Her Choices

by Shaker ViveLaFat

[Trigger warning.]

"Every fucking day of my life," was the response Wendy Maldonado gave to the 911 operator when she was queried as to whether her husband ever beat her. She had called 911 to report that she and her 16 year old son, Randy, had used a hammer and hatchet to kill her husband while he slept. The details of the abuse she and her four children suffered at his hands were detailed in an hour long documentary by Tommy Davis which is currently showing on HBO. While the documentary itself is a terrifying account of one man's systematic torture of his family and one woman's equally terrifying (if arguably justified) response to such torture, it is this review of the documentary by Brian Lowery at Variety.com that has brought me here to my very first guest post on Shakesville.

In his short review of "Every F-ing Day of My Life" Brian writes:

Nobody will come away from the movie filled with holiday cheer, either, but it's a sobering look at the consequences of bad choices -- from Maldonado in her teens marrying a guy who turned out to be a psychopath, to enduring having her teeth knocked out because she didn't perceive herself as having other options.

Of course, Wendy only perceived that she had no options. In reality she had plenty of choices including: Being beaten to death, watching her loved ones murdered, and bringing terror on anyone she tried to get to help her. While Mr. Lowery puts special significance on Wendy's "choice" to endure having her teeth knocked out, he doesn't make any mention of the person choosing to knock Wendy's teeth out. Mr. Lowery stops just short of claiming Wendy had it coming, and if she really wanted to avoid being beaten she shouldn't have made Aaron so angry.

However, gentle reader, Mr. Lowery wasn't finished.

No, when several people actually commented that his review partook in the blood-sport of victim blaming, he posted a response. Let me sum it up for you: Mr. Lowery is a big important critic and didn't spend much time on his review of this paltry, little documentary. Any intellect or artist would understand the point he is trying to make; however, for the whining, sensitive masses, he will deign to explain what he meant.

Now, perhaps [the review] was slightly inartfully worded -- as a 65-minute documentary, it didn't warrant an epic of a review -- inasmuch as I didn't restate how much of a bastard her husband was. To me, that was fairly self-evident to anybody who chose to watch the film.

But to suggest noting that (Wendy) Maldonado made "bad choices" along the way "blames the victim," as some have, is patently ridiculous.

No, actually, what is patently ridiculous is devoting one sentence to Aaron Maldonado's violent choices. I won't be so charitable. Aaron Maldonado knelt on his wife's head, in front of their children, until his wife stopped breathing. Aaron Maldonado bashed Wendy's head through the walls so often that she took to covering the holes with pictures her children drew (doing it while Aaron wasn't at home of course, so she wouldn't be beaten). Aaron Maldonado beat her unconscious while she was driving. Aaron Maldonado threatened to kill her family members one by one if she ever left him. He did all of this daily, sometimes multiple times a day. Yet, Aaron's choices, the daily choice to raise his hand in anger to his wife and children, are clearly not worth mentioning. Instead, let's see whose "bad choices" Mr. Lowery decided to expound upon:

Without having the movie fresh in my mind, I would call each of the following bad choices:

1) Getting married in her teens to a guy she really didn't know all that well. That's frankly the worst choice of all, and generally a prescription for marital and financial problems.

2) Having children (four of them) with him too soon.

3) Not more fully exploring her options in terms of finding some other way to escape her marriage. I realize she was threatened and terrified, but the movie closes with information about a domestic-abuse hotline. It does not say that if you are in an abusive relationship, you should kill your abuser while he sleeps and hope for mercy from the criminal-justice system after the fact.

I had an entire paragraph refuting the claim that the above were bad choices, but I erased it because it's moot. None of these "choices" actually exist. They are all figments of Mr. Lowery's privilege. A choice requires the power or liberty to choose; Wendy had neither power nor liberty. Making choices requires having choices; Wendy's lack of choice started when she was born a poor woman in a culture that doesn't nurture poor women, doesn't invest in providing them opportunities, doesn't ask questions like why a smart but troubled girl accrues 200 days of detention, gets pregnant, drops out, and marries her boyfriend, because she sees no other future for herself.

Wendy's lack of choices continued when her husband made her a prisoner of their marriage through threats, intimidation, and physical violence. And again when she tried to do the right thing but her calls to police were met with inaction and disdain. A choice was taken from her at every turn until, at last, murder seemed the only choice left.

And after Wendy made her choice, people told her that a jury might find her actions defensible, and let her go. But her oldest son, who suffered the brunt of Aaron Maldonado's abuse toward his four sons, participated in the killing, and while she might have been willing to gamble with her own life, she didn't want to gamble with his. Once again, she saw only one choice. Alongside her son, Wendy pleaded guilty, and was sentenced to 10 years in prison.

During those 10 years, assholes like Brian Lowery will have the choice to continue to contribute to the victim-blaming culture that took so many options from her to begin with. Or not to.