Author Archives: Peter Sanford Kahrmann

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About Peter Sanford Kahrmann

Writer, disability rights advocate, civil rights advocate.

Promoting violence against children

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You can’t support violence against children and be a Christian at the same time.  You can’t support violence against children and be emotionally well at the same time. State Representative Gail Finney, a Democrat from Kansas, disagrees. She recently proposed a bill allowing parents,teachers and  caregivers  to spank children so hard they can leave bruises. A visit to her website reveals someone who very clearly believes she is a Christian and no doubt believes she is the very picture of emotional health.

Sick and distorted is the mind that supports violence against children and believes themselves just in doing so.

There is something sickeningly insidious about Finney’s bill. Consider this; given that spankings in schools are currently legal in Kansas (and 18 other states! ) what on earth would compel anyone to propose a bill that legalizes bruising a child’s buttocks? Does Finney truly believe they are not being hit hard enough? It would seem so.

John Bradshaw, a widely-respect philosopher, theologian, counselor, and teacher has repeatedly warned about the pulverizing damage caused by violence against children.  His Healing the Shame presentation is particularly enlightening,  powerful, and poignant. More than once I’ve heard him remind adults that when a child is being hit, they are being hit by someone who is, at minimum, twice their size. Imagine someone twice your size hitting you for a moment. Now, imagine a child, who does not have an extensive enough life history to know they are being abused. As a result, the child believes this is the way it’s supposed to be. This is what he or she deserves. And therein lies the savage psychic damage many never recover from.

While I wish Finney no harm, I do wish her emotional health. In the meantime, she should resign from office. It would be the Christian thing to do.

The trust reward

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There are many things to be grateful for when you live a sober life.  That I still have my life tops my list, thank you very much (smile). The fact those who know me trust me because they know they can is right up there. To be trusted is quite the gift, especially for someone like me who for years would lie and spin tall tales without batting an eye. It was a unhealthy way of life. It was so ingrained in my character there were times I either didn’t realize I was doing it or times when the lie was so silly it baffled even me. If I read 25 books one year I’d say I’d read 26. Crikey!

Many  believe (I did) the moment you stop using (alcohol and or drugs) you are sober. Not true. You have to stop using to then get sober. It took time for me to learn how to live a sober life, an honest life. Dishonesty itself is an insidiously addictive substance.

Being honest does not (by any stretch of the imagination) mean I am always be right. Far from it. In fact, one of aspects of honesty I appreciate the most is the relative ease with which I can admit when I’m wrong, and, when appropriate, apologize. There is something comforting about honesty.

Now, the fact I am honest does not mean people always believe me.  Though they are not always pain free, moments when people think I am being dishonest with them are absent the presence of guilt (now there’s an emotion that will erode one’s sense of worth) and therefore less stressful and complex moments to manage. Not always easy though. While honesty does not make life easy, it does make life easier.

“No legacy is so rich as honesty,” wrote William Shakespeare (“All’s Well that Ends Well”, Act 3 scene 5).  For me it is a legacy within reach, and one I’d never thought possible.

Getting physical: it’s all dance to me

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Movement comes from the inside out, not from the outside in. At least that’s my truth. Someone asked me once how I decided to dance to a particular piece of music. “It’s not up to me,” I said. “It’s up to the music.”  Let the music in and out the movement comes. You’ve got to keep self out of the way. In other words, don’t interrupt.

Movement: a form of dance like jazz, ballet, modern, a form of what society calls exercise or sport: running, swimming, climbing mountains, hiking, biking, walking, kissing, love making… hell, it’s  all dance to me. I’ve seen definitions of dance I like such as, to perform or take part in as a dancer, and, to bring into a specified condition by dancing. These help me understand why, when live wounds or rewards deeply, getting physical is inherently part of my response. When my mother committed suicide in 1992 I ran two marathons in two weeks in 1993. When my daughter was born, I could’ve danced forever.

Of late, swimming is my “dance floor” and  get-physical refuge, though I’m eyeing some challenges on my bike (summiting Mt. Greylock, Massachusetts’ tallest peak at a modest 3,491 feet) and a few others  I’m keeping off the page (for now).  I’m quietly joyous about my relationship with swimming. I can swim a mile freestyle now. For me this is a big deal. It was fall 2012 when I (finally!) decided to face my fear of water, deep over-my-head water.  Now when life wounds or rewards I’m in the water early morning, churning through, moving, dancing all the way. That movement experience when body, spirit, mind, heart and soul are one.

No better place to be fully alive than in the moment, the only place you have to be, in the moment.

Getting physical: it’s all dance to me

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Movement comes from the inside out, not from the outside in. At least that’s my truth. Someone asked me once how I decided to dance to a particular piece of music. “It’s not up to me,” I said. “It’s up to the music.”  Let the music in and out the movement comes. You’ve got to keep self out of the way. In other words, don’t interrupt.

Movement: a form of dance like jazz, ballet, modern, a form of what society calls exercise or sport: running, swimming, climbing mountains, hiking, biking, walking, kissing, love making… hell, it’s  all dance to me. I’ve seen definitions of dance I like such as, to perform or take part in as a dancer, and, to bring into a specified condition by dancing. These help me understand why, when live wounds or rewards deeply, getting physical is inherently part of my response. When my mother committed suicide in 1992 I ran two marathons in two weeks in 1993. When my daughter was born, I could’ve danced forever.

Of late, swimming is my “dance floor” and  get-physical refuge, though I’m eyeing some challenges on my bike (summiting Mt. Greylock, Massachusetts’ tallest peak at a modest 3,491 feet) and a few others  I’m keeping off the page (for now).  I’m quietly joyous about my relationship with swimming. I can swim a mile freestyle now. For me this is a big deal. It was fall 2012 when I (finally!) decided to face my fear of water, deep over-my-head water.  Now when life wounds or rewards I’m in the water early morning, churning through, moving, dancing all the way. That movement experience when body, spirit, mind, heart and soul are one.

No better place to be fully alive than in the moment, the only place you have to be, in the moment.

The killing of Jordan Davis

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Unless you are a newborn, a toddler, or delusional, you know damn well if a black man fired 10 shots into an SUV filled with four white teenagers, killing one,  he’d’ve been convicted for murder by now and on death row, if the state had the death penalty.

But that’s not what happened in Jacksonville, Florida on November 23, 2012.  A 46-year-old white man, Michael Dunn,  man fired 10 shots into an SUV carrying four teenage black men, killing 18-year-old Jordan Davis, and brutally traumatizing the lives of the other three and the families of all four. Dunn says they wouldn’t turn their music down. His claim that he saw the barrel of a shotgun is suspect at best. He never mentioned this to his fiancé, Rhonda Rouer, according to her testimony, as he drove the two of them back to their hotel after the shooting. Law enforcement said no weapons were found on the teens.

Dunn was convicted of attempted second degree murder. The jury was deadlocked on the count of first-degree murder. Thankfully, Dunn will be tried again on that charge. Dunn’s attorney, Cory Strolla,  said his client was “in disbelief” over the verdict. One wonders why. Could it be because Dunn is so delusional he actually thinks he was justified? Or, did he think he would get a pass because he lived in Florida? Has it not occurred anyone that if any of the teens actually had a shotgun they might’ve have fired back?

I have no sympathy for Dunn. I say this not just because he tried to kill four boys (succeeding in killing one) but because of the choices he made immediately following the shooting.  He didn’t call the police. Not only did he and his fiancé simply drive back to their hotel after the shooting, they drove the 175 miles back home the next morning, still not calling the police. His true colors showed up again in his letters from jail. In one he wrote, ““The jail is full of blacks and they all act like thugs. This may sound a bit radical but if more people would arm themselves and kill these fucking idiots, when they’re threatening you, eventually they may take the hint and change their behavior.”” 

And this tragedy is not about the music. Thinkprogress.org’s Judd Legum is right when he wrote, “many prominent media outlets referred to it as the “loud music trial.”” It’s got nothing to do with music. It has to do with America’s addiction to guns, the seething racism that courses through the veins of more than will admit it, and stand your ground laws that empower both.