Heroes, Legends and Idols of Clay

Heroes, Legends and Idols of Clay

All the heroes and legends
I knew as a child have fallen to idols of clay
(Styx, Show Me the Way)

(Photos: Right: Cesar Chavez 1979 (Photo Credit) Left: Dolores Huerta 1972 (Photo Credit))

Can we revere anyone anymore? After the news broke this week of the horrific sexual abuse that the late farmworker organizer Cesar Chavez inflicted on girls in his orbit, I found myself thinking about our yearning for true heroes and our utter dismay when we learn that many heroes are really “idols of clay” as the song goes. According to an investigative report in the New York Times, what Chavez did was so heinous that many cities and municipalities that once held him up as a role model of working for justice have begun to cancel events in his honor, remove street signs and even consider changing the names of schools and programs once named to honor him. The story in the New York Times called Chavez “one of the most consequential figures in Mexican American history,” an icon of organizing for generations of Latinos. His name is now synonymous with scandal, disgrace and terrible crimes. The United Farmworkers of America, the labor union that Chavez co-founded, immediately began to distance the organization from its co-founder. Chavez joins a long line of prominent, powerful men who were predators, apparently believing that their power and status entitled them to commit abuse and rape. The list is long.

Shortly after the story broke in the New York Times, longtime Chavez collaborator and UFW co-founder Dolores Huerta, now 96, issued a statement revealing that she, too, had been sexually abused by Chavez. In her statement, Huerta says she kept her silence because she did not want to harm the farmworker movement for which she had devoted a large part of her life. She reflected the experience of many abuse victims when she wrote, “I had experienced abuse and sexual violence before, and I convinced myself these were incidents that I had to endure alone and in secret.” And she went on, “I have never identified myself as a victim, but now I understand that I am a survivor — of violence, of sexual abuse, of domineering men who saw me, and other women, as property, or things to control.”

Immediately, Huerta was criticized for remaining silent, but her critics clearly do not understand that her experience and her reasons for remaining silent reflect a universal response among people subjected to sexual abuse, especially by powerful men. It’s been nearly 20 years since Tarana Burke founded the #MeToo movement, and yet too many women (and, yes, men who are also survivors) still hide their truth out of fear of more violence, retribution, shame or the despair of not being taken seriously.

Each day’s headlines continue to shout stories of sexual abuse and women’s despair over being ignored, humiliated, shamed into silence. Just consider the unbelievably ugly, corrupt, abusive secrets still hidden in the now-infamous “Epstein Files,” a shorthand phrase that veils an unfathomably large global network of powerful men (and a few women collaborators) that engaged in sexual abuse of young girls. We may never know the truth about Jeffrey Epstein and his large circle of customers and co-conspirators, but the number, status and shocking details of the names already revealed should be cause for widespread revulsion and demands for atonement…. but the shouts seem muffled and many of the perps continue to go about their business as if nothing happened. The Epstein files are the secular analog to the Catholic Church’s clergy sex abuse scandal — maybe even worse because of the widespread engagement of so many public figures and the apparent deliberate and protracted attempts of the political administration to repress the evidence and hide the truth.

In such an environment, it’s no surprise that an individual woman might hold back from revealing her awful secret, no matter how painful, because the pain that might come with speaking out could well be worse — or so some women think.

We need to make it safe for women and all victims of abuse to speak out, to seek justice, to secure their own safety and security against the men who commit crimes of sexual, physical and psychological abuse. We need the justice system to do a better job of prosecuting and punishing the perpetrators. We also need families, schools and workplaces to do more to educate and elevate climates for respect for women and all people. In this regard, rather than standing idly by while the current administration gets away with obliterating programs devote to teaching students how to treat others with respect (the whole point of effective DEI education), we should be insisting that such programs are central to any curriculum that strives to educate happy, peaceful, productive citizens.

Finally, maybe we need to stop creating so many idols of clay. Sainthood is only bestowed on a few after death and careful scrutiny. We spend entirely too much time and energy elevating ordinary human beings to sainthood status while they are alive, and then we are shocked, shocked, to find out they are made of all-too-soft clay. We don’t need another hero — we need moral, sensible, committed human beings who are capable of leading others without exploiting or abusing them, who can show the way forward with humility and grace, not dominance or a misplaced sense of entitlement.

Cesar Chavez joins a long, tawdry list of fallen heroes. We can mourn that loss from our pantheon of great men, or we can reconsider the whole idea of the pantheon as bestowing too much mythology on flawed human beings.

NOTE: At Trinity, we have a set of policies designed to protect members of this community from harassment and abuse. Please be familiar with these policies and please never hesitate to report any instances of harassment or sexual violence.

Policy on Harassment

Title IX Policy on Sexual Misconduct

Sexual Assault Resources