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News Updates Please visit our new extensive Survey Poll On the Loss of Freedom The hallmark of neurosis for me is the loss of freedom; and the impossibility of gaining it back. Because unfulfilled need makes us obsessive and compulsive and deprives us of choice. So we have to drink, take drugs, work so hard, eat so much, unable to rest; you fill in the blanks. We have reduced our choices and narrowed our perspective. We lead more superficial, narrow lives; lives bereft of feeling because feeling has been buried along with our basic need. We keep having broken relationships, brief rapports, truncated love
affairs because we started out in life like that; inconsistent love,
sporadic affection, parents leaving. We are prisoners of these patterns
because we have no idea as to the why of it all. AUSTRALIANS who were abused as children in church, charity and government-run institutions are demanding a royal commission. Twelve months after they received a prime ministerial apology for the abuse they experienced, the forgotten Australians and child migrants marked the anniversary yesterday by calling for justice. Former Democrats senator Andrew Murray, a child migrant himself, said the abuse sustained by many of the 500,000 forgotten Australians amounted to "crimes against humanity". "You had deaths for which there was no coronial inquiries, beatings, criminal physical assault, criminal sexual assault," Mr Murray said. "There was abuse but much of it was criminal assault that was illegal then, illegal now and the fact is that certain crimes should always be punished, particularly the rape of children, both male and female." Care Leavers Australia Network founder Leonie Sheedy backed the call. "A crime is a crime no matter whether it was committed 50 seconds ago, five minutes ago or 50 years ago," she said. Justice for Magdalenes: Official Response to IHRC Findings Clergy abuse in Delaware: DeLuca 'charmer,' victim says
What Frank did, the stuff ... he's sick," said Vai, who is now suing St. Elizabeth's Roman Catholic Parish and defrocked priest Francis DeLuca. Unlike his earlier, brief testimony in a Diocese of Wilmington bankruptcy proceeding, Vai did not talk in detail about the sexual abuse itself. Instead, he reminded the jury that they heard DeLuca admit in a video to molesting him, so he felt there was no need to go into the "vile" details. Vai said as an eighth-grader in 1966 he was awed that a priest wanted to be his buddy. And DeLuca, he said, was "a charmer ... a nice guy" who lavished expensive gifts on him, took him to dinner at the Hotel du Pont and on trips to the beach and New York City. Now, Vai said, he realizes it was all part of a grooming process by a child predator. continue: http://www.delawareonline.com/article/20101113/NEWS01/11130352 Notre Dame Press “. . . an important book, written with scrupulous attention to detail and impeccably researched. This is a dark and deeply emotional subject about which James M. Smith manages to be fair-minded and calm in his judgments. It is an essential book for anyone interested in the fear and cruelty surrounding women’s sexuality in the Ireland of the recent past.” —Colm Tóibín “This is a book about amnesia, acknowledgment and atonement. It weaves history, politics, and art together in one of the most compelling and best-written studies I’ve read in recent years. Smith is able to stand outside his subject, independent of affiliation, and he manages to resist the urge for cheap outrage. It is a serious, brilliant, art-driven examination of a story, or history, that needs to be told over and over and over again, lest it be forgotten or allowed to seep into the ambient noise.” —Colum McCann Continue: http://undpress.nd.edu/book/P01180 Magdalene Laundries inquiry ordered The Irish Human Rights Commission (IHRC) said compensation should be paid to former residents where the state is found to have had a hand in their detention at 10 Catholic Church reformatory workhouses. IHRC commissioner Olive Braiden said the lack of public records meant only a statutory inquiry would uncover the truth. She said many women were omitted from the Residential Institutions Redress Scheme based on the argument that there was no state responsibility. However Ms Braiden said it was clear the state and Irish society in general bears responsibility for the way they were treated. JFM welcomes IHRC call for statutory enquiry on the Magdalene Laundries Survivor advocacy group Justice for Magdalenes (JFM) welcomes the Irish Human Rights Commission’s (IHRC) validation of the evidence submitted in seeking a formal inquiry into the State’s responsibility for human rights violations in the Magdalene Laundries. http://www.magdalenelaundries.com/press_releases.htm JFM’s submission argues that the treatment of the women and
girls in the Laundries violated their constitutional rights, including
the right to bodily integrity, the right not to be tortured or ill-treated,
the right to earn a livelihood, the right to communicate, the right
to individual privacy, the right to travel, the right to one’s
good name and the right to one’s person. Anonymous man sues Catholic Diocese of Fort Worth, saying he was abused by priest FORT WORTH -- More than a decade after his death, people who say they were sexually abused by Monsignor James Reilly continue to seek redress in the courts. A man filing as John Doe I sued in October, naming the Catholic Diocese of Fort Worth as the defendant. Doe is asking for more than $50,000 in damages. The Fort Worth diocese has already settled cases with at least 18 people claiming abuse, their records show. According to the plaintiff's original petition, Reilly engaged in sexual acts with and abused Doe while on church property between 1973 and 1974, while Riley was a priest at St. Maria Goretti Catholic Church in Arlington. Read more: http://www.star-telegram.com/2010/11/05/2608787/anonymous-man-sues-catholic-diocese.html Sexually Abused Children at Risk for Adult Psychosis A new report suggests children who are sexually abused may be at higher risk for developing schizophrenia and other psychotic disorders. The Austrian study found that a history of sexual abuse with penetration especially increased the risk. Previous studies have established that abused children are more likely
to develop depression, anxiety, substance abuse, borderline personality
disorder, post-traumatic stress disorder and suicidal behavior, according
to background information in the article. UK-resident survivors of child abuse in Ireland call for
pensions and other needs Social housing, medical help, counselling and even pensions legitimised by child labour from the age of 12 are among the list of things survivors believe should be funded by financial contributions from religious orders. It is believed that around one third of all abuse survivors, some 4,800 of the total respondents to the Redress Board, now live in the UK. Many want help to come home, others say they could never come back. “I would like to visit my dad in Ireland [but] I could never live there again,” said one respondent who took part in the survey carried out by the Irish Women’s Survivor Support Network (IWSSN). Another wrote: “I cannot return to Ireland… it’s too damaging.” mong the findings, the IWSSN found that one third said they still required funding for counselling, 36% asked for assistance in returning home, 20% requested further educational support for family members and 76% asked that pensions be provided to those forced into child labour. Of those, 44% have been receiving treatment for up to 10 years and 7% for even longer. New study shows 76% of pimps were sexually abused as children A study was done earlier this month by Jody Raphael and Brenda Myers-Powell
of the DePaul College of Law regarding the business of pimping and
the background of pimps. The study interviewed 25 ex-pimps from the
Chicago area. What they uncovered from the study is quite eye opening
and alarming. in Brief: A week to forget your fears? Studies with mice have demonstrated that fearful or traumatic memories
can be extinguished -- often temporarily, but sometimes permanently.
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