The Mamas & The Papas & The Daughters

There’s no humor in potential rape/incest. However, it’s not like papa John didn’t have a history. Was Michelle even 18 when they got married?

This is the worst Wednesday ever – I can’t even work up any snark. This job ends Friday, and I’m taking 2 weeks off, and I really need it to start already.

@blogenfreude:

I dunno. Did you watch Quaddafi (I can’t be arsed to look up the spelling)? He was crazy like a loon…plenty of narrative ground to run your snark over there.

@The Nabisco Quiver are Go!:
I was reading this until I got creeped out. it did not sound like rape.
they were talking about “running away together” where they would not be “looked down on” like – Fiji!

dude. just move south of the mason dixon.

sorry southerns. I am one.

@Tommmcatt is hunkered down in the trenches: Someone needed to start playing Oscar music during Qadaafi’s speech. The JFK/MLK conspiracy theories plus the explanation of jet lag were by far the high points of my day.

@The Nabisco Quiver are Go!: There you go with your “boundaries” again.

@RomeGirl:

Plus the “Swine Flu was a military experiment gone wrong” thing was precious…almost Jim Jong Il style, really.

@Tommmcatt is hunkered down in the trenches: Yeah, but Kaddafi (I’m old school) or Ahmadinner frothing at the UN isn’t news. More like a never-ending Cher tour.

@Tommmcatt is hunkered down in the trenches: Meh – sick of him and his Trump tent … old news that he’s a whack job.

@blogenfreude:

Hmmm… I still think there’s something there. You could compare that speech with one of Bachmann’s. Interchangeable, really.

may I also editorialize about stuff I am reading around the web on the Phillips thing and the whole Stockholm Syndrome thing.

IMO

yeah the father gets most of the blame. fine. but she was old enough to know better. take some responsibility. dont blame the drugs. dont blame the druggie loser father. she was old enough to walk at any time. this sounded far from a one time thing.

again. just MO.

@Prommie: Guilty. But am I the only one thinking that Michelle remains a totally hawt cougar in her 60s?

@The Nabisco Quiver are Go!: Yes.

On the other hand, a man I know very well, when a teenager had an affair with his mother. It lasted about 6 weeks.

BTW, he’s straight.

@Benedick says Keep on Fucking that Chicken:

I bet he doesn’t write a book and go on Oprah to hawk it.

I don’t think this qualifies as pestorking.

@Capt Howdy: He did write a book in which this incident figures. I’ve read it. Very nice man.

@Benedick says Keep on Fucking that Chicken:
didnt mean to sound judgmental. I actually have more of a problem with the shoving the blame off on the dead loser father.

title?

@Capt Howdy: It’s called Mostly Women by Michael Ward who was, for many years, a top photographer for the Sunday Times in London. It’s published by Granta UK and I don’t know if it’s available here. The incident with his mother is only a small part of it and is more strange than anything else. He hardly knew her while growing up and she was more immature than he was when it happened. He also writes a lot about a series of wonderful cars he had; Silver Wraiths, etc. And photographing the Beatles; he has a great mass of as yet unpublished photos of them, ditto Rolling Stones. Unfortunately his health has not been good which has delayed the release of the pictures.

@FlyingChainSaw: I agree, most definitely not pestorking. Horrible.
@Capt Howdy: It wasn’t a one-time thing. But how much do you know about the psychological abuse that most incest/sexual abuse victims go through? Not to mention Papa Phillips was pumping her full of drugs when she was 11 years old. Sure, she could walk out the door when she was 19, just like victims of domestic violence could walk out the door. But sometimes they can’t, due to the emotional damage. And I don’t think she’s shoving the blame off on the dead loser father, if anything, from that article, she seems to be minimizing his role and still blaming herself. Very very sad. I don’t think we can be judgmental of her – I wouldn’t have blamed her if she had taken a shotgun to his head when he was on the deathbed.

@SanFranLefty: This is way, way beyond even rape. He manipulated with her with drugs, raped her while she was incapacitated and then brainwashed her into a relationship she uses the word ‘consensual’ to describe. The guy murdered his own child’s soul. What do you call that?

@FlyingChainSaw: “What do you call that?”

More evil than Dick Cheney?

Seriously, words like evil get thrown around a lot, but I don’t know what else you call it. Grotesque?

@SanFranLefty:
probably more than I want to write about here. but putting that aside. perhaps I was harsh and unclear. I did not necessarily mean to come down quite so hard on her. I have no doubt her life has been hell in spite of (or maybe because of) being a child star with resources most of us could only dream of. I think you are right about where she places the “blame”. I was really complaining about comments I have seen around the web about how “evil” he was. and maybe he was. and about how this was ALL his fault.

I just dont see it that way. at some point no matter what you have been through you have to take responsibility for your own actions. she was an adult. even legally when most of this took place. and dont blame it on the drugs. that is the lamest of excuses. I bet I have done more drugs than she has and seen more drugs than she has.

also I think going on Oprah to tell the world and rake in the profits is at best unseemly.

but as I said. just MO.

one other thing. growing up, as I did, in the late 60s and early 70s I have witnesses many children being given many drugs by their parents. as far as I know none of those children went on to have sex with said parent.

is this cool. of course not. its terrible and I would never do it. but we were also children and it was funny at the time and as far as I know none of the children, and I do still know most of those children, were any worse for the horrible experience. although I dont ever remember an instance of an 11 year old being coke.

in short I am in no way excusing what he did. I am just sayin it takes two and she was an adult. and adult who even now, as you say, doesnt completely excuse herself. to her credit. IMO.

@Capt Howdy: Oh, I’d call him an evil sick fuck for what he did. Maybe she could have walked away sooner, I don’t know; she had been so damaged by that point. If writing a book helps her healing and catharsis, I don’t begrudge her that. For too long incest and sexual abuse has been minimized or swept under the rug.

On an unrelated note, just saw a quiet act of kindness out my office window that seriously has given me tears in my eyes. The elderly Chinese woman who comes down the street every afternoon around this time with her improvised conveyance of bags tied to broom handles strapped on her back to collect recyclables was rifling through the giant garbage can of the deli across the street. One of the Latina janitors walked out the side door, put her finger to her lips as a “don’t tell anyone” sort of move, looked furtively back into the deli, and handed the old lady a couple of styrofoam boxes that were probably full of leftovers. Welcome to America – we wouldn’t want these lazy immigrants to have health insurance or anything.

@Capt Howdy: Unfortunately I know of people who were children in the ’60s and the ’70s who may or may not have been given drugs by their parents, but their parents did so many drugs and had such a free-wheeling approach to sex that they crossed a lot of boundaries with their children and in some cases molested or raped them. I don’t think you can call it the kid “having sex with said parent” but instead I would call it “said parent raping and exploiting all trust of their child.”

I think Chainsaw put it best: “murdered his own child’s soul.”

@SanFranLefty:
fair enough. he was a evil sick fuck. the world is full of them. all the more reason people need to start taking responsibility for their own actions.

great story. how sad is it that he had to be furtive.

@SanFranLefty: Nice.

@SanFranLefty:
well
I see two issues here. giving drugs to your kids. and molesting your kids.
none of the people I know would have done the latter. as far as the free wheeling approach to sex and lifestyle. I guess I wish there was more of that.

@SanFranLefty:

I read an article comparing sexual and physical abuse victims that stay in relationships to addicts, in that after a period of abuse there is usually a “honeymoon” period, where the abuser changes the way that deal with the abused out of fear of discovery, guilt, etc. The victim gets addicted to this cycle- first to the abuse, as it reinforces their place in the relationship, and then to the release of guilt and bad feelings as the abuser treats them very well, for a time.

I read it years ago..if I could find it I would link to it here. Fascinating.

@Capt Howdy: And don’t forget: impregnating your kid.

TJ: The U.S. Census worker killed in Kentucky was found hanged with the word “Fed” scrawled on his chest

Oh Fuck.

@SanFranLefty:

Yuck.

@SanFranLefty:
um, yeah
evil sick fuck.
the weird thing to me is, if this can happen to a rich spoiled child star who is probably a meal ticket to many, you have to wonder how many ordinary every day kids out there it is happening to right now. as I write this.

but I dont really have to wonder. one of my best friends has for years specialized in counseling teen aged victims of incest. more boys than you would think.
getting drunk with him – which he needs to do regularly in his line of work – is a hoot. let me tell you. /snark/

but yeah, I do not wish to be seen as the defender of the evil sick fuck.

@Capt Howdy: I don’t see you as such.

And it happens to waaay more ordinary every day kids than we as a society would ever want to admit.

@Capt Howdy:

That’s not a fun role, trust me. I’ve been there, here.

@Capt Howdy: Forgot to tell you that I don’t know how people like your friend can be in that line of work without it really getting to him. I’d probably start going postal on the world. Glad there are people like him who can keep going at it.

@SanFranLefty, Capt Howdy: Along those lines, I have a friend (mother of the teen Jewish redneck hunting and fishing kid who comes on camping trips with me and his dad. Kid brings us beers and cuts cigars for tips at camp. Anyway . . . ) who is a paramedic in Albuquerque. I asked her if she suffered from PTSD. She said everyone in that biz does.

@Capt Howdy: Also, a second generation substance abusing celebrity for whom normal societal mores would not apply.

@Tommmcatt . . . : I was a DV prosecutor early in my career. I had victims ask to have charges against abusers dropped, even had a victim go to see the judge about dropping a case.

The Capt makes a valid point: the ‘victim’ can be the seducer. I’m not saying that’s what went on here – neither is he. But I know that’s true.

@Benedick says Keep on Fucking that Chicken: Its certainly true, but its dangerous to mention it. Lolita, the most recent movie version, was killed, after completed and ready for release.

There is a presumption that chronological age is equivalent to maturity and strength and power in a relationship. Which it isn’t.

There are many many many men and women who live sexual lives based on abusing people who are much less mature, much weaker, much more fragile and vulnerable than they are, even though these people are the same chronological age they are. Its the same as preying on children, but we don’t regard it as such, because of this assumption that age equals maturity.

And then there are people like Woody Allan, whose first wife was 16 when he married her, then his second wife was something like 20 years his junior, then he had an affair, in his forties, with a high school student, then wrote a movie about it, Manhattan, and had an affair with the 18 year old Mariel Hemingway, who played his 17 year old real life girlfriend. And then, who knows how many 17-year olds later, takes naked photos of his all but legally sanctioned stepdaughter, what a surprise.

Yet noone talks about him as a monster.

Every relationship between humans, and every sexual relationship, is open to the potential for severe inequalities of power, some that are relationships between people of the same age have inequalities greater than in relationships we would call pedophilia.

I personally believe that a mature and healthy person would never desire a relationship with anyone other than an equal. How can you truly enjoy someone who does not challenge you? But so many like to dominate. Weak people. Jerry Seinfeld at the height of his fame picking up his Shoshanna Lonstein from her high school in his limo.

The variable are so many, that focusing solely on age, is missing a lot.

@Promnight: I think Woody Allen is a monster and don’t understand his apologists. If he weren’t a rich famous white dude he’d be locked up as a lifelong sexual offender and/or put on every registry. There’s a lot of poor white, black, and brown dudes locked up or stigmatized for life for way less than what Woody’s done.

@Promnight:
my 2 cents
I guess I would have to say that I have dated enough younger men to not be in a position to be judgmental about this but I would say that not all may-december relationships are about dominance and control. sometimes its purely physical (that would probably not be much of a “relationship” in the strictest sense but Im just sayin). this is something I have not done in several years simply because once I got past my 50s I was just not getting the attention I got in my 30s and 40s and but trust me I made hay while the sun shone and I make no apologies.
also I have a very good friend who I have known since the early 70s when she was about 12 (the sister of one of my best and oldest friends). years ago she married a quite well known tv personality/game show host that will remain nameless who was about 30 or 40 years her senior. for the last 20 years or so they have been sublimely happy. I have never seen Lori so happy. she is not dominated – by a long shot. she is a very smart woman who once worked for the UN, speaks multiply languages who just likes older men. and she is nobodys victim.
sometimes a cigar is just a cigar.