Child Sex Abuse: A Sin Silently Eating Childhood Away
Monday, June 13, 2016
Apart from nature’s wonders, what gives me intense happiness is a sight of a baby’s smile which leaves me with depths of benevolence and rejuvenation. This is the reason why I feel exasperated beyond measure whenever I come across stories where the soul of the ‘childhood’ was crushed and tormented through devilish acts of sexual gratification and was forced to grow feeble with haunting memories and endless agony. The victims of child sexual abuse (CSA) are the most incapacitated because such cases are often not reported and their voices, lost into oblivion. In societal settings where adults, especially women and LGBT, have to face dire consequences of patriarchy, the girl child unconsciously internalizes the normalised beliefs and values thus self-regulating her socio-psychological behavior. Since she is the object of scrutiny by the family and society at large, she often hesitates to disclose the abuse in order to prevent herself from facing the undesirable outcomes. Where the voice of a girl child is often muted, the cries of a boy child are succumbed to nescience and imbecility of the so-called educated people, rejecting the harsh reality that boys are also subjected to sexual violence.
Who does it and where?
The perpetrator is often a family member, parent of the child or a person in a position of trust. Thus the child is ensnared in the trap of loyalty for the person and the sense that s/he has been drawn into some grievous act. This unceasing psychological dilemma leads to non- disclosure of the abuse and a ‘false’ sense of shame. Hence, victim is either not able to muster courage to disclose the abuse or even if the voice is raised by the child, it is often silenced or rather ‘murdered’ by the family members. Statistical data collected by Ministry of Women and Child Development in 2007 (with the help of NGOs like “Prayas” and professional agencies like “Haryali”, Centre for Rural Development and support by UNICEF and Save the Children) manifest the ubiquity of this hideous practice: 53.22% children have undergone sexual abuse and 50% of abusers were known to the victims or family members whom victims trusted. However, there would surely be many unreported cases, since victims are often in constant state of dubiety regarding the disclosure of the abuse. Though, fear of sexual assault is often correlated with public domains or outside home, but the sexual violence that takes place within four walls outnumbers the violence in public places. Therefore, the social environment and societal factors are more responsible than the physical environment for sexual assault to exist in the first place.
Unawareness of the child and who is responsible for this?
In Indian society, the behaviour of an individual is controlled by the repressive mechanisms of culture or ‘sanskriti’. Institutions like family and school engage in the conditioning of children to be ‘feminine’ or ‘masculine’ which is translated through exemplary notions of morality and ethics. In most Indian conservative families, because of the traditional values and societal structure, it is still considered a taboo to discuss sexual abuse as a subject. Often, children are not even rendered knowledge about sexuality and physical and emotional changes that they undergo during puberty. They are rather reprimanded if for engaging in something sexual in nature like playing with their genitals or asking questions about biological differences between male and female. This lack of knowledge about sexuality and unawareness of getting abused lead to non-disclosure of sexual abuse by the child and thus it advances perpetrator’s confidence to repeat the sinful cycle of abuse. Many times, because of no knowledge of sexual practices, a child does not even realize the fact that s/he has been sexually abused. RAHI (Recovering and Healing from Incest, 2007) carried out a research on women survivors of incest and CSA in which some participants reported that until they were given the questionnaire they did not even realize that they have been sexually abused, perhaps they might have repressed the incident as a grievous act they did not want to recall.
Legal and other aids
The Protection of Children against Sexual Offences (POCSO), the bill passed by Union Cabinet in March, 2011, covers all aspects of child sexual abuse: (i) penetration (peno- vaginal, peno-oral, peno-urethral or peno-anal, fingering or object penetration), (ii) touching vagina, penis, anus and breast of the child or make the child do so with such or any other person, (iii) voyeurism, (iv) making demands for sexual favours and (v) encouraging or/and forcing the child for pornography. Childline India Foundation runs ‘Child Line 1098’, a 24X7 helpline for children in need is directly supported from MWCD and is available in 291 cities. Their website www.childlineindia.org.in also has free animated videos and childline songs based on CSA which serve as amicable mentor for children. Even with all the legal and other aids, there is still a dearth of reported cases related to it, because in India, family honour is often given much consideration and value than child’s traumatic experience. In fact, the child is accused and made responsible and guilty for the act and thus, in such circumstances sexual assault happens with ‘granted’ impunity.
Psychological effects
According to the report of American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry (AACAP, 2011), children, especially of very less age, are not in a position to realize that sexual activity is wrong but they still undergo psychological problems due to the inability to cope with these situations. Children who are victims of repeated sexual abuse undergo many traumatic experiences and psychological troubles, like: (i) low self-esteem, (ii) a feeling of worthlessness and disgust, (iii) secretiveness, (iv) perceiving their bodies as dirty, (v) unusual aggressiveness, (vi) mistrusting other adults and (vii) suicidal tendencies. Children often show changes in their behaviours which communicate how they feel (AACAP, 201): (i) advanced level of sexual knowledge, (ii) improper sexualized behaviour with toys, other children of same or older age or adults (iii) resistance from friends and regular playing activities (iv) decline in performance at school (v) resistance from or excessively spending time with a particular adult (vi) unusual aggressiveness (vii) suicidal tendency (viii) signs of abuse on body like marks of bruises and pain or bleeding in genital areas (ix) sudden change in sleeping patterns like being not able to sleep because of nightmares or falling asleep all the timeEven though these behaviour patterns do not evidently project that a child has been sexually abused but it is quite discernible from such behaviour that the child is in distress and thus compassionate assistance of parents is required. Therefore, monitoring children’s behaviour and imparting knowledge regarding sexual abuse (according to their age) become subjects of critical essence.
What can we do?
There are some risk factors that are correlated with CSA: impaired children, children with one parent or without parents and children who encounter constant parents’ marital conflicts - verbal or/and substance abuse - are at higher risk than other children. If you are a parent, then during disclosure of the abuse, you should be prepared and willing to listen to the child patiently without under or overreacting. Even if all the information and knowledge is provided to the child, there is still a plausible uncertainty of non-disclosure of the abuse, for a child seeks a cordial environment and a harmonious relationship with parents to communicate her/his encounters and experiences. If you want your child to confide in you then there are some parenting measures that you need to appraise: (i) not neglecting children (ii) avoid fighting in front of children (iii) listen to children’s experiences patiently and (iv) guiding children with proper demonstration rather than beating or scolding them. Once the matter is disclosed, it should be reported legally without any delay. If you are not a parent, then the least you can do is to make others cognizant of this menace. Institutions like schools need to coordinate with parents and excogitate as well as propagandize the ways to prevent children from sexual abuse. Therefore, ‘protection’: job of the family and ‘prosecution’: job of the state are the pivotal practices to terminate this abhorrent deed and spare children from long- lasting traumatic impressions.
-Sakshi Chauhan is a research scholar at The English and Foreign Languages University, Lucknow Campus.
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