Up until that summer of '02, I vehemently knew that CSA was a horrendous crime, but I believed it was horrendous when it happened to other children, "real" children, not when it had happened to me. I believed I had been born bad. I don't know how to explain how it feels to have this belief. It was a belief I internalized in my mind pre-cognizantly. How do I explain the destructive thought processes created by having absorbed this belief before I was consciously aware of learning anything? This belief was embedded in my brain before I knew what it was like to not have such a belief. It was something I didn't know to even question. It wasn't until July of 2002 that I started to realize I had been born a real human child. I was 36 years-old when this first started to dawn on me.
Up until my 36th summer, I had no way at all to keep myself safe from predators like Marc Maron or my sda school principal. I thought I was the one born bad. I had no way to know that any adult who told me they knew how badly I had been hurt, when I hadn't said anything about my history, was someone who had spotted my symptoms from CSA, and were grooming me to see them as someone who had noticed the pain I carried, and wanted to "help" me. As soon as they did that, I thought they really cared about me. After all, they had taken the time to see the awful pain I tried to keep hidden. I believed as long as I listened to this person, who had cared enough to see the unspoken pain in my soul, I would learn how to get better. If I could do whatever kept this person happy and caring, they would help me no longer carry such horrible pain alone. I just had to make sure I wasn't bad, which would cause them to leave me. The principal, the owners and bosses of places I worked, the parents of friends who bought me alcohol or pot when I was having a rough time, therapists, 12-step sponsors, doctors, neighbors, clergy, all easily conned and re-exploited me over and over. And every time they were done with me, they blamed me for the CSA symptoms I had, said I was a bad person, called me crazy, and told me they never wanted to see me again. That erroneous self-slut-blame core belief I carried was reaffirmed by all of this over and over, and that belief became more deeply embedded and solidified each time this happened. This belief meant I couldn't keep myself safe. But without exception, I was told by family and friends and society and the legal system that I had to once again go try to trust some new person, so I could stop having so many mental health issues, so I could quit being such a fucked up member of society. So I would try yet again. I was doing what I kept being told I needed to do. And I had to keep trying. I couldn't just give up. I was doing my damnedest to raise three kids whom I didn't want to ever have to live life like me. I had to fucking keep trying.
In July of 2002, I saw a news report about a child who had been taken from her yard in Southern California. I heard someone say she had been taken by a person who told her he needed help to find a lost dog. The cruelty of gaining access to a child by telling them about a ficticious lost dog made my heart hurt. The pictures of that child, the sweet nickname her mother called her, the nightmare understanding of what that child was most likely going thru, made me feel physically ill, nearly panicky. I did not function well that day, as I tried to get everything done. I couldn't eat when I fed my kids. As they watched Nick at Nite, my mind could not focus. I was unable to sleep. I remember how my stomach felt, as a sheriff's deputy held a news conference the next day. He seemed to be shedding tears at one point. He told reporters Samantha Runnion had been found, dead.
As that emotional deputy said those words, my mind went into a sort of shutdown. I kept picturing the photo of Samantha, with her cat, that had been shown at some point during the coverage. My mind was trying to tell me something. I could not let myself hear it. For about a week, I was in a very disconnected state. I would almost let myself see what my mind had glimpsed. But I couldn't reconcile it with my core beliefs about me. In the end, I took that never-fully-acknowledged thought, and kept it at arm's length in the back of my mind. I knew what the thought was. I just couldn't make myself admit it was true. It would take over a decade for me to fully be able to accept, and express that truth I began to understand in 2002. And it wasn't until this year that I finally wrote that truth out loud.
Every decent human who heard about Samantha Runnion's abduction, assault, and murder, knew that she was a child who had been destroyed by a monstrous adult. An innocent child had been horrendously assaulted and murdered by a man who had definable evil in his heart. There was no gray area in this fucked up inhumane and absolutely depraved event. On that day, in 2002, every decent human who heard this news story knew exactly who was to blame, and who wasn't.
So, why in the fuck did part of my mind feel a sense of relief for that little girl, when that deputy had said she was dead? What made me have such a horrible feeling? Why was part of my mind thankful to know that at least Samantha would never be conned in a few years by some trusted school principal or therapist, be made to think they cared about her and wanted to help her heal from having been so harmed when she was five, just to have that trusted adult re-exploit her and leave her wishing she was dead? Why was I relieved for that little girl's sake? Mantha Ray Runnion would never have to experience being re-exploited by every predator who would have done exactly that to her, if she had lived. She wouldn't have to know that a horrendous crime committed against her is viewed as an acceptable aphrodisiac for adult men in this patriarchy.
Samantha Runnion's story happened publicly. My mind was realizing that if she had lived, Samantha would have been viewed by predators, including Marc Maron, as somebody they could target and groom and get to know, re-exploit at will, and then blame when they were done with her. And those same decent people who knew she had been an innocent child in 2002, would be the same ones who believed she was to blame for what predators like Maron would've done to her. This meant my mind had to face, and accept, that even though Samantha Runnion was blameless for what happened to her, decent people were going to blame her for the very symptoms she would experience, because of what happened. Thru no fault of her own, she would have been viewed as a girl who could be re-exploited and left in even worse condition, the same way every one of Maron's victims gets left: taking the blame for being sexually re-exploited by much older adult predators.
Seeing this truth started eroding the core belief I carried since I was a toddler. I had not been born a slut. My legs having to be in a splint due to a birth defect was not me being "seductive." I did not make my father sexually exploit me. I was as blameless as Samantha Runnion. All sexually exploited children are as blameless as Samantha Runnion. And all of them are going to experience symptoms that will leave them vulnerable to predators like Marc Maron. They do not cause decent humans to sexually exploit them. Adults who re-exploit sexualized children are the ones to blame. They are sexual predators.
Every single adult who allows older predators to re-exploit survivors of childhood sexualization, is as culpable as the predators are, for the further destruction of young survivors. Samantha Runnion would be blamed today, by Maron and his friends and fans and a society who defend Maron's predatory behavior, if she had lived and Maron had interviewed her alone in his garage, and she had responded to his grooming. Allowing an older man to re-exploit damaged young girls for over 3 decades is indefensible. This is a man who has spoken often about purposely grooming teen girls who have been sexually abused. Underage girls are blamed when they respond to this man's grooming. Little girls see him in their classrooms each November, reading a book aimed at them. Children view this man as a safe character from a kids' movie. Their teachers, their parents, everyone in society is letting children see this man as a safe person. Maron wants to sexually exploit teen girls, and has bragged about it for decades. He grooms sexually exploited girls, draws them in, gets close to them, then says they are obsessed with him, and that he is compelled to fuck them. He has claimed he cannot control the sexual urge he has to fuck these damaged girls, to sexually exploit girls with mental health issues, girls at risk of suicide, girls now young enough to be his granddaughters.
When predators are able to convince children they were born wanting to be sexually exploited, it becomes part of their belief system, just like anything else being taught to kids. The only reason society is unable to allow Marc Maron to sexually re-exploit Samantha Runnion, a child abducted and sexually assaulted when she was 5 and Maron was 38, is because that child was murdered. How long do sexually exploited children have to die, as the only way to escape sexual re-exploitation?
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