Dear Editor,
Encinitas City Council meetings and social media sites, Save Encinitas Now and Encinitas Keeping It Real, have become a stage for a particularly hateful drama. The antagonists are not shadowy figures lurking in alleys, but rather, performers with a talent for weaponizing their privilege.
They are the DARVO divas. Their current target? Our homeless neighbors and the very organizations that offer them a lifeline. DARVO stands for Deny, Attack, and Reverse Victim and Offender.
It’s a familiar script: the City Council considers a grant to enhance a safe space for all residents in need, including our unsheltered neighbors. The divas descend, their voices dripping with disdain, their arguments cloaked in the thinnest veneer of concern.
They’ll DENY any hint of heartlessness, insisting they “just want what’s best for the community.”
Then comes the ATTACK, a barrage of fear-mongering and dehumanization: “They bring crime and should be removed from our city;” “I worked hard to live here, they should too;” “Community organizations that provide support are enablers.” And when countered with facts, compassion, or even basic human decency, they unleash the…
REVERSE VICTIM AND OFFENDER, portraying themselves as the persecuted martyrs of their own self-serving narratives. “We just want….,“ “Please save us from…”
Despite our new City Council members’ campaign promises to represent all residents, they are clearly influenced by these performers who are their supporters. The council prioritizes the whines of the privileged divas over the desperate cries of the vulnerable. Inexperienced council members allow the divas’ fear-mongering to influence policy, effectively condemning our homeless, low-income residents and organizations that care for them to further hardship.
This must stop to heal and reunify our community. Sadly, the DARVO divas are incapable of changing their behavior.
We, the residents of this city, must demand that our Council members prioritize compassion over fear, facts over prejudice, and the needs of the many over the whims of the few. We must remind them that their duty is to serve the entire community, not just the loudest privileged voices.
We must call out the DARVO divas for what they are: purveyors of cruelty, disguised as concerned citizens. We must expose their tactics, their hypocrisy, and their utter disregard for the humanity of those less fortunate.
Our homeless neighbors are not a blight on our city; they are native Encinitans, our neighbors, our fellow human beings. They deserve dignity, respect, and a chance at a better life. The Community Resource Center is not the enemy; it embodies our community’s compassion. (See CRC’s Annual Impact Summary)
New City Council members, it’s time to choose. Will you continue to cater to the mean-spirited demands of the DARVO divas, or will you stand on the side of justice and compassion? Will you prioritize privileged self-interest over human lives? Will you allow fear to triumph over empathy? The upcoming annual budget decisions you make will be the best test of your values.
The choice is yours. But know this: we, the citizens who believe in a just and compassionate city, are watching.
Theresa Beauchamp is a longtime Encinitas resident and member of Encinitas Action.
10 comments
Well, there are a lot of compelling Comments but only one deserves a response. Before Theresa and I married I asked her if she wanted to change her last name to mine. She said, “no”. She then asked if I wanted to change my last name to hers and I said, “no”. She why and I told her that it was my hope, maybe someday, perhaps even 37 years later, to use our different last names to trick people on a newspaper website. It’s great to relive that wonderful memory. I think we may have discussed sharing an entirely new name like “Mr. and Mrs. Minion” or “Mr. and Mrs. Puppet” but my memory may be off about that.
Bob Ayres and Theresa Beauchamp: I’d love to know as well. There have been multiple IG accounts accusing me of being SAVEENCINITASNOW, which I am not. In fact, my attorney recently subpoenaed Meta to authenticate ownership of the IG accounts.
I’m also interested to know who these DARVO DIVAS are given you refer to SAVEENCINITASNOW as a female diva. As someone accused of owning that account, this article is a likeness.
Do you own any of the IG accounts and are you referring to me when you appear to diagnose with a clinical term? Defamation per se includes stating someone suffers a form of mental illness and we would like to know who you are referring to, particularly so since you hold medical licensure. Please have your attorney contact Mark Skeels. 619.536.2498.
DARVO is not a clinical term and it is not a diagnosis, it is a description of tactics, not symptoms. DARVO is not a mental illness, it is a set of behaviors. It’s similar to using the term “gaslighting”, which can also be used in counseling and therapy, but has also been used in common vernacular. So if someone says they think you are gaslighting them, they are not diagnosing you, they are describing their experience of your behavior.
You may not be the person behind SAVEENCINITASNOW, NSettoon, but you sure do comment on almost every one of their posts under your user name usayimadreamer. So how can you even be bothered by being accused of being behind an account when you have clearly aligned yourself with them in multiple ways, such as even using the same footage as them in your public comment in city council meetings?
NSettoon has also accused people of unseemly behavior on social media, based on her own opinion, and has no problem besmirching other people’s character, but is quite litigious if you say anything about her at all. Basically, she has the freedom to share her opinion online, but no one else does unless she agrees with it.
I gather Ms. Beauchamp was not witness to the naked junkie parading through downtown Encinitas a few Friday rush hours ago, stopping briefly at the intersections of D and the 101 to masterbate in traffic, to little affect, before heading towards the homeless haven of Cottonwood Creek Park. Families with children witnessed this horrible scene that went on for many minutes. Maybe Ms. Beauchamp should offer a spare bedroom to one of these vagrants or has she already? By her tone of compassion and love, I fully expect her to welcome them with wide open doors.
These bum neighbors, whether local or just visitors are a scourge on our community. They are costing businesses money, through loss of business, turnover of employees afraid to go to work or the time it takes to clean up urine and human excrement in front of their businesses.
This compassion nonsense is pandemic/Blakespear era virtue signaling.
Let’s face it. Our sister neighbor cities got tough on vagrancy and we haven’t. Mayor Bruce Ehlers campaigned on cleaning up the homeless problem. So far, crickets! Will he live up to this crucial campaign promise or bow to the opposition? Does he have the courage of his convictions or is he just another politician who disappoints?
I hope Encinitas Now and Encinitas Keeping it Real continue to point out the realities of a very serious problem that is eroding our public safety in Encinitas. Real compassion is getting the drug addicts into programs and keeping our community safe and clean. Anything else is just noise.
Ayers failed to mention that he is the husband of the always hateful Beauchamp.
Interesting how they don’t use the same last name when posting their drivel.
Anyone that disagrees with them about anything are automatically in the ‘hateful’ camp.
So bitter that their fauxgressive Developer Puppet Blakespear minions aren’t polluting our Government anymore.
How does coddling developers help the homeless? It doesn’t.
Interesting how they don’t use the same last name when posting their drivel? Heaven forbid a couple get married and she keep her last name. For almost 40 years she’s used that name and then some guy who lives in his mom’s basement and can’t conceive of women being equal partners in a loving marriage yet keeping her family name? YIKES.
Blaming, shaming, name calling, finger pointing, and outright lying about reality is clearly evident in this ridiculous Op-Ed commentary.
No one wants the down and out, the homeless, people living in cars, homeless drug addicts, the mentally ill, and homeless ex-convicts stopping over or living in their town, and anywhere near the schools, no matter the city. And no one wants to witness the unwanted behaviors that accompany the homeless transients. Businesses suffer from this element, as does tourism and the overall quality of life and public safety for all residents. This is not about empathy and compassion, or your personal values, it’s about common-sense policies that make sense for Encinitas. Everyone knows this. Encinitans will defend their town, families, businesses, and property before they ever defend the homeless living in their town, and before defending the homeless charities operating in the town. And Encinitans expect the city leadership to do the same. There’s nothing priviledged or dictatorial about this.
An anonymous hateful comment establishing a priority of one human’s needs over another. What a shock!! Free Speech cements the author’s opinion and mine. As a resident of Encinitas for over 60 years I can assert that the increase in traffic, housing and homelessness is far less damaging to our Fair City then the hateful, mostly anonymous rhetoric called out in the commentary.
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