My last blog covered the case studies found in Chapter 1 The Problem. Before beginning Chapter 2 Knowing It Is a Problem: The Need for Clarity, I want to make a point I missed from Chapter 1. Think about some of our current efforts to prevent child molestation. We teach children about safe touching (Good touch, bad touch), saying “no”, and telling a trusted adult when something happens, and to continue telling until an adult listens. Who is primarily responsible for this process? The child. The process implicitly tells children that they are responsible for their own safety. Are there any other areas of criminal justice in which society places the responsibility of protecting themselves on children?
We tell children to tell a trusted adult, and to keep telling them until they are believed. That gives the message to children that their stories will seem unbelievable. We want children to be more persistant than most adults would be in less emotionally-charged situations. In the situations Dr. Van Dam covers in her book, it’s the adults who are groomed by the perpetrator to gain access to the victims. When the adults welcome the molesters with open arms, public praise and increased social standing, how will children respond when they have to make serious charges against such an outstanding citizen?
Let’s keep that in mind as we learn the tools we need to be the protectors. Our children do not need that burden. That’s on us.
In Chapter 2 Dr. Van Dam writes about how many of the problems that society has in addressing this issue are because of the numerous definitions people have for child molestation. When people don’t feel sure about what they are seeing, they are hesitant to act. Predators thrive in the resulting uncertainty. Parents who get told things by their children will often choose erroneous avenues to address the situation. For example, a student that tells their parents that a teacher put their hands down the back of their pants, may address the issue with the school principal rather than the police.
As an educator for 29 years, and as a school safety expert for nearly 15 years, I know educators struggle with this, even after laws that make it clear. For example, under Indiana Code IC 31-33-5 and IC 12-17.2-3.5, child care staff and volunteers are mandated to report suspected child abuse and neglect. Failure to do so is a class B misdemeanor. Most states have similar mandatory reporting laws. Yet in my travels around the country, educators and school administrators struggle with that.
In my work with Safe Havens International, the world’s largest non-profit school safety center, we conduct scenario assessments, in which various school staff are given video or audio scenarios, and asked what they would do to respond to the incidents. We record their responses for the first 30 seconds. One of the scenarios involves a staff member acting inappropriately with a student by saying sexually explicit things, and stroking the student’s hair. This scenario, while disturbing, is not explicit in nature, but I often see the staff member struggle with what to do, and more often than not, reporting the incident to the authorities is not mentioned, even in those states in which doing so would be mandated by law. I think, more often than not, this is due to uncertainty.
This uncertainty exists even among experts in the field. As Dr. Van Dam writes,
There is no consensus among researchers and
practitioners about what sex acts constitute sexual
abuse, what age defines children, nor even when the
concept of child sexual abuse is preferable to others
such as sexual victimization, sexual exploitation, sexual
assault, sexual misuse, child molestation, sexual
maltreatment, or child rape…. Cases in which children are raped or otherwise
sexually abused by their peers, younger children, or children less than five years
older than themselves, are often discounted as instances of child sexual abuse. (p.
133)
(Van Dam, Carla. Identifying Child Molesters (p. 42). Taylor and Francis. Kindle
Edition.)
Perhaps this is a case of the experts getting lost in the weeds. They get caught up in research, of trying to prove a particular point, and they forget why they are doing the research. People who are experiencing the situation first-hand can’t decide what is going on, because the experts can’t agree on what to call it.
The problem we face is that clarity is needed. The lack of clarity assists the molester, and does nothing to help us protect children. Lack of clarity interferes with appropriate treatment. If you don’t know what to call a particular behavior, then a proper treatment cannot be determined. A lack of clarity can interfere with proper educational practices. For example, children require proper physical contact for regular emotional and psychological development, thus going with a “no touch” policy would not be in the child’s best interests.
Dr. Van Dam used a term, nescience, a lack of knowledge or awareness, to explain how some people can see something happen, but not see it. I witnessed this as a school administrator. We had two students in a field after school, conducting field research on the procreative process. They were in an advanced state of undress, when the school’s cross country team, along with their coach, ran by. The two young researchers sprang up, in fragrante delicti (red-handed, so to speak), instantly creating a team full of eye witnesses. Except for the coach, who apparently went situationally blind. In the case of child molesters, they can brazenly fondle a victim, and the sheer cheekiness of the act, along with the confidence of the molester, will prevent witnesses from making a report. They will not believe what they just saw, in what researchers call “shared negative hallucination”. No belief, no report, and a child becomes a victim.
So what’s to be done? Gavin de Becker is one of the world’s foremost experts on personal protection. His book, The Gift of Fear, is a must read for anyone. He commented on those who deny seeing sexual abuse, “During the beginning of sexual abuse, deniers are unconscious co-conspirators” (de Becker, 1999, p. 15). (Van Dam, Carla. Identifying Child Molesters (p. 49). Taylor and Francis. Kindle Edition.). So when it comes to the safety of our children, would we think that ignorance of violence was an acceptable approach? No. We need to overcome denial, overcome nescience, and see the problem with clarity.
Clarity comes from knowing what outcome you want. We want to keep our children from getting into a situation in which a child predator can victimize a child. That means we don’t need to worry about what definitions researchers, politicians or lawyers use. We want to terminate the problem behavior before harm is done to the child. Thus, Dr. Van Dam uses a psychological definition. According to Dr. Van Dam, sexual abuse has three conditions:
1) It is a violation of a trust relationship with unequal power and/or advanced knowledge, 2) There is a need for secrecy, and
3) Sexual activity. The activity could be talking, to voyeurism to intercourse.
So if the perpetrator uses power and/or coercion, if the perpetrator has advanced knowledge, or if threats are used, then abuse has occurred. Dr. Van Dam used an example of a high school coach who had created a peephole into a locker room. He watched students through the peephole and masturbated while doing so. The coach was in a position of power, the coach attempted to keep the peephole secret, and the voyeurism was a sexual act, even without the masturbation.
Most of the rest of the chapter was Dr. Van Dam explaining the differences between pedophiles (Pre-pubescent children) and ephebophiles (Post-pubescent children), incest offenders and various orientations of sex offenders. She points out that the research shows that one-third of child molesters are women.
So child sexual abuse is a violation of a trust relationship with unequal power and/or advanced knowledge, in which there is a need for secrecy, and sexual activity. A child molester is anyone, male or female, whose sexual behaviors meets this definition.
Having provided clarity on what child sexual abuse is, Dr. Van Dam will next write about why it’s a problem in Chapter 3.
NEWS DESK
– Trans Teen Found Dead After Online Date
– Sheriff issues chilling warning to parents after missing teen girl rescued in ‘routine’ traffic stop
– Nickelodeon star Jennette McCurdy claims mom gave her showers until she was 18, made her ‘uncomfortable’
– Child rape suspect caught with fly undone, 6 kids in vehicle during traffic stop: video
– Yakima Man Sentenced to 300 Months Imprisonment and Lifetime Supervised Release for Production and Attempted Production of Child Pornography and Possession of Child Pornography
– Springfield Man Sentenced to 15 Years for Sexual Exploitation of a Child
– St. Louis County Man Sentenced to 10 Years in Prison, Ordered to Pay $66,000 to Child Pornography Victims
– Ottawa County Man Sentenced To 38 Years In Federal Prison For Distributing Child Pornography
– Lame Deer man sentenced to prison for sexually abusing minor
Meditations of a Bald, Fat Guy 