In the aftermath of the Kavanaugh confirmation hearings, many disappointed supporters of Dr. Blasey are asking whether her coming forward was worth it. Not only did her testimony fall on deaf ears among all but one Republican senator, it even failed to impress one of the democrats. Against her instincts, she participated in the very public, contentious hearings, once her identity became known, because she felt it her civic duty to do so. Ultimately, President Trump led the charge, emboldened by Senator Lindsay Graham’s staged, infantile temper tantrum in defense of Judge Kavanaugh, by mocking and dismissing what Dr. Blasey had to say, calling it a “hoax.” This contrasted with initial comments from almost all committee members, on both sides of the aisle, which lauded her courage, and credibility as she was deemed to be a credible witness. Republican senators, and the President, himself, were at first trying their best to cast themselves as caring, compassionate, sensitive human beings, apparently determined to refrain from turning on and attacking Dr. Blasey the way Anita Hill was attacked in 1991. That didn’t last very long, as it began to appear that Kavanaugh’s candidacy was in danger of crashing down. Feigned compassion metamorphosized into disdain; messages of support soon vanished and turned into vicious attacks. When all was said and done, the imperatives of partisan politics trumped decency, re-victimizing the victim, just as occurs to many survivors of sexual abuse who summon the courage to speak out about what happened to them.
Only Dr. Blasey can answer the question of whether her coming forward was worth it. Did she derive any benefit from the extensive support she received from fellow sexual abuse survivors across the nation, and from the more enlightened public officials who earnestly spoke up in her behalf? Would she have been better off if she simply kept quiet about her horrendous ordeal, as she had done for the past 36 years, with the exception of long delayed revelations to her husband and to her therapist? For other victims, struggling to decide on how best to heal and to truly recover from the attacks and their psychological, emotional and physical aftermaths, it may be helpful to be educated about what has been learned in the field of sexual trauma from retrospective studies, anecdotal reports of survivors, and from clinical observations reported by treatment providers. Such information should also prove useful to friends and loved ones who wish to come to the aid of survivors, as soon as disclosures are made.
To begin with, the data on the disclosure patterns of children and teens who were sexually victimized has been well documented within professional journals. A 2008 review of 13 retrospective studies of the disclosure patterns of 15,000 adults who had been sexually abused during childhood, found that between 55% and 69% of victims failed to disclose until after reaching adulthood. Of those who belatedly disclosed, between 10% and 46% did so for the first time at the time of the studies. In a 1999 study of 384 child sexual abuse survivors, only one-third disclosed at the time of their abuse. The remaining 262 subjects suppressed what happened to them for years, later explaining how they feared being disbelieved and/or losing parental love. Such fear triggers the victim’s early decision to opt for secrecy. Absent immediate protest, delay breeds continued secrecy, which undermines the hope of being believed as time passes. When the child does not immediately complain, it becomes apparent that there is no second chance. The child experiences a sense of shame, as submission emerges as her only option. Shamed, she feels small, exposed, and inhibited. Shame offers a kind of protection, as it inhibits further action, thereby removing her from additional interpersonal danger. It entrenches secrecy, and paves the way for various negative psychological sequelae, including Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder, pathological dependency, social withdrawal, dissociative reactions, self-injurious behavior, and the development of a self-loathing self-schema, eventuating in depression. Years and decades may pass before the now adult victim of child sexual abuse matures, and she becomes sufficiently angry and empowered to demand to be liberated from the toxic secrets about her past that have interfered with full self-acceptance and full realization of potential. The long suffering victim yearns for resolution of long-held contradictory views about herself; she wants to feel normal, and may now demand justice. Long delayed disclosure is met, however, with incredulity and claims of blatant lying. The fears and threats underlying secrecy come rushing back, as she is blamed for the crisis precipitated by her disclosure, and is cast as offender rather than victim. By the end of the Kavanaugh hearings, Dr. Blasey was the open target of President Trump and his senatorial sycophants, who succeeded in large measure to frame the Judge as the victim and she as the mixed up, conspiratorial offender.
A typical method used to undermine the credibility of the disclosing victim, is to harp on the incomplete details she is able to provide about the alleged incident(s). Supporters of Judge Kavanaugh insisted that Dr. Blasey’s narrative was too short on contextual details, such as precise location, time of event, antecedent and consequent conditions. As lay people, they couldn’t be faulted for their lack of scientific knowledge about the interface between trauma and memory. They couldn’t possibly know about the phenomenon of perceptual narrowing, the narrowing of the perceptual system at the moment of encountering a traumatic event. It has been found that much of the traumatic event may never have been stored because the individual’s attention was focused entirely on the source of survival threat, and the stimuli associated with survival actions. Consequently, much of the information about peripheral details never gets encoded into the memory system to begin with, and thus can subsequently only be inferred. It is no wonder that Dr. Blasey had vivid recall about the identity of her attacker, at a 100% level of confidence, while having only vague recollections of many peripheral details. In assessing victims of child sexual abuse, more weight is placed on sensory and emotional details elicited than on peripheral details, particularly when incidents may have occurred remotely in time or when the victim was very young. The subjective experience of being molested is recorded and processed in a very personal manner which sears the memory trace into the victim’s brain much more vividly than occurs with the processing of peripheral details. That she was terrified of the possibility of being accidentally killed, strongly suggests that her attention was on survival, making it less kujeky fir her to retain many of the other peripheral details.
Kavanaugh’s supporters also emphasized the importance of having no eye-witnesses or other physical, medical or interpersonal evidence. They largely ignored the importance of evidence offered via public communication by Dr. Blasey’s treating therapist, who presumably attested to the presence of confirmatory signs of sexual traumatization. Dr. Blasey’s supporters fell for the bait, by allowing the fate of the inquiry to rest with the discovery of corroborating witnesses through an extended FBI background check. Indeed, a breakthrough of comity miraculously appeared on Saturday, September 29th, when Senator Jeff Flake, at the urging of his friend across the aisle, Senator Chris Coons, seemingly broke ranks with fellow Republicans to demand that the FBI re-open its background check before he’d agree to decide about confirmation. Senator Flake seemed to be genuinely touched by two sexual abuse survivors who confronted him at the elevator on the way to the committee meeting. On the morning of Saturday, October 5th, he and Senator Mikulski appeared to be the only two Republicans driven by concern for protection of the victim as opposed to party. In my email to him that morning, I applauded him for his taking “the bold, principled step of requiring an FBI investigation … before voting to confirm,” but added, “unfortunately, the investigation did not go as far as many pursuers of the truth would have liked, and leaves as many questions on the table as were present before last Saturday. The perception is that the FBI’s mission was compromised for political reasons, tainting the reputation of that hallowed institution even more than Donald Trump succeeded in doing since taking office. I hope and pray that this does not discourage you from continuing in your principled path, and that you vote your conscience…” Alas, my prayers went unanswered. Perhaps Flake never received my email. If he did, I reasoned, surely he’d agree that the additional FBI investigation he had demanded a week earlier was a sham, with dozens of potential witnesses who were suggested by Dr. Blasey ignored and never questioned. Was Flake really as anguished as he appeared to be on 9/29, or was he merely pretending to care. Conceivably, his evident distress may have related more to his having to struggle in response to cogent arguments made by his friend, Senator Coons, than to questions about treating Dr. Blasey fairly. In the end, he caved, even as he was seemingly patronized by Chairman Grassley who acceded to requesting the sham FBI investigation.
During the extra week before confirmation, the Republican narrative devolved into a logically inconsistent position. The “he said, she said” argument, which proclaims the impossibility of ascertaining the truth in situations where there are no witnesses, and it’s one person’s word against the other’s, was discarded. Replacing this line of reasoning was the “compassionate” line that poor Dr. Blasey truly appeared to have been sexually victimized in her younger years, but that someone other than Dr. Kavanaugh must have been the offender. It couldn’t have been Judge Kavanaugh, because he unequivocally denied he ever treated anyone as she described; it couldn’t have been Judge Kavanaugh, because he refused to acknowledge that he ever suffered drinking related blackouts – he only fell asleep; it couldn’t have been Judge Kavanaugh because he testified that he was a virgin until years after he entered college; it couldn’t have been Judge Kavanaugh, because of his exemplary record as a Federal Appeals Court judge … and coach for his daughter’s soccer or basketball team. Using this spin, the Republican team succeeded in convincing their followers that they could have their cake and eat it at the same time. They could pretend to be compassionate, supportive defenders of victims and victims’ rights, while simultaneously trashing the very same victims through insinuations about being confused, being delusional, or being willing to participate in a conspiratorial hoax. In concocting this totally illogical position, they hopefully fooled no one about their motives and priorities. They were collectively more cruel in their phony solicitations to Dr. Blasey than their 1991 predecessors (including Senators Grassley and Hatch) were in attacking Anita Hill outright.
When attention shifted on September 29th to the renewed FBI search for corroborative evidence about Dr. Blasey’s allegations, all efforts to respond appropriately to delayed disclosure about sexual victimization were effectively abandoned. Republicans and Democrats all took their eyes off the ball, off the victim. Overlooked was the simple fact that in the great majority of sexual offenses, there are no eye-witnesses, or even circumstantially corroborating witnesses. Furthermore, there is rarely any physical or medical evidence to be found. As such, it is difficult, if not impossible, to prove someone’s criminal guilt beyond a reasonable doubt. Yet, Judge Kavanaugh’s supporters insisted that the principle of assuming one’s innocence until and if there is overwhelming evidence of guilt, applied in the confirmation proceedings. Since guilt could not be proven, Senator Collins’ “independent minded” reasoning suggested, the concerns raised by Dr. Blasey’s allegations could be ignored, leaving Judge Kavanaugh’s impeccably crafted choir boy image intact. Despite substantial evidence to the contrary, Judge Kavanaugh could be taken at his word when he assured her that he would follow precedent when the question of women’s right to choose came again before the Supreme Court. Brett wouldn’t lie. He never lied about anything to anyone in his entire adult life – not about his awareness of stolen Democratic officials’ emails, or his involvement in developing the legal rationale for water-boarding, or about the degree to which he had a drinking problem in high school and college. Either Senator Collins is a prime candidate to buy the Brooklyn Bridge, or perhaps she isn’t the champion of women’s rights and human rights that she has purported to be. Throughout the hearings, it was repeatedly declared that this was not a criminal proceeding, but instead was comparable to a job interview. The mission was not to prove guilt or innocence, but to learn enough about a candidate’s personal and professional histories to determine whether he was fit for the position of Associate Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court.
In contacting Senator Flake and Senators Feinstein, Whitehouse, Booker, Collins and Schumer on September 23rd, I suggested that a better comparison for the hearings about the allegations is what routinely transpires in Family and Matrimonial Courts across the land. I wrote as follows: “Over the past three decades, I have conducted and supervised hundreds of child sexual abuse assessments for child welfare agencies, Family Courts, and Matrimonial Courts. The central focus of such assessments was the welfare of the child. Authorities sough information about the child’s functioning and how it may have been affected by traumatic sexual experience. They also wanted to know about the details of past sexual trauma, including the identity of the perpetrator. Referrals were triggered by the child’s statements, sudden behavior change, noticeable emotional displays, and/or histories that raised suspicion of sexual traumatization. With child safety in mind, authorities needed to have as much information as possible to determine protective steps that were required. Many of my assessments were used by Family and Matrimonial Court Judges in making determinations about child custody, unsupervised parent-child visitation, ordering stay-away orders of protection, treatment or rehabilitation requirements of family members, and termination of parental rights. Judges were thereby aided by having access to a wealth of professionally collected data, which served as evidence either supporting or not supporting a finding that the child was traumatized and in need of special protective measures and/or trauma-focused treatment. Criminal guilt or innocence is not determined in these proceedings; the matter is referred to the police if criminal charges are deemed appropriate to make. In Family and Matrimonial Courts, the standard of proof of wrongdoing is whether there is a preponderance of evidence (i.e. at least 50.1% evidence) in support of a finding of wrongdoing. This contrasts with the standard applied in Criminal Court, where required evidence of guilt must be high enough (i.e .95% or more) to be conclusive beyond a reasonable doubt. In Criminal Court, the mission pertains to search for truth so that justice may be served, and offenders are held accountable for their actions. In Family and Matrimonial Courts, the mission pertains to search for the truth so that the child’s physical and emotional health is secured.” I urged the senators to apply the preponderance of evidence standard in contemplating Dr. Blasey’s allegations, emphasizing that the hearings are “not to reach a verdict on the innocence or guilt of the alleged offender, Judge Kavanaugh, but rather it’s all about protection. In the present instance, rather than ensuring the safety of a child, it’s about preserving the image and viability of the Supreme Court…” I argued that once the credibility of the Court is sufficiently tarnished, “respect for the rule of law will erode, thereby dooming our democracy… senators must act similarly to Family or Matrimonial Court Judges, ruling in the interests of safety – for the future of the child or the future of our confidence in the Supreme Court, hence, the future of our democracy.”
Perhaps the preponderance of evidence standard will be adopted by congressional committees in the future when partisanship recedes sufficiently to permit objective inquiries about possible candidate misconduct, without resorting to attacking the complainant, or subjecting the candidate to a criminal style inquisition. Advise and consent should be all about protection of the public and our institutions, determining when there might be excessive risk attached to one’s candidacy. It should not be about the prosecution of a crime or the search for justice. In Dr. Blasey’s case, preponderance of evidence pertains how the disclosures made during her testimony were delivered in an honest, forthright, and emotionally congruent manner. They were also consistent from what we know about her previous disclosures made to her therapist 6 years ago, when there was no possible political motive for her. Her disclosures, in conjunction with what has been reported by her therapist, provide convincing evidence that she was a victim of sexual and physical traumatization as a teen. She does not equivocate about the identities of her assailants, particularly since her face was ostensibly only inches away from that of Kavanaugh when he pinned her on her back and covered her mouth. She asserts that she had no more than one drink on the day in question, and she was therefore not impeded in her perceptions by the influence of alcohol. In sharp contrast, Judge Kavanaugh’s testimony was replete with defensive, misleading responses to questions. He ultimately reverted to an offensive attack against his questioners, and on the supposed left wing conspiracy opposing his candidacy. According to Dr. Blasey’s testimony, both Kavanaugh and his friend, Mark Judge, were substantially inebriated at the time of the attack. There is a preponderance of evidence supporting the notion that Kavanaugh was prone to acting out in socially inappropriate ways when under the influence during late adolescence and early adulthood. This lends support to her narrative, and to an explanation as to how both Kavanaugh and Judge might have very little or no recollection of what they allegedly did to Dr. Blasey on the day in question. Other evidence in support of Dr. Blasey’s allegations include her psychological symptoms of trauma as reported by her therapist and by her, and social-behavioral changes that were observed by others soon after the incident. It is noteworthy that one objective held by many belated disclosers of sexual victimization is to finally see that justice is served – even decades after a crime was committed. A significant degree of satisfaction, even euphoria is achieved when the victim and/or loved ones finally get to see that the offender receives punishment that is due. Unfortunately, in most cases of sexual victimization by family members or persons known to the victim, convictions are not common, as a criminal case is impossible to prove without the presence of overwhelming evidence. In the previously mentioned 1999 study of 384 adult survivors of child sexual abuse, only 12% were investigated, only 6% led to criminal charges, and only 3% resulted in conviction. Subjects reported that the most meaningful response that was most helpful to them was action taken to control the perpetrator. As a group, these subjects scored lowest on scales measuring level of depression, and highest on scales measuring self-esteem.
Back to the question of whether it was worth it for Dr. Blasey to subject herself to attacks upon her integrity and credibility heaped upon her by the likes of President Trump, Leader McConnell and their band of unpatriotic bullies who will do anything to hang on to power. What did she possibly gain for herself, for other sexual victimization victims and for the majority of our country’s citizens who are fair-minded and compassionate? For one, she received an outpouring of thanks in appreciation for her sacrifices which served to inspire and mobilized perhaps millions of fellow citizens. On a personal level, perhaps the level of anguish and shame that has endured throughout her adult life may have subsided, thanks to the tremendous support she received from various corners during this ordeal. Research conducted 20 years ago by colleagues and me provided evidence of the enormous benefits that can accrue to a sexual abuse victim who receives comprehensive support from one or more caregivers or other important adults in whom she chooses to confide. Our study, entitled, “Positive Reaction to Disclosure and Recovery From Child Sexual Abuse,” (Gries, L., Goh, D.S., Andrews,. M.B., Gilbert, J., Praver, F., & Stelzer, D.N., 2000, Journal of Child Sexual Abuse, 9(1), 29-51), was initially presented in 1998 at the First International Conference on Child and Adolescent Mental Health, Chinese University of Hong Kong. The study identified factors which helped child victims of sexual abuse experience significantly reduced levels of post-traumatic stress symptoms, dissociation, depression, and behavioral dysfunction. Most important were opportunities for children and teens to speak about their victimization experiences to adults who extended full and reliable support to them. Where children received comprehensive emotional, belief, advocacy and loyalty support from current caregivers, they were assessed by their mental health therapists to be coping remarkably well in light of their ordeal. It was found that just talking about past trauma doesn’t make things better – it can even add to one’s emotional distress, unless comprehensive support for the victim is immediately forthcoming once disclosures are made. When a disclosing victim receives emotional support, she no longer feels alone. Instead, she feels connected, and loved. When she receives belief support, she is better able to shed residual feelings of blame and guilt. Her narrative is accepted and validated without reproach, regardless of any gaps in details that may exist. When she receives advocacy support, she feels confident about getting the help she needs to move on in her life. Someone has her back! When she receives loyalty support, she knows her significant other is committed to her and their relationship unconditionally. There is no threat of being suddenly abandoned in favor of others, of being dropped to the floor after seemingly enjoying the much needed support … abandoned the way she was by Trump and his Republican henchmen in Congress. It is hoped that the uplifting experiences that Dr. Blasey enjoyed through the kind outreach of support from intimates in her life as well as millions of appreciative fellow citizens, greatly outweigh the boorish actions of a few ignorant, insensitive, and misguided politicians who temporarily hold positions of authority for which they are painfully unqualified.
October 9, 2018
Leonard T. Gries, Ph.D., DABPS, Diplomate, Forensic Clinical Psychology, has been a health provider in Psychology for 50 years. Over the past 30 years, he has conducted and supervised hundreds of child sexual abuse assessments for child welfare agencies, family courts and matrimonial courts. He is Executive Director of the Institute for Emotional Health, in East Hills, N.Y. and Briarwood, N.Y., and he is the author of “Gregory of Zimbabwe, A True Story of Overcoming Child Abuse and the Scandal of Diplomatic Immunity.” Fithian Press, 1993.
Only Dr. Blasey can answer the question of whether her coming forward was worth it. Did she derive any benefit from the extensive support she received from fellow sexual abuse survivors across the nation, and from the more enlightened public officials who earnestly spoke up in her behalf? Would she have been better off if she simply kept quiet about her horrendous ordeal, as she had done for the past 36 years, with the exception of long delayed revelations to her husband and to her therapist? For other victims, struggling to decide on how best to heal and to truly recover from the attacks and their psychological, emotional and physical aftermaths, it may be helpful to be educated about what has been learned in the field of sexual trauma from retrospective studies, anecdotal reports of survivors, and from clinical observations reported by treatment providers. Such information should also prove useful to friends and loved ones who wish to come to the aid of survivors, as soon as disclosures are made.
To begin with, the data on the disclosure patterns of children and teens who were sexually victimized has been well documented within professional journals. A 2008 review of 13 retrospective studies of the disclosure patterns of 15,000 adults who had been sexually abused during childhood, found that between 55% and 69% of victims failed to disclose until after reaching adulthood. Of those who belatedly disclosed, between 10% and 46% did so for the first time at the time of the studies. In a 1999 study of 384 child sexual abuse survivors, only one-third disclosed at the time of their abuse. The remaining 262 subjects suppressed what happened to them for years, later explaining how they feared being disbelieved and/or losing parental love. Such fear triggers the victim’s early decision to opt for secrecy. Absent immediate protest, delay breeds continued secrecy, which undermines the hope of being believed as time passes. When the child does not immediately complain, it becomes apparent that there is no second chance. The child experiences a sense of shame, as submission emerges as her only option. Shamed, she feels small, exposed, and inhibited. Shame offers a kind of protection, as it inhibits further action, thereby removing her from additional interpersonal danger. It entrenches secrecy, and paves the way for various negative psychological sequelae, including Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder, pathological dependency, social withdrawal, dissociative reactions, self-injurious behavior, and the development of a self-loathing self-schema, eventuating in depression. Years and decades may pass before the now adult victim of child sexual abuse matures, and she becomes sufficiently angry and empowered to demand to be liberated from the toxic secrets about her past that have interfered with full self-acceptance and full realization of potential. The long suffering victim yearns for resolution of long-held contradictory views about herself; she wants to feel normal, and may now demand justice. Long delayed disclosure is met, however, with incredulity and claims of blatant lying. The fears and threats underlying secrecy come rushing back, as she is blamed for the crisis precipitated by her disclosure, and is cast as offender rather than victim. By the end of the Kavanaugh hearings, Dr. Blasey was the open target of President Trump and his senatorial sycophants, who succeeded in large measure to frame the Judge as the victim and she as the mixed up, conspiratorial offender.
A typical method used to undermine the credibility of the disclosing victim, is to harp on the incomplete details she is able to provide about the alleged incident(s). Supporters of Judge Kavanaugh insisted that Dr. Blasey’s narrative was too short on contextual details, such as precise location, time of event, antecedent and consequent conditions. As lay people, they couldn’t be faulted for their lack of scientific knowledge about the interface between trauma and memory. They couldn’t possibly know about the phenomenon of perceptual narrowing, the narrowing of the perceptual system at the moment of encountering a traumatic event. It has been found that much of the traumatic event may never have been stored because the individual’s attention was focused entirely on the source of survival threat, and the stimuli associated with survival actions. Consequently, much of the information about peripheral details never gets encoded into the memory system to begin with, and thus can subsequently only be inferred. It is no wonder that Dr. Blasey had vivid recall about the identity of her attacker, at a 100% level of confidence, while having only vague recollections of many peripheral details. In assessing victims of child sexual abuse, more weight is placed on sensory and emotional details elicited than on peripheral details, particularly when incidents may have occurred remotely in time or when the victim was very young. The subjective experience of being molested is recorded and processed in a very personal manner which sears the memory trace into the victim’s brain much more vividly than occurs with the processing of peripheral details. That she was terrified of the possibility of being accidentally killed, strongly suggests that her attention was on survival, making it less kujeky fir her to retain many of the other peripheral details.
Kavanaugh’s supporters also emphasized the importance of having no eye-witnesses or other physical, medical or interpersonal evidence. They largely ignored the importance of evidence offered via public communication by Dr. Blasey’s treating therapist, who presumably attested to the presence of confirmatory signs of sexual traumatization. Dr. Blasey’s supporters fell for the bait, by allowing the fate of the inquiry to rest with the discovery of corroborating witnesses through an extended FBI background check. Indeed, a breakthrough of comity miraculously appeared on Saturday, September 29th, when Senator Jeff Flake, at the urging of his friend across the aisle, Senator Chris Coons, seemingly broke ranks with fellow Republicans to demand that the FBI re-open its background check before he’d agree to decide about confirmation. Senator Flake seemed to be genuinely touched by two sexual abuse survivors who confronted him at the elevator on the way to the committee meeting. On the morning of Saturday, October 5th, he and Senator Mikulski appeared to be the only two Republicans driven by concern for protection of the victim as opposed to party. In my email to him that morning, I applauded him for his taking “the bold, principled step of requiring an FBI investigation … before voting to confirm,” but added, “unfortunately, the investigation did not go as far as many pursuers of the truth would have liked, and leaves as many questions on the table as were present before last Saturday. The perception is that the FBI’s mission was compromised for political reasons, tainting the reputation of that hallowed institution even more than Donald Trump succeeded in doing since taking office. I hope and pray that this does not discourage you from continuing in your principled path, and that you vote your conscience…” Alas, my prayers went unanswered. Perhaps Flake never received my email. If he did, I reasoned, surely he’d agree that the additional FBI investigation he had demanded a week earlier was a sham, with dozens of potential witnesses who were suggested by Dr. Blasey ignored and never questioned. Was Flake really as anguished as he appeared to be on 9/29, or was he merely pretending to care. Conceivably, his evident distress may have related more to his having to struggle in response to cogent arguments made by his friend, Senator Coons, than to questions about treating Dr. Blasey fairly. In the end, he caved, even as he was seemingly patronized by Chairman Grassley who acceded to requesting the sham FBI investigation.
During the extra week before confirmation, the Republican narrative devolved into a logically inconsistent position. The “he said, she said” argument, which proclaims the impossibility of ascertaining the truth in situations where there are no witnesses, and it’s one person’s word against the other’s, was discarded. Replacing this line of reasoning was the “compassionate” line that poor Dr. Blasey truly appeared to have been sexually victimized in her younger years, but that someone other than Dr. Kavanaugh must have been the offender. It couldn’t have been Judge Kavanaugh, because he unequivocally denied he ever treated anyone as she described; it couldn’t have been Judge Kavanaugh, because he refused to acknowledge that he ever suffered drinking related blackouts – he only fell asleep; it couldn’t have been Judge Kavanaugh because he testified that he was a virgin until years after he entered college; it couldn’t have been Judge Kavanaugh, because of his exemplary record as a Federal Appeals Court judge … and coach for his daughter’s soccer or basketball team. Using this spin, the Republican team succeeded in convincing their followers that they could have their cake and eat it at the same time. They could pretend to be compassionate, supportive defenders of victims and victims’ rights, while simultaneously trashing the very same victims through insinuations about being confused, being delusional, or being willing to participate in a conspiratorial hoax. In concocting this totally illogical position, they hopefully fooled no one about their motives and priorities. They were collectively more cruel in their phony solicitations to Dr. Blasey than their 1991 predecessors (including Senators Grassley and Hatch) were in attacking Anita Hill outright.
When attention shifted on September 29th to the renewed FBI search for corroborative evidence about Dr. Blasey’s allegations, all efforts to respond appropriately to delayed disclosure about sexual victimization were effectively abandoned. Republicans and Democrats all took their eyes off the ball, off the victim. Overlooked was the simple fact that in the great majority of sexual offenses, there are no eye-witnesses, or even circumstantially corroborating witnesses. Furthermore, there is rarely any physical or medical evidence to be found. As such, it is difficult, if not impossible, to prove someone’s criminal guilt beyond a reasonable doubt. Yet, Judge Kavanaugh’s supporters insisted that the principle of assuming one’s innocence until and if there is overwhelming evidence of guilt, applied in the confirmation proceedings. Since guilt could not be proven, Senator Collins’ “independent minded” reasoning suggested, the concerns raised by Dr. Blasey’s allegations could be ignored, leaving Judge Kavanaugh’s impeccably crafted choir boy image intact. Despite substantial evidence to the contrary, Judge Kavanaugh could be taken at his word when he assured her that he would follow precedent when the question of women’s right to choose came again before the Supreme Court. Brett wouldn’t lie. He never lied about anything to anyone in his entire adult life – not about his awareness of stolen Democratic officials’ emails, or his involvement in developing the legal rationale for water-boarding, or about the degree to which he had a drinking problem in high school and college. Either Senator Collins is a prime candidate to buy the Brooklyn Bridge, or perhaps she isn’t the champion of women’s rights and human rights that she has purported to be. Throughout the hearings, it was repeatedly declared that this was not a criminal proceeding, but instead was comparable to a job interview. The mission was not to prove guilt or innocence, but to learn enough about a candidate’s personal and professional histories to determine whether he was fit for the position of Associate Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court.
In contacting Senator Flake and Senators Feinstein, Whitehouse, Booker, Collins and Schumer on September 23rd, I suggested that a better comparison for the hearings about the allegations is what routinely transpires in Family and Matrimonial Courts across the land. I wrote as follows: “Over the past three decades, I have conducted and supervised hundreds of child sexual abuse assessments for child welfare agencies, Family Courts, and Matrimonial Courts. The central focus of such assessments was the welfare of the child. Authorities sough information about the child’s functioning and how it may have been affected by traumatic sexual experience. They also wanted to know about the details of past sexual trauma, including the identity of the perpetrator. Referrals were triggered by the child’s statements, sudden behavior change, noticeable emotional displays, and/or histories that raised suspicion of sexual traumatization. With child safety in mind, authorities needed to have as much information as possible to determine protective steps that were required. Many of my assessments were used by Family and Matrimonial Court Judges in making determinations about child custody, unsupervised parent-child visitation, ordering stay-away orders of protection, treatment or rehabilitation requirements of family members, and termination of parental rights. Judges were thereby aided by having access to a wealth of professionally collected data, which served as evidence either supporting or not supporting a finding that the child was traumatized and in need of special protective measures and/or trauma-focused treatment. Criminal guilt or innocence is not determined in these proceedings; the matter is referred to the police if criminal charges are deemed appropriate to make. In Family and Matrimonial Courts, the standard of proof of wrongdoing is whether there is a preponderance of evidence (i.e. at least 50.1% evidence) in support of a finding of wrongdoing. This contrasts with the standard applied in Criminal Court, where required evidence of guilt must be high enough (i.e .95% or more) to be conclusive beyond a reasonable doubt. In Criminal Court, the mission pertains to search for truth so that justice may be served, and offenders are held accountable for their actions. In Family and Matrimonial Courts, the mission pertains to search for the truth so that the child’s physical and emotional health is secured.” I urged the senators to apply the preponderance of evidence standard in contemplating Dr. Blasey’s allegations, emphasizing that the hearings are “not to reach a verdict on the innocence or guilt of the alleged offender, Judge Kavanaugh, but rather it’s all about protection. In the present instance, rather than ensuring the safety of a child, it’s about preserving the image and viability of the Supreme Court…” I argued that once the credibility of the Court is sufficiently tarnished, “respect for the rule of law will erode, thereby dooming our democracy… senators must act similarly to Family or Matrimonial Court Judges, ruling in the interests of safety – for the future of the child or the future of our confidence in the Supreme Court, hence, the future of our democracy.”
Perhaps the preponderance of evidence standard will be adopted by congressional committees in the future when partisanship recedes sufficiently to permit objective inquiries about possible candidate misconduct, without resorting to attacking the complainant, or subjecting the candidate to a criminal style inquisition. Advise and consent should be all about protection of the public and our institutions, determining when there might be excessive risk attached to one’s candidacy. It should not be about the prosecution of a crime or the search for justice. In Dr. Blasey’s case, preponderance of evidence pertains how the disclosures made during her testimony were delivered in an honest, forthright, and emotionally congruent manner. They were also consistent from what we know about her previous disclosures made to her therapist 6 years ago, when there was no possible political motive for her. Her disclosures, in conjunction with what has been reported by her therapist, provide convincing evidence that she was a victim of sexual and physical traumatization as a teen. She does not equivocate about the identities of her assailants, particularly since her face was ostensibly only inches away from that of Kavanaugh when he pinned her on her back and covered her mouth. She asserts that she had no more than one drink on the day in question, and she was therefore not impeded in her perceptions by the influence of alcohol. In sharp contrast, Judge Kavanaugh’s testimony was replete with defensive, misleading responses to questions. He ultimately reverted to an offensive attack against his questioners, and on the supposed left wing conspiracy opposing his candidacy. According to Dr. Blasey’s testimony, both Kavanaugh and his friend, Mark Judge, were substantially inebriated at the time of the attack. There is a preponderance of evidence supporting the notion that Kavanaugh was prone to acting out in socially inappropriate ways when under the influence during late adolescence and early adulthood. This lends support to her narrative, and to an explanation as to how both Kavanaugh and Judge might have very little or no recollection of what they allegedly did to Dr. Blasey on the day in question. Other evidence in support of Dr. Blasey’s allegations include her psychological symptoms of trauma as reported by her therapist and by her, and social-behavioral changes that were observed by others soon after the incident. It is noteworthy that one objective held by many belated disclosers of sexual victimization is to finally see that justice is served – even decades after a crime was committed. A significant degree of satisfaction, even euphoria is achieved when the victim and/or loved ones finally get to see that the offender receives punishment that is due. Unfortunately, in most cases of sexual victimization by family members or persons known to the victim, convictions are not common, as a criminal case is impossible to prove without the presence of overwhelming evidence. In the previously mentioned 1999 study of 384 adult survivors of child sexual abuse, only 12% were investigated, only 6% led to criminal charges, and only 3% resulted in conviction. Subjects reported that the most meaningful response that was most helpful to them was action taken to control the perpetrator. As a group, these subjects scored lowest on scales measuring level of depression, and highest on scales measuring self-esteem.
Back to the question of whether it was worth it for Dr. Blasey to subject herself to attacks upon her integrity and credibility heaped upon her by the likes of President Trump, Leader McConnell and their band of unpatriotic bullies who will do anything to hang on to power. What did she possibly gain for herself, for other sexual victimization victims and for the majority of our country’s citizens who are fair-minded and compassionate? For one, she received an outpouring of thanks in appreciation for her sacrifices which served to inspire and mobilized perhaps millions of fellow citizens. On a personal level, perhaps the level of anguish and shame that has endured throughout her adult life may have subsided, thanks to the tremendous support she received from various corners during this ordeal. Research conducted 20 years ago by colleagues and me provided evidence of the enormous benefits that can accrue to a sexual abuse victim who receives comprehensive support from one or more caregivers or other important adults in whom she chooses to confide. Our study, entitled, “Positive Reaction to Disclosure and Recovery From Child Sexual Abuse,” (Gries, L., Goh, D.S., Andrews,. M.B., Gilbert, J., Praver, F., & Stelzer, D.N., 2000, Journal of Child Sexual Abuse, 9(1), 29-51), was initially presented in 1998 at the First International Conference on Child and Adolescent Mental Health, Chinese University of Hong Kong. The study identified factors which helped child victims of sexual abuse experience significantly reduced levels of post-traumatic stress symptoms, dissociation, depression, and behavioral dysfunction. Most important were opportunities for children and teens to speak about their victimization experiences to adults who extended full and reliable support to them. Where children received comprehensive emotional, belief, advocacy and loyalty support from current caregivers, they were assessed by their mental health therapists to be coping remarkably well in light of their ordeal. It was found that just talking about past trauma doesn’t make things better – it can even add to one’s emotional distress, unless comprehensive support for the victim is immediately forthcoming once disclosures are made. When a disclosing victim receives emotional support, she no longer feels alone. Instead, she feels connected, and loved. When she receives belief support, she is better able to shed residual feelings of blame and guilt. Her narrative is accepted and validated without reproach, regardless of any gaps in details that may exist. When she receives advocacy support, she feels confident about getting the help she needs to move on in her life. Someone has her back! When she receives loyalty support, she knows her significant other is committed to her and their relationship unconditionally. There is no threat of being suddenly abandoned in favor of others, of being dropped to the floor after seemingly enjoying the much needed support … abandoned the way she was by Trump and his Republican henchmen in Congress. It is hoped that the uplifting experiences that Dr. Blasey enjoyed through the kind outreach of support from intimates in her life as well as millions of appreciative fellow citizens, greatly outweigh the boorish actions of a few ignorant, insensitive, and misguided politicians who temporarily hold positions of authority for which they are painfully unqualified.
October 9, 2018
Leonard T. Gries, Ph.D., DABPS, Diplomate, Forensic Clinical Psychology, has been a health provider in Psychology for 50 years. Over the past 30 years, he has conducted and supervised hundreds of child sexual abuse assessments for child welfare agencies, family courts and matrimonial courts. He is Executive Director of the Institute for Emotional Health, in East Hills, N.Y. and Briarwood, N.Y., and he is the author of “Gregory of Zimbabwe, A True Story of Overcoming Child Abuse and the Scandal of Diplomatic Immunity.” Fithian Press, 1993.
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