IT was on "Anderson Cooper 360" that I heard the woman. What an interview. But then I suppose news outlets are scrambling for a unique angle when reporting the finding of kidnap victim Jaycee Lee Dugard.
But to bring this woman, Cheyvonne Molina, who knows Jaycee and her daughters, to the viewing public without some kind of disclaimer for her shortsighted belief that these three young women, who have lived their lives in captivity, are really quite fine, is simply irresponsible journalism.
There needed to be, if not a disclaimer, most certainly some kind of counter-statements as to the fact that being held in captivity cannot produce "quite fine."
Initially we met two impressive women, Lisa Campbell and Ally Jacobs, who broke the 18-year-old kidnapping case by following-up on their suspicions upon seeing Dugard's two daughters on the UC Berkeley campus in the company of their father, ex-convict and registered sexual pervert Phillip Garrido.
Campbell and Jacobs noted the girls were not in school, their skin was pale and they avoided making eye contact. Also, it was unusual, this dynamic duo noted, for an 11-year-old to look every time she said something at her older sister for approval.
Cheyvonne Molina said these girls were friends of her daughter and had most recently attended her party. She went on to say the girls were fans of the TV show "Hannah Montana" like so many other kids their age.
And this makes them normal?
The media, said Molina, "made it seem like these little girls were living like wolves or jungle kids in the backyard dungeon. Perhaps that's it, but they didn't give that visual to me."
Molina, I'm afraid, has lost track of her own African-American heritage or perhaps has never had the opportunity to understand our ancestors' life in the big house being raped by master and bearing his children, as Dugard's experience has duplicated.
Or maybe Molina has been reading but has focused on those now corrected history books that portrayed slaves as happy Negroes picking cotton and singing songs in the field. Maybe Molina is stuck with the image from "Gone With The Wind" where the house Negroes were dressed in starched and well-pressed garments.
Since she says the girls were both polite and well-mannered, Molina, like old-time historians, failed to understand that a smile and a "Yessuh, master," does not denote normalcy.
How come two UC campus officers saw something odd with the girls, something that needed to be investigated? How come, Cheyvonne Molina, who knew the children, their kidnap victim mother and the sex-pervert kidnapper for some time, comes on "Anderson Cooper 360" expecting viewers will find merit in her viewpoint of normalcy?
Perhaps, since Molina doesn't have a grasp of her own identity based upon the historical significance of slavery and the impact it has had on shaping the viewpoint of so many, she just sees what she wants to, and life is so much less troublesome that way.
On the other hand, Campbell and Jacobs, in their job capacity as an event planner and as campus security, live life knowing what clues indicate and also knowing they have a responsibility in life, and that doesn't equate with things being easy.
Without the Campbells and the Jacobs in our society, we wouldn't be able to shake our heads and wonder why the decision was made to put Molina before the news cameras.
