Excerpt From Jerry Remy Book

drbretto

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I do think it's pretty ridiculous people holding him accountable for his son's crimes. That's pure internet armchair life judging from a 1000 miles away and basically everything wrong with people having access to the internet. We don't go blaming Ted Bundy's parents or anything like that, so the only reason anyone would focus that attention on Jerry Remy is because we're familiar with Jerry Remy. And that's a really dumb reason to blame him for his kid. Some people just grow up to be terrible people. He was an adult and made his own choices.
 

John Marzano Olympic Hero

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It's interesting that this was just brought up because I had a very lengthy conversation about this with my brother recently. He's of the opinion that Remy should be a pariah for what his son has done since he and his wife (seemed) to have bailed Jared out every time something went wrong. My brother's POV is that basically through negligent parenting, Jared Remy became a monster and eventually did something so heinous that not even Remy could get him out of it this time.

In 2013, I pretty much agreed with him. I don't in 2019.

Reading through Jared Remy's Wiki page, the dude is a serious piece of shit. The worst of the worst. But I'm not sure exactly what Jerry and Phoebe could have done to stop the dude, especially once he reached adulthood. Not provide him cushy jobs with the Sox? In hindsight, probably. But maybe Jerry did that so he could watch over him (or at least have others in the organization keep tabs on him). And what is the alternative? Jared Remy is a scumbag and was going to hang out with scumbags if his parents booted him out of his house.

I would think that it's hard as hell to give up on your kid, so I don't envy Remy at all -- despite his job and his cash.

But I'll tell you, and I'm a bit ashamed to admit it, that back in 2013, I wanted Remy gone. I wanted him to pay for the sins of his son. And now, I think that's the wrong take to have. I think that Remy lets himself and his wife slide a lot in this excerpt. I'm not sure exactly what I wanted him to write, maybe nothing would have satisfied me.
 

jcd0805

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I think Remy's wife contacted the fiance and tried to get her not to press charges in previous cases, at least that's what I recall, and that is pretty indefensible. But Remy it seems pretty clear just adores his wife and he was gone A LOT and probably feels guilty that she had to raise the kids and does not want any blame put on her. I do think sometimes it's clear that parents are raising a-holes because they want to be their friend or they don't want to the hassle of disciplining them or whatever reason, but ultimately Remy's son was a grown ass man who chose to murder someone and that is all on him it just is. My heart really hurts for Remy, I remember watching him be honored at Fenway last year and he was just so happy to have that day it made me very happy the Red Sox didn't cut him loose after this happened.
 

Dummy Hoy

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As @fairlee76 linked article covers, it’s not just one kid who made mistakes- the whole Remy clan are a bunch of assholes (the wife may be okay, I don’t know). Stories about what a sullen prick Remy was/is growing up have been circulating for years, and all three of his kids have been involved with aggressive, physically violent crimes. I know this stuff is sacrilege because everyone loves the Remdog persona he puts out, but it’s pretty clear (and has been to people paying attention) that this wasn’t a story about one bad apple- the rot goes a lot deeper.

I’m very empathetic to the challenges of raising kids- I have my own and I have spent more than 25 years working with special education students, including a lot of time with severe behavioral kids. It can be very hard and sometimes an individual is just too disturbed to be helped. While that may be a (large) part of the Jarred Remy story, i have no interest in listening to Jerry try to absolve himself of the blame so he can sell a few more books.
 

RG33

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I think it sounds like Jerry was a lousy Dad. I think it sounds like the whole family is a pile of shit.

I don't think it sounds like Jerry is responsible, at all, for his son committing a heinous crime where he killed the mother of his child. Jared was a grown man who made horrible decision after horrible decision, and regardless of Jerry and his wife's enabling along the way, I don't see how direct lines can be drawn to this level of evil.

All of these things can be true at the same time in my opinion.

Also, I'm not a fan of the "Rem-Dawg". I grew tired of listening to him like 20 years ago.
 

uncannymanny

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Jared had developmental and emotional issues at a very young age (including aggression). These did not come from parenting. Maybe the Remys didn’t handle those issues as well as they could’ve, but Jared was a mess without their help and has been pumping himself full of steroids for years.
 

nattysez

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I think Remy's wife contacted the fiance and tried to get her not to press charges in previous cases, at least that's what I recall, and that is pretty indefensible. But Remy it seems pretty clear just adores his wife and he was gone A LOT and probably feels guilty that she had to raise the kids and does not want any blame put on her. I do think sometimes it's clear that parents are raising a-holes because they want to be their friend or they don't want to the hassle of disciplining them or whatever reason, but ultimately Remy's son was a grown ass man who chose to murder someone and that is all on him it just is. My heart really hurts for Remy, I remember watching him be honored at Fenway last year and he was just so happy to have that day it made me very happy the Red Sox didn't cut him loose after this happened.
My recollection was that both Remy and his wife urged her not to press charges, but I couldn't find an article specifically outlining that in a few-minute search. Then they followed that up by going to court against the parents of the woman their kid killed to try to get full custody of their granddaughter. I don't have an ounce of sympathy for him.
 

uncannymanny

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I’d place the most blame here on the courts which routinely (like every few months) CWOFed him or let him out on cheap bail for violent and violent domestic incidents. Read the legal timeline on Wikipedia. It’s fucking crazy. He should’ve been locked up years before this happened.

Parents are going to help their children to a fault. Would any of your parents totally bail on you?
 

azsoxpatsfan

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I don’t have kids so I have no idea but I feel like most people wouldn’t just give up on trying to help their kid even if they know that it would be the rational thing to do. I think it’s obvious he had good intentions (trying to help his son), and it’s probably close to impossible to admit that your son is a piece of shit beyond help. Maybe he wasn’t a good father, maybe he was partially responsible for his son not being locked up before he could kill someone, who knows. But I still definitely feel bad for him
 

wade boggs chicken dinner

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I’d place the most blame here on the courts which routinely (like every few months) CWOFed him or let him out on cheap bail for violent and violent domestic incidents. Read the legal timeline on Wikipedia. It’s fucking crazy. He should’ve been locked up years before this happened.

Parents are going to help their children to a fault. Would any of your parents totally bail on you?
As someone who was pretty involved in the Boston DV scene in the early 1990s, I will say that the timeline of what happened is horrific to me, particularly considering the description that his lawyer, Peter Bella gave (see https://masslawyersweekly.com/2014/03/28/longtime-remy-lawyer-peter-bella-responds-to-criticisms/).

The system clearly failed. I will note, however, that the system was never designed to deal with intimate partner violence and for a lot of reasons, the system isn't equipped to deal with such issues.

Which is sad for a lot of women.
 

Marciano490

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If nothing else, the guy was obviously on a massive amount of steroids. Where was he getting the extra thousand or so a month to run the kindnof cycles he was on?
 

santadevil

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I somehow found my way to this article in the Boston Globe
Crazy read, but does show that more than once, Mom got Jared out on bail

And that even though he was making minimum wage with the Sox, he was able to post his own $3,000 bail and get out
Though he said he made only $10 an hour at Fenway, he quickly produced the $3,000 bail to free himself that night. In court in Waltham for his arraignment the next morning, he ignored a restraining order and strode over to McMahon, according to a police report, and accused her of cheating. She forced him to examine her black-and-blue face. “Remy put his head down and said it was the Anedrol [Anadrol, a steroid],” police wrote in the report. According to the report, Remy told McMahon “that he was going to miss her . . . and said sorry.”
It's implied over and over than Jerry and Phoebe were funding his lifestyle
 

Marciano490

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That kind of closes out the point I was making above - that steroids can increase aggression. So, if he’s making 10/hr and running that much juice and that juice is making him violent.... yeah, fuck Jerry Remy.
 

moondog80

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If nothing else, the guy was obviously on a massive amount of steroids. Where was he getting the extra thousand or so a month to run the kindnof cycles he was on?
He was fired from his security guard job with the Red Sox because another guard who was caught with steroids cited him as the supplier. So maybe he was dealing?
 

Spacemans Bong

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But I'll tell you, and I'm a bit ashamed to admit it, that back in 2013, I wanted Remy gone. I wanted him to pay for the sins of his son. And now, I think that's the wrong take to have. I think that Remy lets himself and his wife slide a lot in this excerpt. I'm not sure exactly what I wanted him to write, maybe nothing would have satisfied me.
I don't know, as I reread stuff about this case, re-remembering just what enablers Jerry and Phoebe Remy were really bothers me. Obviously, in hindsight, they'd have done things differently. Reading the except, with the recognition that this is ghostwritten, I get the impression Jerry Remy feels a lot of guilt about what happened. But they went *way* beyond trying to help their son to full-on shielding him from even the slightest consequences of his actions, and it's fair to point that out.

It's obvious Jared Remy had a pretty disdainful attitude towards his own mental health. Taking anti-anxiety medication makes me broken! and utter nonsense like that. I don't know where he got that from but with Jerry's (likely connected) mental health struggles in the last few years, if Jerry was the source I bet he's reconsidered.
 

Kliq

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As someone who was pretty involved in the Boston DV scene in the early 1990s, I will say that the timeline of what happened is horrific to me, particularly considering the description that his lawyer, Peter Bella gave (see https://masslawyersweekly.com/2014/03/28/longtime-remy-lawyer-peter-bella-responds-to-criticisms/).

The system clearly failed. I will note, however, that the system was never designed to deal with intimate partner violence and for a lot of reasons, the system isn't equipped to deal with such issues.

Which is sad for a lot of women.
Peter Bella fulfills a lot of defense attorney stereotypes, he really should be a character on Law and Order.
 

John Marzano Olympic Hero

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But they went *way* beyond trying to help their son to full-on shielding him from even the slightest consequences of his actions, and it's fair to point that out.
I agree with this assessment, I really do. But I wonder (and this isn't on you to answer), as a parent, what do you do? It's easy for me (a father of two kids under 12-years-old) to say "Fuck Jared, they should have let him rot." but honestly, I don't know if I could do that to one of my children. I don't think that a lot of people can step outside themselves and see their children for who they really are. I mean we all grew up or knew of boys who were complete psychos or girls that were promiscuous. And while we are able to see those kids for what they are, do their parents? And if they do, what can you do about it? Get them treatment, push them towards rehab. Sure. But what if they don't want to or refuse to go? Then what?

And I'm not letting Remy off the hook, or at least I'm trying not to. But it's hard enough to raise a kid, I'd imagine it's ten times more difficult when he's a roided-up, uncontrollable psychopath. Jared Remy could rip his parents apart if he wanted to. Is he going to listen when you say, "Jared, that wasn't a good choice. Let's rethink what we just did."? As far as helping them, yeah the Remys messed up huge -- there's no denying that. But to anticipate that your own son would murder someone, especially his fiancé? Man, that's really dark. I don't know if I could go there.
 

uncannymanny

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I agree with this assessment, I really do. But I wonder (and this isn't on you to answer), as a parent, what do you do? It's easy for me (a father of two kids under 12-years-old) to say "Fuck Jared, they should have let him rot." but honestly, I don't know if I could do that to one of my children. I don't think that a lot of people can step outside themselves and see their children for who they really are. I mean we all grew up or knew of boys who were complete psychos or girls that were promiscuous. And while we are able to see those kids for what they are, do their parents? And if they do, what can you do about it? Get them treatment, push them towards rehab. Sure. But what if they don't want to or refuse to go? Then what?

And I'm not letting Remy off the hook, or at least I'm trying not to. But it's hard enough to raise a kid, I'd imagine it's ten times more difficult when he's a roided-up, uncontrollable psychopath. Jared Remy could rip his parents apart if he wanted to. Is he going to listen when you say, "Jared, that wasn't a good choice. Let's rethink what we just did."? As far as helping them, yeah the Remys messed up huge -- there's no denying that. But to anticipate that your own son would murder someone, especially his fiancé? Man, that's really dark. I don't know if I could go there.
100% nailed what I was trying to say. It's really easy to disown someone else's kid.
 

jcd0805

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My recollection was that both Remy and his wife urged her not to press charges, but I couldn't find an article specifically outlining that in a few-minute search. Then they followed that up by going to court against the parents of the woman their kid killed to try to get full custody of their granddaughter. I don't have an ounce of sympathy for him.
I believe they went to court just to assure they would still be able to have contact with their granddaughter, not gain custody of her.
 

wade boggs chicken dinner

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I agree with this assessment, I really do. But I wonder (and this isn't on you to answer), as a parent, what do you do? It's easy for me (a father of two kids under 12-years-old) to say "Fuck Jared, they should have let him rot." but honestly, I don't know if I could do that to one of my children. I don't think that a lot of people can step outside themselves and see their children for who they really are. I mean we all grew up or knew of boys who were complete psychos or girls that were promiscuous. And while we are able to see those kids for what they are, do their parents? And if they do, what can you do about it? Get them treatment, push them towards rehab. Sure. But what if they don't want to or refuse to go? Then what?

And I'm not letting Remy off the hook, or at least I'm trying not to. But it's hard enough to raise a kid, I'd imagine it's ten times more difficult when he's a roided-up, uncontrollable psychopath. Jared Remy could rip his parents apart if he wanted to. Is he going to listen when you say, "Jared, that wasn't a good choice. Let's rethink what we just did."? As far as helping them, yeah the Remys messed up huge -- there's no denying that. But to anticipate that your own son would murder someone, especially his fiancé? Man, that's really dark. I don't know if I could go there.
I agree that it's not the fault of the parents when the kid does something horrific but I do hope they look in the mirror to see what they could have done better.

On a purely theoretical level, what a parent is supposed to do is set for the child boundaries and consequences. When the child crosses the boundaries, the child has to face the consequences. Constantly bailing a child out either from the legal process or with money isn't going to help the child make better choices in the future.

But as you say, it's incredibly tough to do that with family. All we need to do is take a look at the Dear Abby or Dear Ann Landers columns (or their successors) to see how many families don't do this.

It's sad that no one with whom Jared Remy interacted didn't say, "Look, you can't act this way and you have to face the consequences of your actions." The DV laws were designed to take this possibility out of the equation (i.e., forced prosecution and protective orders). Still, the reality of the situation is that there are enough of these cases so that it is not uncommon for a batterer to figure out how to manipulate judges or prosecutors or victims (or all three) that they slip through the cracks and then something terrible happens.

And it's not just DV. A relative of my wife is on what I believe to be his 13th DUI and he's still driving. And drinking.
 

uncannymanny

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On November 7, 2005 police responded to a domestic disturbance at Remy's home in Waltham, Massachusetts. Police stated that Remy had grabbed McMahon by her hair, dragged her down the stairs, threw her to the ground, threw a cell phone at her, and kicked her in the back, stomach, and face. She was beaten so badly, that she suffered a broken nose, a bloodied lip, and had a welt around one eye.[2][7] She was taken to Newton-Wellesley Hospital. Remy was arrested at his father's home in Weston, Massachusetts, and charged with assault, battery, and resisting arrest.[7] Remy admitted to police that he had "slapped her around", but dismissed the likely consequences as just "another year of probation".
 

Mueller's Twin Grannies

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Was Remy's wife a drinker at all when she was pregnant with Jared? Is there any chance he was a FAS kid? My cousin was one of those and he turned out much the same way (minus the murder, as far as I know). His parents basically disowned him but they had their own issues (his dad was philanderer and his mother an alcoholic who drank herself into an early grave after they divorced). Last we heard, he was either dealing drugs or in jail. But I have been told that a common thing with FAS kids is completely lack of conscience and that seems to describe Jared pretty well.
 

Spacemans Bong

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I agree with this assessment, I really do. But I wonder (and this isn't on you to answer), as a parent, what do you do? It's easy for me (a father of two kids under 12-years-old) to say "Fuck Jared, they should have let him rot." but honestly, I don't know if I could do that to one of my children. I don't think that a lot of people can step outside themselves and see their children for who they really are. I mean we all grew up or knew of boys who were complete psychos or girls that were promiscuous. And while we are able to see those kids for what they are, do their parents? And if they do, what can you do about it? Get them treatment, push them towards rehab. Sure. But what if they don't want to or refuse to go? Then what?

And I'm not letting Remy off the hook, or at least I'm trying not to. But it's hard enough to raise a kid, I'd imagine it's ten times more difficult when he's a roided-up, uncontrollable psychopath. Jared Remy could rip his parents apart if he wanted to. Is he going to listen when you say, "Jared, that wasn't a good choice. Let's rethink what we just did."? As far as helping them, yeah the Remys messed up huge -- there's no denying that. But to anticipate that your own son would murder someone, especially his fiancé? Man, that's really dark. I don't know if I could go there.
I don't really disagree, I'm a father of youngster too and you find new depths of love and willingness to protect them. But when your teenage son's pregnant girlfriend is crying to you that he tried to throw her out of a moving car, how are you continuing to protect this kid in every possible way? It doesn't have to be putting them in the justice system (not that it was equipped to provide boundaries to Jared anyway). Therapy, reasserting control of his finances (since I believe he was being funded by Jerry), something. The mutant who showed up in a courtroom with a gash above his head, inflicted by a girlfriend fighting for her life, that guy may terrified Jerry and Phoebe Remy, but 19 year old Jared wasn't that size yet. He wasn't Aaron Judge on the juice, teenage Jared judging by the one photo that I've seen of him looks like he was a chip off the old block in height and build.

Sure, anticipating your son would brutally murder his fiancé, nobody sees that coming. But should they have been as surprised were Jared a passionate gardener who enjoyed writing poetry and became a vegan for animal rights reasons? Of course not. He was violent and had a DV trail a mile long.
 

wade boggs chicken dinner

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Sure, anticipating your son would brutally murder his fiancé, nobody sees that coming.
Actually, people in the profession/system probably should have seen it coming. One thing they teach you during DV trainings is that the violence almost always escalates and someone who is able to break the nose of a partner is definitely able to kill her.
 

John Marzano Olympic Hero

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But when your teenage son's pregnant girlfriend is crying to you that he tried to throw her out of a moving car, how are you continuing to protect this kid in every possible way? It doesn't have to be putting them in the justice system (not that it was equipped to provide boundaries to Jared anyway). Therapy, reasserting control of his finances (since I believe he was being funded by Jerry), something. The mutant who showed up in a courtroom with a gash above his head, inflicted by a girlfriend fighting for her life, that guy may terrified Jerry and Phoebe Remy, but 19 year old Jared wasn't that size yet. He wasn't Aaron Judge on the juice, teenage Jared judging by the one photo that I've seen of him looks like he was a chip off the old block in height and build.

Sure, anticipating your son would brutally murder his fiancé, nobody sees that coming. But should they have been as surprised were Jared a passionate gardener who enjoyed writing poetry and became a vegan for animal rights reasons? Of course not. He was violent and had a DV trail a mile long.
Before we go further, here are two things that I think:

1. Jared Remy is the lowest of the low. A true scum bag who has anger issues mixed with money and second-hand fame. This is a combination that always ends poorly for anyone who comes within 100 miles of his orbit.

2. Phoebe and Jerry Remy are probably not Ward and June Cleaver or Mike and Carol Brady or Cliff and Claire Huxtable. Thanks to Jerry's job as a baseball player and announcer, my guess is that he was rarely home, which left all the parenting to the mother. Obviously there are a lot of great single moms who have awesome kids, but maybe Phobe wasn't cut out for the single mom thing. Maybe when Remy was home he was still an absent dad. I don't know. But I think it's obvious that mistakes were made. A lot.

Having said that, let's play the throw the girlfriend out of the moving car scenario out, a bit further. Perhaps J&P thought that they weren't helping their son when they didn't report him to the cops or took away his money or kicked him out of the house. Maybe they thought that they were helping his girlfriend. Jared clearly has messed up thought processes. Maybe the Remys were worried that if punishment was meted out by them, he'd blame his GF and take it out on her. That's what I would worry about, my son's retribution.

As far as not being scared of Jared because he wasn't Aaron Judge sized, I'm not sure if I buy that. He (and a couple of his buddies) fucked up that male friend of his girlfriend when he was still in high school, so even if he wasn't ripped, he was still unbalanced and dangerous.

I guess I'm not sure what the right answer is here. They probably should have nipped this in the bud when he was younger, but they didn't. I'm not sure why, but I wager it probably has a lot to do with what we know and what we don't know. And these things have a way of snowballing out of control if you don't get ahead of this. That's what happened to the Remys and I empathize with them. Does that mean I take them off the hook for any guilt? Hell no. And TBH, I think that the excerpt from this book doesn't really paint Jerry in the best light. But at the same time, we've all been in situations where things go south really fast, most of the time it doesn't involve our child and the murder of our daughter-in-law.
 

Time to Mo Vaughn

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I agree with this assessment, I really do. But I wonder (and this isn't on you to answer), as a parent, what do you do? It's easy for me (a father of two kids under 12-years-old) to say "Fuck Jared, they should have let him rot." but honestly, I don't know if I could do that to one of my children. I don't think that a lot of people can step outside themselves and see their children for who they really are. I mean we all grew up or knew of boys who were complete psychos or girls that were promiscuous. And while we are able to see those kids for what they are, do their parents? And if they do, what can you do about it? Get them treatment, push them towards rehab. Sure. But what if they don't want to or refuse to go? Then what?
I think what some of this comes to is who to blame, and I think what I come back to is the fact that all three of their kids have been arrested in some sort of violent event. I think there can be the one kid in the family that just turns out as a sociopath despite the kids best efforts, but we're talking about now the Remy kids are 3 for 3, and that probably under reports the incidents they have actually had considering they are white, wealthy and related to a local celebrity. I don't think I blame Jerry or Phoebe for trying to always help their kids. I blame them for raising really shitty human beings.
 

Archer1979

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As stated upthread, it's easy to disown someone else's kid.

This is why you have impartial people in the middle of these legal proceedings. Of course the Remy's are going to be an advocate for their son, but they're not the ultimate decision makers. That's on someone else for not reading the situation correctly and putting a stop to it until something tragic happens. Ultimately, it's Jared Remy's to blame, but there were professionals involved that became the enablers.
 

hittery

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I work with a lot of DV clients (the accused). There are some that I look at and think it's just a matter of time before they kill someone, and some that I see are totally salvageable with the right intervention. In both cases, sometimes I'm right, sometimes I'm wrong. I long ago gave up trying to predict these things.

I don't know a lot about Jared Remy (sounds like he was an asshole, to be sure), but I know as a mother that the love you have for your child blinds you in a way to their bad behavior. You know the sweet, loving child your kid is capable of being, and you forever believe that that will prevail over his bad side. You NEED it to prevail.

I'm glad the Sox kept Jerry in the fold. I remember thinking at the time he was done, and I'm happy that I was wrong.
 

joyofsox

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Would any of your parents totally bail on you?
Off topic, but yes. When I was 19, my mother threw me out of the house I had grown up in because I was not following the tenets of her religion (JWs) under "her roof". She had a friend come over and change the locks while I was out one night. This action came less than a year after my father's suicide (they had divorced and he had remarried). We never reconciled. I spoke to her on the phone a few times and saw her once before I moved out of the state about four years later. And three years after that, she died of cancer. For several reasons, I did not go back and see her before she passed away.
 

Wallball Tingle

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I mean we all grew up or knew of boys who were complete psychos or girls that were promiscuous.
Somewhat off-topic, and I enjoy your posts most of the time JMOH, including the majority of your content in this thread, but I feel like conflating male psychosis/violence with female promiscuity is problematic. I mean, I think I get your point that some girls/women were raised in a way that encourages risky behavior (poor choice of sexual partners, not using protection, etc.), but promiscuity in and of itself isn't morally wrong. I mean, male promiscuity is comparatively rarely frowned on by comparison. And there's nothing wrong with liking sex or having it with lots of people if everyone's a consenting, informed adult. Certainly compared to violence.
 

Rovin Romine

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I work with a lot of DV clients (the accused). There are some that I look at and think it's just a matter of time before they kill someone, and some that I see are totally salvageable with the right intervention. In both cases, sometimes I'm right, sometimes I'm wrong. I long ago gave up trying to predict these things.
Quoted for truth.

***

As evidenced by this thread, there's a very human need to try to reduce a lot of complex individual occurrences into a couple of simple scenarios to be addressed with simple decisions that have (imagined) guaranteed outcomes. Which is not to put down the impulse to want to fix things that seem broken; especially when that apparent breakage is liked to such a tragic outcome.

However, to use a baseball analogy, some of the comments here are like hearing people assertively say somehting along the lines of: "You should always pinch hit any righty batter against any lefty pitcher." Might seem reasonable for an eyeblink, but then you scratch your head and say - "Hey. . .it's a little more nuanced than that."
 

MuppetAsteriskTalk

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Somewhat off-topic, and I enjoy your posts most of the time JMOH, including the majority of your content in this thread, but I feel like conflating male psychosis/violence with female promiscuity is problematic. I mean, I think I get your point that some girls/women were raised in a way that encourages risky behavior (poor choice of sexual partners, not using protection, etc.), but promiscuity in and of itself isn't morally wrong. I mean, male promiscuity is comparatively rarely frowned on by comparison. And there's nothing wrong with liking sex or having it with lots of people if everyone's a consenting, informed adult. Certainly compared to violence.
Thank you for posting this. I tried to write a response to his post a couple of times and ended up just deleting it because it was more confrontational than I wanted to convey, but I think you got it right here.
 

John Marzano Olympic Hero

has fancy plans, and pants to match
Dope
SoSH Member
Apr 12, 2001
24,533
Somewhat off-topic, and I enjoy your posts most of the time JMOH, including the majority of your content in this thread, but I feel like conflating male psychosis/violence with female promiscuity is problematic. I mean, I think I get your point that some girls/women were raised in a way that encourages risky behavior (poor choice of sexual partners, not using protection, etc.), but promiscuity in and of itself isn't morally wrong. I mean, male promiscuity is comparatively rarely frowned on by comparison. And there's nothing wrong with liking sex or having it with lots of people if everyone's a consenting, informed adult. Certainly compared to violence.
I think that you're right that comparing someone who likes to have sex to a person who beats people up is wrong. After rereading my original post, I can see how you could think that though it wasn't my intent.

What I meant to write is that for me, a parent of two girls, I really wouldn't want my child to have the reputation as the town slut or someone who's easy. I grew up in the 80s and 90s and while the thought of a woman like that was cool (in that sort of weird, horned up teenage boy way), I don't think that I ever really respected a girl like that. And that's probably more on a me, a high school virgin who was kinda afraid to talk to girls, than it was on the girl. But I also don't think that I was alone in that regard in terms of a teenage boy's view on their female classmates.

Old feelings and prejudices die hard, I suppose.

When I wrote the original post, it was easy for me to think of something that I wouldn't want my kids (if they were boys) to be: bullies. No matter how big or tough you were as a boy, there was always someone around trying to knock you down. If you weren't that big or tough or didn't like getting into fights, that threat multiplied. While there are a few bullies in my past, there're wasn't that many, but it totally sucked. Who wants their child to become that kind of asshole? And while all bullies don't grow up to ultimately become killers, I'm sure that a lot of them start out that way. When I went searching for a female equivalent of something that I wouldn't want my daughters to grow up to be, I'd be lying if I said that sluts or promiscuous wasn't the first thing that I thought of. I guess there are a lot of female bullies, but it's not normally the default option of things you don't want your daughter to be. And I do see the disconnect between having sex with someone and killing someone.

I'd like my daughters to be respected and liked for who they are, rather than what they can offer in a basement rec room after junior's mom and dad go to bed. I get that they're going to drink and experiment with drugs too, and I have to be cool with that as well. But at the same time, I don't want them to be the town wino either. Everyone has that one guy or woman who's the town drunk that everyone cracks on and it can be fun. But when that person is related to you, it's not as much fun.

I'm not sure how much this explanation will help you or MuppetAsteriskTalk, but hopefully I made my point a bit more clearer.
 

IpswichSox

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Jul 14, 2005
2,792
Suburbs of Washington, DC
I agree with this assessment, I really do. But I wonder (and this isn't on you to answer), as a parent, what do you do? It's easy for me (a father of two kids under 12-years-old) to say "Fuck Jared, they should have let him rot." but honestly, I don't know if I could do that to one of my children. I don't think that a lot of people can step outside themselves and see their children for who they really are. I mean we all grew up or knew of boys who were complete psychos or girls that were promiscuous. And while we are able to see those kids for what they are, do their parents? And if they do, what can you do about it? Get them treatment, push them towards rehab. Sure. But what if they don't want to or refuse to go? Then what?

And I'm not letting Remy off the hook, or at least I'm trying not to. But it's hard enough to raise a kid, I'd imagine it's ten times more difficult when he's a roided-up, uncontrollable psychopath. Jared Remy could rip his parents apart if he wanted to. Is he going to listen when you say, "Jared, that wasn't a good choice. Let's rethink what we just did."? As far as helping them, yeah the Remys messed up huge -- there's no denying that. But to anticipate that your own son would murder someone, especially his fiancé? Man, that's really dark. I don't know if I could go there.
Dad of two teenagers here. This is well said and represents where I am.