Tag Archives: Religious Abuse of Children

Building a Fence Around Victims – By Nancy Bicknell

Building a Fence around Victims in the IFB Church to Keep Out Predators

By Nancy Bicknell

  wolf
What comes first? Caring for the Predator Preachers or, Caring for the People they harmed? Big People Taking Care of Little People is something that sticks with me as a good formula for who needs to be helped. I always want to help the Little People who have been harmed by the Big People. When the wolf got in our chicken coop, I helped the chickens and my dad put up a fence so it would not happen again. When church members praise the Predator Preacher they are putting new victims at risk by opening the door, which says “More Predator Preachers WELCOMED, rather than building a fence around the people that were harmed and those who may be harmed in the future by other Predatory Preachers.
Can these sex offenders be cured or cared for? Theories of using confrontational treatment of sex offenders ordered for child sexual abuse perpetrators is the most common approach. They use group therapy that relies heavily upon punitive and hostile confrontation and a non-systemic blend of psychoanalytic concepts and traditional talking therapy. There is often little or no effort to provide a theoretical base for the program. These procedures are often moralistic and reflect the judgmental emotional response of society rather than an empirically-based healing technique. As you can see there is not anything that we know of for sure that works with pedophilia. However, in dealing with pedophilia, the focus is not on CURING the pedophile; as no one really knows how to do that. The focus is then on CARING for children, to keep them safe in the future by building a fence around the vulnerable among us, by locking up the pedophile and not allowing the continuation of their abuse. Our society currently is set up to keep the weakest, the littlest among us safe. Big People take care of Little People.

How much more so should that statement be true in our churches. Did the IFB church in your life protect the Little Ones or their Pastors who protected the abuser who abused the Little Ones? Shame on those who did not condemn the Pastors who abused or, protected the abuser, and continue to PRAISE them by allowing them to sit in the IFB PEWS and have not cared for the LITTLE ONES who sat in those same pews while being abused! SHAME on those who enable the Predatory Pastors message to continue through their praise, presence or silence.

Those who enable Predatory Preachers by praising them endanger the vulnerable. So the problem in my view is not those who are confronting the Predatory Pastor or Praisers but, what are we doing to keep the message of the pedophile from being praised or promoted and attracting more Predator Pastors? The blood of the child victims in the IFB church, like the blood of the chickens killed, will bring more wolfs to the chicken coop.

Many in the IFB churches are still in some denial believing they can cure the pedophiles by using a loving message and accepting those who praise the rapist —  like Jack Schaap, for example. This Praise of the Predatory Pastor should make us angry and motivate us to action. I would be equally angry at a group that praises Charles Manson and talks against those people who are trying to protect future children. If your family has been victimized by such a killer as Manson, who actually never killed a victim himself that we know of – yet his followers did – what side of the fence would you be on? If there is not a fence that your IFB church has put up, you would be determined by the blood you or yours have sacrificed because of the wolfs killing spree, to quickly put your energy into building a fence.

There is no easy answer. However, I don’t understand why those who are in denial about the danger of Pastor Predator Praising groups or churches have not left those communities to go build fences around the vulnerable. We build those fences by pointing a finger at the danger of praising the perp-pastor groups and churches. I support all of you advocates, survivors and those who support you with efforts that use your personality style to expose the dangers for those vulnerable ones still in the IFB churches like First Baptist Church of Hammond, Indiana, and their former pastor, Jack Schaap. As leaders in this movement, we must build fences resilient enough to resist future Predator Preachers from getting to our children! I am your cheer leader. You are who you are and that leadership has been helpful to many who see your strong word on that subject. You are a leader and leaders show strength. That is a good thing. I have never seen a predator react to a feather.

Be strong all of you who are building the fences in your life time. Some of you are good yellers, so yell! Others are good writers, so write! Some of you are great listeners, so listen! Some of you draw pictures, so draw pictures! Together we can build a fence, but alone, well. . . alone we are just alone and the IFB will see us as a feather and blow us away.  So get your post hole digger out and help build the fence the best way you know how because God can use your talents to protect His Little Ones if you own your talents and prioritize fence building over caring for the Predatory Pastors.

The IFB tried to teach us as members that the real wolf was our government trying to take away our rights; and so many of us spent so much time looking out for the government as the wolf ready to devoured us that we missed the Wolfs among us in the IFB. As a result, many people got hurt and many, many children were harmed. What a paradox we found ourselves in when we finally saw the IFB wolfs in sheep’s clothing and it was too late. We were hoodwinked. I pray I will see the real wolfs in the future and point the IFB wolfs out to others. Keep up the good fight and I will cheer you on and, draw a picture now again.

Global Scope and Magnitude of Violence Against Women

This past year has been a wake-up call to me that violence against women has a global scope and VAWmagnitude that the media is turning a blind eye to. As women, we must ask ourselves what we can do to help put an end to this epidemic that spans across all societies across the world. The global scope and magnitude of the violence is a direct result of the religious and cultural “indoctrination” that takes place to proliferate this “inequality” of the sexes.

Male-dominated societies push through the “belief systems” that enable them to continue to oppress and suppress women from positions of authority and power throughout the world. Women in positions of authority that have the power and influence to affect changes in law, would absolutely stop much of the violence. Women do not tolerate abuse or, abuse on their children; men do. If men TRULY desired to end the violence, they absolutely could by using “thought or behavior reform” and, the same methods they have always used AGAINST women, to reverse behavior and attitudes that lead to abuse. They could also put permanent laws in place to protect women.  They could prosecute 100% of the perpetrators.

The magnitude of the abuse:

Chart1

Religious indoctrination plays a major role in the behaviors and attitudes of men toward women. The religious manuscripts in existence have been proven to have many thousands of changes; many of which, have eradicated women from the religious roles they once held in the days of the early church. Changes have been made in order to dishonor and degrade women. Interpretations of scripture are twisted to teach that men are “superior”.  Why would men do this? Why would men change “scripture” to eliminate women in leadership in any capacity within religious circles? This is not difficult to answer. It keeps women in a position of inequality and submission that leads to total control; that leads to sexual exploitation (see my articles on Sexual Exploitation of Women in Cults, How Submission is Obtained: The Cult Rationale and, How Submission is Obtained: Personal Abuse)

Thought reform (also known as behavior modification), has been a major tool used by men to keep women in a place of inequality and submission; thus, enabling the abuses talked about in the following study that I am about to give you.  This study reveals just how bad the war on women really is. Every woman must educate herself on the statistics, and the reality, of what is truly taking place in not only this country, but across the world. We must be exceedingly “aware” of the changes in law that affect our equality, freedoms and protections.  As a race of people, we must take steps to protect ourselves and our children from this abuse. We do not have to put ourselves at the mercy of abusive men in any situation. Unfortunately, oftentimes, we are “forced” into this abusive environment by men whose only real agenda is sexual control and power. Through “religious” laws (like Sharia) interwoven into civil laws, women are “forced” to endure the torture, sexual mutilation, physical abuse, incest, rape, humiliation and trauma that men perpetrate against them. As a result, of these religious laws, as a result of religious indoctrination, as a result of the forced submission and sexual inequality, women and children are left at the mercy of abusive and perverse men in all societies across the globe. MEN can STOP the VIOLENCE and bring EQUALITY – IF THEY WANTED TO!

Global magnitude of the violence against women.

chart2

What are some of the steps we can take to ensure our safety? Let’s put some thought to this and really figure out what is necessary to stop violence against us and our children.

  1. Women should be vying for positions of leadership all over America within Government. Women in Government protect themselves and children.
  2. Women should be ever alert to changes in law that take away their rights and protections. Many times men will enact “laws” using the “MORAL” excuse as a blanket to deprive women of sexual equality; thus, enslaving them to their agendas of “exploitation”, control and submission to THEM.
  3. Women that have been abused MUST speak out about that abuse! The STATISTICS are so badly understated that it gives the impression that it is not as bad as it really is!
  4. Women MUST be courageous in taking action against ALL perpetrators of abuse where there are laws in place to protect them from it.

IF we do NOT do this, these laws will fall away leaving us NO protection. Think about this! The Violence Against Women Act (VAWA) was not renewed last year because the religious “right” said it would cost too much money to help abused women. Do we really believe that they cared one wit about  money on this issue? Of course not! It’s about maintaining the power imbalance and control over women.

Here’s an excerpt from the Huffington Post online on February 14, 2012.

Protecting women from violence and abuse has been an issue of bipartisan cooperation since President Clinton signed the landmark Violence Against Women Act (VAWA) in 1994. It was reauthorized with overwhelming bipartisan support in 2000 and again in 2005. Not this year.

On Feb. 2, the Senate Judiciary Committee approved legislation (S. 1925) reauthorizing VAWA. The bill was sponsored by Chair Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.) and Sen. Mike Crapo (R-Idaho) — who is not on the committee — and cosponsored by 34 senators from both parties. Nevertheless, the legislation attracted no GOP support among committee members and passed out of committee on a party-line vote of 10-8. It was, according to Leahy’s office, the first time VAWA legislation did not receive bipartisan backing out of committee.

“Helping victims of domestic violence shouldn’t be partisan,” said Leahy in an interview with The Huffington Post. “I remember when I was a prosecutor and I’d go to a crime scene at 2:00 in the morning where [there were] victims of domestic violence. … I never remember the police saying, ‘Well, we can only investigate this if it’s a Democrat or a Republican or whatever else. Their reaction was, ‘How do we find the person who did this?’ It’s outrageous to make this a partisan issue.” – Huffington Post, Feb. 14, 2012

“But VAWA is facing well-organized opposition, and as Jillian Rayfield reported, it’s coming almost entirely from the religious right movement [emphasis mine].

The socially conservative Family Research Council asked supporters to help it oppose the reauthorization of the Violence Against Women Act because, the group says, the “real abuse” is how much it will waste taxpayer dollars.” – MSNBC’s Madowblog.com, Feb. 7, 2013

However, President Obama signed it back into law this year to provide women protection from domestic abuse. What if he hadn’t done so? Why isn’t this law PERMANENT? Why is it TEMPORARY and must be “voted on” at the end of its term? Does that make any sense at all? Let’s protect women “temporarily” until such a time as we have a man in office that decides it’s not worth renewing because his “religious” beliefs degrade women anyway? What is wrong with people in government that this needs to be voted on? This is a moral and ethical issue here. This should be a PERMANENT law here in this country.

If women across the globe are going to EVER gain their honor and dignity back, their rights and equality, then we MUST speak out about ABUSE of all kinds. WE MUST REPORT IT. We MUST strive to get into government positions that will allow us to affect changes in law. Why does one think that all these women were shot down by the MEDIA in the last four years? Katheryn Lane, Michele Bachmann, Sarah Palin, Hilary Clinton. These women were viciously “discredited” and “attacked” by the media and, it was not because they were not qualified for the positions they were vying for. They were discredited because they were WOMEN that DARED to run for an office that would enable them the POWER to affect change for women all over this country; changes that would stop the power imbalances in government, changes that would stop the abuse and afford women the protections they have been denied oftentimes, changes that would give women the courage to report ALL abuses because they would not have to worry about men shaming and humiliating them and hurting them any longer. WOMEN do not tolerate abuse. Let’s let that sink in for a moment.

If we women are going to change America and bring equality of the sexes, protection of women and children and, equality of power, then we must stand together as a WHOLE and do our best to put women in these positions! We cannot let ourselves be divided by MEN’S agendas as the media “portrayes” them. We cannot let the MEDIA “LABEL” those that try to make a difference for women everywhere.

Labeling:

Here is what “labeling” does.  It attempts to dehumanize a person or race so that dismissing them or their opinions is much easier.  Choosing not to address someone individually who challenges the toxic faith places a blanket negative label on all who would agree with that person.  Those who disagree with what is taught are labeled as “detractors,” “malcontents” and “traitors”, who would destroy the ministry or organization.  These labels then become rallying points under which other followers can be moved to action to squelch a revolt.  Once the label is placed, it becomes more difficult to see the person as a human with real needs and the potential for good judgment.  This is exactly what religious leaders have done to women throughout history!   — Religion’s Cell: Doctrines of the Church that Lead to Bondage and Abuse, C. McClaskey

These women showed the COURAGE to stand in the forefront and run for political offices. They were not only publicly shamed and humiliated (typical male tactic against us) by men, they were shamed and humiliated and mocked by other WOMEN!  They were “labeled” by the MEDIA and MEN. They were used to DIVIDE women everywhere across this country!  What is wrong with people? Only equality of POWER will stop abuse for us and give us the freedoms that we have been denied. If you don’t think we have been denied equality, then ask yourself why men are paid higher salaries than women?  Please, think about these things as you read this study that puts all of this into perspective. This is a WAR on WOMEN and always has been. This war is the result of “religious mindsets” delivered to people deceptively over time. It is time to wake up women of the world and realize that the time is NOW to do what we must do to change our positions in society and to protect us and our children. This will be the most important document you will every read to open your eyes to the global scope and magnitude of violence against women.

Violence Against Women Global Scope and Magnitude

Some “reality checks” for women:

What is the Texas Islamic Court?

Muslim Gang-rapes across Europe under-reported in press

Female genital mutilation on the rise in the United States

Saudi preacher gets fine and short jail term for raping and killing daughter

Court: Man raped 7-yr old inside Church, gave her Chlamydia

Why is rape in Syria being ignored by U.S.?

Rape is Rape: How the Culture of Shaming, Stigma, and Victim-blaming is Hurting us

Papua New Guinea woman burned alive for sorcery

The Magdalene Laundries: Forced Labor

When Violence Against Women is ‘Honorable’, ‘Religious’ and ‘Legal’

DHS Allowing Saudi’s to bypass passport and travel controls

Washington: Hamas-linked CAIR bullying middle school teacher, defending Hamas, Taliban

For the sake of the assault these bring on our conscience, I will stop here with the unlimited list of articles across the world that show beyond a shadow of a doubt that the abuses are real and need to be dealt with. They show the religious “attitude” toward women. They show the reality of the abuses. They show the “mindset” of most men due to religious “brainwashing”. There is so much more that it is mind-boggling. Violence against women caused by “religion” is the main reason I wrote my book, Religion’s Cell: Doctrines of the Church that Lead to Bondage and Abuse. I expose the tactics and mindsets that religion has used to ENLSAVE a whole race of people – women.  Why aren’t mainstream MEDIA covering all of these stories? Why aren’t mainstream MEDIA telling the real story that is taking place against women? Makes one wonder, doesn’t it? Power imbalance and inequality have caused these atrocities. It’s time for women to unite and work together to elect women in places of leadership across this country before we are “forced” permanently into the abusive roles that we once fought so hard to get out of. The time is short. Only unity between us will make the difference.