22427: McAlister: Re 2204: Sending Courage to Anonymous (fwd)

[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

From: Elizabeth McAlister <emcalister@wesleyan.edu>


Dear Anonymous (and all the others on this list who have experienced
sexual violence):  I read with great sadness and sympathy your post
and I thank you for having the courage to speak out.  I too know many
Haitian women who have experienced rape, and have read the Human
Rights reports cataloging it as a political tool that has also become
rampant generally in Haiti as have other forms of violence.  I am
very close, in particular, to one Haitian woman who was repeatedly
abused throughout her childhood, by her mother's boyfriends as well
as the maid's brother and a cousin.

As I tell her, It was not your fault, it does not define who you are.
You had no way to defend yourself, and you did what you had to in
order to survive.   I wish for you and others healing and peace, and
I send you anpil kouraj.

Kenbe fem, pa lage
Liza
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* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
Elizabeth McAlister, Ph.D.
Associate Professor
Department of Religion
Wesleyan University
Middletown, CT  06459-0029, USA

Tel:  (860) 685-2289
Fax:  (860) 685-2821
Internet home page: http://www.wesleyan.edu/religion/mcalister.htm
Rara book page:  http://www.ucpress.edu/books/pages/9291.html


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