Why, Daddy... Why?

by Robert Owen

This work is a account of child abuse and survival, set in circa 1960’s America, and told from the child’s point of view. Many books and movies have covered this subject, but this account seems especially heart-wrenching, covering many years of continual abuse. It addresses aspects of the psychological mindset of both the victim and the perpetrator. It reminds us that, in the life of an abuse victim, there are both failures and victories of a personal nature. Abuse at the hands of a parental figure is a personal hell of the deepest darkness; yet life can go on, victory can be achieved, understanding and acceptance can be realized. In the end, this is not a story of darkness and despair, but personal achievement and a life victory. This is a truthful account of my wife’s upbringing, but through no particular desire to ‘protect the guilty’, let us call it a ‘truthful’ account with a poignant ending.** Update for 2020 ! ** For those who have read 'Why, Daddy… Why?' in years past, I wanted to let you know this is an updated, expanded version just in time for the end of 2020, available now.There was more to the original story than was first told, and now it can be.

300 pages, Kindle Edition

First published July 15, 2010

About the author

In 1771, reformer and philanthropist Robert Owen was born in Wales. He became known as "a capitalist who became the first Socialist." Owen started work as a clerk at age nine. With help from a sympathetic cloth merchant to whom he was apprenticed, Owen educated himself. Owen was an unbeliever by 14, influenced by Seneca, and his acquaintance with chemist John Dalton and Samuel Taylor Coleridge. By 18, Owen established a small spinning mill in Manchester. He married the daughter of a Glasgow cotton manufacturer, purchasing his father-in-law's New Lanark mills in Scotland. Owen set out to put his humanitarian creed into practice, and turned New Lanark into a model community attracting the attention of reformers around the world.

Owen set up the first infant-school in Britain, and a three-grade school for children under ten. He appealed to the government and other manufacturers to follow his lead, but was rebuffed by clergy-led opposition when his views on religion became widely known. At a public meeting calling for "villages of unity and cooperation," living wages and education of the poor at the City of London Tavern (Aug. 21, 1817), Owen called "all religions" false. He sought to limit hours for child labor in mills in 1815, and saw passage of a watered-down Factory Act in 1819. Owen's Essays on the Principle of the Formation of Human Character (1816) were his major treatises, in which he advised: "Relieve the human mind from useless and superstitious restraints."

He founded New Harmony, a model settlement in Indiana, in 1825-28--a failed venture which he signed over to his sons Robert Dale and William Owen. Owen wrote Debate on the Evidences of Christianity (1829). Owen founded the Economist in 1821 to promote his progressive views, and The New Moral World in 1834, along with an ethical movement called "Rational Religion." His "Halls of Science" attracted thousands of nonreligious followers ("Owenites") and the trade unions. Owen founded several other publications. His autobiography was published in 1857-58. Joseph McCabe called him "the father of British reformers, and one of the highest-minded men Britain ever produced." (Biographical Dictionary of Modern Rationalists, 1920). D. 1858.

Reviews

[Miriam · Rating 3 out of 5]

I don't start with the content, but a general opinion. This was a strange story for me. I don't mean it judgmental or anything. It's just the way the story came across.

The way it was told… I generally don't enjoy third person. I don't mind it, but it doesn't really help me connect with the people of a story.

Otherwise, I read this story because I thought it would be the 'usual', if you can say that, story about abuse. I stated in many other reviews, why I read those stories. The main reasons are that those books help me with my own trauma and help me find solutions/perspectives on how to deal with it in a way. And I read those stories as an act of silent support, learning more about how to help or recognized child abuse in any form, and I learn a lot from those strong personalities who survived such horrors.

But usually it's nothing psychic, with strange input on different topics. And decisions that didn't make sense to me. There was a lot to unfold and keeping track of.

I admire the strength as usual. That the victim in the story kept moving on and all. But as I said, I had issues connecting with her. Especially with all the strange events sprinkled in. The ending was unusual too. In general, the book could have been shorter, since there is not much movement and things were repeated over and over again.

As I said further, I didn't agree with many of the decisions. Maybe it was the time it took place in. But that she stayed with that step-mother and father for so long, and put up with their crap… While I get it, topics like that were difficult in the past. They still are. And many victims never call out their abusers. But I was not sure about the message of the story.

Her life was mostly a shitshow with not much joy. Sure, later on, when she finally started her own life, it got better. Bit by bit. And in the ending, she at least found love. But what I read most of the time was, that she find living was exhausting for her. She only was there for her psychic job, which wasn't really appreciated either? Everything else in her 'earthly' existence was good/okay, but that was it.

I didn't felt encouraged in the least or find any great meaning in it. The story was just strange to me.