Spiritual Leader, My Butt: Some Blunt Suggestions on How to Cope When an Elder In Your Spiritual Group Turns Out to be A Perverse Piece of Crap

As promised, below is a practical follow up to this post.

Here is a list of things that I wish someone had said to me before I ever joined the Pagan group where I was molested and harassed by an "Elder in good standing". Hopefully it will help others who encounter a group run or co-run by a predator.

POWER CORRUPTS.
ALSO, SOME PEOPLE ARE JUST ASSHOLES.

A person in the role of religious leader commands a certain level of respect and trust from those within his or her group. However, there are always going to be some people who gain power, have it immediately go to their heads and start thinking that their leadership role in one aspect of life puts them above others in all aspects of life. They feel entitled to exploit those looking to them for leadership, and do it without conscience, playing up the "wisdom" and "initiatory knowledge" they offer in return. A particularly vile subset of these corrupt religious leaders extends his or her sense of entitlement to the bodies of adherents -- or to the bodies of their children. As much as we don't like acknowledging it, some Elders are completely corrupt, and some of those will either try to weasel into your pants or should never be left alone with your kids.

It's sad to think about, and sadder still to have to plan for. But if you don't face facts, and learn the warning signs of such predators, you and your loved ones end up more vulnerable to them.

RELIGIOUS LEADERS' AUTHORITY ENDS WHERE YOUR RIGHTS BEGIN.
FULL STOP.

If someone in your spiritual group has made you genuinely uncomfortable, ignored basic physical, emotional or privacy boundaries, made exploitive demands or tried to manipulate you, it doesn't matter what rank they are or which gods they claim love them. They have exceeded their rights and abused their authority, and regardless of whether the other leaders oppose or protect them, they do not deserve your respect. Certainly, they do not deserve your trust or your unquestioning obedience -- though this kind of person will demand it the most.

IF THEY IGNORE YOUR RIGHTS,
THEY DON'T BELONG IN AUTHORITY OVER ANYONE.

The first thing you have to do when someone in religious authority over you attempts to abuse or exploit you or your loved ones is to remove their power and influence over you. This must be done emotionally, intellectually, and most of all, practically. Get away from that person, get your loved ones away, and get your head clear on dealing with him or her after that. Exploitive leaders are very persuasive, and will try to confuse and manipulate you or those close to you. You have to firm your resolve against these people and anyone blindly defending them (which, sadly, may include friends or relatives), and ignore what the predators are saying. Any incidentally valid points in their statements are guaranteed to be swimming in gallons of self-serving bullshit.

DON'T LET ANYONE MINIMIZE WHAT YOU WENT THROUGH.
INCLUDING YOU.

The biggest mistake I made in this situation was caving in to pressure to minimize the severity of what my own attacker did to me. I did this because at his most blatant, he was following me around an event constantly sexually molesting me while I was too tranced out (and terrified) to do anything. The head of the House and several elders witnessed his doing this, and said and did nothing. I made the mistake of convincing myself that I was overreacting somehow, because "more enlightened" people watched the whole thing and didn't give a shit. Now I realize that that was because the House leader and other witnesses were terrible people, but at the time I believed in them and followed their lead. Don't do this, and don't listen to anyone who tries to do it to you.

STAND UP FOR YOURSELF, AND BE SMART ABOUT IT.

Document your experiences. Names, dates, who was there, what the circumstances were. But don't wait until you have a lot of documentation to speak out against the abuser.

Don't be scared to act up...intelligently, and with the purpose of exposing the predator. My predator's "defense" was that he was possessed by a spirit at the time he went after me sexually...multiple times, with multiple spirits involved. (Apparently West African tricksters, Hindu deities and Aesir all really love my badonk and can't keep their hands off it). Now this was a guy who was pretty much infamous for faking possession; the other Elders joked that his possessions were basically "him channeling him" a lot of the time. Yet they accepted his excuse. If I knew then what I knew now, I would have turned this on its ear. "Oh, gee, I had no idea I threw a drink in your face and called you a lying old pervert with a raisin-sized weewee in front of everyone. I was possessed!" Ah, missed opportunities.

If you are safe and can manage it, tell your abuser in no uncertain terms to stop. Do not, however, threaten any consequences. These people are masters of ass-coverage, and will scramble straight into that mode the moment they think some consequences might come of their vile actions. If you tell them there will be reprecussions, especially if you get specific, they will start planning their "defense" -- usually a character assassination of you. So just tell them that what they are doing is wrong and that you won't put up with them doing it any more, and leave it at that. Don't give them a warning, and thus lead time, when it comes to your plans.

Standing up to them can also be good for you personally, though the exploiter's reaction can be unpredictable. Some will be scared off by a show of backbone. Others will throw a tantrum, or try to "test" the new boundary to see if they can overcome it. This is why it is usually best to make sure this confrontation happens in front of witnesses. Not only is it less dangerous, but there is a good chance that he will show something of his true colors when confronted. Provided that your group isn't solidly composed of idiots, at least some of the witnesses should take notice.

EXPECT TO TAKE SOME HITS EMOTIONALLY.

Sadly, don't expect that you'll be able to resolve the issue by confronting your exploiter. Not only will these predators deny any wrongdoing, but they'll do anything they can to gaslight you and anyone else involved into believing the same. If someone responds to your saying "stop constantly staring at my breasts, it's making me uncomfortable" with "oh, sorry" and no longer staring, they weren't trying to exploit anyone, they were just being mannerless horndogs. Real exploiters don't give a damn. If they had enough conscience to acknowledge that they were doing wrong, they wouldn't be trying to use you or your kids in the first place.

UNDERSTAND THAT YOU'RE NOT THE ONLY ONE AT RISK.

These people are guaranteed to seek out other victims if you won't cave in. That means that you have a moral obligation to say something to your group. This will not be easy. A lot of people respond to news like this by denying or minimizing any incidents, at least at first. Be ready with your accounts of what happened, including details like where and when. Expect frustration. Expect to find out who your friends in the group really are.

SO SAY SOMETHING.
BUT DON'T EXPECT ANYONE WILL BE HAPPY TO HEAR IT.

Start with a trusted authority figure or senior member of the group. If you don't trust anyone in power in the group, skip this step and get the HELL out of the group. If you can't trust them, they can only help you grow spiritually at a distance -- by serving as an example of how not to act.

Warn others who might be vulnerable. New members, young members, those wrestling with mood disorders or recent loss. If this guy tried to target your kids and he's still breathing, make sure that parents in the group know why you called the cops on him.

Expect backlash. If you found no reliable religious leaders to go to in your group, or did not go to all of them, the others are guaranteed to kick up a stink about it, especially if the police end up involved. One of the craziest reactions that I saw in my old group, and have heard about in others, was that a statement of intent to go to the authorities if action was not taken was viewed as a serious threat to the group -- while having a sexual predator in a position of power among them barely seemed to bother them. Even if the group as a whole finally comes around to face facts and support you, at least some of them won't, especially at first, and it is going to hurt.

THE OTHER GROUP LEADERS MAY DO THE RIGHT THING.
BUT THEY ALSO MAY NOT.

Don't be surprised if challenging a well entrenched spiritual leader ends with your being cast out of the group. It isn't fair, it isn't rational, but for some reason a disappointing number of people will be more angry at the person who disrupts the group by seeking justice than at the toxic person who is causing actual problems. As an example, I gave the group leader the names and contact information of two other people whom my would-be predator had exploited sexually, and she never followed through. Her head remained firmly in the sand, and within a month I was out. It was painful, but it would have been less so had I prepared myself for the possibility.

IF THE GROUP TAKES THE PREDATOR'S SIDE, IT'S ON THEM.

Keep owning and standing up for the truth even if your spiritual group rejects you and claims you are lying or overreacting. This includes calling the police if your legal rights have been violated or your safety is threatened. Some may whine that the police may take the opportunity to harass the other members of the Pagan group, which is a possibility -- but only a possibility, whereas what happened to you and will continue to happen to others is actual reality. And let's be real: if the leaders of the group refuse to deal with the criminal in their midst in a way that protects other members, they have no damned business complaining when you're forced to go to outside authorities. They should have gotten off their butts when you came to them first.

LEAVE THE GODS OUT OF IT.

Don't let yourself believe that your treatment by a corrupt group of flawed human beings is supported by the deities or spirits the group honors, that these Powers will reject you for leaving the group, or that you need the group to work with them. Seriously, if your spiritual group put you through the kind of Hell that mine did, you don't need it to work with the spirits. In fact, your spiritual relationships can only be strengthened once you walk away from a bad group, because you won't be wading through their crap while you seek spiritual truths.

Don't waste time wondering why the powers that be didn't help you. In case you have not noticed by now, gods, spirits and deities don't exactly come running to our rescue when we're in serious physical-world trouble. Sometimes they step in in a real way, but it's unpredictable; thus, you cannot rely on them to save you from that or any situation. You need to rely on yourself, on trustworthy human beings and on the knowledge and experience of those who have faced or documented similar things before you.

Think about it. Genuinely miraculous occurrences happen, but they're pretty damn rare. The Ultimately Powerful, Eternally Loving Celestial Babysitter image of the Divine got drilled into a lot of us as kids, but it's crap. If it wasn't, no child would ever starve to death, no one would ever get away with murder and we wouldn't be dealing with a corrupt-scumbag infestation among religious elders in the first place. In reality, if you want the help of the Powers That Be, expect to do a lot of real-world work too. They will guide you, help you, maybe provide serendipity here and there -- but it's no substitute for standing up and dealing with things yourself. Spirit work and the help of the gods supplements positive personal action. It rarely if ever replaces it completely -- even when we really, really need it to.

If the gods actually do punish the douchebag in question, expect a wave of denial that would swamp the Queen Mary to go through any group members supporting him. Example: some time after I finally told the group about my would-be predator, and realized that they wouldn't listen to or protect me, he actually did get hit with a well-aimed Karma Hammer. The accident happened on a day very sacred to his head deity, the circumstances were inexplicable, and they quickly led to his losing his job and being kicked out of his condo by his now ex girlfriend. I commented quietly to the leader of the group: "wow, I guess (head deity) really didn't like what he did to me." She hastily dismissed it, saying "No, He was clearly just pissed off about (something else entirely)." After all, in her mind what her butt-grinding buddy did to me was no crime, and clearly nothing that would anger a higher being.

Thinking about it now, she always was a real piece of work.

My advice is that on the oft chance that Something Does Happen, don't be surprised if deniers blind themselves to it. If they do, don't listen; chalk them off as the moral cowards they are, and ignore their excuse-making.

IF PEOPLE ASK WHY YOU LEFT THE GROUP, BE HONEST.

It's hard to know what to do when you have to leave a spiritual group thanks to problems like this. All the rage may prompt you to start a revenge campaign of spreading your story everywhere. That is up to you, but unless you're very careful and calculated about it, and are ready to deal with an explosion of wank from your former spiritual home, it may be more trouble than it is worth. However. There is absolutely nothing obliging you to protect a group that harbors and protects a predatory pervert. So don't think you have to bite your tongue, smile, and give some noncommittal answer about how it "just didn't work out" if someone asks why you left. Tell your story. Be completely honest. People will draw their own conclusions, and your former group will throw a giant tantrum if they find out. But not only does it get a warning out about the scumbag and his enablers -- it's also how you find out that you're not alone. If I had not shared my story, I would never have met two of that piece of crap's other targets, or learned of others within the community who have been wronged. Solidarity with your fellow survivors is powerful: it helps give back the voice that your predator and those who sided with him tried to take away.

NO MATTER HOW HARD YOU WORK ON MOVING ON, IT WILL HURT FOR A WHILE. MAYBE A LONG WHILE.

Having a religious leader leap off his pedestal and try to land on you feet (or cock) first is painful. Having members of the group then circle the wagons against you hurts like hell, and so does watching other "enlightened spiritual leaders" go into such deep denial of wrongdoing that they even deny things they personally witnessed. Worst of all is realizing that it will be a hard, taxing fight to try and get any justice at all, that you will likely have to do it alone, that your detractors will defame you as crazy or a liar to discredit you, and that you can't expect to get any real vindication from it. My point is that however many of these things you end up experiencing, it's going to be rough to get over for a while. Therapy, spiritual work and support groups are all good options for getting through this time. But whatever you do, don't make your recovery dependent on seeing your attacker face justice or getting your former religious group to admit they were wrong. Realistically speaking, it may never happen, even if you go to the police. Seek justice, but do not rely emotionally on achieving it. It is a rare commodity in this world -- but one that will become less rare the more we keep fighting for it.

Revisiting the Unhappy Medium: Pagans Talk about Exploitive Elders

I just finished reading Lydia Crabtree's heart-wrenching article on the sexual exploitation currently being exposed in the Pagan community, The Fish Rots from the Head Down: Squid Eye and Sexual Exploitation. The first thing I have to say is: go read it. She describes the issue better than I could.

Since the arrest of Pagan elder Kenny Klein in March, the Pagan community is finally doing what it should have done decades ago: talking seriously, and in a very self-questioning way, about how much sexual exploitation is going on among us and what to do about it. As a survivor of some grotesque and blatant exploitation attempts, watching this all come out has caused me a lot of personal anguish. I know that the pompous ass who kept groping me and did worse with several others likely won't be among those facing the music. His House has already shown the extent they will go to protect him, and of course that will include lying for him as well as looking the other way.

In retrospect, the House was hardly into sexual ethics in general; it's possible that they literally believe that what he did to me was just fine. But whatever the case, they have his back. This whole blowup over Klein and the Frosts and various others has reminded me that Pagan hierarchies can be as bad as Catholic ones when it comes to butt-covering for the worst among them.

I will never understand why it is so hard for so many members of religious groups to understand that if an elder in your community is exploiting people sexually, he doesn't deserve his title or your support. Maybe it's shock, maybe it's pride, but continuing to support such people is irrational, and it hurts and endangers people, including children. The fact that you trusted him with personal secrets, followed his lead, and believed in him shouldn't make you go into denial when it comes out that he's been harassing, exploiting or straight up raping people. It should make you angry, because he's been lying to you about his character and trustworthiness this whole time.

But more often than not, status and popularity win over truth, and the victim gets revictimized by the group through denial, ostracism, criticism, minimalization of the incident, accusations of being crazy or wanting attention...it just goes on and on. That is what happened to me, and what has happened to a lot of other people, including underage kids. The fact that these people are covering for sex offenders never even seems to register with them. Maybe they're just really good at buying their own lies.

Now however, the truth is starting to come out about predators in the Pagan community, and though it's painful to read about, it can only be for the good. These predators thrive on secrecy, and those who have protected them deserve to be questioned as well. If you will stand there and watch while one of your elders repeatedly gropes and grinds on a tranced-out neophyte, and not only do nothing but deny later that anything untoward happened, you don't deserve to lead anyone.

Some may fret over a potential "witch hunt" starting, but if you actually think about it, the chances of that are rather rare. This fear is a distraction from the truth, similar to MRA whining about false rape accusations. Our focus should be on protecting the actual, real victims of sexual exploitation, instead of protecting largely theoretical victims of false accusations.

I wish that I had some way of helping to fix this, besides speaking out against it and offering help to fellow survivors. All I really have to offer are suggestions on what to do when you find yourself in a situation like I did, or when you see someone else going through it.

It seems ridiculous to have to be telling people how to avoid creepy Elders and deal with their predation attempts, instead of telling these so called "spiritual leaders" to stop being horrible creeps. But none of them are going to change until their chances of being caught at it go up enough that it deters them. Preparing people to deal with these kind of situations is one way to help improve those chances, as well as help them protect themselves.

The guide to avoiding and dealing with these corrupt Elders deserves its own entry. But it can basically be boiled down now to one thing: if someone in your spiritual group is harassing you or trying to con you into sex, or if someone comes to you for help because they're being exploited, SPEAK UP. Kick up a stink before things get worse, make sure that those in authority know, and don't be scared to threaten wider exposure if they don't move their asses.

If they are as toxic as my old House, you will end up out on your ear, yes--but you will be infinitely better off for it, as they will have shown their true colors. And of course, you can never go wrong with simply leaving a group where someone in authority is making you feel uncomfortable, and letting people know why from a safe distance. Had I known then what I know now, getting away from the House would have been my first step.

I hope that one day, people who are targeted by sexual predators within the Pagan community are the ones being supported by the group. I hope that we reach the point where when someone is victimized, they can speak up and know they will be heard, regardless of the status of their exploiter. Maybe one day it will be the exploiters who end up being ridiculed and ostracized, instead of those of us whom they have hurt. I for one think that's something to work toward.

Check-in after a very long time....

I took a few years off from any real shamanic exploration, in favor of working on getting various health issues under control. As it turns out, I had both undiagnosed and improperly treated problems, such as my apnea, which was woefully undertreated, thanks to a negligent doctor having me on the wrong settings for years despite regular check-ins. Because of this, I was getting the functional equivalent of about four hours of sleep a night--upward from about two a night previously since I was little. That's a lot of sleep debt. Now that I'm under the care of a competent sleep doctor, I can much more easily focus--including on spiritual matters.

A whole lot has happened since I set aside my creative and spiritual life to work on core personal issues. My therapist, George, who supported me for years while I was in the worst part of my struggles, died last year. I owe him for getting me writing again, for helping me to get past the anguish of being betrayed by my spiritual group, for helping me reconcile with my family, for teaching me to manage my emotions better and for helping get my anxiety attacks under full control. The guy really helped me get my feet under me, and he remains an inspiration.

I have semi-maintained my altar and gear since shutting things down for a while. The only spiritual work I have done is a little crafting, a little advising. Now, it's time to not only move the altar but also revamp the whole thing. I need to make room for George on the memorial section, and my ideas of altar layout have evolved considerably. I am realizing that I was still trying to cling to practices that have no personal spiritual meaning, giving equal space for spirits I honor but no longer work with, and being lackadaisical about design. I'm an art major--I can do better.

As I prepare to take up my rattle again, I have been using a tool which I originally started working with a few months ago for stress and insomnia. Binaural Beats are a kind of sound wave therapy, and are also very handy for masking outside sound when you are trying to meditate or journey. I have had surprisingly good results after several weeks of trying it out--though only while using headphones. I'll probably do a more detailed write-up after another few months of testing.

Here is a link to a free Binaural Beats web site.