Have You Ever Met a Monster? | Amy Herdy | TEDxSanJuanIsland

Video Statistics and Information

Video

Captions Word Cloud

Captions

have you ever met a monster someone so scary they alerted the reptilian part of your brain one morning I was going to my job as a criminal justice reporter in Denver I stepped into a crowded elevator faced front and got the sense that someone behind me was watching me so I glanced over my shoulder to see this man staring at me in a very calculating way with cold shark eyes so I stared back and my look said rude person and he didn't drop his eyes so I ended that contest and turned back around alarm bell sounding in my head I instantly decided I didn't want him to know which floor was mine swift the next stop just before the doors came together I darted out at the last minute I flew up the stairs and ran into the news room my heart pounding the fear of monsters is instinctive in Denver in 2005 reports of a serial rapist had residents so frightened some were carrying baseball bats police released a name Brent Brent's and the media scrambled to find out whatever we could on this guy a reporter at the rival newspaper got Brent's sister in Arkansas on the phone and she said he deserves whatever he gets before hanging up one sentence but we'd been scooped get be on a plane to Arkansas editors said find his family and get them to talk to you so I did his mother described Brent's his willful intelligent kid grown up hunting and fishing ran track wrestled boxed he had a learning disorder and became frustrated then angry in school he started smoking pot at age 10 and drinking and that's when he began beating his mother at 13 he flipped a switch on a railroad track and was sent to juvenile detention where he was in and out until the age of 18 when he was convicted of raping two children he served 16 years in prison and was least without supervision his sister remarked that Brent had a lot of anger toward their father who had died the year before so I turned to the mom and said I'm sorry to ask but this is a standard question when someone sexually abuses others was Brent ever abused as a child it was a long pause and then looking down she said Brent makes up all kinds of lies please caught him a few days after Valentine's Day at the start of that weekend a detective had gotten him on the phones and turned herself in you little punk Brent's essentially replied come find me that weekend he raped five victims including two children and nearly beat a young woman to death the DNA from those cases was processed within hours and the manhunt that followed ended in a dramatic car chase into the mountains where police captured him at gunpoint this kind of story causes a media feeding frenzy reporters flocked to the jail but I didn't I didn't think it would do any good instead I sent him a letter on plain stationery handwritten two sentences dear Brent I went to Arkansas where I met with your mom and sister if you were to ask them they would say I treated them with dignity and respect and I would do the same for you I then gave him the phone number to the newsroom and told him to call collect any time because I figured he'd be getting a lot of hate mail on the back of the envelope I wrote please don't be afraid to open this at the end of that week police fruit a statement about another confirmed victim of Brent's and since they'll protect the identity of a victim of sexual assault they'll only release the cross streets that are close to where it happened get thee to those cross streets you and a photographer editor said find this anonymous victim and get her to talk to you right so off we went to those cross streets and we found a sea of rental units like giant Legos we knocked on doors for hours with no luck it was close to getting dark when we saw a woman out walking her dog dog walkers are always great for information and sure enough she said the handyman had told her about a woman who'd been attacked and she gave us the handyman store number and he gave us a victim's door number and I knocked on the door and a man answered and I could see this tiny dark-haired woman hiding behind the door and identified myself and she came out and said you scared me her name is Margaret and she told me her story her attack had happened nearly three weeks earlier and she still had the yellow outlines of bruises on her neck Brinson rushed her at her front door she was coming home from running errands she fought him and he beat and choked her and then raped her Margaret pointed to her couch which had a big chunk cut out of the upholstery the police had taken it for evidence because that was where the rape had happened and when you can't afford a new couch and he can't afford to break your lease and move and Margaret couldn't then you're forced to live with reminders of your worst nightmare she said the police had told her the DNA from her case would take about two months to process they gave her no hope of solving her case and then she saw a story about Bryn's being wanted and recognized his mug shot as her attacker one of the last things she said to me that night really struck me she said I hate him and I still feel sorry for him an animal poor creature a week later Brent's called me one of the first things he said to me was I'm not going to give you anything I love it when people call me and say I'm not going to talk to you okay he then said I have one question for you and anything further depends on your answer and he said people say they hate me that I'm a monster do you think so and without thinking I said no I don't you've done monstrous things but I don't consider you a monster and that's how we started a correspondence in one letter Brent's wrote don't trip I've actually stood two feet away from you in an elevator and rolling my eyes I pulled out a piece of paper to fire back a responsive don't be as we had a deal to always tell the truth and I realized that had been him behind me on the elevator that morning the man whose very presence had caused me to run to the newsroom like a Frightened Rabbit it turned out that Brent's had followed my work a few months before he was released from prison I had co-authored a three-part series into how the military mishandled cases of sexual assault and domestic violence and that had resonated with him not because he was a perpetrator but because the angry manchild within him considered himself a victim this is a picture of Brent in first grade his father had been raping him for three years by then a few weeks after this next picture was taken when Brent was 12 his father beat him so badly that he suffered what medical records described as a left orbital blowout fracture his left eye socket was broken records and interviews with family members indicate that his father was a violent sadistic man the two children from his second marriage were both removed from the home because of his abuse and Brent his brother were both returned although it's not clear why Brent said his father told him that he himself had been beaten and sexually abused as a child by his father Prince grandfather and so the pattern repeated pain degradation shame Brent Brent stood two others what had been done to him as a child and while he was still a child like many victims he blamed himself he once wrote I don't remember much of when I was really young except fear and shame and lack of courage Brent's told me that after that detective said to him turn yourself in you little punk that he Brent's had worked himself into a rage Ben he'd gone and committed his final horrific crime spree and I'm not saying that these factors are an excuse for the violence Brent's committed he made choices he absolutely deserves to spend the rest of his life in prison but knowing what happened to him does help explain why someone like Brent's could commit such violence with such a lack of empathy that his brain was predisposed to it and the abuse inflicted on him was his model it's human nature to want to distance yourself from someone like him label him as a monster dismiss him as evil we don't want to have anything in common with such a monster because then it could mean that we too are capable of monstrous things but putting a rapist in the category of monster may make us feel safer today but it's more dangerous for tomorrow because then we won't believe that the monster can be a neighbor a co-worker a trusted friend and that enables them to hide in plain sight the dominant theme of how to prevent sexual assault today is cloaked and helpful advice like don't walk alone don't drink too much don't put yourself at risk and the message primarily to women is don't get raped how about we turn our focus to a different population instead and say don't rape and then why don't we take it one step further and ask ourselves what are we doing wrong as a culture that we continue to produce rapists because whether it's the ex-convict who attacks strangers the college boy who rapes his girlfriend or the celebrity who drugs and assaults his victims they all choose to exert anger power and control over someone else and with that choice they are all the same and they all leave pain in their wake I've interviewed more than 50 survivors of campus sexual assault in the past two years alone and the details I learn about their perpetrators paint a picture of so many young men being deliberately predatory they isolate their intended victim they ply them with drugs and alcohol they lock doors they ignore tears they ignore pleas to stop they ignore the fact their victim is limp with fear or is unconscious ten years ago Brent Brent was sentenced to fifteen hundred and nine years today all over this country we're seeing new generations of serial rapists why is this still happening why do we continue to reinforce the message to our boys and young men that their worth is linked to their ability to dominate but if we prize compassion more than power when they're little we tell our kids play nicely in the sandbox they could older and we say don't get in fights in the playground take a breath count to ten walk away the naked older still and we teach them about the biological aspects of sex health and reproduction what if we were to vulvas conversations with our youth and teach them how feeling shame how feeling powerless feeling angry all of which cover up hurt and rejection could cause them to want to dominate someone else and that they can learn to recognize triggers and not act on them at least start that conversation and then speak up if you witness predatory behavior and you'll know it when you see it don't make excuses for it don't look away don't cover it up and because sexual assault happens on a continuum starting with verbal harassment and escalating to a physical attack speak up if you hear or read a joke about sexual assault or victimization it's not funny it's not sexy it's dangerous if someone confides in you that they've been sexually assaulted you them false reports are so rare so yes believe them listen to them without judgment help them find resources and then support whatever they decide to do for victims prince told me that group counseling for sexual offenders in prison does not work for an inmate even to be seen going to sex offender group puts their safety at risk and once there they don't want to be seen as vulnerable it's difficult to change when you're living in fear and if we really do want to help them try to change why not offer more of the respect and compassion that can be felt with one-on-one focused attention something a damaged person desperately needs instead of building more prisons and focusing on punishing perpetrators why don't we try to prevent them Brens is often said by the time he was nine his brain was broken what if someone had intervened in his life early on a neighbor a teacher how could no one have noticed that boy who went to school with bruises smelling like urine because he had wet the bed the night before rather than creep down the hall to the bathroom and risk waking his father if you help an abused child you could be preventing a lifetime of pain for more than one person so many people today live and what I call garage houses where the garage is the dominant feature they drive it to their garage at night the door goes up the car goes in the door goes down and they stay inside until they leave the next day they can't tell you the name of the family down the street they won't interact and they sure won't intervenes what if we dared to care without hesitation without condition it's a harsh truth but our society cares more about sexual assault victims if they are the right kind of victim remember how police told Margaret the DNA from her case was sit on a shelf for two months when Brent's attack victims in a high-income neighborhood that DNA was processed within hours Lady Justice might be blind but she can sure have a champagne taste I stayed in touch with Margaret as her case wound its way through the court system in July of 2005 Bryn's pleaded guilty to her attack like many survivors who strop it with post-traumatic stress disorder Margaret was terrified of leaving the house she had nightmares flashbacks she couldn't hold down a job her marriage fell apart the day before the hearing Margaret asked me to deliver a message to Brent's for her and I agreed and this was her message tellin I forgive him it's stunning isn't it how could she forgive this man who wounded her so who nearly took everything from her and she said I'm not thinking of the man who tried to kill me I'm thinking of the little boy who had the same thing happened to him and she said hating is not hard but if I go on hating him I will never get over it and she added if it was me I would want someone to try to help me or listen to me and not just look at me like I was an animal or a monster she inspires me if Margaret can forgive Brian friends we can forgive anybody this case had a profound effect on my life it taught me that we are all connected and that turning our backs on others is really abandoning ourselves it made me realize I didn't like the reporter I had become it was actually Brent's who pointed out to me that he and I had something in common we were both driven I quit that job shortly after his case ended and I will never again work in a newsroom because the desperate competition for ratings is unhealthy for me in many ways and I no longer knock on a survivor's door unless I'm invited I started that correspondence with Brent's because as a journalist who has spent a lifetime covering sexual assault I wanted an answer to the question why he began as a bug under a microscope and that's what I told him Brent Brent became a lesson in humanity and compassion even so-called monsters have things they're afraid of Brent's wrote me about his he said my biggest fear is that I will die without ever having done anything good and that's why I tell this story thank you for listening

Info

Channel: TEDx Talks

Views: 831,133

Rating: 4.767673 out of 5

Keywords: TEDxTalks, English, United States, Health, Crime, Culture, Men, Mental health, Prison, Psychology, Sexual Assault, Social Change, Violence, Women

Id: IV5jbi7otx0

Channel Id: undefined

Length: 18min 10sec (1090 seconds)

Published: Wed Jan 13 2016

Reddit Comments