Easy to Judge, Hard to Understand
Many aspects of our physical
existence are taboo to us just as urgently as they would be for a
tribal folk. We would rather not dwell on what we find nasty
about our own bodies, the fact that they contain substances like
shit, mucus, farts, menstrual blood. Such realities are so
embarrassing, so polluting,
that we genteelly hide them away in special places, like
"bathrooms" (note that the name does not even
accurately describe what the room is used for).
Sex is a focal point of that embarrassment. Not only is it shameful, having to do with forbidden "private" parts of our bodies, but it is "sinful" due to the patriarchy's need to control a function that impinges as it does upon power and distribution of wealth. Free expression of sexuality will just not do. Women must be under their husband's control so that reproduction remains a monopoly of the family.
However, sex has never been very effectively controlled and that is just as true of teenagers as it is of adults. We are physically able to reproduce years before it becomes socially "appropriate." As the news magazines keep reminding us, teen pregnancy is a common and recurring "problem" in this society. The pundits shake their heads at the "looseness" of "morality" in the 90s. "Kids Without a Conscience?" screams the headlines of People Weekly (June 23, 1997), as they consider the specter of Melissa Drexler, gory anti-mother of the Prom who stuffed her baby into a trash bag and calmly returned to the dance where she ate a salad.
How we love our fantasies of moral decline! But infanticide is nothing new. Unwed mothers have been killing their infants for centuries. In was such a common practice in Goethe's time that he let Gretchen, the heroine of Faust, kill her own baby in a vain attempt to conceal her loss of "virtue." It was a topic that concerned Goethe who counseled compassion and understanding. In those days birth control and abortion were unknown and chastity in women was insisted on. Such crimes will occur whenever reproduction is accompanied by shame and guilt.
Poor Melissa! She desperately tried to hide her pregnancy from even those closest to her. Now her secret has been cruelly exposed to the whole world. If only she hadn't given birth three weeks early, she might have escaped such notoriety. But giving birth at her prom was just too sensational a story for the press to pass up.
While in the bathroom stall, possibly at the very time she was giving birth, she told her friend that she had an unusually heavy period. The pregnancy may have felt like that to her. Something messy, painful and embarrassing that invaded her body. Not that she didn't know that it was a baby. Intellectually, she was quite well aware of it, as she admitted to those who had questioned her about it at the prom. But emotionally, it probably felt more like an ugly threat of exposure to the censure of the whole world. Her "sin" would become common knowledge. So frightening was that possibility that she preferred to endure months of loneliness as she carried her secret. There is nothing quite so alone as a child with a secret s/he can't share with anyone.
Moral indignation is running high. We sure value human life, don't we? Then why is our country cutting programs intended to feed, house and provide medical care for families with children? Why is this one destructive act so blameworthy while the political leaders' life-denying edits draw at most intellectual disagreement. The answer, of course, is as obvious as it is sad. Politicians are rich and powerful. They don't get their hands covered with blood. They are far removed from the misery they have caused others.
The reason this case hit such a sensitive nerve is that it impinges on our own feelings of shame with respect to our bodies. The very language people choose to discuss it tells us that. For example, Wilford S. Shamlin in conjunction with the Associated Press, wrote in the Asbury Park Press 6/29/97, "...the unsettling details of the baby's death and the violation of an American cultural institution like the senior prom still combine to put the Drexlers in the national spotlight." Interesting that he called it a "violation of ... the senior prom." Leaving aside the many gory and grisly prom stories which the media has regaled us with (think Carey and Prom Nightmare), this true life story seems to shock some of us by contrasting so forcefully with our fantasies about the innocent "happy days" of proms and high school. Another web site, What's Hot in Features, offers an article by a J. P. Essene that calls the event "Carey II." Small wonder. Carey was about a girl's period being splashed all over her face to shame her. That was the significance of the pig's blood, a reminder of the day she got her period in the gym and didn't know what to do for herself. Melissa's pregnancy and/or childbirth felt like a period. She called it that in explaining the time she was spending in the john. There was plenty of blood; blood coming from the same place menstral blood comes from. This embarrassing event which is supposed to be discretely hidden from the world is now splashed all over the headlines and the web.
The same paper has an online bulletin board where a "johndoe" expressed, "So many times we hear talk against the existence of God or the Goodness of God when such obscence(sic) actions occur. Well, whose fault is it? As we can see 'a' young lady decided to go horizontal," June 29. Here we have both the juxtaposition of "obscenity" with God (one is bad and the other good) and Melissa's decision to "go horizontal" which seems a big part of people's judgments. If only we got babies without doing the dirty deed, there would be a lot less condemnation on the part of our self-appointed moral guardians.
Nobody can truly judge another. Some day Melissa will probably realize the enormity of what she has done and she will have to live with that knowledge for the rest of her life. When she does, I hope she can forgive herself.
- Prom Mom
- What is Post-Natal Abortion?
- Abandoned Baby Law