Real Life Tao - Good Cycles, Bad Cycles

Trey Smith

With child predators like Sandusky, mind-boggling monsters with urges that make no rational sense, there are very few things we know -- only things we think. And here's what I think: I think monsters like Jerry Sandusky are made, not born. When they were kids someone hurt them so horribly that it rewired their personality to the point that they, as adults, commit the same horrible acts against other kids.

Something happened to Sandusky as a kid, and years later he repeated what he learned. That's what I think. It's a vicious cycle, this circle of evil, but Sandusky won't talk about it even if it's in his best interest to do so.
~ from Sandusky Sentencing a Footnote in Ongoing Monstrosity of Child Abuse by Gregg Doyel ~

In the discussion of Taoist principles, it is not uncommon to hear mention of the cyclical nature of life and existence. We talk of the seasons flowing one into another. We talk of day and night constantly flowing into each other. We talk of life and death as two sides of the same coin.

In terms of the Grand Mystery, cycles are amoral. They rise and fall without intent. However, in terms of ego-driven humans, cycles can be good or bad. While there certainly are cycles of goodness -- love and compassion -- we seem more apt to fall into cycles of evil. One bad incident or occurrence tends to beget another and, before we know it, we become actors in an ever-widening cycle of pain and hurt.

Child abuse -- in all its many forms -- is one of those cycles of bad. As Gregg Doyel remarks, children who are abused have a propensity to become later dispensers of abuse. We don't know why, only that this cycle is set in motion repeatedly. Without intervention to stop the cycle -- even this often doesn't work -- the cycle will continue to spin from generation to generation. As it continues to spin, more victims are sucked up into the vortex and then spit out to become the next line of abusers.

As Doyel wrote at the end of his column,

Whatever happens to Sandusky on Tuesday, it won't solve anything. Don't get me wrong -- it has to happen. He has to be locked away forever. But it won't help anyone. His victims have been hurt too badly, and on a much lesser scale so has the reputation of a once idyllic place known as Happy Valley. That charade is over, and while it may regenerate over time, it won't happen in our lifetime. State College as we know it and Penn State as we know it have been hurt too badly.

They were hurt by Sandusky, though this didn't start with him. And it won't end with him, either. This hurt will go somewhere else, smiling and deceiving, with only hints and suggestions at the evil inside. A handful of people at Penn State heard those hints and saw those suggestions, but they ignored it, hoping it would go away.

It doesn't go away.

This post is part of a series. For an introduction, go here.