Spiritual Self-Defense: Make Your Action Plan - Part One

I'm trying to figure out why this series by the Botkin Sisters on a divine plan revealed in the Bible to prevent rape, abuse, or guys saying "You look pretty today.  Wanna go on date?" took more than two posts to complete.   The first post decries that state of the world today (as all Botkin posts do) and the second post lays out the right way to do things.  Boom.  Finished.

And yet, there are still four more posts in the series filled with strange, surreal ideas.....

Right off the bat, there is a sentence that encapsulates the Botkin Sisters' confusion around sexual assault and normal responses:

An inappropriate or dangerous overture comes like a bolt from the blue, and suddenly we’re having to make split-second decisions under high stakes, intense adrenaline, and sometimes tonic immobility (the freezing response.)

Let's separate out the easiest part first.  "Inappropriate" does not automatically mean "dangerous".

 Inappropriate in mainstream society means that a person has violated a widely held social norm.  A boss asking their direct report out on a date would be inappropriate.  In CP/QF land, inappropriate is stretched to mean any activity that doesn't align with the family's standards of behavior so something that would be viewed as appropriate by mainstream society - like a single man asking a woman on a date with no parental oversight or a dating couple hugging - is labeled inappropriate.  This broadened meaning of "inappropriate" makes discussing anything involving sexuality more confusing because we've now lumped a broad category of actions into a single category.

Dangerous is more straightforward because both groups agree that a dangerous situation is one where one or more people fear immediate or short-term injury to their person, reputation or property.  An inappropriate situation can be dangerous if the victim is concerned that addressing the inappropriate behavior will allow the other person to retaliate against them with consequences that exceed the normal level.

The strangest part is that the Botkin Sisters conflate all inappropriate and all dangerous situations into fraught moments that require immediate action.   That's simply silly; most inappropriate actions and some dangerous situations can be mitigated simply by stalling for time. 

Tonic immobility is a real thing  - but the Botkin Sisters have it messed up in this post.  Again.  I've typed that so many times.  Tonic immobility is an involuntary freezing survival instinct in which the brain of someone who is in a very dangerous situation overrides their voluntary muscle control and floods the brain with chemicals that dull pain and keep muscles relaxed.   In easier terms, a person's body decides that it is time to stay still until the danger passes and proceeds to do so regardless of if the person wants to or not.  It's been studied in police officers and members of the military.  It is less well studied in rape victims but no one doubts that the same actions come into play in violent crime situations.

Well, the Botkin Sisters include their new standard statement that victims don't deserve or cause crimes - which we all agree is a good step - and then explain how victims clearly screwed up by asserting all of their rights as people:

When we realize that being wise and wary enough to avoid danger sometimes means choosing not to exercise the full extent of our rights to go where we want, when we want, with whom we want, it can be tempting to say, “But that isn’t fair!” or “But their sin isn’t my responsibility!” And both are true. But if we love wisdom, hate evil, and value our safety as much as God does, we have to be willing to let the reality of other people’s sin change how we approach certain areas of life.

So...if you are a victim of a crime, you were in a bad place with a bad person or at a bad time - and you should have avoided it.   I mean - Ms. Torres was nannying in the home of a married religious leader who lead a group who preaches the importance of morality and avoiding sexual sin when she was molested by said religious leader.    Clearly, she should have known better because.....oh, wait.  This is terrible advice that won't work at all for the majority of abuse and sexual assault that occurs in homes and between people who already know each other.


I'm all about sensible precautions to reduce the likelihood of being a victim of crime committed by random strangers - but the Botkin Sisters take this to a crazy extreme.   One of the women mentioned casually in "Good Girls and Problem Guys" to obey the limits set by fathers in terms of where they are allowed to go, whether they need chaperones and curfews like the Botkin girls do.  Now, I had restrictions on where, when and with whom I was allowed to go places when I was a pre-teen and young teenager.  By the time I was in my late teens, my parents trusted me to make good decisions which included staying safe.  All my mom asked was that I wake her up when I came home late (i.e., after she went to bed) so that she wouldn't worry that I hadn't made it home when I had.  The fact that the Botkin daughters have never been freed to make their own choices implies one of two things.  Either the girls are exceptionally immature and reckless as adult women or their family is overly restrictive.

Equally importantly, restricting time around scary people and places isn't a particularly great defense.  The time I was most concerned about the behavior of a strange man who was following me was when I was exiting a grocery store in the middle of the day.  Learning to be cognizant of surroundings and the people nearby is a far better choice - and much more effective.

The Sisters then decide to double-down by trying to make restricting women's activities is a kind thing to do....for the criminals....

The Lord wants us to take the dangers of other people’s sin seriously – even to the point of sometimes choosing to forgo our personal rights (or things that would technically be “lawful” for us), to do what is most wise, prudent, helpful, loving, and up-building, for ourselves and for others.

I expect daft writings from the Botkin Sisters - but this wins a new award. 

"Peeps, we need to worry about the souls of the men waiting to attack us in dark alleyways late at night!  If all women stay locked up safe at home, no men will ever be able to rape another woman and God's Kingdom will be upon us!" 

Nevermind that the solution does nothing to change the hearts and attitudes of violent people towards others; it simply hands the keys to the world over to them and declares that peace prevails. 

The Botkin Sisters probably don't realize this - but most of Europe attempted that method of appeasing Germany prior to World War 2.  Hint: It didn't work on any count.  World War Two happened and Germany enacted genocide on Jews, Romani, people with disabilities and people with different gender or sexual identities other than cis-heterosexual that had been turned away from other countries.

I doubt this plan would end better for women in the US.

*I apologize for the late post.  I was in a minor car accident Monday evening when a really poorly thought-out parking lot design led a pick-up truck to turn right in front my medium sized hatchback.  Thankfully, no one was injured - and the baby was at home with my husband.  The pickup truck received a barely visible dent where my car hit the side panel of the bed.,  The front end of my car is a mess so I spent Tuesday doing all of the random things that needed to be done for insurance and the repair shop while stretching to keep my torso and shoulder loose.