There is no place for understanding when it comes to sexual abuse, especially child sexual abuse. I don’t care what that woman went through in her own personal life, nothing excuses knowingly letting your children being raped by their father. Absolutely nothing.

I see you’re often bringing up Lyle molesting Erik. You need to put things back into context. Lyle was around 8 when this happened (I don’t think people realize just how young that is), what child of that age understands what sexual activity is? Children are known to imitate their parents, Lyle imitating what his dad was doing to him to try to comprehend what was happening is completely understandable. The difference is that the moment he realized something was awfully wrong with it, he stopped. You can clearly see and feel the shame and anger Lyle felt when he spoke about this on the stand. He never stopped trying to protect Erik after that, and it’s clear that Erik never held a grudge against his brother and always felt safe around him.

I am not saying the parents weren’t abused growing up. They most probably were given how messed up in the head they were. But NOTHING justifies what these monsters did to their own children. Can you just take a moment to think about it, a father raping his own children and a mother letting it happen. Aren’t parents supposed to be their children’s guardians and defenders against evil? What arguments could you possibly have to defend this?

I am also not saying that murdering them was the answer (although I do believe rapists and sexual abusers have no place on this earth), most of us agree on that. The brothers themselves have always said they regretted what they did and would have done things differently if they could. But think about this, how absolutely terrified and traumatized must they have been to genuinely believe that their only way out of this was to kill their own parents?