I didn't want to blog about this—my nerves are bad— but there's one part that's been on my mind since my friend ShawnsandLisa mentioned it to me.
Arshon Baker, 5, tugged on his mother's dress, while she was doing another woman's hair. His mother, Angel Glass, 24, responded by beating him with a brush, a belt, then slamming his head against a piece of furniture. Arshon slipped into a coma before dying a few hours later.
Angel Glass gave birth to Arshon while she was in prison. Glass has two other children, ages 7 and 11 months, and is pregnant with a fourth, who will likely be born in prison, too.
Arnetta Fitzgerald, Glass' mother, told Plain Dealer columnist Phillip Morris: "I wish I would have never named her Angel. I started to name her Brenda. But she was born on Christmas day. I thought she was a present. I was wrong. I think I cursed my daughter with that name. She is no angel."
Whatever.
I'm not feeling much sympathy for Fitzgerald, a 44-year old grandmother (one year older than me!). The media will focus on Angel Glass, they'll paint her as a monster who killed her child. But Angel Glass didn't just spring to life ex nihilo. I'm looking at her mama.
Aside from being deeply saddened by Arshon's murder, here's what gnawed at me about this story: Fitzgerald told Morris that when Angel called her from city jail after killing Arshon, "She told me that she knew that I hated her. I told her that I didn’t. I told her that I just didn’t like her ways."
You raise a child who grows up feeling hated, is a mother by 17, a felon by 19, a murderer by 24? You, Arnetta Fitzgerald, are just as guilty of Arshon's abuse and death as your daughter.
Don't get me wrong, I'm not absolving Angel Glass of her heinous crime. But I am so tired of piss-poor parents passing their pathology down from generation to generation. Angel Glass was born perfect; all she need to grow was food, shelter, and love. She did not get that.
Where did Glass learn beating a child with a belt or an electric cord was ok? Where did Glass learn having absolutely no control of your emotions was acceptable? And if Fitzgerald couldn't be a mother to her own daughter, she could have at least stepped in and protected her grandchildren from what she'd created.
SMH.
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8 comments:
Horrible story Kellybelle--and the main reason I do not read the local paper or watch the local news. It's always horrific nightmares from around the block. . . The national news is frightening enough.
I feel you--that there was definitely something lacking from Angel's life as a child. But when do we expect the responsibility to fall away from her mother? It is vexing indeed. And of course--we acknowledge that this young woman is seriously ill, postpartum or a true psychopath (which no one can do anything about) that decided she would not be controlled.
In this country it is difficult to damned near impossible for a parent to control a human over the age of eighteen. Had this effed up young woman abused her child before? Were there warnings? She kept getting pregnant which basically tells me she's depressed, out of control and doesn't give a damned about her own children's quality of life.
I know too many out of control adults who are ill, criminal or are making dangerous crazy decisions that I would never blame their parents for.
And the fact that this 24 year old had just killed her
child, brutally, would be reason enough to ask if her mother hated her. It's a human response. Hell--her mothers second response probably was that she hated her daughter.
So I guess the question is--when does the moratorium on seen or unseen parental war crimes end? I say it ends when you decide to have your own children OR you decide to be a fully functioning adult who wants to do no harm. It's too easy to blame your parents (even though I fully understand the devastating effects that childhood abuse or neglect can wrought).
Also--where was Ms. child killers father? We tend to blame the parent in their life more and not the one that was no where to be seen. Sometimes it's more about the parent who is not there.
This woman has been in the system--she probably had access to mental health officials--yet obviously chose not to use them. Tragic--and another child
is lost forever.
I guess what I'm saying, is Angel Glass didn't just get this way when she turned 18.
I've always said if a kid is, say, doing poorly iin school, either he needs to study harder or he has a leanring disability--either way, the parent's responsibility is to do everything possible to help that child succeed.
If Arnetta had a problem with Angel's behavior while Angel was still a minor (as she was when she had her first child)then Arnetta needed to step up the parenting or take Angel to get some psychiatric help.
But people who are ill-equipped to succeed in their own lives rarely raise healthy children. By virtue of the fact that Arnetta has 10 grandchildren at 44, we can see she had issues.
Kellybelle,
Everything you say is true.
It's a circle though, isn't it? I guess I keep wanting
to believe because we know so much more about mental illness and we are constantly being bombarded by pharm companies wanting you to take a pill and public service announcements about depression and family dysfunction and bipolar disorder I expect people to recognize themselves.
Be better parents or whatever.
In my own family I have a nephew who is struggling. He's fourteen and has had therapy for three years (divorce) He is not getting better. My family is loving, educated and involved in his therapy. But sometimes . . . . . even the ones with everything going for them will have a hard time in the future--so I can only surmise that the grandmother had issues and didn't address them when her children were young because of lack of education, poverty or a myriad of reasons. Or, she
was just VERY unlucky with her children.
The solution to all of this . . . . Don't have kids if you're messed up, I guess, would doom the planet earth.
Peace.
Great post, Kellybelle. I love it when you write about serious stuff, even if it takes a toll on your and the audience's psyche.
As a counselor, facilitator and therapist dealing with family violence, this is hard for me to read. But I KNOW everything you say is true...
We need to find a way to get mothers and fathers to get parenting training before the child is born. That's the only remedy I can think of. Blessings
where is the dad?
unfortunately or sadly the powerful victimizes the powerless, and too often children face the brunt. i was just watching the CNN reporting on children being molested by tourists in kenya. nytimes had a story of runaway kids who get trapped into prostitution.
KB, I wish I had not read this. I am very, very sad.
i agree that the story is sad. but, the grandmother did try to get custody of the grandchildren according to the article. even if she made mistakes with her own daughter, she did try to take responsibility for the grandkids. i don't see how you can fully blame the mother, when there is no evidence she abused her daughter. maybe she didn't protect her enough, but that is not a crime the way that abuse and murder are.
I knew Angel when she was in cuyahoga county jail, and pregnant with Arshon. To me she seemed like a nice girl. She ALWAYS talked about her daughter Myshonna, and her childrens father. They were both in jail, along with her younger brother for assulting a police officer. She was in there for not "snitching" on her kids father. Having known her for only a short time we talked ALOT, to me she just seemed like someone who wanted to be accepted and loved. I didn't personally know her mother but she would always say that she would never tell on her boyfriend because he did so much for her and her family.....like making sure her mother always had money to go to bingo and buy cigaretts, and for her I guess that was ALOT. I really think that her going to prison at such a young age and having not had a good life messed her up mentally. For her mother to even make a comment like she did about her daughter's name speaks VOLUMES about her as a mother. No child grows up thinking there parent hates them without a valid reason. I'm not at ALL excusing what she did to her child, Its just a sad situation for all involved.
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