just a thought… – Page 2

The Grey Fray

Are you as sick of hearing about 50 Shades of Grey as I am? Plenty of people much more influential than I have articulated the damage this movie inflicts on society in general and women in particular. I swore I wouldn’t contribute to the publicity, albeit minimally, by writing about the objectionable story-line.

But two things altered my decision not to jump into the Grey fray, both related to a slightly different perspective.

My experiences in nearly a decade of volunteering at Women’s Crisis Centers.
My concern for the potential of an almost predictable spike in sex crimes involving unwanted male domination as a direct result of the movie.

As a Crisis Intervention Counselor, I repeatedly witnessed firsthand devastation of women’s lives when “NO” is ignored and the sanctity of her most private space is violated. Many survivors consider the experience worse than if they had been murdered. Her body lives but her soul feels dead.

Now, after 50 Shades of Tinseltown tripe masquerading as entertainment, I’m envisioning a surge in headlines implicating men who didn’t believe a woman’s “NO” or who trampled her regardless.

Personal discomfort aside, these two things compel me to speak up.

Someone please help me understand how millions of women sat in a movie theatre sighing and cheering as actors smeared lines of decency, not to mention laws outlining criminality, in the name of romance and passion. What happened to the mass media indignation aimed at a Hollywood star a few short weeks ago? Women who screamed loudest over allegations of rape against an African-American television and comedic legend are the same women swooning over non-consensual sex and violence perpetrated by a wealthy white guy against an innocent young woman on the big screen. What’s wrong with this picture?

Why the double standard? Has Mr. Grey’s helicopter scene stolen the oxygen from our brains?

Movie scripts exalting sadomasochism are not harmless fantasies. Graphic images of violence and perversion don’t vacate our minds when empty boxes of popcorn hit the waste basket at the theatre exit.

The message of 50 Shades of Grey, that women desire domination even if they cry otherwise, reeks of disrespect, danger and denigration of women everywhere. Such filth cheapens legitimate desires of a woman’s heart and positions her as nothing more than a man’s disposable toy.

Sadly, the madness doesn’t stop there. The negative impact to men escalates in direct proportion to what women tolerate, even embrace as romantic. Yes, yes, a thousand times YES, men are accountable for their actions. But they take their cues from women. In light of millions of female viewers supporting this glorification of sexploitation, should we really be shocked when men claim confusion while passing around a defenseless, intoxicated sorority girl like a bong in the 60’s?

Let me break down a few elements of 50 Shades’ “plot”…and I use the term looser than Madonna’s morals or P Diddy’s drawers:

Man stalks woman at her place of employment

Woman has innocent chats with male friend; man threatens to hurt her if she doesn’t stop

Man steals woman’s car and sells it

Woman tells man she is a virgin; man ravages her purity

Man breaks into woman’s apartment; Woman gets tied up to her bed and violently assaulted

Woman repeatedly utters the word “NO”; man takes that as a “come on” and perpetrates sexual deviancy including beating her with a leather whip to the point of crying out in agony.

What am I missing? What about this is swoon-worthy? Where exactly is the romance?

How does this qualify as a “love story”? Two words: It doesn’t.

Consider the above but take away the leading man’s money, power and prestige. You’d have another episode of Law & Order S.V.U. where police officers vigorously track down this sick, twisted animal. As in any good cop show, the pervert would be captured. Someone would demonstrate the proper use of handcuffs to him. And he would trade in his suit pinstripes for prison stripes. THEN sane women everywhere would have something to cheer about.

Lest there be any lingering confusion: Stalking, threats of harm, intimidation, and non-consensual sex are criminal acts. Not seduction. Not passion. Not romance. Certainly not love. Not even desire out of control, as any Women’s Crisis Counselor or Law Enforcement Officer can tell you. Forced sex is called rape. And it’s against the law. Men who perpetrate such actions are not sexy. Not irresistible. Not confident lovers. They are cowards. And they are criminals. They deserve to be prosecuted and locked up as the feculent felons they are. Not glorified as role models of romance.

Finally, I’ll echo what every other voice of reason emphasizes…Women, we were not created objects of male gratification. All women deserve respect and honor. There are men in this world who know what that looks like and are eager to engage you with enlightened magnanimity. Real men want to hold doors for you and willingly offer their seat to a lady. Real men speak without raised voice, threats or intimidation. Real men will only put their hands on you with loving intent. Real men will protect your heart, not violate your body.

One last thought. Real men do not deserve mixed messages or double standards. Respect is a two-way street.

Whether Hollywood ever gets that or not, I pray you do.

A Rose is a Rose is a Rose. Or is it?

Eager, I ripped open the long, thin box left moments earlier on my front porch, now laid out on my kitchen counter. Advertisement markings on the exterior offered a clear indication of the contents. Impatient to bury my nose in flowers, anticipation of aromatic bliss motivated swift fingers. I imagined vibrant colors bathed in rich, luscious fragrance. Reaching into the bright green cardboard container I carefully removed twelve of the most stunning crimson long-stem roses I’d ever beheld. I raised them to my beaming face expecting a glorious scent. I breathed deep. Breathed deep again. Nothing.

Not even a hint of the hoped-for nasal ambrosia. The only thing enveloping my olfactories? Disappointment.

I glanced back at the delivery box. ProFlowers. A thought raced across my mind and passed through my lips: What’s so ‘Pro’ about fragrance-free flowers?

In my mind I contrasted them with the bush growing just outside the back door of our family farm house. Once upon a time, a bare brown six-inch shoot poked out of the ground. For years I watched and marveled as Grandmother, then later Mother, tenderly cared for the burgeoning perennial. Each spring and summer, these devoted gardeners watered, weeded, fertilized, trimmed, and toiled over an emerging mini-shrub until blossoms and buds burst forth. Now the size of our riding lawn tractor, season after season this flowering cluster of roses floods Momma’s yard with the color of sacrifice and fragrance of heaven.

Thoughts and eyes returned to the elegant yet scentless roses in my grasp. I scurried to cut them as directed by a box insert, filled a vase, and arranged them in a captivating configuration to place on my table. At the time I didn’t understand why a tear leaked down my cheek.

Now I get it.

Florist-grown roses are indeed lovely to behold. By the time they arrive, they’re washed free of fertilizer and dirt. Roots stripped. Thorns removed. All in the name of delivering visual delight. The outcome—a skillful disguise of painstaking, messy, yet loving effort involved in growing something truly beautiful. Moreover, mass production robs roses of their fragrance. A considerable part of their intended purpose, stolen. They might as well be plastic. Except they die, never having accomplished what roses were meant for…filling a space with magnificent aroma.

As women, we face tremendous pressure to be the long stem rose rather than part of the bush. Society shrieks at us to not merely stand apart from the cluster but also to look good at all costs. Clean up the fertilizer {you know what I’m intimating here}. Shake off the dirt that soils our souls. Forget our roots, that which causes us to grow and venture deep. Throw away the prickly thorns that protect us from outside threats. Be pretty. And somewhere in the midst of mass-produced efforts to look pleasing to the outside world, we stifle our inner fragrance.

Why do we fight the struggle that makes us beautiful in the first place? What would happen if we exposed all parts of the rose to the world? Even the smelly, messy, prickly, painful parts? What splendid scent would be revealed in us if we acknowledged and embraced our gardening process, however labored or agonizing?

We are beautiful. Not because of something we drape on our body, dangle from our earlobes, smear across our face, or sweat off at the gym. We are beautiful because the Master Gardener devoted Himself to growing something of true loveliness in each of us. We are beautiful not in spite of the growing process but because of it. The ever vigilant Divine Caretaker comes alongside us to plant Truth in our hearts, Truth about our worth and significance. He saturates us with Living Water ever rising up, a spring of hope within us. He trims withered leaves and dark, crusty petals of unhealthy desires to expose radiant velvet, reflecting His Light. He pulls ugly, smothering weeds, eliminating people and things that prevent us from thriving in His grand and gorgeous garden. He even allows us to be covered in “fertilizer” at times because He knows that without the elements of suffering, pain of loss, sadness of grieving, we bear limitations in how deep our roots stretch and how fragrant we ultimately grow.

The more willingly we cooperate with the Gardener’s tender toiling over us, the more regal the rose. True beauty results from embracing the thorns for the sake of the lavish, sumptuous scent God intended in us.

Will we settle for the scentless long-stem delivered in cardboard, destined to die without ever accomplishing its purpose? Or will we grow into a timeless, resplendent, redolent rose in the Garden of the Mater’s touch?

Throwing Away the Remote: A Lesson in Courage

Flipping the page on my Alaska Wildlife calendar to a new month I’m reminded of an encroaching anniversary.

I’ve lost track of how many years passed since my home break-in but even without a calendar on the wall I internally sense its date. My first clue? Something in my spirit hungers for more control. From serving eight years as a volunteer for women’s crisis centers I learned that need to control is a common denominator among survivors of violence. Not surprising when you consider that during the commission of many violent episodes/crimes, victims are generally at the mercy of the perpetrator and have no control over the situation or even their own life.

During my home break-in, I didn’t know if I would live or die. Wickedness taking the form of a human held me prisoner at gunpoint, my only recourse to endure his abuse or perish. In those dark hours with control stripped from me, helplessness assailed me. Even for weeks following I was not in control. Fear gripped me preventing me from living my life. Every noise startled me. I couldn’t eat, couldn’t sleep without nightmares, couldn’t step outside the shelter of a friend’s home without trembling, couldn’t look people in the eye without crying, couldn’t watch tv newscasts without feeling sick. Aftermath of violence rendered me helpless in nearly every aspect of life.

A lie took root: Absence of Control equals Helplessness. The remedy appeared obvious. The more I control my world the less helplessness I experience. In a misdirected attempt to avoid soul agony of helplessness & vulnerability, I convinced myself I must always be in control. Some control proved helpful like planning where I ventured out to and for how long, making sure to return home before dark. Other decisions seem random. I controlled the length of my hair, lopping it boy short for the first time in my life. I wore unattractive colors & frumpy clothing. I isolated myself from everyone, including friends. Many nights when insomnia owned me, I took refuge in television, not for my viewing pleasure but mechanically pressing a remote control every few minutes for hours until I drifted off exhausted. It seems so ridiculous now but at the time, I felt powerful with control literally at my fingertips.

Problem is my controlling spiraled out of control, ruining relationships, isolating me from people who love me. Control cost opportunities, rendered me a slave to lists and self-imposed rules of how life must be structured for my protection. Need to control narrowed my world, prohibiting me from venturing too far beyond the familiar and manageable. It chained me to routines, limited my circle of support, prevented me from trusting, robbed me of freedom, cheated me of JOY in living and loving. Ultimately, my quest for control consumed me.

What I needed wasn’t control but courage. Friends told me how brave I was for living through a violent attack. There’s nothing courageous about being a victim. Courage can only be found in choosing to move from victim to survivor, choosing to FULLY LIVE as a Survivor. Control is the antithesis of courage. Despite my best efforts to appear brave, I realized bravery cannot emerge as long as I control everything because control roots and thrives in fear.

As long as I knew exact outcomes, hid behind routines, averted vulnerability by limiting my friendships, as long as I buried my heart and surfed through meaningless relationships like channel surfing with a remote control, true courage evaded me. I was, in fact, cowardly hiding behind a thin veil of false bravado destined to unravel in ugly ways.

True bravery emanates from staring down our fears, especially the fear of losing control. Courage emerges when everything in me shouts “RUN! HIDE!” but I chose not to, when outcomes are shaky & threatening and I risk anyway, moving forward even in uncertainty but with resolve to conquer. “Courage”, as my dear friend Marshele Carter puts it, “is running up to the dark and taking one more step.”

The truth is, the more I tried to control the more I became controlled. If I honestly believed in the Sovereignty of God, I had to surrender control to Him. Surely the God who numbers the hairs on my head and watches over lowly sparrows cares about my struggles, right? {Matthew 10:29-30} But surrender seemed like giving up, admitting defeat, weakness. I fought until I nearly destroyed myself. The longer I avoided raising the white flag, the deeper fears bored into my soul and the emptier I became. No 12-step program delivered me, no magic formula to follow…just a simple prayer of relinquishment, a commitment to reach out to others for love & support and a long journey of intentionality to trust my Creator with details of my life every moment, every breath, every heartbeat.

As I glance again at the calendar on my wall I commit the date August 3^rd to the Lord. I won’t be controlled by fears in this season. My heart beats a little faster when I think of that night but I recognize fear sooner when it attempts to slip through cracks of my brokenness. I’m quicker to declare I will not let fear rule, not let it constrain me anew to channel-surfing-type control. Instead I choose to throw away the remote. I risk more. I forgive quicker. I laugh louder. I love deeper. I live freer… I live courageously.

{A woman’s magazine invited me to contribute an article about my recovery from violent crime. I submitted this & it’s now under review by the editor. I’ll let my readers know if it they accept for publication. At the risk of sounding self-serving, it probably wouldn’t hurt to get a lot of clicks on this link so please FEEL FREE to share. Thanks!}