During this process, I’ve both experienced and witnessed myriad reasons people choose to not engage the legal system during or after they have been harmed by Michelle E. Culhane. As a psychologist, I’ve been privy to nearly identical reasonings as my clients have moved forward with their healing in therapy and advocacy encounters with me.
I’ve been honored to bear witness to their gut-wrenching wrestling, opine when invited, and supported countless choices made in front of me over the years to either lean into police and court systems or not. Or wait until the circumstances change. Or make peace with whatever choices they made and had to maintain. As a trauma survivor myself, and person who chronically stands up for myself (whoa does it piss toxic people off) I’ve had my own journeys of deciding if and when to call police or cooperate/use the courts when other people’s better angels are on hiatus with deleterious impacts.
Here’s a secret: All of our reasons are good reasons.
Every reason to decide to report is a good one. All of the reasons to not report are good ones. When we are harmed, we are usually left with almost nothing but shitty choices. As I see it, we are charged to choose the best of the shitty options available to us based on our best guess of likely outcomes that include the complicated calculus of who we are, where we’re at and what we actually have access to in the moment.
Dominant culture talks a compelling game about pursuing justice, not being a doormat, and standing up for yourself as a way to protect others from similar harm. It also, just as convincingly, reinforces norms that reward “going along to get along,” punishing people who rock the boat(s) of others–especially the powerful, and for those of us socialized female: being nice, good girls.
This quick pass at some freaking excellent reasons in favor of and against the legal enforcement of boundaries with others, follows. The list isn’t exhaustive of course, but it reflects the things I pondered in my own decision-making, which also happen to be things the other humans who have been abused by (or affected by) Michelle, shared with me. So these are top of mind.
Each one has its own set of costs and benefits which must be evaluated by the individual as they consider the choices available to them. I offer it as an act of solidarity. Of compassionate collegiality. No judgement from me. Just appreciation of the worthy merits of each.
- Attempt to avoid “making things worse” (aka: escalated behavior and/or retaliation) by not reporting.
- Hopes that the abusive person will get bored/distracted and eventually move on.
- Fears that there isn’t enough hard evidence for the police/courts to act upon (and wow, what a friggin’ risk of inevitable retaliation and resource-sucking processes for what feels like nothing).
- Though some things are improving, being a minoritized person (in my case a Queer–but white, mostly able–woman) and going to the police/courts is incredibly risky. Historically, the rep of these systems is rightly examined through enormous, earned skepticism/cynicism.
- Glacial pace of getting any accountability/behavior change/justice means signing up for a huge, ongoing output of resources (time, attention, energy, money).
- Making reports even if the evidence might not be strong enough, because the police and the courts do pay attention to accumulation of consistent complaints.
- Things get bad enough and you’re suffering so much anyway, that to not act becomes intolerable and/or you’re so miserable you might as well see what happens.
- Altruistic desire/personal integrity/righteous indignation to stop the cycle that you eventually learn from others is long-enduring and affects more people and parts of the community than you can stand.
- Your code of Self Love requires you protect yourself in the best ways you can. So you use your good reasons to make good choices.
BONUS Good Reason: Someone else did it and had not-terrible outcomes. I’m hoping we make this one a reality for folx soon. Stay tuned.
This entry is dedicated to the women who have reached out to me. Who responded when I reached out. Those who have used these (and other) good reasons to stand up for themselves and their peace, whatever that looks like from the outside. I will always back your play. If you haven’t pressed charges yet or never will, I respect you immensely for making the least shitty choices for yourself.
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