The Sunday Mail
Life Issues with FGK
Issues that hurt the most are those that seem self-inflicted because we had no idea the one closest to us would betray us. Most of the scars we have were not inflicted upon us by strangers but by those we once trusted.
In this episode, we discuss the issue of trust from a real life scenario which happened a few years back. Names are going to be withheld.
There was a couple staying in Highfield, Harare. Some of their family members lived in the rural areas of Rusape.
Among the relatives in the rural areas was a young girl, a sister to the wife of this gentleman. They decided to take this little girl to Harare to begin her high school in Harare since she had performed exceptionally well in her primary education.
The 14-year-old girl was then raped by her sister’s husband. When the big sister got to know about this, she was hurt, but she had the dilemma of either standing by her sister and reporting the case to the police or protecting her husband from the law.
She chose to cover it all up and told her little sister never to tell anyone about the rape.
As fate would have it, the young girl had been impregnated and in no time, her pregnancy started showing. Neighbours could only gossip about it but could not do anything to help. The big sister had to live with the pain of her wrong decision of protecting a vicious animal in the name of “bread winner of the family”. She also had to go through the pain of watching her little sister struggle with the unwanted pregnancy, psychological and emotional pain.
When a child is raped, such cases must be reported to the police. The wrath of the law should take its toll on the perpetrator to protect other potential victims.
Rapists are harmful, dangerous and evil. It doesn’t matter how much their support will affect the family’s livelihood. It is better to struggle on what to eat whilst your conscience is clean rather than to be full with the bread of evil doing. This rapist was supposed to be a father figure to this girl, he was supposed to protect her and stand up for her, yet he contaminated her purity. His wife trusted him, yet he betrayed that trust.
Speaking of which, trust does not come freely, it has to be earned. It is how much of it one earns that determines how much they are worth in terms of reliability. Trustworthiness demands a price to be paid. It takes ages to accumulate but it seems ironic how it can be undone within seconds. It only takes one ill move to destroy one’s legacy, that is why Robert Green said, “Reputation is everything, guard it with your life.”
It is very important to be a trustworthy person in life. It is a necessary virtue that can achieve more for any individual since it’s an accolade that can be added to a name’s weight. The Bible also says, “A good name is to be desired than great riches.’’ – Proverbs 22 v 1
A name can only be good when trustworthiness is among the credentials. Although traits of untrustworthiness are often conspicuous, deceivers too, get to be trusted by their victims before they pounce on them. Never be generous with trust, don’t give it away just like that. Perception can be illusionary but time always reveals the true core of every individual. It is not wise to trust quickly, our anatomy makes it difficult to tell the inner intentions of a person apart from what they portray and declare to your senses. The real person and their capabilities to inflict harm are always hidden underneath the heart, the grin of teeth is always behind beautiful lips.
Even graves are decorated with beautiful flowers, never judge a book by its cover when it comes to trust.
Trust is defined as a trait of believing in the honesty and reliability of others, this means having complete confidence in a person. Being trustworthy means doing what you say you will do. This stretches further to playing your role in any setting, whether in the family, friendship or business set up.
If you are a teacher to your students, that relationship has to produce what the teacher-student relationship should. When the teacher begins to cross the line and develops another form of relationship with their student, that relationship is bound to produce sour results, which are going to be a betrayal of the trust invested upon the tutor by the student’s parents.
When a doctor has lust towards their patients, their performance is definitely compromised and trust vested in them by the government is betrayed. The delivery of their service is lust-driven and therefore manipulative.
The same goes for a father who is switching roles within the house and having an affair with the maid, or an uncle who pursues love with their relative’s child.
Most of these unstable relatives discompose minors and they might even force themselves onto the child: rape occurs. This is mainly because when the mother of this child or when the responsible guardian looked at the perpetrator, they thought of him as trustworthy. Their eye could not see the real person or animal within.
Therefore, trust should not be easily given, it should be earned. It is not wise to be quick to trust because time exposes the real person. Take time to trust. Trust also means being loyal to the important relationships around you, even your friends. Honesty is an ingredient that should constituent trustworthiness.
People need to learn to cultivate trust by following commitments through, honouring and completing tasks. Keeping promises is a virtue and anyone who possesses this attribute is worthy of trust. Effectiveness in execution of tasks and roles is paramount in earning trust.
Many have been cheated by the people they trusted. Some of you have lost valuables to thieves who were close to you. You were deceived by your close associates. The parameters you had used to judge them as worthy of your trust were delusional.
Within our African society, we feel compelled to trust everyone whom we call a relative. We tend to trust even our neighbours in looking after our kids while we are at work. A lot of things happen in our absence. You might have seen scars on your child’s body, scars that you cannot explain. What happened when you were away? And you never bothered to investigate because you trust the person you left the child with!
Trust is fragile and is broken by one act. To build it back again takes ages and is often impossible.
Let’s discuss what should be done when someone is raped. Tell us your thoughts.
Quote of the week: It takes time to build trust but a second to destroy it.
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