Am I a bad person for keeping contact with my pops?

Hi. I'm eighteen, and my pops lives in another country than the one I'm in; he fled some years ago (when I was pretty little) because he didn't want to show up-to court. He was in a position of power and sexually assaulted many women. It's haunted me. We talk on the phone, and he visits once every few years. I feel - as a woman myself and someone moral - like I'm a traitor for talking to him. Should I shut him out of my life to 'show him' and be in solidarity, somehow, with these victims, even if they will never know it? It may also be an OCD thing, if this seems weird. I have-that too. I keep myself up at night terrified that I'm in-cahoots with an assaulter because I let him call. I don't know if I'm wrong in this or if it makes me just as bad but it's making me go rather-mental. I'd like, please, an impartial opinion. Thank you.

You aren't in the wrong for feeling this way, and I don't think OCD even comes into this equation. On the one hand, this person is your father and they have made an effort to in contact with you over the years. ...But only seeing you every couple of years is odd. Of course, if he fled your country then that makes sense. How is he still coming to your country to see you? Is he a fugitive in your country at this point, and re-entering your country every couple of years illegally? ...Do you speak over the phone often? I feel like your situation isn't a normal one, and that is definitely his fault for putting your relationship in that place if the allegations against him are credible. Considering it involved "many women", it presumably likely is and I'm sorry. I'm curious what frequent respondent, 'Soulmate', would have as a response for you on here. Honestly, answering this one is tough, and I think this presents you with a difficult choice. Maybe the biggest question here is, do you feel that this man has been a good father to you? I know some things are unforgivable. I'm reminded of a story my one buddy told me, probably close to a decade ago now. There was this guy he used to know and be good friends with, before we started hanging out. I can't remember all of the details now, whether he was abusive to an ex or sexually assaulted someone, or cheated on them or what. It was somewhere along those lines, and I think it was a situation where he didn't have this like hardcore proof of the wrong-doing, but he'd heard enough second-hand that he believed the allegations. I just remember him telling me that he debated attacking him at first, but ultimately cut all contact with the guy then and there. And the guy was possibly left really confused about why they stopped talking. He never mentioned that guy to me again. I think the sexual assault is bad enough, but the being in a position of power thing always feels even slimier. I'm going to end this here for now, because I have to. I don't think I can answer the question for you, but hopefully something I've said here is useful to you. Best of luck.

Hi, thank you. He has only visited once but it planning to come more often. He doesn't come illegally; it's just that it's expensive. I've followed his case on-law-sites and it got thrown out or he was declared innocent, I think, but I know he's been weird regardless. Yes, I don't know. It's really complicated and either way I'll end up feeling terrible. I've wanted to ask my mom what she thinks, but haven't worked up the courage. My girlfriend says that he's my dad and I shouldn't feel bad for talking to him, but I still don't know. That's a tough story. I wonder-if I'll need to do that then, if this wasn't even nearly as tame as cheating. Thank you for your words.

Balance, I think you're too modest - that was sooo good! The fact you even went ahead and tackled such a 'grey'-area of a moral conumdrum in the first place warrants huge respondent kudos to you (oh, and fyi, you count as a forum Veteran now). Keep it up, mate, your responses are very intelligently classy. (IMO, you could be a paid counsellor - EASILY!) :) _____________________________ Swiftie, you already ARE showing solidarity. In your case - literally showing it!...BIG-time! You're so gripped by angst over the dilemma that it's keeping you awake at night. (Bet it gives you tummy trouble, as well, yeah?) This is one huge example of Cognitive Dissonance...the most horrid psycho-physiological sensation out! I'm sure your mind is trying to keep you in the dark to protect Conscious You. It needn't be a dilemma, however, because... It's not like you're blinkering yourself for selfish, non-empathetic reasons. It's that very empathy, mainly, that's giving you such a mentally hard time. Now you know how Rolf Harris's daughter felt. (Here's an idea - why not see if you can write to her?) *I* think (because it's by no means uncommon) that what you're mainly doing, here, is investigating him...whilst wishing that you weren't. And that's MORE than understandable because, out of everyone concerned with a need-to-know, yours is the greatest ...as he's supposed to first and foremost, just be your dad. Plus, genetically, your father (co-chef). You're bound to thave an urge to ensure that you yourself haven't inherited any "weirdness" (albeit, actions already say, Nope!). ...And a lot more reasons than that, too (e.g. understanding what your mum went through). I'd want to give him a damn good frisking as well. Plus, you must be even more confused by the fact that the case was dropped (which you and I both know could be down to not enough court-worthy evidence). Yeah, I'd DEFINITELY want to. But you can't just come out with a load of uncomfortable questions, can you, or he could skidaddle. You have to build a sort of relationship with him... Let's disempower him a little and let out some brain pressure. How do you feel about our nicknaming him, SkidDaddle? And I'd like Balance to continue, too - if he and you are both agreeable? Anyway, in summary: YES, he's your father and you need to know, now that you're old enough and ready, for daughterly reasons, but on the whole, you're playing Undercover Detective. So how does all that feel, now you've read it? Bit better? Might take a few days to sink in, might not. Here when you're ready. :)

(Tsk - sorry - typo - god knows why I put Daughter, meant to put Son. Haha, sorry...forgive me...Bit distracted today. Think also, it was because I was thinking about Rolf's daughter.)

(Crikey, I'm even more absent-minded today than I realised! I WAS right to put Daughter. I think that's my cue to stop multi-tasking, since I'm onviously so crap at it. Sorry again. Got there in the end.)

Soulmate, thank you sincerely for your words. They were a good relief to hear this compassioned approach. Thank you. Balance, you as well. :) I hadn't even known who Rolf Harris was til now. The case is very and scarily similar, but the bit about her best friend -- that's terrible. I, yes, did investigate him so to say. For years, not even my mom knew that I was-aware. I just saw it online and kept it secret that I knew the truth for a while. Now he knows that I knows, but makes weird comments eg "They were the ones who did this to 'us'" and "Believe me, I did nothing wrong" but even if it was false (which I very much doubt) I know as a fact his weird relations with girls. They weren't like, underage or anything, but it was weird especially since at the time they were still married. It's most uncomfortable when he references it lightly like it was a little joke. "Oh, you know, these things on the internet, I'm trying to get rid of them," he'll say a little too casually to me on quite a few times. I never know what to say back so I just sit there like a stone. And if I made conversation about it like you say, questions, I think I'd just get lies back. He's complicated. Apparently my mom thinks he's got a personality disorder that can make him feel like he GENUINELY did not do anything immoral. It's unreal to imagine. I am quite alright with SkiDaddle, as he did indeed SkiDaddle all thos years ago. And yes haha, you were right with the 'daughterly reasons'. That bit cracked me up.

Be with you (and others) asap - sorry to keep you all waiting!

I've only got a couple of minutes until I have to go, but I'll try my best at another response. I will say that there are a lot of people nowadays who have personality-disorders, of sorts. A good decade + ago, you would hear the term "mental gymnastics" get used a lot, and you would see a deeper discussion of subjects such as narcissism. And I think it's good that people started having these discussions and realizing the negative traits that a lot of people have. It's frustrating for me because I generally have a pretty good family, but they have done unbelievable mental gymnastics to excuse the bad behavior of people in power. No matter what information comes to light, they do this mass mental-reprogramming to put themselves on the right side of the story. You would think after more than a decade that they would stop and think, "Huh, there sure are a lot of famous people and politicians we didn't used to mind, but now they are all the enemy. Weird." Or that they would think, "Gee, there sure are a lot of people that were associated with these people we like that went to jail or got cancelled, or took the fall for them." But these thoughts simply don't seem to cross their minds at all. They just believe everything that is fed to them without much independent thought. I'm getting a bit off-subject now and I digress. I also don't mean to downplay what you are going through because that is an especially difficult situation, being the child of someone who abused their power and is still clearly playing their own mental gymnastics to somehow be the victim in all of this. To this day I can't tell you what makes people fall for this stupidity. They want to play the blame game and point at everyone and everything else that they felt has wronged them, and don't want to take accountability for their own horrible wrong-doing. ...And in a lot of instances, these very same people who stand accused but deny everything, are the same sort of people who would put others down and accuse them of not taking any sort of accountability for their actions. There is a serious problem in today's world with people in power, oftentimes older men, who feel that they don't owe anyone anything and that they are some gift to society, even if they don't actually do shit. There is a problem with people not taking accountability for their actions when they very clearly should. There is also, on a somewhat different note, a pattern where these kinds of people will project their problems onto other people. Projection is basically all they've got, and that's what they'll do to try to take the heat off of themselves. They are like overgrown, pouty children that can't get their own way. "Those things you're accusing me of? That wasn't me, that was that guy right over there!", and then they go on a crusade against this new target and blame them of all of the very same things that they're doing. Anyway, I'm going in circles here. But that's just my ten cents. I guess all I can really say is, I relate a bit, and I see that this is a huge and ongoing problem in our society.

Round of applause!!! What do you think, Swiftie? Me, I have nothing I could add on that score. Apart from some more terminology: "and then they go on a crusade against this new target and blame them of all of the very same things that they're doing." Scapegoating, and "doing a DARVO" over the victim's mere Reactive Abuse (which in a court of law counts as rightful, unavoidable, Self-Defence). Basically, as the old saying goes (before we knew it was an actual Narcissism disorder) - 'they shouldn't dish it if they can't take it'. It's simply that they tend NOT to be banking on having to 'take' it. (Yeah, well...eff-you, malignant narcs - we empaths (-sign of supreme mental health!) are FAR stronger and cleverer than you! As for Supernova Empaths: best you run and keep running. As for the strongest GenZs: you just wait...running won't even help you.) On another note, Swiftie, i.e. back to the victims: why on earth are you having such trouble approaching the subject with your own Mum? Is she still too upset/upsettable?

PS: "Soulmate, thank you sincerely for your words. They were a good relief to hear this compassioned approach. Thank you. Balance, you as well. :) " And I really liked your response to Ponkan so - thank-you as much as Balance for paying it forward and so well. :)))) (Hahaha - Mutual Appreciation Society here! 50p to join.)

"They weren't like, underage or anything, but it was weird especially since at the time they were still married. " I've a question: If you had to put money on 'which' - do you think it was the young men in these marriages that he was trying to stick it to, as in ruin their lives and prove himself superior, or the young women? Or BOTH, even? Or do you think it was 'just' impulsivem self-gratuitous, self-gratifying and self-gratuitous? (Tell me if you don't know yet.)

"Or do you think it was 'just' impulsivem self-gratuitous, self-gratifying and self-gratuitous?" HAHAHAHAHAHAHA! ('"Time for bed", said Zebedee', haha.)

Hello to you both again! Balance, you're on the money. It's the same thing I've seen a lot now. It's really hard to see all these men in power and fame get accused of what my dad did. When the Neil Gaiman (if you've seen) stuff broke, it struck-me in shock how the stories threaded through entirely the same. These people are unchecked and my father is unfortunately numbered among them. The mental gymnastics with him haven't ceased. When he visited last year, he told me over and over and over, "They did this to us!" "I'm going to make sure to erase the-LIES off the internet!" and so on. I felt like I was being lied to -- to my face. I was. Soulmate, oh, yes, DARVO. I'm familiar in many ways, haha. Oh -- I misspoke, I meant to say my father and mother at the time were still married. The young women as far as I'm aware were single. So it was just an exercise of power on his part, I think. Maybe he was "bored" with my mother (D:) and couldn't even cheat on her with someone his-own-age. Now that I've cleared up my mistake maybe you can offer other theories you've about why he did so. Yes, I'm glad to pay it forward! I've got plenty-of free time, I might spend some more on here helping others out. Thank you both!

The Neil Gaiman thing was disappointing to hear about. Actually, my ex was a pretty big fan of his, had several of his books and things. I guess sometimes I feel like every man in my ex's life, myself included, have failed her. And I honestly don't have a good response to that. Hopefully when the good outweighs the bad, people will recognize that. I don't know. I know I had gotten talking politics more on the other thread. I think the fact of the matter is that a lot of things are broken in the system, and it's been allowed to go on for a long time. We have corrupt media, corrupt corporations, corrupt politicians, corrupt corruption! So not to justify your father in any way, but there are clearly a lot of bad actors getting away with stuff that is just wrong. You know, the Bill Cosby thing still stings a bit. Here was this wholesome older guy, America's Dad, basically. He would criticize rappers for glorifying bad things and whatnot. Okay, cool. ...Then you find out he might have been drugging and having his way with all of these women for years. Wait a minute, not so cool - in fact, where in the Hell did he get off criticizing rappers when in theory what he was doing may have been way worse than a lot of rap artists? Like womanizing is one thing, whatever. And using authority and power to get your female workers to have sex with you is a lot worse. But when you're making people unconscious and raping them, wtf?, that's like a whole other ball-field of horrible. Not as bad as murder or whatever probably, that has a special Hell, but still. At the same time I guess it's like, he's super-old and is probably going to die soon. It's kind of weird how he got away with that for so long, years ago, and got cancelled and brought to justice so late. I wish the world was different. I wish most of the hippies were real and weren't just flip-floppers, and had actually accomplished more years ago. The world would be so much more beautiful now, but it isn't. Instead of following Austin Powers and free love, we followed Doctor Evil and the big-money corporate world.

I don't know who Neil Gaiman is. I'll have to google it when I've a minute. But anyway, Swiftie: what are you thinking/feeling thus far about Skidaddle and contacting Rolf's daughter? Also: "These people are unchecked and my father is unfortunately numbered among them" Did you look into it far enough to realise that the reason these events all, to quote you, threaded through the same ways, is because Skidaddle is a Narcissist (Narcissistic Personality Disorder aka Antagonistic Personality Disorder) - Type, Malignant, Sub-type, Narcissistic Sociopath, meaning, also no taboos, no shame, lack/absence of empathy, no regard for their own or others' safety, petty or serious law- and social-law breakers, on a permanent power-trip thus willing to take huge risks, etc. (and usually sexually-damaged and perverted)? Oh, and also able to be Covert WHILST being Overt. And always trying to disarm you and create excuses by using The Pity Ploy. Don't confuse Malignant Narcs (dangerously-seething kids in grown-up suits - think akin to a pretend-charming Chucky) with fully-formed, adult People. People wouldn't ever DREAM of feeling and behaving like that! No non-Narc would. PS: The REASON he picked/predated on women younger than him is as per Olivia Rodriguez's line from her song, "Vampire": 'Because girls your age, know better'. Your mum had progressively seen through him and his hot-air BS, meaning, had ceased non-stop admiring or respecting (obeying!) him, so, rather than fix his marriage (like mere, angry, kids can't), his constantly-starving/constantly-deflating ego needed new "Narc Supply" (go google). (Other people are their 'oxygen' because, thanks to how and where they were raised, they lack their own 'bicycle-pump'. Basically. Plus, growing-up, they surpassed mere 'brimming with anger and resentment' to point of, turned Broken & Evil and, frankly murderous (SLOW-murderers, they're called...avoidance of physical evidence). And that's ON TOP of still using childish, nasty little ways of coping with/avoiding any form of rejection or rebellion (which they themselves bring about, of course). Did you realise that? Is that what you meant by, familiar in so many ways? Only you would deep-down know whether these affairs were to frighten your mother into lavishing him with attention again (for fear of him leaving her) - or whether he was just trying to more quickly destroy her because it would be far cheaper than the divorce he could tell she was leaning towards?

PS: You must be extremely proud of your mother's strong sense of identity, strength-of-mind, and protectiveness instinct over you, though - yes?