"I'm beginning to think you...crucified your father for normal stuff!"
Without going into details about what affected that statement for whatever reason, I will say that I was appalled when someone said that to me—abuse is never "normal stuff", and all kinds of abuse are out of the norm—at least in a reasonable and decent society, abuse is (relatively, anyway) out of the norm.
No society in this world is going to be entirely reasonable and decent. After all, as Thomas Hobbes observed,
life is short, nasty, and brutish; and "
kings and persons of sovereign authority, because of their independency, are in continual jealousies and in the state and posture of gladiators, having their weapons pointing, and their eyes fixed on one another, that is, their forts, garrisons, and guns, upon the frontiers of their kingdoms, and continual spies upon their neighbours: which is a posture of war. "
That nonetheless does not cause any kind of abuse to be "normal stuff", regardless of whether it's the kind of abuse that I endured from my father (which at least, thank God, was never sexual abuse) or the following examples of abuses that others have endured:
- The "casting couch"—Harvey Weinstein's and others' victims did not want (let alone ask) to be sexually harassed and abused; and they shouldn't have to choose between careers and being abused, between silence to avoid further abuse and between speaking out and enduring further abuse, or between anything else and abuse. Having to choose between anything and abuse, by the way, is being put in an abusive position.
- The "condolence" call that Myeisha Johnson received. What ***** stated was basically, "Your husband knew why he signed up, and we can never repay him or any other American military member whom sacrifices his or her life for the United States; so I'm not even going to try to repay what I can."
- The follow up to the "condolence" call. Especially Myeisha Johnson did not need libel and slander against her; and Representative Frederica Wilson did not need the libel and slander, either.
- The threats of racist and sexist violence against Congresswoman Wilson—as I said, abuse is neither normal nor in the norm in a reasonable and decent society, which is not the kind of society which Congresswoman Wilson's abuser would like to bring back.
In conclusion, then, only abusive societies have ever treated, ever treat, and will ever treat abuse as normal and normalizable.