Suffragettes

We watched  Suffragette tonight, a moving film that depicts a young woman unwittingly getting caught up in the movement and losing her husband and son, being imprisoned, being left homeless, losing her job, when she decided as a result of wrongly labelled as a suffragette, that she would become one. She ended up sleeping rough in an old church.

The police brutality, the way those women were ostracized, it hits hard. And why? So that men could keep their pride and be autocratic? In a way it is hard to imagine a world where women were oppressed like that, and yet in some countries it still happens and even in this day and age, sexism and sexual harassment is still around in every level of work and society.

The way the Church of England behaves is reminder of those bad old days. Although they have 'allowed' women into senior positions otherwise they would have been forced to by the government, they are still a cold patriarchal bunch, and the way they treat abuse victims is sadly reminiscent of those bad old days when the suffragettes had to face violence and imprisonment and even death in order to be heard.

I know I spoke up about a group of abuse victims who tend to inflict the Church's legislation and endless waffle on everyone and I got to a point where I just didn't want that, a group that has become like a splinter of the C of E, and who have two of the church's best known perverts among them, but I believe that they, and I, and all others, should receive proper treatment and care from the C of E, that the Anglican Church should stop virtue signalling and judging others and deal with their internal dirt.

Many think that 'mandatory reporting' will make a difference, it won't. It will drive abuse further undercover, it will do NOTHING about the way the victims are treated, and without the Anglican Church being regulated from the outside, it will make no difference, but the frenzy-whippers have for some reason tried to make it into a solution for everything. I think they are missing the point.

I never wanted to be involved in speaking out. I live with severe pain and my life is too full, but seeing victims being made into a gang, with solutions such as 'mandatory reporting' being made their goal, is hard. Seeing thousands of people angry with the oblivious church, and seeing the harsh and painful accounts of people who have suffered for making CDM complaints, or people who have had to quit the clergy or church after decades and had the door slammed behind them. Hearing victims of abuse suffering. It's hard not to butt in.

Recently I read Giles Fraser's well-written article about the decline of the Parish Church, and the astoundingly out of touch and unchristian response by Simon Butler, a chilling reminder that the C of E are run by a kind of warlord setup that has nothing to do with Christianity or God.
I was surprised how much attention my letter to Simon Butler received, except from Butler himself, I still eagerly await his reply.

The Suffragettes are an extreme of standing up to injustice and being voiceless, but here and now, in this day and age, many victims of abuses are still fighting a harsh and damaging battle for justice and being changed for life by the harm that comes of the fight.

The news is that the Bishop of Oxford has 'admitted' some of his safeguarding mistakes. Some, and he's still there, no resignation. The victims have to go on fighting like Suffragettes while the C of E remains draconian with no sign of 'root and branch change'.