a child called tit

I'm still alive.. just.  I guess the reason I haven't been blogging to my audience of 8 people is that firstly, I don't know if you're real people.  Watching 'Source Code' has made me doubt everything.  Secondly, slowly failing a Masters degree takes a lot of commitment and thirdly... gjkldsjgifdjgdh.  I thought I'd return on a lighthearted topic; the kind of topic that you could absently eat malteasers to whilst half-heartedly watching an episode of Come Dine With Me (effective drum roll..) - Child Abuse.  In particular literature about child abuse, an effective and new-fangled term for it is 'Misery Lit' a popular genre that creeps me out.   

A man who has made gazillions from this market from selling his heartbreaking life to the world is Mr Dave Pelzer, author of 'A Child Called (T)It'.  Leaving his lack of credibility aside, Dave the self pro-claimed 'Robin Williams of Child Abuse' has made a lot of money peddling his trilogy; A Child Called It, The Lost Boy and A Man Named Dave and all because the bestselling, money making purge must go on.  In 'A Child Called It' Dave describes in graphically, relentless detail about the physical, sexual and emotional abuse he says that he suffered at the hands of his mother.   Pelzer reckons that it's 'cathartic' for him to write about the horrors he apparently suffered and probably helpful to other sufferers of abuse who need to break the cycle and tell someone.  I have my doubts but sure, then what about his other readers? What are they getting out of this?

It's disturbing that people like reading these types of books whilst at the same time lamenting how 'horrific' it all is and how it makes them feel 'sad'.  But increasingly after Pelzer cashed in, a whole host of 'survivors' have tapped into this growing genre.  Emotionally manipulative titles like 'Don't Tell Mummy', 'Betrayed' and the directly condescending 'Nobody Wants You'. Hm.  All seem to have the same italic, whimsical fonts and the same type of image in wishy washy colours:  a child model probably being told to look a bit forlorn with the eyes being later photoshopped to up the anti on the sheer heartbreaking-ness of it all. 

I realise that historically sensationalism sells, Edgar Allan Poe managed to appeal and probably at the same time titilise an entire Victorian audience with his Gothic tales of insanity and decomposing corpses of foxy looking women.  What's not to like? One of my favourite quotes from poor old Poe is, 'There is nothing more tragic than the death of a beautiful woman'. I think this theory can be applied to the misery lit range and this is why it sells but perhaps the word 'tragic' should be exchanged for 'compelling'. 

Even WHSmith have taken note of the popularity of this increasingly bizaare genre and have a section called 'Tragic Life Stories' making it all the more easier to pick up that copy of 'Don't Tell Mummy' and as a real treat a Cadburys Creme Egg for a cosy Friday night in. Deee-licious.   I'm not saying that anyone who has read one of these 'memoirs' is a paedophile or future child beater but there does seem to be a disturbing component at play. 

One of the most depressing everyday situation that seems to genuinely depict the morbid voyeurism of human nature is when there is a car accident.  The majority of people driving past just have to crane their necks a bit and look. I think it comes down to the same morbid curiosity that is probably inate in all of us but that should probably not be fed. E.g. don't rubber-neck and don't buy a book called 'Mummy Knew' and a pack of Cadburys Creme Egg without asking yourself why.