My mind was blown when I learned that my grandmother carried me in her womb. As girls and women, we are born with all of the eggs we will ever have. Which means that when my grandmother was pregnant with my mother, she was also carrying the egg that would eventually become me. I love this fact because it further solidifies the spiritual connection me and my grandmother share. And it explains my heart for domestic violence survivors.
When a neighbor found my pregnant grandmother in a pool of her own blood, a piece of me was there.
This shared cellular memory is the reason why I sympathize with survivors, even when I don’t understand their actions. I don't understand survivors using their proximity and familiarity with abusers to excuse and exonerate the more famous ones.
Kelly Rowland did this in 2022 when she presented an absent Chris Brown with the American Music Award for Best R&B Male artist. At the mention of his name, the audience boo-ed. And Rowland held up a gloved finger to the crowd, telling them to “chill out.”
Rowland has shared the abuse she faced in a past relationship in her song, “Dirty Laundry.” “Meanwhile this nigga putting his hands on me,” she sang.
When asked why she defended Brown, Rowland told TMZ, "You know what, we all need to be forgiven for anything that we could be doing, anything that we're thinking We all come up short in some sort of way. And grace is real and we are humans and everybody deserves grace. Period.”
This past April, Jill Scott took to Twitter to sing Brown’s praises.
It wasn’t long before someone challenged her. “I think the women he’s abused would disagree,” Chrissy the social worker wrote in response.
Note: When it comes to Chris Brown's violence, it is more than just Rihanna.
That’s when Scott shared her own history with an abuser.
“...My Mother’s ex husband was a mean, violent human AND he could lay foundation better than anyone in my city. What he did with cement was awe inspiring. We got away. He got a raise and praise for his ability. God dealt with the rest.”
After some gentle and not so gentle chiding from the people on X (formerly Twitter), Scott took some time to think about all of it and came back with this.
“Walked away, came back, googled, read tweets, listened to friends & considered the state of us as a whole. Some, lead with love ( YOU gave me perspectives to consider & directive. THANK YOU ). Some a you ONLY want the highs of war. You may have your war.”
But Jill and Kelly were very mild examples compared to the behavior we witnessed from spiritual teacher, life coach and television personality Iyanla Vanzant.
This past June, Vanzant was tasked with presenting actor Jonathan Majors with the Perseverance Award at the Hollywood Unlocked Impact Awards.
Majors had just been convicted of domestic assault and harassment of his ex-girlfriend Grace Jabarri from a March 2023 incident. The criminal complaint accused Majors of hitting Jabbari in the face, twisting her arm, and fracturing her finger during a fight in a chauffeured car. She received treatment for injuries to her head and neck at the hospital. Through the course of the trial, text messages between the former couple from September 2022, before their infamous incident, suggested that this was not the first time Majors had gotten physical with Jabbari.
Even if people questioned the conviction, the evidence itself is pretty damning. But it wasn’t enough to prevent Vanzant from honoring Majors in an absurd display.
After a lengthy introduction of her two invisible friends Grace and Mercy, Vanzant said,
“As a woman who spent nine years in an abusive marriage, I am both humbled and honored to present this award—the perseverance award—to my brother Jo Nathan Majors.”
As Majors took the stage, Vanzant extends her arms out to him and then grabs the side of his head. He places his hands on his hips, crying before burying his head into Vanzant’s shoulder. She cradles him before performing what looks like some type of clearing ritual. She slides her hands down his back and shoulders, flicking—his sin, shame, and whatever else away. Before he speaks, Vanzant returns to the mic and dabs his tears away and then places the tissue under his nose for him to blow.
I watched the whole thing and wondered two things: number one, what was the reason?! Cardi B. voice. And number two: why do survivors so often feel the need to defend abusers?
After a couple of weeks viewing the whole thing from a very judgmental and critical place, I decided to speak to an expert about it.
Leading with compassion first, I sought the opinion of licensed marriage and family therapist Cherlette McCullough who explained the mental and psychological changes people endure after abuse.
“When we talk about domestic violence survivors, we’re talking about someone who survived trauma. Trauma can be extremely complex in how it manifests in our day to day lives, how it manifests in our souls and in our minds,” McCullough explained.
As a society, our collective conceptualization of forgiveness is warped. But that may be especially true for survivors.
“A person who experiences domestic violence can be confused about what healing and forgiveness look like. Some of us automatically feel that forgiveness means reconciliation. Which is not necessarily true. Forgiveness is a personal thing. It’s a process you go on to release yourself from that traumatic event. Their way of coping with it is putting themselves back in that same environment, saying, ‘Hey, I know how it feels to be on the other end, so let me help you.’” Forgiveness does not mean that you are required to sit with your abuser, have a conversation, see things from their perspective and then help them in that same place.”
When it comes to domestic violence, we can never tell when the perpetrator has truly healed.
“We also know that domestic violence is not just about hitting, it’s not just about yelling or intimidation,” McCullough said. “It’s mainly about control. So how do you measure when someone is healed from the place of wanting to control the people around them.”
For that reason, it’s interesting that survivors would lend their support to men who may be and some who have proven to still be behaving in violent, harmful ways. Not only is it a decision made without all the necessary facts, it could cause harm to other survivors and the abusers themselves.
“Telling [an abuser] you understand what they’re going through, validating their feelings, sometimes, depending on where that person is in their healing journey, you could make things worse. Because validating the feelings of an abuser, it gives them that feeling of ‘What I’m doing is right,’” McCullough said.
And the implications of such support are even more dangerous for people still living in abusive relationships.
“It can confuse them as well when it comes to having the confidence to leave or having the voice to say, I don’t want to deal with this anymore,” McCullough said. “If you see people you admire supporting them, it could send the message of ‘I deserve this.’ or ‘I need to sit and take it and maybe it will change.’ People may want to leave but witnessing this support may take that off the table for them.”
One of the biggest defenses I hear from celebrities and average people alike is that we all make mistakes, people can change and we shouldn’t judge someone for their past. These types of messages do little to encourage true accountability. They don’t speak to the real harm abusive people enact in the lives of others and the trauma that persists long after the abuse ends.
I asked McCullough how we as a society should speak about abusers.
She said that instead of focusing on extending forgiveness, we should be directing our messages to the abusers themselves.
“We should talk more about what the treatment looks like for abusers,” she said. “I do think we can encourage abusers to reach out for help around changed behaviors. I think we can send a message that this is harmful. There’s a possibility that you’ve seen this in your family and you’ve normalized it but this is not well.”
Not only is it not well, it doesn’t deserve applause, excuse, or protection. Let’s reserve that type of treatment for those who’ve survived.
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