Amhran nam Bandia: How Abused Children Wind Up in Jail

Tuesday, October 27, 2009

How Abused Children Wind Up in Jail

The transition from abusive father to pimp to jail is very common with our young people who wind up prostituted, or doing other illegal things to survive. This has touched my life personally, as it has happened to multiple girls, boys and young women I've known. Children don't run away for no reason.

That abuse in the home sets these children up for further victimization. It's the pimps and battering/raping fathers that belong in jail, not the kids who are struggling to survive.

ASHLAND, Ore. — She ran away from her group home in Medford, Ore., and spent weeks sleeping in parks and under bridges. Finally, Nicole Clark, 14 years old, grew so desperate that she accepted a young man’s offer of a place to stay. The price would come later.

They had sex, and he soon became her boyfriend. Then one day he threatened to kick her out if she did not have sex with several of his friends in exchange for money.

She agreed, fearing she had no choice. “Where was I going to go?” said Nicole, now 17 and living here, just down the Interstate from Medford. That first exchange of money for sex led to a downward spiral of prostitution that lasted for 14 months, until she escaped last year from a pimp who she said often locked her in his garage apartment for months.

Read full article: For Runaways, Sex Buys Survival by Ian Urbina

Thanks to Quileute Tribe New Beginnings

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Gaelic Polytheism, Cultural Preservation, Indigenous Solidarity

Occasional musings from one of the original troublemakers behind the contemporary Gaelic Polytheist (GP) (Gaelic: Ioma-Dhiadhachd Ghàidhealach; Irish: Ildiachas Gaelach) and Celtic Reconstructionist traditions. Allegedly the person to blame for that unwieldy, awkward, misinterpreted and misrepresented, umbrella tradition name (CR), and most definitely to blame for the Nigheanan nan Cailleach agus Ora nam Bandia branches of the community.

Clann Eóghainn na h-Oitrich, NicAoidh, agus Eóganachta. Tha mi a fuireach ann Wabanahkik. Co-còrdadh: Gä•sweñta’.

While my family culture growing up was predominantly diasporan Gael (Irish/Scottish-American), and my low BQ gives me white skin privilege / passing privilege, I also have Indigenous heritage from both Turtle Island (Yę Iswąre tatene utkéware hęwu) and Sápmi, as well as cherished African-American ancestors who survived the Middle Passage and the Underground Railroad. I am one of the people who has researched Cherokee blood myths to find the hidden truth that so many of us share - Black ancestors who made the excruciating choice to assimilate and pass in order to stay alive after escaping slavery.

As an unenrolled relative, reconnecting with the community we're pretty certain my ancestors are from, I'm a long-term member of several Indigenous-led collectives, active in Indian Country in largely a backup/support role since the 1980s, and in more recent years in interfaith and political work as both a collective member, extended family member, and as a representative of both our GP groups and the descendant crew. I don't presume to steer the canoe, even when I'm another grunt helping paddle one that my cousins, aunties, and adopted siblings have built and are helming. But except for my fellow Gaels and other diverse relatives, I jumped out of the ship over a decade ago. I'd much rather dive deep with the prop-fouling otters, be a shieldmaiden in the metaphorical jet ski clan, and continue my work with the side of the family I live with now, than get back into that rotting colonists' ship... unless it's to sabotage and change the course. Which I've been known to do sometimes.

It's one of multiple ways that my life is lived in liminal zones.

And if it's not abundantly clear, I fully support and unreservedly defend Indigenous Sovereignty: the right of Tribal Nations to determine their citizenship criteria, as well as their right to set the definition of who is and is not Indigenous. Descendants - those of us with documented ancestry but whose ancestors chose to separate from the tribe and live as non-Natives - need to abide by the criteria for Indigeneity set by the Nations we descend from. Even if it's complicated and not what you want to hear. And this applies exponentially if the documentation is iffy. To violate that boundary by trying to claim full Native status - by self-Indigenization - is dishonorable to the ancestors, as well as a violation of hospitality. Real descendants seeking to reconnect need to do so with profound respect, and on the terms set by the living relatives and Elders in that specific culture and community. And if the answer is "No," or "Not that way," to accept that.

I serve on the governing councils of CAORANN and Gaol Naofa; however, all opinions expressed on this blog, and posted elsewhere under my own name on social media, are my own.