Growing up my mother used the elders as a club, I dispised these men after a while due to their failure to realize what was really going on was my mother was using them to frighten me and further abuse me. You see my mother physically abused me as a child . It is interesting to me when i was a teenager (still being physically abused) and said I was going to the elders, she would say "how dare you take personal family matters to the elders if you do i will kick you out. I was told this at 14 years of age.
Eventually I did tell an elder, What was his response? "Well this is a tough situation you know your mother is from a diffrent culture" he said.
never did he even ask her about it. The coward. After this I was no longer afraid of them . You see I knew then that they where just men and really where not men of god deserving of respect. The sad part is I am now so very cynical of all institutions government, religous, and secular. I know this is a sad way to live (lonely) but I am working on rebuilding my faith in humanity.