Thursday, September 23, 2004

Elderly woman sexually assaulted - doesn't go to police for fear of being committed


This (link) kind of thing makes me so upset. This elderly woman (76) was terrorized by juvenile boys and sexually assaulted, but was so afraid of being committed to a mental health facility again (after a previous sexual assault) that she didn't contact police.

Only someone who has never been in a mental health facility could possibly think it's a healthy space for someone to be in, esp. someone who's just gone through severe trauma. Mental health facilities by their very nature were created as penitentiaries for the "insane." They are not a form of health care so much as a form of segregation. And what does it say about hospitals that this woman was more in fear of them than the boys assaulting her? What kind of treatment did she recieve the last time she was committed?

I don't know what else to say about it, read the article.

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