La Toya Jackson Starts Over

Photo courtesy of wotyougot.
I read an excerpt of La Toya Jackson's latest book, Starting Over. Tell me how I'm didn't even buy the book and I'm already fighting back tears.

I wrote about La Toya and Janet Jackson in a school paper a few years back in college, Virgin, Vamp, and Sweet Little Tramp, now titled Sexual Schizophrenia. It mainly dealt with the American view of sexuality in the media, women, and race. I had to compare and contrast a lot with the racial part because...well let's face it, it's 2012, racism is not dead and sex is running as rampant as the common cold germ. Nonetheless, I was excited and anxious to delve into La Toya Jackson's life story.

She was the Jackson sibling with the pretty face (they're a good-looking family), kind of quiet, and suddenly she disappeared, reappeared, everyone hated her and I couldn't understand why. I was determined to find out what happened to her when I became an adult. I saw her famous Larry King Live interview back in 2003 when I was sixteen and I couldn't believe it when she talked about her abusive marriage and how it affected her career. It happened over a period of time and I was at least six when it all happened, so my ignorant self couldn't understand anything anyway.

After King pushed and dug a little deeper (as Jackson stated in her book), I realized that the only reason why I couldn't believe that she was abused was because she was such a sweet, beautiful, humble, quiet person. How in the name of all that is holy could someone physically beat, emotionally terrorize, financially rob and extort, and spiritually trouble someone so sweet and nice as this woman? I seriously can't understand that or how anyone could do inhumane actions to men, women, and children in general.

Her experience is truly a scary one and I sincerely mean this when I say that I am grateful that she made it out alive. Some women don't. Domestic violence has always been a problem I felt passionate about and I see myself working in programs that helps victims break free. I could go into the nitty gritty statistics, but I would probably end up getting angry again.

Forgive my lack of tactfulness here, but hearing anyone's story of abuse is heart-wrenching and scary. Reading only an excerpt, only a snippet of her book, is enough to not make me want to trust any man on this earth except my dead father. Jackson's story is one every woman should read, whether you are in a relationship or marriage that has minor issues or whether it's evident that you have to escape. No one should have to go through this.

And believe it or not, abuse may be hidden from the human eye, but someone else is watching...

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