The Kimmy Factor

"That this could be!

That I should live to see

Most vulgar Pride, the stale obstreperous clown,

So fitted out with purple robe and crown

To stand among his betters! Face to face

With outraged me in this once holy place,

Where Wisdom was a favored guest and hunted

Truth was harbored out of danger,

He bulks enthroned, a lewd, an insupportable stranger!"

- Edna St. Vincent Millay

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The summer Oldest Daughter was six, we moved to a small cul-de-sac that was home to four other little six-year-old girls. They were a sight to behold that summer! Five little girls, each as cute as the next...roaming from house to house, playing the usual games, and inventing a few new ones. Not every game was particularly charming or benign. In one heart-stopping episode, the five of them stood in the street...blocking, for a very short period of time, the little traffic that tried to pass. Another day, they devised a shake-down scheme that was quite successful in the short-term. They went from Mom to unsuspecting Mom, begging for snacks about every hour. They enjoyed their sugary ill-gotten gains all day long for several days, until the Moms uncovered the scam. My daughter appeared to be the leader of this "little girl gang," so I was sensitive to her culpability. But before long, the gang had an informant. The little girl directly across the street.

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Kimmy.

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Kimmy was the "Sammy the Bull" of the six year olds. After the Snack Caper was uncovered and cookie contributions dwindled, Oldest Daughter's leadership position was obviously weakened. Kimmy saw her opportunity for a play-group coup d'etat and tensions rose. Kimmy began to inform her Mother of my daughter's every transgression. Kimmy's Mom, in turn, began to appear at my door on a very regular basis, demanding resolution and punishment. According to Kimmy and her Mom, my daughter exhibited ONE particular recurring intolerable behavior: the dreaded "You Can't Play in My Yard" pronouncement.

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The "You Can't Play In My Yard" pronouncement had been discussed in depth that summer. Over coffee, Kimmy's Mom and I had agreed on a "It takes a Village Approach"...(though we did not possess that terminology in those days.) We would administer the same justice in the same measure from Mom to Mom. But Kimmy's Mom was troubled that Oldest Daughter had a distinct propensity for outlawing Kimmy from our property. Kimmy's Dad was a noted psychology professor at the University and Kimmy's Mom felt my six year old's statements had some deep psychological and sociological meaning (though if Kimmy and Oldest Daughter were any more "similar," their DNA might have matched.) She would stare meaningfully at me as she questioned me:

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"Why ever would your six year old be exhibiting this behavior? Why is she acting this way?" she'd query.

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"Dunno," I'd answer.

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I felt very guilty, very inadequate, and...frankly, very dysfunctional. Oldest Daughter continued to insist the back-yard banning was most often mutual, with Kimmy giving as good as she got, but Kimmy's Mom assured me that was not so. She would sigh a great sigh of pity for my problem child...and once again, I would acquiesce to her demands.

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And so it would come to pass that Oldest Daughter would watch from her bedroom window, as Kimmy and the other girls played on...without her.

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It takes a village and all that.

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One morning, by an open window, I overheard a stunning statement! Miss Kimmy HERSELF, daughter of the esteemed psychology professor and the perfect mother...telling my daughter, "YOU can't play in my yard." Be still my beating heart! After a summer of punishing MY daughter on their word alone...I had witnessed this turn about MYSELF. Now I approached THEIR door.

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The Village concept fell apart on the spot.

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Kimmy's Mom chose to accept her six year old's word instead of mine.

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"Kimmy says she didn't say it," she told me. "And Kimmy doesn't lie."

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Really?

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The Mommy-rapprochement was never the same. All bets were off. My six -year old returned to the cold streets of the cul-de-sac. Kimmy probably was backyard-banned on a regular basis. I didn't much care. She and her Mother lost all credibility, all sympathy, and all hope of united response from me...on the day they didn't apply THEIR rules, our agreed rules...to THEMSELVES. The day they excused behavior in themselves that they had steadfastly condemned in others. The day they broke faith with our "Village" concept.

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It's the Kimmy factor in the Hoax that has me most distressed. A long time ago, I thought a new generation of us talked about a Dream we wanted for ourselves and our children. Color of skin, someone wise had counseled us, would have no place in our dream....we would revere "content of character." We would be a real community, experience real brotherhood. As a young girl, emotional as I am, I embraced this with every fiber of my being. Yes, a long time ago, many of us committed our very spiritual cores to THAT goal, to THAT plan, to THAT dream. We knew it would be slow, but together, folks of good will and good sense would make it happen. If we couldn't completely change our parents' thinking...we certainly would change our children's thinking. Because it is RIGHT. No pats on the back required...it is RIGHT.

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In the ensuing years, in my real life, in the places I've lived, I've spoken up for that dream. I've quit organizations, severed "social" friendships, ... once called out a guest in my own home, and tangled with a minister's wife whose bias bubbled right under the surface. I won't hear that Dream defamed. Let me repeat: it is right. Like the pact I made with Kimmy's Mom, I have tried to keep up my end.

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That's why one of the worst days for me in this debacle was the day I read the NC NAACP "explanation" of the Hoax events on their website. What an utter unvarnished betrayal of the Dream! It truly sickened me. I could not believe the once revered NAACP would have that screed of lies, excuses, and inaccuracies on its website! That piece stands as the very best definition of biased writing I have seen in a long, long while.

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The dream, the brotherhood, the community, the village has to be all-inclusive to ever mean anything! It cannot replace one set of "favored folks" with another! Call our children hooligans, or homeboys or whatever we wish...we must not favor yours over mine or over theirs...or we have lost it all!

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Hoax Enablers, you've scammed the dream! You've sold it out!

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When I was young I'd hear people say, "What do you care? You don't know THEM. They're not like us," they'd say, "Stick by your own." The understanding was that "They" could be casually sullied and conveniently lied about, because they did not matter as much as US. THEIR reputations were of no import. "THEY" weren't us. I found such talk disgusting. Still do.

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Now the NCNAACP in 2006/2007 seems to adopt the same sickening standard against Collin, Reade, and Dave. They have never even run a correction to the obvious untruths in that article. They appear unashamed. Perhaps someone in the NCNAACP hierarchy is parroting those voices from the past, "Those white privileged Lacrosse kids don't deserve any better. They are not like US. Stick by our own."

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Or as was said at the IWF Forum: "Some crimes are so important, even innocence is no defense."

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Shameful.

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I remember the words, "Kimmy doesn't lie," from a defensive Mother. Now we hear Crystal doesn't lie. Crystal is a full time honor roll student, working nights, the NCNAACP tells us, to spend more time with her children (item 14 ). By now, we all now what and who Crystal is. And how she spends her time. We know the "content of her character." That's the real discovery in the DNA and the witness statements. And to use the overused Hoax phrase..."We know YOU know." But some, in a tragic reversal, now see only her skin, and on the basis of her color, discard all else and crown her "a sister survivor."

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Yes, I remember the archetypal, pot bellied Sheriffs of the Old South who insisted white women, no matter the evidence to the contrary, never lied about rape too.

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Same thinking.

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You have become what we all most despised.

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You may say she is troubled. Reach a hand out to help her and ask us to assist. We are all vulnerable. Our troubled children come in all colors. But don't ask three young men to go to trial or to prison for her lies...to save face, to show racial unity, or to flex political muscle.

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You may say you were duped by Nifong. Many of us were too. But don't give your tacit approval to Nifong's corrupted tactics because now you feel you can't turn back! You'll be haunted by that hypocrisy. Your approval NOW of this shameful Hoax will be a burden to be borne in the future by many others, your sons and daughters and ours. Individually, they each will have good cause to remember that YOU CONDONED CORRUPTION, and pushed it down the road TO THEM. You are sowing dangerous seeds here.

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Don't make colluding with a conspiracy to railroad these boys, the only defense against being called "racist" by your Hoax "cohorts!" Don't make that word "racist" cheap and meaningless as you flail about, searching for some way to prop up Nifong and Crystal. You are flailing at old friends, true friends...friends with a history of staunchly standing by your side.

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Long ago, I decided there was no Club I needed to be in, if I had to sacrifice my intelligence and integrity to be accepted. That applies here too. The entry fee for being exempt from the charge of racism in this case is far too costly.

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When I was a young Mother, I stood at Kimmy's Mom's door, and asked her to apply our rules fairly, as we had agreed. In a much, much more important way, a lot of us are at a threshold today, asking "do unto others in our Justice system, as you would have done unto YOU." A rush to judgment, indictments without evidence, rigged line-ups, witness intimidation, suppression of exculpatory DNA, a D.A. morally unfit to serve...and on and on and on. I'm asking you, Hoax supporters and the NCNAACP, how much will you wink and nod at, how much will you condone in your need protect and promote this egregious case? And, for God's sake, WHY?

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It would seem that many of the Hoax supporters are putting out a new manifesto, a new set of Village rules. "Yes, indeed," they seem to say, "when our children are nifonged, slandered and smeared...yes, we EXPECT you to stand with us, dig into your purse, expose corruption, and DEMAND real justice. Call in Project Innocence! It's your moral DUTY!"

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"But when YOUR children are nifonged, and the girl is "our own"...don't come to our door. Sorry, we must close our eyes and our ranks. We must flex our political muscle to demand a show trial, to show our strength. Despite what the evidence and our intellect tells us, we owe her at least the "something must have happened" defense. "Something Happened is our minimum....because she's our own."

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"Every contorted excuse that can be found will be used blatantly to buttress her lies...to counter the inconvenient truth. Defiance and denial, and denigration of everything we once held dear...all for her!"

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"Thank you for standing with us to remove a North Carolina District Attorney who used a racial expletive in a drunken bar exchange unrelated to any pending case. But, no, we will protect Nifong's right to smear your children in the media in pre-trial publicity over 50 times."

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"Our leaders will reward false accusations with full scholarships."

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"Our sons will say, "Even if innocent, they should go to trial."

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***

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The world has turned upside down.

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With this apparent new thinking, those of us who ask for an equality of justice in this case...in ALL cases...are now branded "racists." Those of us who cry out against a biased corrupt prosecutor are now unfair to an "African Queen." Those who demand ALL receive the same treatment regardless of color, creed, or content of their Daddy's wallet, ... are out of step with the NCNAACP.

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But long ago, after the marches, high on hope, bright-eyed with the vision of a new, better future for ALL our children...we embraced each other and those very same phrases, principles, and ideals. All the ones you abandon now in your pursuit of Collin, Reade, and Dave.

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I do not understand.

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But one thing I do know, no matter how you spin it now.

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Long ago.... that was our dream.

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Joan Foster