Letter of the Day | Condemn Dumas for cruel advice to raped woman
Published:Monday | May 28, 2018 | 12:00 AM
THE EDITOR, Sir:
I read with a certain level of horror and total dismay, the supposed 'advice' given to an alleged rape victim by popular Tell Me Pastor columnist Aaron Dumas in THE STAR newspaper on May 25, 2018.
In it, the redoubtable Mr Dumas advised an impressionable, if not altogether, suffering young woman not to report her ordeal, which happened at the hands of her sister's soon-to-be husband, four years earlier. The reason?
As far as the eminent Pastor Dumas is concerned, the timing is off. In his view, it is not expedient, at this time, to make such a fortuitous announcement. After all, the young woman was clearly wrong for not making a report earlier that she was raped by a man she was supposed to have trusted and who, in the context of both her age, at the time (15 years old), and his relationship to her sister (the father of her sister's child, the victim's niece), occupied a position of trust.
INVESTING IN HYPOCRISY
In direct response to whether or not the alleged victim should participate in the bridal party and, likely, to be tied to her persecutor for the rest of her life, through marriage, the pastor gives his wholehearted approval to the young woman, brushing aside her deep reservations and fears expressed in her question to him.
It surely would not do, of course, that her sister or the family, for that matter, learn the true identity of the man they are about to admit into the intimacies of their private spheres.
Nor does it even matter whether this young woman's suffering prevents her from being fully authentic in her engagement with herself and others around her, whether now or later. No, that is not a concern. After all, the emotional weight of retelling and reliving of her ordeal would only disrupt the expectations of marital bliss so ardently supported by Pastor Dumas and others of his ilk. They would rather invest in hypocrisy and violence, rather than face hard truths.
Indeed, moral honesty, or even a sense of outrage that a minor was forced to have sex with an adult (male), while under his care, does not seem to be a matter that trouble the high-minded Pastor Dumas. Not all.
I am appalled, though not entirely surprised, that THE STAR saw nothing wrong with Pastor Dumas' abhorrent 'advice' and felt that it was okay to use the pages of an official publication to tell potential victims of crimes (of this nature) to remain silent in the interests of moral expediency and 'good' name, if not family honour.
In a society with high levels of crime and, likely, even higher levels of trauma caused by it, Jamaica definitely cannot afford to tell its young people, or anyone else for that matter, that the only time a crime can and ought to be reported is when there is a hundred per cent certainty that people will not be made uncomfortable by said revelations and, definitely, only after living with its torment for several years.
AGOSTINHO PINNOCK