Part of why I’m participating in this whole “blogging for a good cause” is because there is definitely enough terrible stuff happening in this depraved world these days.

Over the last few weeks, two terrible stories have really disturbed me and, to some extent, shaken my faith in the world at large.

The first story I’d like to discuss a bit involves a mother and son who were a victim of a home invasion and rape in West Palm Beach.

Not only did ten attackers (mostly teens) bumrush the mother and force their way into her meager apartment, but they forced the son to actively participate in the gang rape. When they were done, they poured all kinds of household cleaning products (including bleach) into the boy’s eyes.

Didn’t hear about it? That might be due to it happening in a low income housing area in West Palm Beach. People don’t like to talk about what happens in “the projects” of this country. People don’t like to talk about the slippery slope to a life of crime that can occur on the lowest scale of the low income class in this country. Single parents struggling to provide for their families because the other parent ran out at the daunting idea of trying to raise a family on the ridiculously low wages they make when they can find work. Kids getting lost in the shuffle, as they are left to their own devices more and more, as those raising them need to work several jobs. An absentee parent can’t offer much guidance to a kid…and an attentive parent can’t very well provide food and resources for their children if their ain’t enough income coming in.

This sort of stuff will become more and more common as the gulf widens between the haves and the have nots in this country. The situation doesn’t excuse the behavior, for certain…but, then again, is their really an excuse for this situation to begin with?

This entry was posted on Saturday, July 28th, 2007 at 6:10 pm and is filed under Blogathon, Kevin Huxford. You can subscribe via RSS 2.0 feed to this post's comments. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.