I can’t I imagine the depths of Amanda Berry’s, Michelle Knight’s and Gina DeJesus’ superhuman internal instinct to live, or perhaps more accurately, to survive.
Being held against one’s will in a perpetual state of fear may be the most extreme form of domestic violence, right up there on the despicable acts lists with human trafficking. Under the law, what happened to these three women will be called kidnapping, illegal imprisonment or something like that. However, in my mind those charges don’t begin to capture the warped dimensions of the act.
Prisoners know why they’re behind bars. POWs understood the rules of military confinement. Those facing potential death at the hands of kidnappers seeking to make a political point or extract a profit generally understand their captor’s motives.
But what is the sick combination of power, threats, male dominance and vulnerability of youngsters that allow monsters to prey on them and others like Elizabeth Smart and Jaycee Dugard? At one time, I actually thought these imprisonment crimes were aberrations in a civilized society. Now I’m not so sure.
Imagine what you would think if you heard a woman scream, “I need help! I need help! I have been kidnapped for 10 years.” Most likely you’d help a person in trouble. But listen to the early exchanges in the 911 tape, and then be thankful that the operator didn’t treat the call as a prank,or the guy who saw her escaping the house didn’t ignore her pleas. Different responses and the women’s might still be captives.
Elizabeth Smart, who was kidnapped in 2003 at the age of 14 and held captive for nine months, told respond to the Cleveland case this way:
“You never know when that break in the case might come. There are children out there who are still alive and still waiting to come home. What if someone had given up on any one of these children? What if everyone gave up on me? Would I be alive? I don’t know.”
Hope remains as long as we allow it, and heroism occurs when ordinary people respond to crises in extraordinary ways.