Many years ago, my best friend was in a very hard marriage. Her husband and mother-in-law were, for all purposes, nice upstanding folks. Everyone who knew them thought them charming and funny and all around good people. However, as giving and polite as they were to people on the outside, when it came to my friend they were critical and hurtful. Nothing she did was good enough for them and it hurt her spirit. I was one of the only people knew how she felt, and believed her, so I was hurt when the same thing happened to me she questioned whether or not I was misreading the situation.
Let me go back and tell you the back story. I worked at a Christian pre-school for awhile and got along well with everyone, until during a theological discussion, it was discovered that I believed in infant baptism, which was not at teaching in their church. Of course teachings on baptism were not taught in the school, so who would have thought it was a big deal?
Well, to the principle of the school it was a big deal. He started treating me differently...not in front of other teachers or parents of course, but in private he would speak down to me and make me feel uncomfortable. It wasn't anything that I couldn't deal with, but it was most definitely out of character for him.
After I left employment at the school, he began making snide comments to me, intended to hurt my feelings and make me feel small. Again it didn't work, but I told my friend about it. We both had our children in the school, so she only knew him as a nice, upstanding, and polite man, and I think she made me feel worse than him...because she didn't believe me when I said he was treating me badly.
Then the day came when we were sitting in a room waiting for our kids to be released. I was sitting on a window ledge and she was sitting on a chair further in the room. The principle saw me through the window of the door, and pulled open the door and yelled at me for sitting in the window and said some other things I can't remember now. When he noticed my friend in the room, sitting with her mouth open in shock, he tried to cover his harshness with a milder tone and left the room. She came up to me and said how sorry she was for not believing me...after all she lived with the same kind of thing.
Did her husband or mother-in-law, or the principle mean to be so nasty towards us in private? Maybe. Maybe it gave them a sense of power, and maybe they just thought they were helping us or maybe that was just how they were. The point is in private they were not the same person that the rest of the world saw. ...Bullies in a way.
This was a turning point in my life. I realized that mental abusers get away with their 'torture' because they are good at hiding what they do. It was a moment where I decided to give a "whilstle blower" the benefit of the doubt. ...And when there is a pattern of "honorable" people allowing, encouraging, and participating in the mental and sometimes physical torment of people under their control, I try and look past the outward facade and listen to the "silent minority" that claims a culture of bullying.
I am writing this because in my small town right now there is a battle over victim's claims and "pillars of the community". Most people know the good and honorable side of these leaders, but the few who have been the focus of bullying and torment, see the dark underside of the situation. I believe something needs to be done, and people need to open their eyes to the possibility that just because someone is a 'good' person they can't also be a 'bad' person in secret. Do they mean to be? I don't know. Maybe they just feel that young people they consider "troubled" need harsh discipline and allowing abuse is acceptable as a teaching tool. I don't know, all I know is I believe the young folks who claim these 'heroes in the community' allowed this kind of atmosphere to exist. I believe it's time to talk and be open and find out the truth, even if it destroys our view of those we hold most high.
