With all that is happening with Rev. Dr. Robert Bennett, we received a call asking that we please write about what happened with Dr. Rebecca Warner’s involvement in this attempted destruction of a substantial, well-liked, lovely person as he comes to the end of his life at 87 years old. The person calling saw Dr. Warner’s name on one of the original filings and wanted to know what that was about. She also asked about the possibility of filing against Dr. Warner, but didn’t know if she was a person who could do that since she was not one of the family and if not was there some way she could be involved to see that people like Dr. Warner could not continue practicing their craft when they do such things to people without a thought. There should be responsibility for what Dr. Warner has done.
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What was she talking about?
On March 3, 2020 – as most of you know – 8 white policemen showed up at Rev. Dr. Bennett’s home, very unexpectedly and without cause with court papers to remove Rev. Dr. Robert Bennett from his home citing a “section 12” as the reason.
We say without cause because Dr. Bennett was removed from his home by these 8 policemen, 5 or 6 EMT’s two ambulances and more causing a circus in his neighborhood only to be released by Mass General Hospital where he was taken for this Section 12. He was released with “no medicines prescribed”, “all vitals normal” and no reason for him to have been picked up in the first place.
His family insisted he be taken to MGH instead of Mount Auburn Hospital where the Court papers signed by Dr. Jessica Warner wanted him to go.
That clearly said Dr. Warner was wrong from having signed such a paper and something needs to come out of this so this kind of frivolous , racist, evil stops. To start at the end process by sending the police after someone like Rev. Dr. Bennett is unbelievable – but I think most African Americans would understand that process and many probably have experienced other versions.
How do you deal with an African American man who has achieved much, has no criminal record, has prospered in legitimate ways in his lifetime and can’t be put into the criminal system to experience the things that African American men experience who are picked up from their homes and/or on the street for criminal activity and put into jails? How do you incarcerate an African American man who can’t be touched by the criminal justice system? Put him through what has and is happening to Rev. Dr. Robert Bennett and to do that you need people willing to step out and take the risks that Dr. Rebecca Warner stepped out to take against Dr. Bennett.
The police were going to take Dr. Bennett to Mount Auburn Hospital in Cambridge. His family sternly objected because Dr. Bennett had just returned home on – Sunday March 1, 2020 – from brain surgery at Mass General Hospital and had never been to Mount Auburn Hospital, nor had he ever seen or been seen by a doctor at Mount Auburn Hospital so why this order comes from the Court just two days after his discharge from Mass General Hospital was a mystery.
It was signed by Dr. Rebecca Warner who said she had never met Dr. Bennett, never examined him, knew nothing about him and had never been to his home – and yet – she declared he should be picked up for a sectioning at Mount Auburn Hospital and had additionally declared his house “unsafe”..
That order was taken out by Somerville Cambridge Elder and Protective Services who apparently decided to focus on Dr. Bennett – an African American retired Episcopal priest who is lovely, quiet, – someone who is liked by just about everyone he meets, and who has never had even a hint of mental problems at any time in his life.
Well, his wife says he went crazy when he met her, but other than that there was no reason to even attempt to have Dr. Bennett hauled into Mount Auburn Hospital for a “sectioning” under Section 12 which is for those who have had psychotic breaks and caused a public nuisance in the process; or overdosed on drugs, alcohol or some other such substance and caused a public disturbance whereby someone thought he needed to be sent to the hospital to be analyzed and diagnosed by a psychiatrist and more of that kind of thing. Just for a note – Dr. Bennett has never smoked, does not drink, does not take drugs of any kind and is concerned even about medical prescriptions. He wants to know what goes into his system and tries to make sure it is good.
Dr. Warner, signing such a document is, to us, totally irresponsible. What makes it illegal from our perspective is that she could not have gotten any information from anyone else at Somerville Cambridge Elder and Protective Services about Dr. Bennett because no one else had seen him, examined him, been through his house to declare it “unsafe” and all the rest that goes along with this type of sectioning.
This is the strongest action Somerville Cambridge Elder and Protective Services can take against someone. It is usually the last action taken after they are exasperated working with someone who was causing all kinds of problems. This action against Dr. Bennett was taken when SCES did not even know, had never met, never analyzed, never had a discussion with Dr. Bennett on any level and had no business pushing its way into Dr. Bennett’s home and life.
What we discovered in the process of doing this investigation is that people were waiting at Mount Auburn Hospital to send Dr. Bennett to the psychiatric wing of the hospital to begin the process reserved for people being put through this kind of thing that ends up in “Guardianship over” being taken, their assets being drawn upon until they are gone and more. We have discovered many to whom this has happened. All those we discovered were either Black, Latina or Jewish. This seems reserved mostly for Jews, but others are beginning to be pulled in. It is a way to destroy the inheritance of the particular family being targeted. And you don’t have to worry about the press because they are peculiarly uninterested in reporting on such.
For Dr. Rebecca Warner to be so involved with such a scurrilous happening to attempt the physical and financial destruction of a nationally well known biblical scholar, theologian, priest and just all around decent human being, who was still working, doing research, and more at 87 years old. To someone whose family cares about him and is fighting this with all of their resources which should not be happening – says a lot about Dr. Warner – nothing positive.
Isn’t this kind of thing what “Black Lives Matter” is fighting against?
This happening is how to make sure the next generation of minorities cannot survive and will continue in low level jobs which just helps them get by and the generations to come will not benefit from the blood, sweat and tears of their ancestors financial and other accomplishments. What Dr. Warner has done is to help demean, disgrace, establish an undeserved reputation for Dr. Bennett who worked hard all of his life to reach that pinnacle from which African Americans are picked up and thrown into the ugly, vicious abyss for having tried and especially for having thought themselves equal to.
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istant future and you want to preserve it so it can continue to be used and enjoyed. Pass your belongings on to those who either won’t or can’t pay the top dollars required of the people buying new stuff. What is this new stuff they are buying? Shoes full of chemicals way into four figures; New pocketbooks which show off a certain status costing into five figures. Instead of landfill, make sure those items with which you currently live are in such good condition they can be passed on to others to enjoy.
WHAT IS BED & BREAKFAST?
Thursday, October 15th, 2015The term “bed & breakfast” has been garnering more and more excitement over the years. Every corporation, small business, mom and pop shop, wants to gain in their marketing and advertisement so they add things that are totally irrelevant to their businesses in the hope that you will be fooled into thinking they are “bed & breakfast” and will patronize them. You can then be acculturated into a definition of bed & breakfast which has nothing to do with the actual concept.
Let’s take a look:
There are VACATION RENTAL HOMES.
These have nothing to do with “bed & breakfast”, but some unscrupulous, or ignorant merchants, PR people, media, etc. will put them under “bed & breakfast” because they have something to gain – if nothing more than to not have to think and write at the same time.
A Vacation Rental Home is a house which is put up for rent – furnished, with everything you need to move in and set up housekeeping for one week, two weeks, a month, sometimes an entire season. No one else shares the house with you. They are put together for the purpose of renting to those who want a time away from home, but in another house near the beach, near the mountains, in a historic location, etc.
There are ROOMING HOUSES
These are still popular and much used, but they are never advertised as such. The term, which once referred to a temporary community of people, living together in their own rooms with – usually – the local widow providing breakfast and dinner fell into disrepute. As generations passed, the breakfast and dinner fell by the wayside, the community disintegrated into a collection of disparate people who were temporarily down on their luck and rooming houses became what are sometimes known as “flop houses” and so the entire industry fell on hard times until some enterprising “Rooming House” owner discovered he or she could rent their “Rooming House” easier if they called it a “bed & breakfast.”
There are HOTELS
The hotel corporation has been pretty vicious about getting rid of the competition. So, when it became clear – as more and more people travelled, particularly to Europe and especially England – “bed & breakfast” was discovered in the United States and a growing number of people wanted to travel “bed & breakfast”.
Seeing this growing number of people and losing many paying guests, hotels added “bed & breakfast” to their name. Sometimes to a part of the services they offered – Smith Hotel and Bed & Breakfast. Grand Dame Hotel, also offering bed & breakfast. And more such appellations appeared – more and more frequently, until today we think nothing about the conflict of a Hotel and a “bed & breakfast” being conflated into one place. We see “bed & breakfast” advertised by a hotel and do exactly what the marketing and public relations people expected us to do – go for it bringing the romance and reputation of the “bed & breakfast” into the hotels circle.
There are INNS
Once the “Southern Lady” of the accommodations industry, INNS had a romance around them that began to be moved into the sphere of “bed & breakfast” so INNS started calling themselves Smith Bed & Breakfast Inn. Or sometimes, the Smith INN bed & breakfast. Trying to get back the romantic and historical reputation it once had until they got knocked off their pedestal by actual bed & breakfasts.
There are GUEST HOUSES
This category never quite got itself together since the marketing and advertisements were and are usually done by the owners rather than the professionals so they went all over the map.
These are usually private homes which have gone commercial. The owners would normally live in the house, but they live in it the way a funeral home owner lives in a funeral home. There are places in the house which are ready for their close-up and other places where the owners and the help reside and/or work. They can have a restaurant, rent parts of the house out for parties, weddings, etc. and just generally pretend to be a private home/hotel. They vary all over the map, but most call themselves – what else – “bed & breakfast.”
There are the “AIR” people
Started normally in the living room of the apartment they rented from someone else with an air mattress on the floor of the living room which they rent to strangers, this has gotten all out of hand and Attorney Generals, cities, villages, counties, states, are getting into the picture to regulate such. Except they generally don’t know what it is they are regulating.
The “AIR” people have begun to include all of the above, plus more as they define their business and characterize themselves as “bed & breakfast” which has totally disrupted the “bed & breakfast” industry as well as all the rest.
Since some of the “AIR” people started their companies by stealing the concept from others and moving on without any acknowledgement, compensation, or permission of any kind, their ethics have not improved as they develop the concept pushing out others and acting like the mafia of the industry.
There needs to be some authority which sorts out all of these groups and has them identify themselves as what they are rather than trading on a marketing and advertising concept which fools the public and attempts to confuse everyone to their advantage.
So – let’s look at what is actually “bed & breakfast”.
It is a stay in a private home. Where people actually live on a daily basis, going about their lives as we all normally would, except those who offer bed & breakfast welcome guests along the way who are traveling from one place to another.
They do not offer a place for a wedding, party, meeting, corporate retreat, etc. They offer a place to stay for a few people. They do not have 30 or more rooms where people can stay, they have just a few rooms with just a few people staying.
Every culture has had some form of bed and breakfast. In India – those traveling on a religious pilgrimage had places to stay which welcomed those making a pilgrimage – and more. In the United States bed & breakfast comes mostly from the “Bishop’s room”. The place in a home reserved for the Bishop, when he was in town. When the Bishop was not in town, the room was used by the home owners to welcome other guests. The guests left a discrete offering on a side board, quietly, so as not to embarrass the homeowners. That offering could be a chicken for supper, etc. It was also sometimes money.
One family got to know many travelers and the travelers got to know a local person, generally one with whom they stayed in contact over the years. It was a way to reach beyond your circle of friends, your class, your race, your everything into an area you would not reach otherwise. The people who travelled and the people who welcomed them met serendipitously and there a community was formed. You had a contact in another area to whom you could write, later on as telephones came in – you could call – if you needed something or some influence that person with whom you stayed – could provide. It was and remained a personal, one-on-one arrangement.
During the time when African Americans were not welcomed in hotels, motels, inns, etc. they travelled bed & breakfast. There was a list of people in different cities who welcomed guests, who you could call and make reservations to stay for the night or for several nights during your time in a particular area. One of the reasons some African Americans grew closer with people they would never have met otherwise. A community was formed across the country as people who couldn’t get a glass of water from a restaurant found a way around a stone wall.
This has all gotten out of hand as greed pushes us to make ever more money on someone else’s back – on someone else’s concept – inconveniencing many who were perfectly willing to accept a neighbors bed & breakfast, but appalled at the streams of people now appearing, the loud music from the parties, the intrusion into their lives which has happened as the “bed & breakfast” industry is now being destroyed by those who don’t begin to understand the concept, but understand the money they can make by using the name – concept be damned.
“Bed & breakfast” was and is a way for many to use their homes to supplement their incomes and sometimes even to carry them through hard times.
We have helped people get out of mortgage foreclosures, evictions, and more by using the original “bed & breakfast” concept – which is also what it was meant to do.
We hope, that as you read this and go through your life with a better understanding of “bed & breakfast” you will help to calm down and maintain an industry which has meant a lot to many people and should not be so exploited as it is today.
If you want a corporation; a business; which makes reservations for other kind of accommodations, then have that and call it what it is, don’t trade on “bed & breakfast” to promote a fraud. Don’t have a business where people arrive expecting breakfast only to discover they are in a commercial setting and there is no breakfast nor really, no bed & breakfast, but something else they didn’t expect. Don’t have a business which someone who just wants money and has figured out a way to use this concept with your help to rent apartments which they then re-rent to others for “bed & breakfast” reducing the housing – especially affordable housing available in a very tight area. Don’t facilitate the destruction of a wonderful industry because of your out of control greed and empire building. Don’t rent your living room to someone with an air mattress on the floor because you want to do this rip off thing instead of living comfortably and honestly with your neighbors.
It is time for all of this to stop and for the world to come to its senses. Chasing after – greedy for – hurting others – it is enough. It has led to people’s homes burning down because of guests who were ill prepared for where they were staying and got the idea they could use the accommodation anyway they saw fit and consequently didn’t respect the homeowner or the neighbors; muggings because people arrive at these accommodations knowing there would be no one home and instructions given when they rented the place to look under the porch for the key – only to find someone else knew about the emptiness of the house and was inside waiting for them and relieved them of their belongings, money, dignity. It is time to take care with whatever business you call yourself and stop pushing to the point where people using your services feel free enough to rent a house for one thing and instead have a party bus pull up and destroy the house using it as a cheap place to have a loud, destructive party which winds up tearing the house apart and destroying someone’s home which was onlyrented for the night to a couple.
IT IS ENOUGH and time to deal honestly with who you are; what you are doing; and to show respect for the rest of the world by naming yourself correctly and not trading on a concept which has nothing to do with your business.
For the above reasons and others we are putting AirB&B in Bettina’s Hall of Shame.
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Tags: bed & breakfast, breakfast table talk, Guest Comments
Posted in An editorial just because, Bed & Breakfast, Bettina Homes, Bettina's Box of Shame, Bettina's Hall of Shame, Breakfast Table Talk, Empathy, Press Release, Press Release from Bettina Network | No Comments »