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In Reply to: Reframing Family-think: I did not "join" the family! posted by jo on December 08, 2003 at 12:16:07:
Just because there are legitimate reasons for particular actions does not absolve the participants of responsibility for those actions. My belief in this is not an “us” “them” one.
I left the Family when I was 20 years old. I had never been to North America before and had left with the clothes on my back and my passport. I had told a high ranking leader that the person representing the Family in the UK court case repeatedly raped one of my friends when she was 12 years old, and was given a one way ticket to Canada and told that I was no longer a Family member. I was raped not long after leaving, and ended up pregnant from the rape. I felt so guilty about scheduling an abortion for this that I tried to commit suicide and ended up in a psychiatric ward, and when they determined I was no longer a danger to myself, I found out I was now homeless and was discharged into a women’s shelter. The other girls in the shelter were streetwalkers, HIV positive and heroin and crack addicts. I had an abortion because there was no way I could take of a child. I was desperate for a way out and so I moved into a brothel. For the next two years I sold my body for money.
I don’t know what I would do if I had to do it all over again. I honestly believed that entering the sex trade was the only option I had at the time. I also had absolutely no idea what I was getting into. All I knew of prostitution was the FF letters, where Berg said that this was what women were “made for”, seeing women in the Family dressed up glamorously with pagers from escort agencies, and “The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas” which looked like a naughty, non-stop party. I was naïve in the extreme, and had only ever been with two boys my own age in the Family.
However, the reality is that I willingly participated in a business run on exploitation of women and girls. I helped to perpetuate sexist attitudes and abusive behaviour in men. While prostitution is not illegal here, the sex trade is largely run by organized crime and I saw things every day that were criminal and did not report them. I don’t know what I would do if I was ever confronted by the wife of one of my clients. I did participate in her husband’s deception, and helped to perpetuate the notion that the deception was okay and “fun”. I used men in a very manipulative way, and also perpetuated the gender divide and lack of respect for women as equals because of this. I as well as many of my friends in the trade took a lot of drugs and developed addictions. The majority of those girls are now dead, mostly from overdoses. Some of them started their substance abuse at the same time I did, and if I hadn’t done this with them, perhaps they would be alive today.
Like the Family, there were times when I was literally held captive, most of the time though, it was that I thought I had crossed a line and could never be part of normal society. I have a close friend who also spent years in the sex trade. She was kidnapped when she was 13 years old and taken to Vancouver. Her stepfather was sexually abusive and her mother didn’t care that she was gone. She was kept tied up in an apartment, raped and injected with heroin until she developed an addiction. She was then “turned out” on the “kiddie stroll” of Vancouver. She did not have a choice. I did. There are people who have been through similar situations though and did not make the choices I did.
I believe that to say that our circumstances or other people can control us so much that we have no choice is to demean and devalue ourselves. When we sign away responsibility, we also sign away our own power. If I had a choice then, I have a choice now. Even in the most horrific of circumstances, if we understand that there is always a decision that we can make, we can retain our humanity and dignity.
I agree that to wallow in guilt is unhealthy. To understand the effects of our own actions and to take responsibility and do what we can to fix the past and do better in the future is to me, something I can do now. I feel I do owe a debt to society because of what I engaged in. Because of this I refuse to phrase things in a “girly” way or to flirt for advantage or to exploit the societal gender stereotypes, even though (in general) our society is so much easier when we as women do this.
Quite frankly, to say that someone was “forced to have sex with children” not only demeans the trauma of the victims, but also deeply insults the courage and integrity of those who did take a stand and recognised that as abuse and refused to participate in the rape of a child. By the same token, it is interesting to me, that with all the “guilt” and self-flagellation, not one person has turned themselves in to the authorities. With the extensive SG network we have now, it is not difficult to check up on the history of just about anyone, and there are very very few FGs (exers as well) who do not have skeletons in their own closets. Perhaps people think if they beat themselves up enough, they will be absolved. Crimes against children don’t work that way and I don’t think that is taking responsibility at all.
Personally I believe that if people believe that something they did was justified or right, then they should say that. I am not sorry for many things I did in the sex trade. With many of my clients there was mutual respect and for them an opportunity to have companionship and intimacy with no strings attached. I don’t believe that prostitution in itself is wrong. What is wrong is the exploitation and the lack of choice and the brutality for the women and girls involved.
Either way, it’s about taking responsibility and owning our own decisions, and that to me is the essence of adulthood. I am not particularly proud of my time as a prostitute, but it is a part of my past and who I am. I took a lot away from the experience. My hope, for all my decisions, is that I am woman enough to own up to them, take responsibility, learn from the experience, accept the consequences of my actions, and then move on.
