Why Fathers Pray For Their Daughters
November 15, 2007
From the author of SC&A:
I just read When Wanting To Be Accepted Becomes Overwhelming, by the fine blogger Sister Toljah. I am heartbroken.
She recounts the story of a young girl who takes her own life because
…after being duped and ridiculed online by two people in her neighborhood who were posing as a young boy who was supposedly interested in her.
The two people were a former friend of hers …. and that friend’s mother.
The girl was 13 years old.
There can be no father who has not felt a knife thrust into his own heart after reading the story. Sister Toljah’s own commentary is a look behind the curtain.
I’m sure the mother and daughter who set up this fake “Josh Evans” online ID didn’t intend to cause Megan to take her own life, but nevertheless it’s a reminder of how utterly vicious people can be without actually committing a crime, and how sometimes that viciousness can lead to disastrous consequences, especially when the objects of the invective are teen-aged kids, kids who are at that awkward stage in life where they are struggling to find their way, and wanting desperately to be accepted…
This story has stayed with me since I read it, primarily because Megan Meir reminded me of myself when I was her age. She was short, struggling with her looks and self-esteem, frequently down, and wanted so very much for people to like her…
…but the damage to my self-worth had been done. It took me years and years to get to a point where I didn’t question and obsess over the rightness or wrongness of my every move every single day. It still happens, but much less than it used to.
After reading Sistah Toljah’s post, I could not help but wonder what my daughter really thinks. I know her mentors are more like Sistah Toljah as opposed to the mother who helped her daughter, but the world is a scary place. Father’s obsess about those kind of things.
My daughter is growing up. I wrote:
My daughter has gone from playing Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star to playing Chopin.
My little girl no longer bangs at the keyboard, legs dangling from the piano bench, glaring, focusing and concentrating with her tongue unconsciously sticking out, determined to hit every note. Now, my daughter sits at the piano, poised and with unconscious gracefulness and plays Chopin, with her eyes closed, transported to another place where she finds peace, beauty and meaning.
“Isn’t that the most beautiful thing you’ve ever heard?” she asks. “Can you feel the music, daddy?“…
Fathers of daughters develop a secret and special ability to see the young woman before them and the little girl that adored them, at the same time. We don’t talk about that, ever, because fathers need to believe that gift is special, unique to them. Fathers know that gift comes about as a result of loving their daughters with every single fiber of their being.
Every father in the world will tell you they wished with all their hearts Megan Meier had turned to them for comfort and guidance. Every father in the world would have dropped whatever he was doing to come to the aid of Megan Meier. Every father in the world is haunted because they did not hear Megan Meier’s cry. Every father in the world fears looking into the eyes of Megan Meier’s parents.
I cannot imagine a world in which a young woman in pain believes she has nowhere to turn, because I have a daughter.
November 15, 2007 at 12:13 PM
SC&A:
She hanged herself…Lord have mercy. Do you know how long that takes to die?
If you ever want to suicide, the rope is about the LAST means you want to use…seriously.
Why is everone so concerned for the privacy of the adults behind the bogus MySpace account?
Wouldn’t it be good social hygiene for the public to know the identities of adults who prey upon children?
Perhaps they’re feeling shame for what they did.
I hope they fucking drown in it.
November 15, 2007 at 12:17 PM
“Perhaps they’re feeling shame for what they did.
I hope they fucking drown in it.”
I pray you are right. I cannot begin to tell you how upset this story made me. Really shook me up.
November 15, 2007 at 1:51 PM
My goal is alwyas be close enough to my dughter that she never feels she has “nobody”. Parents need to be there for their kids. My prayers go out to her family, and tonight I will go home and remind my daughter that I love her and am there for her no matter what.
Thanks for reminding me how thin that thread really can be
November 15, 2007 at 3:22 PM
I find myself increasingly concerned about this sort of social cruelty, especially since I am the mother of four of them, the oldest of whom will be in middle school all too soon. To learn that a MOTHER was involved is genuinely shocking and really, really disheartening.
When I was in middle school and the girl-girl cruelty was in full swing, one of our teachers – a nun – stopped class one day to talk to us about it. I will never forget her insistence that “to malign someone behind her back and ostracize her in public is a form of killing – you are KILLING her character and spirit. Be sure that God intended to forbid this behavior when he gave the commandment ‘Thou Shalt Not Kill’”.
It’s a grave matter to make sport of the feelings of others and a terrible poverty to be so bereft of kindness that one is willing to “play” in this way. My heart goes out to the family of the girl who took her life. I join your prayers, SCA, for all little girls; everyone deserves to grow up with the understanding that they have undeniable intrinsic worth.
November 15, 2007 at 3:23 PM
oops…especially since I am the mother of four girls, I mean….
November 15, 2007 at 8:21 PM
When I read Sistah Toljah’s post this afternoon, it was like a knife in my gut. My girl is in college now, and believe it, it’s even worse there. Fueled by sex, drugs, alcohol, administrations who hand out condoms on the quad and tell parents they can’t interfere with their children because they are ADULTS now – the pressure to throw everything away is incredible. They are no more adults than that sad old GM car down in my garage is a Mercedes. It is a very frightening time in her life….and ours.
November 15, 2007 at 9:59 PM
The anonymity of the perpetrator is a prime example of an instance where Law does not serve Justice.
The Good Bilgewife works at a high school, and just this week a former teacher there was arrested for having sex with some of the students.
The Principal’s response was to ban the local papers from being brought on campus…which shows what a dipshit she is. The students knew about this guy and his predations before she did.
(She will jump down your adult ass for lighting up a Winston in the parking lot, though…bad example for the kids, y’see).
This teacher had been “asked to leave” the teaching job he had held before being hired on by the high school at which my wife works.
The concern for his anonymity is what allowed him to be hired here.
These laws must be changed.
November 16, 2007 at 11:05 AM
Thanks, Sig – as a father of two young adult daughters, this touched me deeply.
November 16, 2007 at 4:45 PM
These laws must be changed.
They will be.
When we crumble completely and Shari’a replaces them.
November 16, 2007 at 6:38 PM
This is a brilliant post.
Ken, are you paid for your PR work, or just using the death of a child to grandstand on an unrelated issue? I’m not clear on which it is.
November 17, 2007 at 8:31 AM
[...] Why fathers pray for their daughters (Sigmund, Carl and Alfred) [...]
November 18, 2007 at 8:43 PM
Ms. Drew used the same same exact mode of operation as a child predator enacts in the seduction of a child.
Drew posed as a member of the opposite sex and spent weeks and weeks luring this girl into a relationship.
But yet it went further. The adult Drew formed a heated relationship with the 13 year old girl. She worked hard to gain the girl’s confidence. She exploited the girl intimately by posing as a boyfriend. She enacted the same methods child predators use to groom their victims.
Then the woman emotionally raped this child. She took her supposed love and sexual stimulation and crushed the girl emotionally with them -all while knowing the girl was unstable.
This adult and her friends calculated the best way to achieve maximum mental distress and then carried out their plan. Even enticed others to join in the destruction of this child.
There are manslaughter convictions on the books that won based on looser ties to a person’s death than this. Child predators go to jail for following this scenerio.
Ms. Drew is the clear definition of a child predator. She used the internet to stalk, entice and lure a 13 year old girl into a romantic, sexually sparked, full fledged relationship. She then used that power to inflict Great Mental Harm to this child… A physical rape and mental rape are both as equally destructive to a 13 year old child. Drew knew this (or should have known this) and still proceeded unabated.
This is so far beyond “Harassment”, this is full fledged exploitation of a child.
Is the local police of this county out of their minds to think that NO charge will stick?
Is the local District Attorneys office serious if they don’t think this girl’s rights have been thoroughly trampled by a grown woman?
Does the DA really expect people to roll over while this woman goes without so much as even a single charge?
Does even a speeding ticket register a more serious offense than this?
_____________
Last of all, the very worst. Ms. Drew remains defiant and indignant. Claims the girl was already on the edge mentally.
Ms. Drew denies wrong doing and insists she bears no guilt in her actions.
She justifies her actions as being “protective of her daughter”… Please tell me how she was protecting someone by mind raping a 13 year old child?
To add insult to incredible injury…. The Drews file charges against the family that lost this child.
The Drews, in a final act of ultimate hate, seek to hurt this family who lost a beloved child. She seeks to harm them financially….
Just as MS. Drew attacked an innocent little girl, Ms. Drew now attacks a grief stricken family – again seeking to harm someone’s very life.
This woman is evil incarnate
This woman has county officials protecting her…
The same county officials who would put ANY other child exploiter in jail.
It would appear we have a few corrupt city officials. Officials who need to be fired
Perhaps the county detectives on the case need some scrutiny. Did they really investigate this crime thoroughly? Apparently not.
There had better be some charges…and some heads better role from this complete mismanagement of law enforcement.
November 19, 2007 at 9:51 AM
[...] 19, 2007 We wrote on Megan Meier. the young girls who killed herself because of an online ‘prank’ [...]
November 19, 2007 at 5:01 PM
to written above
how can you say that? This is very upsetting and you say that she had it coming for her. Do you know how messed up our nation is getting, and some of it is from things that parents and OTHERS do every day like this. People who lack confidence will do ANYTHING and yeah they may need help, but still that gves you no right to say things like this or make up a person.
I give my heart out to the family of this inccident. God Bless you.
November 21, 2007 at 10:26 PM
i type this with tears in my eyes , to think that ms drew feels she has done no wrong , leaves me with an emptiness for humanity /world . i have a 7 yr old daughter i am raising alone , and there is not a day that goes by that she is not secure that daddy loves her with all his heart , that i will always be there for her . i understand how megan felt, i live in the deep south where racism is still alive and well , when i moved here when i was 8 i was the first of my kind here . i am spanish by the way . i dealt with it diff than meagan i diverted the attention to people like megan . i have seen the wrong i was doing about ten years ago and it has been my mission to say i am sorry to those i hurt during those years. icould not sleep knowing i might have been part of someone taking there life, because i tried to do the same , i failed at it .
i decided that what they think dont matter, i am who i am and i cant make everyone like me . i wish i could have had the chance to talk to megan in her time of need , to help her she was important to the whole scheme of things. my heart goes out to her and her family….
p.s.
all she needed was someone she could talk to, someone who would just listen .. one day ms drew will stand before god and be judged hope she is ready ….
November 22, 2007 at 2:50 AM
@Obi
Normally I wouldn’t butt in, but I feel compelled to argue a counterpoint. As a university student who distributes condoms to her fellow students at dances, this behaviour is not done to encourage casual sex, but to shield people who are already participating, so that, just as you may burn yourself when you learn to cook, young university students are equip to handle the mistakes that tend to be made as one transitions into adulthood. I give out condoms because prior to starting this program, our volunteer centre was giving out pregnancy tests at an alarming rate. It’s better to assume people gradually learn to cope by doing risky things than suppose good judgement and skill spontaneously appear after a certain point.
It’s also worth noting that the students least likely to binge drink, have unprotected sex or otherwise do badly are those who have had early exposure to the behaviours under social guidance. Children who got a sip of wine with dinner generally don’t drink themselves incoherent, the way a sheltered just-legal-age student will. Adequate sex education, before children are sexually active, takes a lot of the mystique out of the process and similarly encourages one to be responsible.
December 3, 2007 at 12:59 AM
On Wednesday, October 21st, city officials wasted no time enacting an ordinance designed to address the public outcry for justice in the Megan Meier tragedy. The six member Board of Aldermen made Internet harassment a misdemeanor, punishable by up to a $500 fine and 90 days in jail.
Does this new law provide any justice for Megan? Does this law provide equitable relief for a future victim?
The Vice rejects the premise of this new law and believes it completely misses the mark. Classifying this case as a harassment issue completely fails to address the most serious aspects of the methods Lori Drew employed to lead this youth to her demise. The Vice disagrees that harassment was even a factor in this case until just a couple of days before Megan’s death.
Considering this case a harassment issue is incorrect because during the 5 weeks Lori Drew baited and groomed her victim, the attention was NOT unwanted attention. Megan participated in the conversations willingly because she was misled, lured, manipulated and exploited without her knowledge.
This law willfully sets a precedent that future child exploiters and predators might use to reclassify their cases as harassment cases. In effect, the law enacted to give Megan justice, may make her even more vulnerable. So long as the child victim doesn’t tell the predator to stop, even a harassment charge may not stick with the right circumstances and a good defender.
Every aspect of this case follows the same procedural requirement used to convict a Child Predator. A child was manipulated by an adult. A child was engaged in sexually explicit conversation (as acknowledged by Lori Drew herself). An adult imposed her will on a child by misleading her, using a profile designed to sexually or intimately attract the 13 year old Megan.
Lori then utilized the power she had gained over this child to cause significant distress and endangerment to that child. She even stipulated to many of these activities in the police report she filed shortly after Megan’s death.
City officials who continue to ignore this viable, documented admission and continue to address this issue as harassment are intentionally burying their heads in the sand, when the solution is staring them right in the face. Why?
There are several other child exploitation laws on the books. To date, none of them have even been considered by City, State and Federal officials in this case. The Vice is outraged that a motion was never even filed, so that the case could at least be argued before a judge or jury.
Danny Vice
http://weeklyvice.blogspot.com