Active discussions

Meet the Other Phone. Only the apps you allow.

Meet the Other Phone.
Only the apps you allow.

Buy now

Please or to access all these features

Talk

Back to thread
Original poster

To be shocked at the appalling treatment of Rosemary Kennedy?

2 replies

IfyouseeRitaMoreno · 30/09/2018 09:09

And even more shocked that the Kennedys never suffered the consequences for what they did to her (well the father to be more precise).

I’ve just found out about her story and can’t stop being horrified. Sister to JFK, she had minor developmental issues, was considered mentally deficient because she had sexual liaisons (the horror!) as a teenager.

Her father, Joe Kennedy, took her without the consent of either her or her mother, for a secret lobotomy with a physician Dr James Watts. It left her unable to walk or speak. It gets worse...

So then they dump her in various institutions and barely visit her for 20 years. Her siblings tried to make up for it in some way (JFK passed a law to help mental illness and her sister introduced the Special Olympics) but her parents just abandoned her and NOTHING happened to the physicians Watts and Freedman who did this to her knowing the risks. Except of course that they went on to have illustrious successful careers.

I also read that 80% of lobotomies were performed on women which shocks me even more. Why?

Will someone else be shocked and horrified with me? I guess I’m just Shock that they could do this to their daughter, cover it up, and face no reprisals.

[post edited by MNHQ to remove offensive language]

Go to post
MNHQ

LilyMumsnet · 30/09/2018 12:16

Hi all

We've had some reports about the language being used in this thread and for that reason, will be going through and removing or editing posts.

We have a blanket ban on offensive terms (like the one being used here) regardless of context, so please do bear this in mind when posting.

MNHQ

LilyMumsnet · 30/09/2018 19:15

Hi all,

Really sorry for any confusion here - we're not going to be editing posts retrospectively but we did say that going forward, we will allow asterisks or 'the 'r' word' in this context. We edited the posts that we felt could be edited and deleted posts that we felt couldn't be edited.

We understand that there are times like this when it's hard not to use a different word because the entire point of the conversation is about how awful the word is, however, there are a small handful of words that we just think are so offensive and cause so much upset that when they appear on the boards, we zap them on sight.

We hope this explains things a little bit. Flowers

Watch this thread for updates

Tap "Watch" to get all the latest updates

End of posts

There are no more MNHQ posts on this thread

Back to thread