty much my reaction. Someone comparatively disempowered and isolated goes to an authority figure within their community and reports a crime, the authority figures don’t really do shit, and somehow the original reporter is on the hook for failure to go to the cops but the community authority figures aren’t?

8. in my opinion, it matters more if the person doing the ignoring had some degree of responsibility for the abused — a teacher, a doctor, a parent, etc), and the relative power of the abuser over the person who knew and did nothing

   The law agrees with you concerning teachers and health care providers, and I think day care providers too – they’re subject to mandatory abuse reporting. Of course, it’s difficult to try to extend laws like these to parents. For one thing, as you point out, potential abuse reporters are often victims themselves. For another, teachers and health care providers receive training about spotting abuse their responsibility to report it.

9. I do support the idea that we should hold people who aid and abet abuse accountable. That said, I think part of rape culture is focusing on everyone but the perpetrator and given that the vast, vast majority of sexual assault cases do not end in conviction, I have a hard time telling focusing on witnesses.

   Furthermore, in cases where the mom is the non-abusive parent (and a father is offending) we need to be aware of the tendency of our society to place more responsibility for the welfare and protection of the child on the mother. For example, I have heard many horror stories in my state of non-abusive mothers being beaten by the father of their children, and the children getting taken away from the mother for failure to protect the child from witnessing the abuse. This isn’t quite the same as the child suffering from sexual abuse, but still relevant, I think.

   One final issue, is that people who aid and abet sexual abuse often hold the same rape myths that the general population holds. A father couldn’t do that to their own child, the victim somehow brought it upon themselves, etc. Or, if they believe the abuse occurred and warrants criminal action, they care subject to the same fears about seeking help that survivors have- fear of putting their child through the trauma of reporting and testifying, fear of violations of their privacy, fear of breaking up the family.

   This doesn’t by any means condone knowing about the abuse and letting it go on, but it makes me think that continuing to educate and raise awareness and limit barriers to seeking-help would be more effective than criminal prosecution.

   So, yes, I agree they should be accountable, and yes, I agree that it is one big mess in figuring out how to do that. Very interesting topic for discussion.

10. I believe that the Amish are peace-church Christians. Turning someone over to the police would mean turning them over to arrest, possible police brutality, and possible imprisonment, with all the violence inherent in it.

    Yeeaaahhh, because nothing keeps the peace quite like an abuse victim having to shut up and take more abuse, right?

    Look, Marja E. I’m going to give you the benefit of the doubt that you didn’t mean that how it sounded. I’m a survivor of domestic violence, both as a child and teenager (father) and adult (husband). When I hear a statement like that, I hear, “it’s more important that Lubu’s (father, husband) not have to risk the possible physical violence inherent in arrest and prosecution than it is for Lubu not be abused.” Because y’know, it’s not like I never asked not to be hit anymore.

    And I’m going to be very, very, blunt here. The Amish are WHITE. The chances of any man going to prison for beating his wife is pretty damn small. The chances of a white man having to endure police brutality for beating his wife is slim to none. Meanwhile, the chances of the wife having to endure more (and increasingly violent) beatings is 99.9999999% positive.

    Any church that condones domestic violence, either explicitly or implicitly, by words or by actions, is NOT a fucking “peace church.” Amen, and amen.

11. Among the ultra-Orthodox Jewish communities, the standard about dealing with everything within the community comes from a time when if one Jew complaining to outside authorities about, say, another Jew stealing from him, the response from Gentiles could easily be, “The Jews are thieves! Kill them all!” But it seems like, in the last few years at least (I don’t know enough about what was going on before that), the ONLY time that the “don’t bring problems between Jews to outside authorities” argument gets brought up are cases of domestic abuse or of children being abused by teachers or rabbis or other people in positions of community authority. There’s a lot of distrust of the police within that community (for various reasons), but I can’t remember ever seeing people object to police involvement this much in any other type of case.

12. Forgot to type this before posting my last comment — the reason that people are starting to go to the police now is because the “talk to the rabbis” system is not working. For most cases that get settled by the rabbis, everyone involved is more or less satisfied that the outcome is just. But a lot of abuse cases have gotten rulings from the beit din that the victims and their families just cannot see as fair.

13. La Luba,

    I have been through a lot of pain, but what those cops did to me years ago still haunts me. I wanted to die, and when I’m triggered too hard, a few times per year, I want to die to get away from it.

14. (((Marja E))) I’m sorry for what those bastards did to you.

    Meanwhile, I spent time in my youth and as an adult wishing that someone would think I was a worthwhile enough human being to call the cops on the behalf of. Shit, when I left my (ex) husband, and he came back and tried to kill me, the first thing to go in the fight was the phone from off the wall. It was a full apartment building, and there was a whole lot of noise coming from my apartment—but no one called 911. And really—whatever the intention—that act of not calling prioritized his life over mine. Even though it was crystal clear what was taking place. How do such people justify that? How do they go to sleep at night, knowing that they turned their back?

    Marja E, how do we bridge that gap between us—your perspective and mine? I have spent my life wondering why people are more eager to excuse, forgive, accommodate, and understand abusers rather than support, protect and defend the abused. The mental gymnastics required to do so, especially in the name of “justice” or “peace”, astound me. It places yet one more burden on our backs. And I’m done. I’m not carrying that burden. I am not going to shoulder that burden of being on the receiving end of someone else’s violence because of the trauma he’s experienced, or might experience. Screw that. And I am damn sure not teaching that toxic form of relations to my daughter (she came along several years after I was divorced—a lifetime ago, so no…she hasn’t had that experience).

    In other words, I finally learned how to value myself in the absence of outside validation. And I’m sure the hell not going back. When I see a pimp beating a prostitute, I call the cops. A husband beating his wife, I call the cops. Boyfriend/girlfriend? Yep, the cops. Because of all those years I wished someone had done the same for me. Am I a snitch? Fuckin’ A. I’m prioritizing the life of the woman over the man who makes himself feel better by hitting her.

15. I have spent my life wondering why people are more eager to excuse, forgive, accommodate, and understand abusers rather than support, protect and defend the abused. The mental gymnastics required to do so, especially in the name of “justice” or “peace”, astound me. It places yet one more burden on our backs. And I’m done. I’m not carrying that burden. I am not going to shoulder that burden of being on the receiving end of someone else’s violence because of the trauma he’s experienced, or might experience. Screw that.

    SECONDED. Bad enough that abuse and sexual assault is ignored and minimized, the survivors are then pilloried for having the gall to call the cops because the perps might suffer? What about the suffering of the abused?

    Marja, what abusers do the abused still haunts them years after. Do they not count to you?

16. Church officials are required by law to report incidents suggesting child abuse to the authorities–obviously, this includes the sexual assault of minors. It was the church officials–and not necessarily the wife–who had an obligation to contact child services.

    And one more thing… I wish we weren’t discussing the Amish here as if they’re the freaking FLDS. Yes, they are a patriarchal religion, but no, I haven’t seen any evidence that this kind of crime is endemic within Amish communities. This story involves one culprit; I don’t think there’s any reason to make tacit assumptions that this happens in Amish communities anymore frequently than it happens in the so-called “English world.” It’s a culture that’s quite foreign to a great many of us, but it isn’t the FLDS. There’s no systemic evidence of child marriage or child abuse.

17. It was the church officials–and not necessarily the wife–who had an obligation to contact child services.

    Yes – the wife reported the abuse to appropriate officials, who then did nothing to prevent further abuse, let alone punish the perpetrator.

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