I will say the ONLY part of this I sort of understand is their fear of going to the police, leading to the family being broken up, or something horrible happening to the son. If they had done *everything* else right: Immediately removed Josh from the home, legitimate licensed counseling for him AND legitimate licensed counseling for the girls, only allowing him back into the home if/when counselors recommended it... If they had done all those things but not gone to the police out of fear, I would actually believe they still were trying to protect their children. But they didn't.

This is SO going down in flames... Nothing anyone could say could make this any better... The parents should just exit and keep their mouth closed from here ever after...

My friend's shih tzu actually has almost converted me to small dogs, which is no easy feat. That dog is awesome. Laid back, friendly, no shedding, no smell, no barking. She alerts my friend to seizures with no previous training whatsoever, and if my friend has to lay down unexpectedly, the dog will circle and lick her until she sits up again. Not dumb in my book!

Is there a reason he doesn't just go for his GED? There are numerous GED prep courses if he is anywhere close.

What an amazing story of strength and healing.

DD16 is particularly interested in women's issues as far as women being seen as "less than". I also find the history interesting (sufferage, history of women's rights, etc.) I also don't think of feminism as a dirty word, but don't really even know how to explain it to her in a balanced, non-man-hating way, and I think she would be really interested in the subject and it would really speak to her. Are there any resources that I could share with her since she is interested in these subjects? About women's history or what feeling empowered as a woman really means? I tried searching some websites, but I am looking for something not too extreme or something that is demeaning of women *choosing* among their choices to have a family/keep a home/whatever. FYI, we are a pretty conservative family with an "easy-going" headship model. We believe in the headship principle, but there has never been a time my opinions were disregarded or we were not able to work something out to my satisfaction. We have had lots of discussion about "complementary" rather than "less than", which I believe.

A few months ago DD16 came running out of her room with her phone held at arms length away and her head turned, yelling, "Eww! Ewww! Help! Help!" :lol: It took 2 days for me to get that stuff off her phone! THAT'S what makes me angry!

I do understand how scary it is. We struggle with a mix of monitoring and freedom. It's hard to know where the balance is. I agree that there is some sick and dangerous stuff out there, so I am not in favor of *totally* unsupervised access. But you have to hand it over to them at some point, so we feel it's best to do it in stages, which is what we have tried to do. Young age, computer program that blocked everything. As she got older, less blocking more talking. Then no blocking and more talking. Then cell phone heavily supervised. Then cell phone less supervised. Lots of talking, talking, talking. I agree with others that they *will* be exposed to this stuff, and agree that younger ones especially may not know how to handle the curiosity and other consequences. But as they get older, they *will* be exposed, so it's better to teach them how to use the internet and and their judgment at the same time. It's a sliding scale that ends when she is 18 and can do whatever the heck she wants. So I have X amount of time to go from supervised to unsupervised, and I don't want that to happen over night.

It doesn't surprise me either. When all this first started being implemented, it was so clearly one of those things designed to make people feel safer but without actually making anything safer. I just thought it was odd reading all the headlines "TSA fails..." Isn't that just going to encourage people to try things? That's like saying, "Secret service is inept, feel free to attack the president!" Although, wait a minute... that kind of has been in the news lately.. ;)

Everyone is covering it. Is it just me, or does anyone think it wasn't such a good idea to advertise how ineffective the TSA is?

What is a whinge? :confused1: A whine combined with a binge?

Wow that's rude. Maybe the desk people didn't realize they could get your info off it, from the lock message? Is that possible? Then this guy realized it after they let him have it.

Oh no...that's heartbreaking...

That is appalling...I've never heard that before.

I confess I've skipped my "off week" to change my cycle schedule for a vacation... But I was already on the pill at the time. I don't know about *getting* on the pill. When I first get on a pill or change pills I'm usually cranky and nauseous for the first month...

There are quite a lot of people in my area who watch. I would be willing to bet that none or few of them are aware of the ATI connection or even know what ATI is. I found out about it here. That's what is a little sinister I think. On the surface I think most people saw them as either an oddity, or as "a nice Christian family trying to raise nice Christian kids". The ATI thing adds a whole other level.

Go Nadia!

Your comment is insulting to those who start out with nothing, work hard, and still can't get anywhere. We are talking about the majority and about trends, not about the isolated case. And, I doubt Richard really felt like he was being an ass. I have heard that comment over and over and over again from people who were successful. They think they are telling the truth, not being an ass.

YES. 5 years olds are still so easily confused about things. But it wasn't too much older that she realized, "I could've gone to the teacher, but why didn't I?" Well...because you were 5! You just didn't get it at the time. How many times do we see those shows where parents are SO CERTAIN their little kid wouldn't play with a gun, or go off with a strangers, and then 10 minutes later they go and do the exact thing. We protect little kids because they really *can't* protect themselves.

Thank you for all the responses. I agree with the comments about the boy, that likely he was not malicious and should have received some intervention himself. And yes, from the teacher's viewpoint it was not ongoing, so she probably did what she thought was best with limited information. I am more interested in how my friend in processing this, and understanding. I personally tend to think more like SKL, that I (or maybe even most kids) would just shake it off as foolishness or otherwise. But I am trying to see it from my friend's view... If an older boy or man did this, no one else would have any problem seeing it as abusive because of the power differential. But for my friend *for some reason* she felt she had the power to say stop, but not the power to *make him stop*. So just because I don't see it that way, I can see why it led her to feel vulnerable and it was abusive to her. Also, she has a memory of it feeling somewhat pleasurable, which then led to guilt and shame later. That is difficult enough for an adult to process from a sexual assault or abuse, I can't imagine a child trying to process it. She had thoughts of "I told him no, but maybe I didn't get the teacher because I sort of liked it, and that makes me ashamed.." Thinking on this more and reading replies, I think that I can understand this better by isolating her perspective of the experience, from whatever I believe about the boy or his perspective. From her perspective, whether there was a power differential or not, *she felt one* and felt not in control of that situation... I hesitate to label that as wrong or unhealthy. It sort of just *is*. FYI, she is seeking some counseling about it.

The Duggar this is totally different, because I agree that at 14 he was old enough to know what he was doing was wrong. But it made me think of something that happened to a friend. When she was 5 and in kindergarten, there was a boy (also 5) who was always next to her at nap time. He would reach over and touch her sexual areas. She told him to stop it, but he kept doing it. One time the teacher walked by and saw him doing it, and the teacher told him to stop it. She also put him somewhere else at nap time. The boy never bothered my friend after that. That was the end of the story. This really traumatized my friend. She said she didn't really realize what had happened was "wrong" until a few years later (even though she knew at the time she didn't like him touching her). When she realized it was wrong she felt really ashamed and vulnerable. This carried onward into a vulnerability and general fear of safety around men. This was wrong of the boy of course. But this was a 5 year old boy and a 5 year old girl. I'm surprised the teacher didn't tell the parents about it, but would/should that have been reported to the police? I just wonder about getting the police involved and what that would have accomplished. Also, it is very clear that my friend perceived this as abuse and experienced trauma because of it, but on the part of the boy, it could have been just curiosity or experimentation and not anything really malicious. That doesn't seem to make any difference to my friend though, and she views herself as a victim...sometimes I have a hard time understanding that. Then I feel bad because I don't understand, and maybe I should understand that? I don't discount her perception of what she experienced, but I would really like to understand this better. The behavior is wrong. But I *think* it would make a difference knowing someone did that maliciously and should have known better, or someone of the same age and inexperience did something that was possibly just, truly, a mistake. Am I wrong that would make a difference? Because it doesn't make any difference to my friend and maybe I'm wrong to think that. You guys are good at giving different perspectives, please don't be harsh to me, I really want to grow in understanding. ETA, I have NEVER said anything to my friend to minimize or discount anything she has experienced. These are just thoughts in my head.

Ok.....WHAT?!?

Maybe I missed this, but Josh said "my parents arranged for me and those affected by my actions to receive counseling". So supposedly either the construction guy or the church camp ALERT thing was what they were calling counseling for Josh. How much later did he get sent to the ALERT thing? And that was just a general church camp, right, not anything specific to his issues? Also, has anything they are calling counseling for the girls been mentioned at all?

This.

That's not a bad idea....checking on it...