Amish school gunman 20- year old secret
Tue Oct 03, 2006 at 10:32:54 AM PDT
Here, apparently, is the secret that gunman who shot up the Amish school had. Here's what happened to Charles C. Roberts IV about 20 years ago, when he was about 12.
According to CNN his wife said he had molested someone, possibly one or more family members aged 3 or 4, when he was 12. His family said they had no knowledge of that. This would not be an unusual thing in a case of child molestations; most do not come to light, and he as a 12-year old had far more power to keep it hidden than a 3-year old would to bring it to light. But he remembered it, and was apparently troubled enough to tell his wife about it.
A child molesting other children is often someone who has been molested himself. If I was interviewing a 12-year old molester, I would explore for that possibility. Of course I can't interview this guy. Regardless, as with all cases like this, it stays on my mind--where did this boy learn that behavior? Who taught him? Was it is own idea? Is there an as-yet undiscovered adult behind the scenes who molested this guy, staying safe while the children in that schoolhouse became the objects of Roberts's rage?
Blaming the victim is very common in child molestation or incest cases. Parents sometimes do it, authorities sometimes do it, some members of the Republican party are doing it now. So perhaps Roberts did too. If only you hadn't done/been XYZ, then I would not have had do do that! Directing anger at the vulnerable rather than the more powerful is pretty standard behavior, regardless of who is really to blame. But it's not always simple, not always straightforward. That blame can help wipe away one's own shame, but it doesn't always work completely. It can be an escalating sequence of self-blame and shame and other-blame and rage, and can get so intense that the only two alternatives can seem like "you die" or "I die".
Now, 20 years later, did the shame at his own deed get mixed up with rage at the victims, and perhaps at the man who molested him (because the majority of people who molest children of either gender are male), get twisted up in Roberts's psyche to the point where he could no longer control his own actions? Is that why he entered that school with guns, with lumber to hold the doors closed, with an absurd number of rounds and clothing and plastic handcuffs and toilet paper? To somehow wipe away his own suffering? To reclaim a feeling of power or safety? To protect himself by removing temptation?
It's not possible yet to know. And it's too easy just to say that he was a typical wackjob child molester--we don't have any evidence that he had molested children after the age of 12. Children--including, perhaps especially, molested children--may molest once, and with treatment, never molest again. He may have gone in that school intending to molest those children--tube of KY jelly was found in the schoolhouse and it's not standard equipment in Amish schoolhouses as far as I know--but there is no evidence that he did rape them. Perhaps he struggled with his own urges. CNN reports that he had been having dreams about molesting. Perhaps he was terrified about what he might become. About his decreasing lack of control over this behavior. Perhaps he went into that schoolhouse to wipe away the temptation that he believed ruined his life 20 years ago--pretty little schoolgirls. Perhaps...well, we don't know what his exact motivation was.
But as a psychologist, I would say that there is a big red flag here--that this boy had been molested himself. He talked about being angry at God in his suicide letters. It's not uncommon among religious people to, when something like this happens, to feel forsaken by God. To feel angry at the deal being broken--the deal of "I follow you no matter what, and you take care of me no matter what". When sick, sick horror like molestation breaks in, and the horror resounds for years, it is hard to square that with such a religious practice.
Whatever way this turns out to have gone down, it may be a horrific testament to the lingering effects of molestation on even a pubescent child. And on a young molester himself.
And as Hastert and Shimkus and all the others covered up Foley's activity, as they facilitated Foley's predation on children, they gave not one thought to the nightmares they might be creating. To them the pages were just things, just pieces of "ass", and Foley unbelievably more important. A Republican seat unbelievably more important. The nightmares of others were nothing. The nightmares they may have created begin with the victim, and then spiral out from there in widening circles. May those politicians pay, like these little girls's families have paid, like Roberts himself seems to have paid. A very, very long-term price.
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