Caught a call-out for abuse? Here’s my advice, as a survivor and believer in transformative justice.
Disclaimer: The work contained in this post is extremely difficult to undertake, and is not guaranteed to produce desired results. While I have found it helpful in my own experience, it’s not for everyone. Each in their own way, and in their own time. I encourage everyone to take what resonates, and leave what doesn’t.
The legacy of pedophiles is under the microscope now more than ever.
I just finished the post-humous release of Virgina Giuffre’s memoir, Nobody’s Girl. Some of the Epstein files have recently been released. People are talking about the statute of limitations on child sexual abuse. Meanwhile, we have a second-term child rapist in the White House right now. And last week, as I was pitching my novel featuring a C.S.A (child sexual abuse) survivor protagonist to agents, the small-town tattoo empire of my rapist went up in flames.
With all of that, I decided to resurrect a piece that I wrote back in 2019, the last time that I tried to confront Ben Dewitt, aka Benny, or Benny the Kid as he had the nerve to call himself back in 2009. He was not, however, a kid. He did what he did to me when he was 25, while I was a 16-year-old sophomore in high school. That fact is disputed by no one. Yet, I was and have been blamed for it. It is a big reason why I left my hometown, almost friendless, and started my life over elsewhere. I’m incredibly lucky that I was able to do so, and that I didn’t die by suicide, succumb to addiction, or otherwise lose my ability to tell my story and heal from it. I highly recommend living to see the day your abuser receives a consequence for their actions, as so many of us don’t get to. I can’t call it justice, but I will take what I can get, and this is the most hope I’ve had that this will be the last time.
Anyway, onto the big question: What can justice look like for someone who uses their power to abuse someone else, if not incarceration?
Understanding that actions can never be taken back and that harm can never be undone, we must find strategies for stopping the cause of harm for good each time it happens in our communities. If we are serious about abolition, the chance to rehabilitate, and ending capital punishment, we are going to need tools that are better than the those of the prison industrial complex.
I offer this as an alternative to that and to the notion that the only option we have is cancelling someone. I don’t just mean de-platforming someone, by all means, do that. But behind the scenes, cancelling also comes with personal consequences for the accused offender. When we deny this fact, we add fuel to the fire of men’s rights camps who feel victimized when that reality is not acknowledged.
I’m sure it sucks to be Ben right now, and I don’t doubt that the stress of losing your entire staff is causing him pain. That gives me no great joy, and even less that this is happening again, after I failed so many attempts at holding him accountable before.
However, let’s examine the outcomes of the personal effect of being cancelled. Long-time trusted friends suddenly blocking you, without a word. Or piling onto the bashing ritual for their own clout and to save face. I’ve seen people pack up and leave town in the wake of an accusation. I’ve seen “social justice warriors” talk over survivors in a full-blown savior complex. I’ve seen how cis male privilege has left some of the accused with hurt feelings while others, especially BIPOC, queer, and disabled people, get stalked and beat down by a whole crew of performative feminists.
Does any of that produce safer conditions for anyone else, let alone justice? When someone poses a real threat to the community, and they are run out of town and cut off from their entire support system, do you really think they will be successful in changing their behavior? Or will they just start over in a new place where no one knows what they did? While the survivor(s) are left with a stain on their soul and the fear of ever encountering that person in the wild. Let’s be honest, no punk with a “kill yr local r*pist” patch on their vest is actually doing that. Those who have are probably the same people who would have attended a lynching.
It’s long past time use critical thinking when addressing this issue. The meaning of justice depends on it.
Step 1: Gather Information
Abuse takes place within a web of interlocking social dynamics, such as rape culture, toxic masculinity, unresolved trauma, and unchecked privilege. The work of gathering information about systemic oppression and intersectionality must be done to lay a foundation for having conversations about it that go further than “not all men”, or victim-blaming, or lame excuses.
This step should be a prerequisite and ongoing effort. However, if it hasn’t been done before someone speaks up about how you or someone you know hurt them, there’s no better time to start than the present.
Even if you have your own experiences of oppression and/or abuse, as most people do, you must learn about the experience of others in order to develop a lens of empathy and pattern recognition. Otherwise, the western patriarchal colonizer culture will cloud your eyes, blinding you to the reality of others’ experience and insulate you within a prison of your own making. Denial, invalidation, fragility, and self-victimization will be your only recourse. You learn nothing, and miss out on any opportunity to be accountable, grow, or change.
Read autobiographies and memoirs of BIPOC, women, LGBTQIA folks, survivors, and activists. Angela Davis, Assata Shakur, and Phoolan Devi’s autobiographies are a good place to start.
Miki Kashtan’s Facing Privilege conference calls are an important resource available for free at thefearlessheart.org
Study nonviolent communication, empathy for yourself and others, loving kindness meditation, and other emotional de-escalation tactics. You’re going to need them to navigate this and follow through with change.
Step 2: Grow a backbone
Now that you’ve learned more about the world outside of yourself, you need a “backbone” for the heavy lifting to be done. It will take emotional stamina to stay present with grief, which is a an essential and natural process to fully understand and empathize with the harm you have caused. This is not the same thing as beating yourself up or confessing to others that you’re a piece of shit. You don’t get off that easy. While your behavior can be considered toxic, you as a whole are a dynamic human being with free will and the capacity to do better, and it is your responsibility to do so. You will need to build an emotional support toolbox to accomplish this.
Resist the urge to hate yourself into worthiness of being forgiven. That only serves to center yourself and maintain your state of overwhelm, from which you won’t be able to listen to anyone. Instead, take a flashlight, crack open the locked door inside yourself, and take an honest inventory of where this is all coming from. Examine the root cause(s) of your behavior. This may mean looking at ways in which you have been abused in the past, unmet needs that you have, etc. While some may defend themselves by using their past experiences of trauma to assert they would never do what they are accused of, the fact is that hurt people hurt people. What happened to you isn’t your fault, but it is your responsibility to deal with. Otherwise, the cycle of abuse continues. Most male pedophiles, for example, were sexually abused as children. This is called phenomenon is called trauma re-enactment. Make sure to process this on your own time, and not with or in front of the person who has been hurt by you.
If you have unresolved trauma or PTSD symptoms, find a trauma-certified therapist who has experience in your area of focus (codependency, sexual abuse, verbal abuse, physical abuse, substance abuse, race/gender privilege, homophobia, etc.) Al Anon, AA, and co-counseling are also great options. ChatGPT is not a therapist, BTW.
Create a list of strategies that help you to process and emotionally de-escalate yourself. Refer to this list in triggering moments, instead of acting on impulse or participating in more harmful behaviors to yourself or others. Keep going through and trying things on the list until the feeling of overwhelm dissipates. Some options: Take a walk, drink water, eat something nourishing, practice breathing exercises that activate the parasympathetic nervous system, sing a song. Use medicines as appropriate. I like motherwort tincture for this purpose.
Map out your support network by identifying different needs you have that require support from another person. These needs may look like someone to practice active listening with (potential co-counseling partner). Someone who is good in emergencies, if you have violent tendencies. Someone who knows you well and for a long time, who you have no structural power over, who can give you honest feedback AND who you can tell you the truth to, even if it hurts (like a good therapist should). Someone who loves you unconditionally and can hold space for you while you’re processing your own trauma. Reach out to who you need to when you need to, and if you don’t have people for each of these needs, try broadening your support network. Keep it growing and nourished by giving back what you can to them when you can.
If you have any thoughts of hurting yourself, save the number for the suicide prevention hotline in your area. It’s free and available 24/7. Simply dial 988. This can be super helpful and allow you space to decompress in a way that isn’t going to drain the people around you.
Step 3: Make Amends
First, understand that making amends cannot undo what has been done. It does not entitle nor guarantee you another persons’s forgiveness, immediately or ever. Consider whether the other person wants any contact with you, and if the answer is no, then leave them alone. Depending on the other person’s history/current wellbeing, there’s a chance that even your best intentions may cause more harm than good. Get consent from a trusted mutual friend or mediator before attempting to contact them, and ask what format of contact would be preferred by them (in person, over the phone, via text/email, letters, etc). Give them as many options as possible.
Even if they aren’t ready or willing to have a conversation, or to forgive you, you should still do all of the personal work on your own. It will benefit you and the people in your life from more harmful situations in the future. However, you should at least offer amends to the person you hurt the most. It’s an important and necessary step for follow-through on the work you have already done, and could hold huge potential for healing and recovery for them. You owe them the option.
If they accept it, then enter that conversation knowing that you may be faced with a lot of anger, hostility, fear, grief, and many of the other emotions that may come out. Maintain empathy for the person over getting triggered yourself. Use your toolbox. Again, no beating yourself up, excuses, dumping your own trauma, or defending yourself. Your opportunity to make amends is a golden one that you probably won’t ever get back, and this is not the time to center yourself or process your own emotions.
Use active listening when the person is explaining their experience. Repeat back what they have said in your own words until they agree it matches what they meant to convey. Ask questions if you are unclear. Again, don’t state your case or argue against anything they have to say, even if you don’t remember it that way or at all. Maintaining empathy through it is the only way you can have hope of lessening their pain and suffering.
Acknowledge and name the actions that you took that were harmful to them, and take responsibility for them. Do not bring up any of what you have learned about where the behavior came from. They don’t need your life story and they’re not here to feel sorry for you. That is for another conversation if they are willing to repair the relationship, but discussing it now will come off as excuses for why you did what you did.
Express remorse for the harm created.
(Optional) Let them know how seriously you are taking this by filling them in on some of the actions you have taken since you became aware of your behavior. Name the strategies you have used to help you be fully accountable (therapy, relying on the support network, studying others’ experiences, etc). Explain how this work has helped you insure that the behavior will not be repeated again. This may or may not be appropriate or needed depending on the situation.
The survivor may be given the opportunity to make any requests. These are not demands, as you are still a sovereign being, and they have no real ability to enforce these requests upon you. Rather, they are making them from a place of vulnerability, because you can deny them, and they are trusting you to be responsible for following through with anything you agree to. These requests may be for reparations, for certain boundaries, or anything else. You may agree to them or offer alternatives if the request is impossible. However, to make your amends, you may need to go the extra mile here to show that you are sincere and willing to back up your words with action.
Step 4: Changed Behavior
This is the most important goal of this process. If you give up before making real change, then this is all moot. Recognize that it’s easy to slip back into old patterns even after years of successfully changed behavior. Also recognize that while you may have changed as a person, it may take time for the one(s) you have hurt to see and recognize this change. They may or may not accept you back into their lives, and that’s okay. Relationships go through the life/death/life cycle just as everything else, and even if the relationship dies and doesn’t come back, it may give rise to something else in your life – like a new relationship with yourself. You don’t need to require a continued relationship with the other person in order for change to be acheieved. You only have to hold respect for them as a human being, and do your work to never repeat the harmful behavior again with anyone else. A death of a relationship can be a positive outcome when it’s not steeped in passive aggression or violence, and when you respect and honor boundaries.
Step 5: Pay it forward
Unfortunately, harming others isn’t special. Things like this happen all the time. You and your situation are not unique. What that means, though, is what you have learned is extremely valuable, relevant, and replicable. When you recognize someone else in your community exhibiting similar patterns, especially a friend or acquaintance of yours, you are uniquely suited to address it before it gets worse. Using your new lens of empathy and understanding of systemic oppression, as well as personal experience, you now have more tools than most to de-escalate that harm and help support your community.
There is more to transformative justice than virtue signaling, cancelling, and carceral punishment. You can directly help make your community truly safer for everyone. Always listen when someone gives you the opportunity to understand how something you did hurt them. Weigh in the context of intersectionality. Stay in your own lane, avoid tone policing, practice empathy, and don’t act on impulse from a triggered place.
The most exhausting thing in life may be the act of giving empathy and receiving none in return. Yet, this is the work of transformative justice. This is the gift and the skill that must be honed in order to live and heal in a world devoid of empathy. Even the most disastrous situations can be your best teachers, if you will learn from them. Accept this as a challenge with courage and diligence, and you may be surprised how powerfully transformative it can be.
Final thoughts:
Survivors, feel free to contact me and let me know your thoughts on this piece. I did consult with a number of other survivors back when I originally penned this in 2019, but I’m always looking to deepen my understanding of this topic.
For those who were still in Ben’s orbit in 2025, even after multiple people have come forward with allegations, I’m sorry. I tried to warn you. More people getting hurt was always my biggest fear.
To Ben, it’s too late for me. I will never be able to forgive you. I had to re-build my life from scratch, spend 8 years and thousands of dollars in therapy, and now I’m writing my own justice through fiction. But I hope you read this and that you make some changes. Better late than never to actually live up to your “Good Heart” brand. You could start by granting my request to pay reparations from your business to the Sojourn Shelter. You could also use your platform to take responsibility, teach other men about transformative justice, and apologize for the harm you have caused to me and others.
And, to my inner teenager who wrote this:
You’re safe, I’m sorry, and you do get to build a life and experience love. It’s just going to take a long, long time to get there. Thank you for not giving up.
This article comes at the perfect time, building on your important work, and while transformative justice is a huge undertakin, I'm intrigued by your perspective.