Posted on 08/04/2008 6:00:07 AM PDT by FreeManDC
Hey girls, want to get skanky? Well, sashay down to your local abuse shelter and get buzzed! No, you don't have to be a real victim of domestic violence. All you need is a convincing story.
Last year Hollie Cephas of Monticello, Ark. arrived on the doorstep of the Options shelter to recount her tale of woe: Her husband had beaten her to the point of having two miscarriages, he hid her insulin, and once he even called her a "fat pig."
The intake worker at Options had been taught to "always believe the victim," so of course she was beside herself. One employee was so moved that she loaned Mrs. Cephas $25,000 and let her use her credit card. That covered liquor purchases, a few shopping sprees at the local WalMart, burial expenses for her child, and more.
Then with a dramatic flourish, Cephas phoned the shelter to let them know she'd just had a kidney transplant and the life support was about to be turned off. She died a few days later.
It was all a hoax.
On February 11 police went to her home, where she was still very much alive, calmly residing with her allegedly battering husband. Cephas was hauled down to the Drew County Detention Center, where she was charged with theft by deception and a $250,000 bond placed on her head.
Here's the moral of the story: If you're going to accuse your husband of trying to knock you off, don't use a borrowed credit card after your own funeral.
Girls, there so many ways your interlude at the shelter can be relaxing, profitable, and fun.
First of all, realize you're entitled to three nutritious meals a day, personal toiletries, and so forth. Transportation services may also be available, "but the only excursions offered were to the local mall where a wealth of unaffordable merchandise stared them in the face," explains Nancy S., who spent two years shuttling among shelters in the San Francisco area.
Don't let your kids stop you from having the fun you deserve — all shelters offer free day care, sometimes courtesy of a local teenager who's working off her parole time. She'll have some interesting stories to regale the youngsters!
And don't worry if your kids are still black and blue from their latest visit to the wood shed — shelters won't turn you in for child abuse, at least if you're staying at Another Way in Lake City, Fla. As one former employee told me, "We always knew not to call the law unless you were prepared to be unemployed."
And if you want to toke a little weed, that's fine, too. After all, you've been battered and belittled, you deserve a little break.
If you're in the Houston area, be sure to go by the Bay Area Turning Point. That facility hosts dating parties where local men drop by to schmooze and relax. That's according to Bobbi Bacha, vice president of Blue Moon Investigations, who wonders whether such events are appropriate for abused women at such a vulnerable point in their lives.
And don't fret about that nine o'clock curfew. If you want to go behind the bushes with your new heart-throb or hang out with your old boyfriend — the one you said is your lifelong abuser — no problem, they'll reset the security alarm for you.
If lavender is your color of choice, you don't even need to venture outside. Everyone knows shelter staffs are replete with dykes cruising for a hook-up.
Got a man-problem? Shelters can solve that, as well.
At Bethany House in Falls Church, Va., "Women with almost no marital problems are declared abused and are coached by the staff to go to court and get a protective order against their husbands with the promise of long-term shelter, legal services, [and] counseling," reveals a former shelter volunteer.
And don't worry that your naughty antics might land you in the clink. The good ladies from the abuse shelter will bail you out. After all, you've obviously been suffering from Battered Woman's Syndrome.
Believe it or not, the best is yet to come!
Once you check out of the shelter, you now have the gold-plated Keys to the Kingdom. That's because you can now lay claim to life-long status as a victim, a battered woman. You're a certified survivor.
Want to skirt the return-to-work requirements under TANF? No hassle. Need to re-up your Section 8 housing? You're covered. Are you an illegal immigrant? Bienvenidos, amiga!
There's just one little hitch. Legions of other women have figured out how to work the system, so many shelters now have a long waiting list.
The solution, of course, is to come up with a better story.
Why should I feel sorry for them? I often go to the mall and see stuff I can’t afford to buy.
Somehow I suspect that the con-artists, etc. mentioned in this article are something of the exception, rather than the rule.
Geez, is this really true? Someone sure is out to put the abuse shelters ina bad light.
Judge Judy says, “You picked him/her”.
By the way, the article mentioned TANF. I believe that stands for Temporary Assistance to Needy Families.
Where there’s some possibility of a little free cash, there will always be scammers nearby.
Sniff. How COULD they? How COULD they prosecute this woman?
When you give charity to someone, how can you prosecute them for what they spend the money on?
Next we'll be charging panhandlers for spending money MEANT for food on dope and alcohol instead.
The cases mentioned here are the logical conclusion of the nationwide impementation of the politics of victimhood.
Get ready for a veritable tidal wave of such behavior at ALL levels of “community aid” once B. Hussein Obama is sworn in as our new Chancellor, and Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid and George Soros are REALLY calling the shots.
There are battered women who leave their husbands/boyfriends and go to partner up with women only to learn that women too can be dominant and physically abusive in relationships. The system seems to tell them only beware of men, not of abusive and manipulative “people”.
Actually, you might be wrong about that. I once was a volunteer at one of these shelters. My friend and I volunteered from 9-5, 5 days a week. The longer we were there, the more we came to realize that many of the women (and children) there were just gaming the system. They had figured out that if they came in with a sad enough story, they would be provided with a clean room, 3 squares a day, child care, sent to visit doctors if necessary, and pretty much everything they needed.
All they had to do was make up some tale about some man abusing them--no proof needed--and they could stay up to 2 months at the shelter.
It took my friend and I a while to figure this out, as we were much younger and more inexperienced than we are now. In fact, in the end, she and I got "fired" from our volunteer positions because we decided that the women and children staying there should live by the rules of the house. We started really enforcing them--and were told by the paid director that we were "unfeeling and uncaring".
This was my first exposure to liberalism in action.
So it's the woman's fault if she married a man who turns out to be a wife beater? Really?
I’m not sure I understand the upshot of this story. Are there people out there scamming the system? Sure. So the actions of a loud, but exceedingly small group of people diminishes the reality that the huge majority of people going to these shelters really need them? Holy crap.
This, uh, journalism is at the same level of those who wish to demean an entire religion based on the actions of a very small number (percentage wise) of rogue priests.
I try very hard to avoid painting the vast midddle with tiny extreme.
This is the other side of the coin that the MSM/govt doesn’t want you to hear about. Whether it’s the exception or the rule isn’t something that can be determined on a message board. No doubt there are women abused by their husbands, just as there are many men abused by their wives. That tragedy doesn’t discount the fact there are obviously many who so hate men that they are willing to lie and manipulate the system.
I'd suspect that the legit shelters + people who use them, love to see the bad apples weeded out.
“Why should you feel sorry for women beaten by their husbands? Are you really looking for an answer?
Somehow I suspect that the con-artists, etc. mentioned in this article are something of the exception, rather than the rule.”
There is no question whatsoever that you are correct.
I think what Judge Judy means is that there’s typically signs long before the marriage, i.e., days, weeks, months into the relationship, long before a marriage even occurs.
I once dated a lady to took up the battered spouse and rape crisis cause because a she and a friend had been raped in a short period of time. What she found when she joined certain organizations disgusted her to the point of quickly leaving them.
These organizations were dominated by lesbian women who were filling the void of a stable relationship with a male. The victimized women soon suffered from the same abuses (manipulation, isolation, mental and physical abuse). Being an 'angel of mercy' to victimized women -- at their most vulnerable points in their lives -- made the lesbian hook ups much easier. Some women were literally passed around from counseler to counseler.
“the system” is a cog in the machine bent on destruction of the family unit.
Since a woman married to a man constitutes a family, and a women shacking with a woman does not, only the “heteronormative” relationship gets the scrutiny.
No it’s her fault for staying with him.
A man doesn’t “turn out” to be a wife beater, or violent, or abusive.
A man IS a violent, abusive, wife beater, or he is not.
(Barring a severe head injury altering personality, of course.)
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