I had the unfortunate opportunity to “witness” the end of our neighbor boys, along with several other guys, beating up some boy in the middle of our fairly busy road in the dark at around 8pm last night. Being the “not so quiet” person that I am (*grin*), I started walking over and shouted, “Hey! What’s going on?”
There is a street light at the end of our driveway, in which I noticed one of our neighbor boys with his hands in the air saying, “I didn’t do anything.” as a bunch of the other boys started running off. Didn’t do anything? Really? Is being present really not doing anything? I don’t think so! If you are not STOPPING something that is wrong then you ARE doing something – something wrong. It just really saddens my heart. It brought to mind a movie I saw a long time ago…I’ll have to think for awhile about the name of it – but it had to do with a girl (Jodi Foster played the part) who got raped. I remember the part in the movie where all the men where taunting the other men…egging them on. So, even though some of them “didn’t do anything” – they definitely did something. Something wrong, VERY wrong. [Ok, it has been a LONG time since I’ve seen this movie…and I watched it long before I was saved and really don’t remember a lot of the movie…but I looked it up online and it is “The Accused“.)
The boys across the street have basically raised themselves ~ as their mother is hardly ever home and their parents are divorced. I think I’ve seen their dad over there one time. With that, we’ve always kind of kept an eye on the boys to make sure everything is okay. Despite their rough situation, they do seem to be “pretty good kids” and both are on the local football team. Overall, I am saddened to have seen this happening and their involvement. But mostly by his saying he didn’t do anything, even though he was there, watching.
My simple prayer is for those who think they are “doing nothing” (because they are standing “in the sidelines” and not actually the ones DOING the wrong thing) they are still showing their approval by not stopping what is happening. I pray that our youth will be able to stand up for themselves, and for others, who are being mistreated. This is something Christ would do – and something I pray my boys will do. I pray they will be strong enough IN HIM to do what is right.
Please pray for all the boys involved in this situation. Pray the Lord will speak to their hearts and instill in them that this behavior is totally unacceptable. (The boy that was beaten up was apparently okay enough to walk away while I will still trying to find out what was going on from one of the other boys. Thank the Lord he was at least okay enough to walk away, although I would have liked to speak with him a little. Apparently that wasn’t the Lords desire.)
In Him,
Wow! So glad you went out there when you did. It is a sad state when NOT stopping something is thought of as NOT doing anything wrong. I know the movie The Accused and it made me sick when I saw that part. Hopefully those boys will see something in you, or someone else, that will show them the truth.