After seeing this movie.
Rosemary Kennedy’s lobotomy is testimony to how truly vile and evil Joseph Kennedy really was.
Rosemary was born mildly retarded. Her mother, Rose, worked hard to give her a normal upbringing and keep her with her family.
But Joe secretly arranged for the lobotomy-—then a very dangerous and experimental procedure without even bothering to consult with Rose. A procedure which made Rosemary much worse and was confined to a convent for the rest of her life.
There were many despicable thing Joe Kennedy did, including his cowardice and Nazi sympathizing as ambassador to Great Britain during WWII, running away from the London Blitz and hiding in the countryside. Not to mention stealing the 1960 presidential election among other things.
She was not even that. She was emotionally unstable which interfered with her ability to sit in a classroom and do conventional book learning. I have a relative who was a bit like this in school. She was an emotional basket-case with horrible grades, but when she is calm and relaxed it is obvious that she is as intelligent as anyone. Over the years she has had a hard time keeping a job and her marriage fell apart early on, but as she has gotten older I think she has found her niche and settled into a normal life. That's what infuriates me about the Kennedys. I picture my relative in the same setting as Rosemary and it all fits. I can't imagine the horror of a human being they destroyed by butchering her brain -- just horrible.
I read somewhere that Joe pounced on a day when Rose wasn’t home and that poor Rosemary had an idea of what was going to happen to her and was taken from the house screaming. It must have terrified the other girls. Oddly enough, according to actress Gloria Swanson, one of the reasons why she ended her relationship with Joe Kennedy was her discomfort about his attitude towards Rosemary.
It pleases me to think that Joe burns in Hell for his horrible deeds....as does Teddy, Bobby, and Jack.
After seeing this movie.