Married Church Staffer Arrested for Secretly Filming Upskirt Videos of Girls, Women in Church Bathroom and While They Kneeled During Services – Equally Yoked is BUNK
Way farther below in this post is a link to a news story about a married church staff guy who was a pervert. (I think I first saw this news story via @watchkeep’s Twitter account.)
My Christian parents brought me up to think if I wanted to marry, that the best place for me to meet potential spouses would be at a church. I suppose the assumption with that is that the type of men who attend church regularly are going to be “safer” or better moral choices than the type of dude you might meet at a bar.
However, in the last few years of running this blog, I have seen (Link): so many news stories of church-going Christian men who get arrested for abuse or perversion, I now have my doubts about that.
Secondly, single women out-number single men in churches. I know that every church I’ve been to in person, I’ve been one of the few singles there. The only men in attendance and 80 years old, which would be fine if I were 80 too, but I’m not, and May December relationships (Link): make me want to barf.
Below is a news report of a church staffer who was caught secretly filming “upskirt” videos of girls and women in church bathrooms and during church services. That is bad enough as-is, but the report says that the church discouraged the women from contacting the police over this.
This article says that the church asked the women to not file charges against the pervert, because it might wreck his family, career, and reputation. Who cares if it does? He’s a pervert who preyed on women. Not only does he deserve to have his family fall apart, lose his job, but he should also have his voyeuristic eyes cut out.
SEXIST CHRISTIAN GENDER COMPLEMENTARIANISM
However, that attitude is sadly par the course for most churches, which tend to be complementarian: the needs of women and girls are below the needs and considerations of the men.
SEXIST BILLY GRAHAM RULE
The same thinking is at play with the stupid evangelical BGR (“Billy Graham Rule”) in which the reputations of men are esteemed more than the welfare of single women, who are treated like we are all potential Jezebel harlots, who might harm a man’s reputation, gosh golly, if we are seen talking to him.
(See how Christians don’t care about how the BGR ruins the reps of women by making all women look like cheating whores?)
MARRIED PEOPLE ARE NOT MORE ETHICAL, MATURE, OR GODLY THAN SINGLES
Some conservative Christians hold this inane, idiotic idea that marriage is necessary to make people more mature, and that single adults are not as “godly” or ethical as married people: notice in this news story that this pervert who hid cameras in a church bathroom is a MARRIED man.
He’s not a single.
Christians need to start apologizing to singles left and right for holding us up as unethical, over-sexed horn dogs, when it’s often MARRIED people who are engaging in sexual sin.
MARRIED CHRISTIAN SEX NOT HOT
Christians teach if you remain a virgin until marriage, that the married sex will be great and regular, and you won’t be tempted to seek sex outside of marriage.
If all that is true, why was this married church staffer getting his jollies off by seeking sexual thrills outside the bounds of matrimony? According to Christian sex propaganda, all this guy should have needed to be sexually fulfilled was to see was his wife undress – not some “Average Jane” in some church bathroom on a video tape.
YOU DON’T HAVE TO BE GODLY OR PERFECT TO EARN A SPOUSE
Sometimes Christians teach that if you are single and want to be married that you have to perfect yourself first and clean up your life. You have to become godly and righteous before God will permit you to have a spouse, Christians say.
Obviously, that idea is a farce, since a guy who is a pervert who films women half naked in bathroom stalls is not godly, ethical, nor deserving of a spouse – yet he is married.
EQUALLY YOKED IS A JOKE
The “equally yoked” Christian teaching amounts to the notion that a Christian should only date and marry other Christians.
If the type of Christian man I would meet at a church to date and marry is the type of guy (like the one in this news report) who thinks it’s okay to secretly video females in various states of undress (and at a church service or church bathroom no less), a big “no thank you” to the “equally yoked” teaching.
I would rather try to get a date with a single man at a bar full of atheists.
(Provided said atheist is not one of those smug, condescending, arrogant “anti theist” atheists – they are insufferable. About any other atheist dude, provided he’s a gentleman who treats me nice, would be okay.)
This article says that the church already KNEW of this guy’s sex perversions (he had apparently done perverted things before working at their church).
(Link): Former Grizzlies announcer Rick Trotter reportedly recorded women at another church in 2010
Alleged victims say they were discouraged from reporting incident
Trotter was later released on $70,000 bond for the four misdemeanor counts of photographing without consent. He returns to court Sept. 20. He has been dismissed from both Downtown Church and the Grizzlies. Neither Trotter nor his wife, Heather, could be reached for this story.
But according to the four who talked to the newspaper, Trotter also recorded unsuspecting victims as they used the restroom at Fellowship Memphis, where he was a staff member at the time. The church was then housed at the former Crichton College on Highland.
In the statement, they acknowledge the bathroom incident but provide few details.
…According to the Memphis Police Department’s Lt. Karen Rudolph, no one ever contacted police to report the incident or file a complaint. The church’s statement makes no mention of contacting police after the camera was discovered at Fellowship.
One adult victim who spoke to the newspaper said Bryson contacted her to tell her she was on the recordings.
…Another alleged victim was only 16 at the time of the recording, she told The Commercial Appeal, adding that her parents were also discouraged from going public. A second victim told the newspaper that she was 15 when she was recorded.
“I was a little disturbed. I was really angry actually. I also found out what lengths the church went to cover it up and keep it quiet,” said the woman who was 16, adding that she and her family left Fellowship. “That made me even more angry and upset with the church that they would cover that up. It was disgusting.”
…The adult victim said they were discouraged from filing charges to avoid affecting Trotter’s life and career.
“They said that no one would consider pressing charges because it would ruin his life and he had a family. They said they had already consulted with the police and they were told to destroy the evidence,” she said.
…After that, Trotter and his wife met with some of the alleged victims at their house, three of the alleged victims said, a process that at least one of the women refused to take part in. The church statement doesn’t mention those sessions.
“They made us meet with him, with Rick Trotter. Sit down with him and his wife. That’s terrible. I couldn’t handle that at the time,” said the adult woman, who left the church almost immediately after this happened.
…The statement says Trotter was fired after the discovery of the phone, but that the church paid for him to attend a three-month rehab for sex addiction. After that was completed, Trotter read a letter of apology in a members-only church meeting. One of the victims said Trotter also met with people after that admission to talk to them individually.
In the statement, the two pastors acknowledge that Downtown Church leaders knew of Trotter’s past when he was hired.
“The leaders openly discussed Trotter’s prior sexual misconduct and the counseling he attended for sexual addiction. Trotter gave permission for both parties to openly discuss his sexual misconduct. Downtown Church also spoke with several counselors, including two that worked closely with Trotter during his time in counseling, to determine the effectiveness of the treatment as well as his readiness to re-enter the ministry.”
The adult victim said she was “disappointed” by the fact that Trotter was allowed to move to another church despite the past incident.
“I think I’m more disappointed that he was allowed to continue and work with families and children who were left vulnerable, because no one would take a stand,” the adult woman said. “I’m more disappointed about that than I am with anything.”
Related Posts:
(Link): Non-Romantic Nearness, The Billy Graham Rule, and Pope John Paul’s Friendship With a Married Woman
(Link): Patriarchy tends to sexualize all male / female relationships (article via Junia Project blog)
Christian Pundit 