Saturday, April 03, 2004
(2:21 AM) | Anonymous:
Oh My Baby Baby Babe Gave Me Malaria, Hysteria-uhhh uh
Really..what about the voice of Geddy Lee? How did it get so high? I wonder if he speaks like an ordinary guy? I know him, and he does!Sorry. You know when Kotsko is away on "Real Life Leave", I have to quote as much pavement as possible.
However, this post isn't about pavement, but the title lyric instantly came to mind when I thought of the subject of this post: Hysteria.
I recently watched Capturing the Friedmans at my home entertainment center on my DVD play-er. I must say, it's a dang good flick. It basically tells the tale of a man and son who both went to jail in an alleged child gangrape bust. However, it amply proves that along the way, no one bothered to stop and ask some extremely simple questions. For instance, this gang raping allegedly went on during a computer class, and went on in a big room, with everyone present. There was abuse as part of it, and filming as part of it, and everything else you can imagine, according to the suit. Yet..on many occasions parents would drop by unannounced, and there was nothing suspicious. No parent ever found a bruise, no child ever said a word, and there was never any evidence of soiled-on pants or any other physical evidence at all. This includes the alleged piles upon piles of child smut that were left around the house, according to the charges. However, even in the police search photos, there's absolutely nothing, except a stack of child porn magazines they found hidden behind a piano.
What happened to bring it all up then? Well, the man was charged with receiving a child porn magazine through the US Postal service. When they came to put him under arrest for this, they found out he hosted a computer class that all aged kids came to, and began to somewhat assume what was going on. There was a big hype with child sex rings scaring every parent in the nation at the time, and suddenly they began filling in blanks with their worst fears, rather than looking at what actually went on.
There is one priceless scene where a high up police expert and then a fancy-shmancy child psychiatrist both go through how children are very impressionable, and often will want to tell an adult what the adult wants to hear. Thus, you need to be very careful in questioning, always to leave what happened up to them, saying things like "What happened next?" or "do you remember anything else?" rather than trying to force it out of them, because otherwise they'll start taking what you feed them, and add on all sorts of stuff they are making up. This is observable with any child, try it sometime.
The very next scene, they interview the people who did the questioning in this case. And they are like "well..kids can be very difficult to get anything out of..you pretty much have to confront them, telling them you know what happened, and then they'll break down and tell the truth. Like..there were a couple kids who wouldn't talk at first..so, you know, we played some toys with them, and then offered to make them an honorary deputy..and you come back the next day and pin a badge on the kid, it's a whole different story..they'll admit to everything"
There are many interviews with the kids who are now all young adults included, and 4-5 of them, who were responsible for over 100 counts against the person, come right out and say that nothing happened, and they just remembered feeling like if they said it did, the police would leave them alone. There's also 1 extremely humorous guy who is obviously a complete, I don't know...lying moron isn't the right word, but it's the first to come to mind, and he was single handedly responsible for some 43 counts against them. The kid just goes on and on making the most ridiculous accusations which in no way could be possible..including in the same breath saying that the raping always took place in the back room, and then describing how the Friedmans would line the kids up naked and play "leap frog", raping each kid in turn.
Here's the thing. Something probably happened here. The Father later admitted to sleeping with his brother when he was younger, and being attracted to little kids ever since then. He also admitted to molesting two kids about 10 years before the alleged incidents. I think it's highly probably that 1 or 2 of the kids were perhaps telling the truth, that Arnold Friedman had molested them either before or after the computer class started. But this spiraled into this massive thing where there was something like over 400 combined charges, and tales of daily rapings, and everything else, to where justice or any kind of actual trial wasn't even possible. Both pleaded guilty, not because of guilt, but just due to the fact that with so many charges, there is no possible way to combat them all.
The police investigation turned up nothing. There was ample evidence disproving everything..for instance, the fact that the kids spoke in glowing words about the class to their parents often, and many were eager to re-enroll each year. There was a derth of any evidence other than the testimonies. The police went about the procedure with every against the book procedure known to man - at one point, they charged 3 others as participating in what they called a "sex ring". They charged them, calling them in the charges and to the media, Jessie (the son)'s best friends. However, not a one of them was anywhere near even a friendly acquaintence. No proof at all of anything even coming close to a link was given, and Jessie's real best friends were strangely left off, even though several had helped in the computer class...Not surprisingly, all 3 were approached with plea bargains if they'd turn state's evidence against Jessie. Think about it, you barely know some kid from school..but suddenly are facing 10-20 years of jail time, then you are offered 6 months probation if you'll testify. Simple choice, eh? What's more, the charges against all 3 were dropped once the Friedman's decided to plead guilty. The father pleaded guilty first, because his lawyer told him it would help get his son off if he pleaded guilty. However, the police then took that SEALED and CONFIDENTIAL document to each of the parents who were still on the fence or were against charging Jessie, and said "look..his father admits that massive gang raping went on at each computer session...you know Jessie was there..why would his father admit it if it wasn't true?" which, of course, brought even more charges piled on to the already insurmountable total.
So, now that I've basically re-described the movie for you, let me get to the point: Hysteria controls at least about 80% of our judicial system today. Truth does not matter, at all. Instead, it is just about piling on as much loosely backed up evidence as possible, finding enough people willing to say something happened, whether it did or not, and then charging forth on it. This is nothing new, I know. But perhaps now it's more scary then ever.
We all know the salem witch trials never died. They go on constantly still today - someone doesn't like someone, or has a baseless suspicion, they then begin to speak to others, and an accusation is made. A simple accusation is enough to effectively end one's life. Yet, how long is it before the hysterics which so have come to personify child molestation trials and murder trials and well ,yeah, all trials today, starts to be applied to terrorism? It already has begun on a minor level in some instances..I had a friend who got a visit from the FBI because a neighbor thought he was "suspicious". This friend is arabic, but also a top student at Johns Hopkins University. So, if one person reporting something is enough for a friendly visit, what about when 4-5 people start getting together? When the depraved feeling of goodness that comes with having "totally figured it out" starts to hit soccer moms everywhere? How long before our prevention techniques upon terror hit this same level where all it takes is several accusations for you to wind up in court, facing hundreds of charges with no hope of being not guilty..or at the very best, having to risk either accepting a guilty plea and serving 10-30 years in prison, or pleading not guilty and facing 3 consecutive life sentences? Who's ever going to plead not-guilty under such circumstances?
I thought I had a lot more to say about this movie when I started, but this has basically just turned into a long way of saying "go rent it". This is what happens when you wait for 3-4 days after seeing a movie to post about it - all that brilliant insight you thought you had seems to trickle on out. I won't apologize, but I am sorry..
