I watched a very disturbing film last night. It was a film about child abuse, about the kind of child abuse that leaves mental scars that take far longer to heal than physical abuse. And this abuse is both legal and widely encouraged, because there are many good people taken in by it.
We have a natural revulsion towards seeing children being forced to act like adults, in that most adult of traits, sexuality. At first I couldn’t understand what it was that bothered me most about the interviews with the children of fundamentalist evangelical Christians in the documentary, Jesus Camp then I realized.
They did not sound like children at all, but were spouting off rehearsed indoctrination with adult vocabulary, opinions and mannerisms.
Levi: At five I got saved…
Becky Fischer: Yeah?
Levi: …because I just wanted more of life.
This is like a line from a world weary reformed drunk in a film noir, not an innocent child.
Their innocence had been removed and they looked either somewhat cold and insincere, or were overcome with emotion, sobbing in a way that you wanted to help these poor kids escape this torture. Only occasionally did their real childish innocence and playfullness shine through.
And if anyone thinks I’m over-reacting, that indoctrinating a child to be an, M16 rifle carrying, fundamentalist Christian radical, is not like indoctrinating a child to be an AK47 rifle carrying, fundamentalist Muslim radical, for example. That this is not child abuse. Then consider this.
Jesus Camp is a film about pre-teen children at a religious summer camp, with no footage of anything that the children themselves weren’t exposed to and yet it carries a certificate 13 – it is not considered fit for young children.