foolmenot.com

Battle Creek Enquirer, April 27, 2008 

Eric Greene: The monsters among us and the kids that 'never had a chance'

There are monsters among us and they do not belong. These monsters, usually men, thrive on control and order. They're sadists who crave power over the weak. They prey on women and children, especially children. And my heart weeps for the little ones who are hurt, tortured and killed by adults who are so blind in their own self-hating that they redirect their anger to those least able to defend themselves.

Nothing makes me more furious. I'm not trying to assign blame in the death of 4-year-old Mackenzie Vandenheede — a trial is ongoing and someone's guilt is for the jury to decide — but testimony last week showed Mackenzie never had a chance. She was beaten and killed. She might have been regularly abused. In the end, she wasn't the bubbly little girl her grandma loved to visit. She was scared and alone. The words beaten, abused and scared should never apply to a 4-year-old.

But the phrase that keeps coming back to me is this: She never had a chance. Doctors who treated the Marshall girl testified that a strike to the back of the head is what killed Mackenzie. Old chest and pelvic bruises showed the death blow wasn't the first. In fact, one doctor said, the injuries suggested someone had hit her repeatedly or kicked her as she rolled on the floor. She was 4 years old.

I shudder. I shake my head. My hands tremble as I write this, thinking of Mackenzie, once happy and alive with spirit, violently and savagely cut down to nothing. When I think of cases like this, and Mackenzie's is far from the first, rage builds inside me. My gut instinct is to strike back on behalf of the dead. I imagine the physical violence I'd do if I was the father of a victim; my vision inevitably ends with me in prison for premeditated murder, trying to repent of my own sinful act. What is a society to do with its monsters? We can talk all day about sentencing guidelines, death penalties and social programs, but that's not what this column is about. I'm interested in how a grown person can cast evil on a little girl or boy and how our society seems to keep breeding such vile, broken people. How can someone look into the face of a child, any child, and not see hope? Kids, in my experience, represent purity, innocence, illogical enthusiasm, boundless energy and limitless potential. How can someone hate themselves so much — hate the world so viciously — they'd spread the festering disease inside them to someone so undeserving of that fate?

Mackenzie was 4 years old. And she never had a chance. I don't understand, and I'm not sure I want to.

Eric J. Greene can be reached at 966-0687 or egreene@battlecr.gannett.com.