child abuse – A Mama's Blog

With the passing of Michael Jackson today, one of our generation’s biggest icons, my initial response was sad.

A few minutes later that had passed and I started to think about the child abuse allegations that he had been accused of in the last few years.

I loved Michael Jackson growing up. I think he had talent. I think he was an amazing dancer and entertainer and he took “rock star” to a new level. I still turn the radio up when I hear his songs. I am not questioning his talent nor his contributions to the entertainment industry, but as a mother his child abuse allegations are extremely disturbing to me.

Michael Jackson was a great singer and a pop icon- I liked his music and my family and I actually met him through a family friend in 1984.

However, I feel Michael Jackson (MJ) was a *serial* child molester / pedophile, or whatever term you want to use.

Non-molesters don’t have young boys over to sleep in their beds & then pay out millions to keep it quiet. Michael Jackson befriended young boys, sometimes from disadvantaged backgrounds, and then took them to his ranch, banning their parents.

This is a HUGE red flag. If MJ loved children so much, why didn’t he befriend them at Disneyland? Take them to public places, have their parents along, or just even go hang out at these children’s homes?

Giving MJ the benefit of the doubt, and assuming he was victimized by these families out to destroy him and get money from him, which is what MJ claimed, he should have never had put himself in a situation like this again after the first allegation. But he did, and he chose to do this- still taking the boys to his private ranch.

It is interesting how so many other celebrities like Angelina Jolie, Brad Pitt, Madonna, Meg Ryan, Mia Farrow, etc., can have big hearts for children and work with them, and yet none of them have been “victimized” claiming they have been falsely accused of molestation for money. No child can describe Brad Pitt’s genitalia like one of Michael Jackson’s alleged abuser could. I don’t consider Michael Jackson bigger than “Brangelina”, and there have been no claims of inappropriate sleep overs from the Jolie-Pitt house. So I don’t buy into the money claim.

The FACTS are MJ was arrested once and accused twice of child molestation. He settled out of court once, and found not guilty once. Both times the details have been sealed, and millions of dollars were paid out. If he had nothing to hide, why not let the facts get out there to clear his name? Celebrities get accused of false things all the time, but very few of them get arrested, and hide the details-twice.

The case would never have gone to trial without sufficient evidence in the 2005 case, where Michael and the boy were discovered sleeping in bed together. How many other celebrities are having sleep overs with minor children in their houses with doors locked, and parents banned?

How many just normal parents have sleepovers like this with their children’s friends? I can imagine the outrage if a Boy Scout leader was found sleeping in his tent with boy scouts on on an overnight camping trip. Parents and the public would be outraged-as we should be. But since this is MJ and he could do the moon-walk, these facts are pushed to the background-suddenly a 40 year old man who has 13 year old boys sleep with him in bed, doesn’t matter.

I view this like OJ Simpson. He never got convicted and was found not guilty either of killing his wife and Ron Goldman, but he had a lot of money, and was able to create doubt. Even if he could run with a football. Are there any people out there ten plus years later that don’t think OJ had something to do with the murders of his wife and her friend? Even though the jury said he didn’t?

I don’t care what talent in life you have- if you put yourself in compromising positions when you are under a spotlight, especially with minor children, you create suspicion on yourself. You have to be even more careful. If they ever release the evidence and the facts of the cases about these boys and Michel Jackson comes to light that he was completely innocent, I will be the first to apologize for doubting Mr. Jackson’s innocence.

Michael Jackson’s family has my sympathy- no family should have to lose a loved one, but I am more sorry for the families of MJ’s victims and the position these young boys were put in by an ADULT man who should have known better not to have young boys locked in his bedroom sleeping in the same bed with him. Some things in life, you just don’t get to do- and this is one of them.

I don’t care if you can throw a football, raise money for children in Africa, run with a football, dance, sing, or are the greatest entertainer in the world. Putting yourself in compromising positions over and over again with young children, that raises a question of inappropriate behavior with them is wrong. No matter who you are.

There is no free pass for taking advantage and molesting children. Don’t take them in your bed to sleep with them. Don’t lock the door to the bedroom, and don’t ban the parents. Seems pretty simple to me. We all make mistakes, and no one is perfect. How could MJ NOT have known or had not been advised to do this- but he chose to do it anyway.

The world lost a great entertainer, but his victims have lost their innocence too. They will never get that back. Victimizing the most vulnerable in our society is unforgivable, and I for one, can’t help but feel somewhat relieved that there is one less person putting innocent children in compromising situations.

Note: for more information, read The Smoking Gun: The Case Against Michael Jackson: https://www.thesmokinggun.com/archive/010605jackson.html

**NOTE: If you don’t share my opinion with me fine-feel free to leave your thoughts. I don’t allow swearing or profanity on my blog and if you leave profanity in your comments I will delete the comment and block your IP. Let’s discuss but also be civil. Thank you.**

October 19, 2009-

Thank you for all the respectful comments and discussion. It is very evident from the comments that people feel passionately about MJ’s innocence or guilt, depending on what they personally believe. Many readers provided evidence for both sides, and these added greatly to the discussion. My intention on this post was to never debate the legal matters and dig up every document ever produced on the case. It was my opinion, as a mother, on how I felt about MJ’s behavior with children. It seems more and more people are becoming very hostile, rude, and disrespectful when offering their opinion, and since I have less and less time to monitor the comments closely, I have decided to close the comments on this post. I thank everyone again for the civil discussion.

Heather

Chandler Grafner

UPDATE: 8/12/08: The jury found Chandler’s foster father guilty of murder in the first degree. He will receive a mandatory life sentence without the possibility of parole. The father’s girlfriend, pleaded gulity, and made a plea bargain before her trial started. She will be sentenced to 48 years in prison.

**Before you read any further, please be warned that this is a horrible and heartbreaking case of abuse. I can’t even follow it in any detail- it is too horrific for me, and I won’t be writing about the awful details, but I feel it is important to help raise awareness on child abuse.**

The child abuse that Chandler Grafner, a 7 year old boy suffered by his half-brother’s dad, and his common-law wife, who by the way were his legal guardians, are just horrendous and gruesome. You can read a brief summary of what happened to him on Wikipedia here. (This is a summary and does not go into all the details.)

The “father” of Chandler is now on trial for first-degree murder charges, and if you can stomach it, you can read what is happening in the case, and all the sickening details of how these people abused and eventually killed Chandler here. (About half way down the page, in the right sidebar, there is a box of related links, and you can start there if you want to read about the entire case.)

While I know the basic details, I can’t read about this story for more than a few seconds without crying. It is just so heartbreaking to know a child was treated like this. What is worse, is so many people failed Chandler from social services- people who should have been able to recognize what was happening.

I believe a teacher of Chandler’s did report possible abuse to Denver social services, as did the assistant principal, but evidently social services did not do enough to save Chandler. Eventually Chandler was pulled out of school because the teachers and school were asking questions, and trying to get help for Chandler, but again, social services did not catch the extent of what was happening.

Whether others suspected abuse was happening or not, I don’t know- I can’t read the story in enough detail to know. But I do know that nothing like this should ever happen to a child, but sadly it does. I just can’t help but think how many other children are being abused in our communities, right under our noses?

This little boy should not have had to give his life, which hadn’t even started, up to child abuse. I can only hope that if anything slightly positive can come from the senseless death of Chandler and so many others like him, is this can serve as a wake-up call in our society and communities.

We have to be more aware and stop thinking that other kids aren’t our business. We should stop worrying if we will offend the parents, or come across as nosey, if we suspect a child is being abused. We have to start focusing on kids. Instincts are seldom wrong- if you suspect a child is being abused, don’t ignore it. Report what you suspect, and pray that social services will do their job- even though they failed Chandler.

People talk about the evil out in the world- terrorists and the such, but this just shows we have plenty of evil right here in our society. We have to get more involved when we think a child is being abused. It is far better to report a possible child abuse case, and be wrong about it, than to continue to have innocent children like Chandler suffer, and die painful and horrible deaths.

If you suspect a child in your neighborhood, school, or community is being abused, it only takes a simple, brief, and usually anonymous phone call to your social services department. They can be found in your phone book, or on-line. Or you can contact the The Childhelp National Child Abuse Hotline, which is available 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. Or The Child Abuse Hotline. You can also make tax-free donations to organizations like these, and help support their important work.

I pray and hope Chandler and the other thousands of children who die at the hands of child abusers are in a better place and are finally free from their sad, painful, and heartbreaking short lives.

How we treat and protect our children shows what kind of a society we are. I think this quote sums it up perfectly,

There can be no keener revelation of a society’s soul than the way in which it treats its children

~Nelson Mandela