You Have Chosen Your Side

If you question the abused instead of the abuser,
you have already chosen your side.

If you require proof, before you offer the abused compassion,
your loyalty is not to the truth.

If you tell the abused to “get a second opinion” about their abuse,
you are not seeking understanding. You are avoiding it.

If you call the abused “brainwashed” for telling the truth,
you are protecting the lie.

If you shame the abused for speaking out,
you were never safe for them to begin with.

If you villainize the abused so you can remain comfortable,
you are not confused. You are complicit.

If you accuse the abused of “not getting any better” because they won’t conform,
you don’t care about their healing. You want quiet.

If you reduce the abused to “changing the family dynamic” when they name it,
you are protecting the system that allowed it.

If you tell the abused to move on and “get over it,”
you are asking them to abandon themselves for your convenience.

If you mock the abused when they tell you how they feel,
you have revealed exactly who you are.	

If you isolate them, withdraw from them, and give them the silent treatment,
you are continuing the harm.

If you call the abused selfish for not considering you in their own trauma,
you have no understanding of love.

If you tell the abused that “wasn’t my experience” to silence theirs,
you are rewriting reality.

If you threaten the abused to “tread carefully with you” that there is “no coming back from this,”
you are not protecting the relationship. You are protecting control.

If you stand by silently while others do these things to the abused,
your silence is not passive. It is participation.

If you do all this and still say you “don’t understand” why the abused pulled away.
you understand more than you admit.

If you claim the abused are "punishing their children" for protecting them from people like this,
you have an inverted view of who is actually being harmed.

And if you do all of this while believing you hold the higher ground,
you have lost your moral compass.

“You will know them by their fruits.” Matthew 7:16
Copyright © | Year Posted 2026

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Book: Diverse Voices: The Poetry of Human Rights and the Pursuit of Peace