They always have a backstory, don’t they?
Some excuse tucked into the folds of their history—
a troubled childhood,
a lonely adolescence,
an addiction,
a trauma
(a trauma just like mine, funny how that works).
And so the world wrings its hands.
Poor man. He didn’t mean it.
He was hurting. He needs help.
They call him broken.
I call him dangerous.
Because here’s the truth that no one wants to say out loud:
He knew exactly what he was doing.
They don’t “accidentally” cross every single boundary.
They groom. They calculate. They watch.
They pick the quiet ones, the trusting ones, the ones who won’t be believed.
And when they’re caught,
they cry like victims
while the real victims are asked to forgive.
To move on.
To understand.
To stop being so angry.
But I am angry.
Righteously. Permanently. Productively.
Because every time we soften the blow with pity,
another predator slips through the cracks.
Let me say this plainly:
We do not owe monsters our empathy.
We owe children our protection.
Our allegiance is not to the man with sad eyes and a tragic past—
it is to the child who wakes up every night
in a cold sweat,
wondering if anyone will ever believe her.
So no, I will not “see both sides.”
There aren’t two sides when one holds power
and the other bleeds for it.
There are survivors.
There are monsters.
And there are those of us
who are done pretending
they’re the same thing.
B
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