I dislike family politics

[omimouse]

warinbear's grandfather sent him an e-mail. He wants to come and visit.

The man is a known child molester. catchild's journal holds more info on the subject.

Old New England family. He is the family patriarch. The whole family knows that he likes little girls, and most of them carefully pretend that the problem doesn't exist.

Old family, old blood, and he has the family estate. According to his eldest daughter (warinbear's mom) who also happens to be the executer of his estate, he has a right to have access to every member of his family. Quoting: " That was a long time ago. He knows what he did was inappropriate; he doesn't do it anymore. Besides, he only did it to his own daughters, and only to make them better wives. And he has never done it to anyone else." Direct quote, to the best of catchild memory, from four years ago.

If you do anything that upsets her, you get cut out of any will that she has any control over, and she does his books and estate for him. And not letting him have access to his kids, grandkids, and great-grandkids upsets her. And she still believes that he has a right to see his great-grandchildren, even after one of her sisters sent a letter to every family member that she had an address for. Said letter was a copy of one that she had sent her father, and listed what he had done to her and to her older daughter.

Our daughters, catchild and myself are, to the best of my knowledge, the only female family members that he has not molested in some way.

I despise family politics.

Comments

Re: Ummm

[chaiya.livejournal.com]

Far be it from me to defend Kathy -- I don't play that way.

However. I do actually love and appreciate Grampa. I think he's too fond of patting girls on the bottom as they go by, and I've felt uncomfortable about it a couple of times, but after I established with him that I didn't like to be touched that way, I stopped having a problem. I know that those who don't live in his vicinity probably don't have the chance to establish such baseline rules, and I know it sucks that they have to be established. But the man isn't just someone who abused his kids and feels so guilty about it that he can't deal with it. He's also the man who supported my right to never see my father again, even if that meant uninviting my father's family to my graduation and now the wedding so that I wouldn't have to deal with that crap. Grampa was the only one who said (and loudly) to Jim's face that my father was a con man and an asshole.

I understand your concerns, and I share them. I agree that you can't take Kathy's word that Grampa would be okay to visit with the girls. However, I also think that you would really like Pat, Grampa's new wife, and you would be impressed with how well she has trained him. Pat is absolutely incredible, and I like her a hell of a lot. :)

Nobody needs to actually DO anything here, as far as I can tell. If Grampa actually were to visit, you could send the girls away for that time. You could also just explain that you (singly or collectively) are just too ill for him to come to you, but he could visit with Scott if he wanted to meet somewhere. I honestly think that Grampa is interested in how his extended family is doing, and he considers you all part of that because you're part of Scott's life. That's how he treated Mom's live-in boyfriend, Doug, before he died a couple of years ago. Grampa has been treating Steve as family for about a year now, even before we got engaged. Grampa has mellowed from his hidebound views, and may actually (gasp) be trying to get the real scoop instead of hearing his news alternatively from Kathy and me. (Not that I pass a lot on, but I do correct him whenever he tries to figure out the situation and gets confused about how people could possibly be poly and be happy about it.)

That's my $5.00, anyway. YMMV.

Re: Ummm

[catchild.livejournal.com]

i know he is actually interested in warin and warins life. i also know he genuinely cares about his family.

but his molestation goes beyond a pat on the bottem as you go by. it includes things like putting his hand up the dress of a four year old girl. caressing the breasts of barley pubesent kids. pulling not yet pubesent girls into his lap and kissing them with an open mouth while running his hands over thier bottoms. and this is all things i've seen him do with my own eyes. some of it at my wedding some of it when we went up for gram's memorial service.

i can assure you if he tried any of that shite with my children he'd be dead. if he tried it with any of the adult members of sanctuary he'd be in jail on sexual assult charges. his name and money would not protect him here.