Most child sexual abuse gangs made up of white men - Home Office report

[stumbledin]

Study of England, Scotland and Wales dispels myth of ‘Asian grooming gangs’ popularised by far right

The majority of child sexual abuse gangs are made up of white men under the age of 30, an official paper has said.

It found that while offenders come from diverse backgrounds, groups tended to be of men of the same ethnicities. Money and sex were motivations as well as a sexual interest in children and misogyny, the review said.

www.theguardian.com/politics/2020/dec/15/child-sexual-abuse-gangs-white-men-home-office-report

[PaleBlueMoonlight]

I don’t really understand this. Is it saying that grooming gangs are disproportionately white given the proportion of the population that is white?

[GnomeOrMistAndIceGuy]

'dispels myth of Asian grooming gangs' is massively offensive. Asian grooming gangs exist. Many of us work with the victims and communities shattered by these men's actions. Feel free to bring to light sex crimes of other sectors of society, but don't insult survivors of abuse by casually writing off their experience as 'a myth.'

[NiceGerbil]

One thing in common they're all men.

[DidoLamenting]

@PaleBlueMoonlight

I don’t really understand this. Is it saying that grooming gangs are disproportionately white given the proportion of the population that is white?

No statistics or facts given. 80% of the UK population is white but as no statistics are given it's not possible to make anything of this.

[PaleBlueMoonlight]

It seems to say that some studies show disproportionately that it is black or Asian gangs (is this regional?) but that stats are unreliable.

Nazir Afdal seems to imply that Asian gangs are disproportionately prosecuted.

I guess Priti Patel is right that it is difficult to draw conclusions.

I may have to read it...

[Frouby]

The main issue, speaking as someone who lives in Rotherham and am old enough to have had friends suffer from the first proven cse cases, the issue isn't that asian men abuse women, it's an issue with it being ignored and covered up by the authorities. That's what makes the abuse of girls by asian men such a contentious issue.

And the % population of asian men vs white men.

[FiveFootTwoEyesOfBlue]

The headline is a bit misleading. And why doesn't the article give a link to the research paper?

Quote:
Some studies suggest an overrepresentation of black and Asian offenders relative to the demographics of national populations. However, it is not possible to conclude that this is representative of all group-based CSE offending.

“This is due to issues such as data-quality problems, the way the samples were selected in studies, and the potential for bias and inaccuracies in the way that ethnicity data is collected.”

It's just saying that the evidence isn't strong enough that they're disproportionally non-white. Most of them being white isn't really a surprise when 85% of the population are white.

I would like to see, for example, the number of people that make it considered a gang - 2? 3? 10?

[PaleBlueMoonlight]

Indeed. What is a grooming gang?

I really, really hate misleading/incomplete journalism, especially when it comes to numbers and stats.

[Imnobody4]

assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/944206/Group-based_CSE_Paper.pdf
Link to actual report. Haven't read it yet.

[stumbledin]

It dispels the myth that the right wing perpetrates that sexual abuse in (only) carried out by Asian gangs.

As someone said up thread, the gangs are all men.

Dont forget that in trendy Labour councils in London they went out of their way to conceal the abuse of children by white men.

This doesn't mean in any way that anyone is ignoring the abuse in Rotherham, but reminding people you cant just say oh it only happens in x or y group.

The common factor is men. The common factor is men of the same class or other identity, usually with a shared profession that makes it easy to exploit vulnerable youngsters.

So lets deal with the real issue.

That men of all races, class etc., exploit young people. And too often for political convenience those in authority do not investigate properly, and / or imply the young person bought in on themselves.

The bit I was surprised was the statement about them being young men. I had always thought (assumed) it was men in the older age group.

So all young people, of any race or class, need to be protected from all men irrespective of race or class.

And of course religion. The abuse of children by "good" christians is now so well known, but still effectively hushed up.

[JohnMcClane]

@NiceGerbil

One thing in common they're all men.

This,

The commonality is men, and women and girls not being believed.

Did anyone listen to that FIle on 4 Podcast? It was harrowing

www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000kv7v

[TheQueef]

Aye ok.
What Gnome said.

[EndemicPanda]

Well that article is just plain wrong. The report says that some studies suggest Asian men (and some other ethnic minorities) are over-represented in terms of the proportion of offenders, but it's impossible to rely on them due to the number of offences where ethnicity data was not collected.

It certainly does not dispel myths.

Honestly Guardian go sort yourself out. You're embarrassing yourself

[Kaliorphic]

dispels myth of Asian grooming gangs' is massively offensive. Asian grooming gangs exist. Many of us work with the victims and communities shattered by these men's actions. Feel free to bring to light sex crimes of other sectors of society, but don't insult survivors of abuse by casually writing off their experience as 'a myth.

This.

[PaleBlueMoonlight]

I didn’t know that there was a myth that there are only Asian grooming gangs? I thought the issue was whether it was OK to draw attention to the ethnicity/culture of the particular gangs targeting girls in Rotherham and other northern towns, because there was police/political concern that to do so would be racist, and how this had fed into the appalling treatment of the victims?

[PaleBlueMoonlight]

@Frouby

The main issue, speaking as someone who lives in Rotherham and am old enough to have had friends suffer from the first proven cse cases, the issue isn't that asian men abuse women, it's an issue with it being ignored and covered up by the authorities. That's what makes the abuse of girls by asian men such a contentious issue.

And the % population of asian men vs white men.

And yes, this.

[stumbledin]

Sorry - as I said up thread, the myth being dispelled is the right wing myth that sexual abuse gangs are all asian. You undermine yourself by not quoting the complete sentence.

It has nothing whatsoever to do with dismissing what happened in Rotheram or any where else.

What you are doing by endlessly intoning this misrepresentation is negating the experience of all those who have experience sexual abuse from men of other races and religion.

And in fact by only acknowledging this you in fact buy into and perpatuate the right wing myth that it is only Asian men.

The issue is MEN

The issue is that in many if not all areas where this has been known to be happening, the authorities always have an excuse not to investigate or to blame the children.

So please stop ignoring the abuse of other children.

And those who keep going on like this make it look like they are happy to be part of a right wing misrepresentation ie to try and make invisible the abuse by white men, by only being willing to talk about abuse by Asian men.

The full quote is "dispels myth of ‘Asian grooming gangs’ popularised by far right"

Honestly have you any idea of how outlandish it looks to try and say that because abuse is carried out by men of all races and class it says what happened in Rotherham is a myth.

Or does this indicate that you believe the right wing myth?

[WeeBisom]

I also thought it was highly relevant that the Asian grooming gangs appear to target working class white and Sikh girls just because they are outsiders to the men’s community. There seemed to be an element of racism in their victim selection. So do white grooming gangs similarly deliberate target Muslim girls for sexual exploitation?

[Comefromaway]

@NiceGerbil

One thing in common they're all men.

There is a local grooming gang (after a huge operation 10 were arrested but only 2 were convicted. ). Two were women.

They were white and from a particular sector. They targeted vulnerable young people on the fringes of the law/with SEN who wouldn’t be believed.

Most of them are still at large. We were warned by a social worker because Ds is vulnerable.

[IfNotNow12]

the myth being dispelled is the right wing myth that sexual abuse gangs are all asian
I don't think there is a myth that sex abuse gangs are all Asian, is there?
The scandal came about because the authorities turned a blind eye to the racial aspects of particular cases of mass grooming and abuse, not because anyone thought that all gangs of men grooming children were Asian?
And, yes, the men who groom children and adolescents are mainly under 30. Didn't anyone ever have any friends at school at about 14 who had much older "boyfriends" who would pick them up in cars and buy them stuff? Those men are be brown, black or white equally but none of them should get a pass because of their culture.

[PaleBlueMoonlight]

But this article is about ethnicity and it is important that if a report is reported in, that that report contains useful and accurate information.

You said that myth was popularised by the far right - ie that it’s reach is wider than the far right. Anyway, I was not aware that this was a myth that needed dispelling in the general population (though I am happy, if alarmed, to be wrong about that).

I agree that the overwhelming problem is men, but we have to look deeper than that to be able to tackle it. And we have to maybe assume that when people think that culture (and I think it is culture rather than ethnicty) is important when looking at a particular grooming gang, that they are doing it because it helps aid understanding of what is going on and to do pattern spotting, not because they are racist/far right. The same kinds of cultural analysis can be done for other grooming gangs.

[Flaxmeadow]

Is this the study that only researched areas that haven't had Grooming Gang convictions?

And did not include areas/the counties where there have been a high number of convictions (West Yorks, South Yorks, Grt Manchester , total population about 7m)

[Frouby]

@stumbledin

Sorry - as I said up thread, the myth being dispelled is the right wing myth that sexual abuse gangs are all asian. You undermine yourself by not quoting the complete sentence.

It has nothing whatsoever to do with dismissing what happened in Rotheram or any where else.

What you are doing by endlessly intoning this misrepresentation is negating the experience of all those who have experience sexual abuse from men of other races and religion.

And in fact by only acknowledging this you in fact buy into and perpatuate the right wing myth that it is only Asian men.

The issue is MEN

The issue is that in many if not all areas where this has been known to be happening, the authorities always have an excuse not to investigate or to blame the children.

So please stop ignoring the abuse of other children.

And those who keep going on like this make it look like they are happy to be part of a right wing misrepresentation ie to try and make invisible the abuse by white men, by only being willing to talk about abuse by Asian men.

The full quote is "dispels myth of ‘Asian grooming gangs’ popularised by far right"

Honestly have you any idea of how outlandish it looks to try and say that because abuse is carried out by men of all races and class it says what happened in Rotherham is a myth.

Or does this indicate that you believe the right wing myth?

The thing with the right wing propaganda is that it promtes the idea that asian men are responsible for cse.

The thing with trying to disprove this is that you end up say not all asian men rape and sexually exploit white women. And that white men also exploit white girls (children) and women.

The problem has never been asian men raping white children. The problem is that those who should have stepped up and said 'we have a problem' didn't because not all asian men rape white children. And if we say that, then the right wing nutters are going to cause a race riot and we don't want that. And also, in Rotherham at least, high ranking members of the local council were asian.

So the children being systematically abused and gang raped, lifted from council run care homes were sacrificed in the name of local race relations.

Deeper than that there is a problem, in Rotherham and other predominantly northern, working class towns with high rates of unemployment and poverty with non integration of asian (mainly those of Pakistani origin) which creates its own issues. So rather than isolated cases being sensibly discussed so the town could move on, and the families at least having an easy time through the justice system, it was made as difficult as possible and the extreme right wing politics, never far from the surface erupted. And because the caes were proved, and because everyone knew how fucking harrowing it had been, how much had been covered up, how many people in a position of authority had lied qnd how much evidence of corruption had been conveniently lost, the far right wing had a captive, frustrated, angry mob to rally.

So before you blame the right wing and the people of Rotherham for being racists and uneducated and frankly a bit thick for listening to the right wing hyperbole, remember the 20 odd years leading up to that.

And no reports will change those facts.

[Flaxmeadow]

A quick scan of the pdf link, unless I'm mistaken, it seems none of the cases mentioned are in the North of England. Why is that?

[Ereshkigalangcleg]

agree that the overwhelming problem is men, but we have to look deeper than that to be able to tackle it. And we have to maybe assume that when people think that culture (and I think it is culture rather than ethnicty) is important when looking at a particular grooming gang, that they are doing it because it helps aid understanding of what is going on and to do pattern spotting, not because they are racist/far right. The same kinds of cultural analysis can be done for other grooming gangs.

This. I've never heard anyone who isn't a right wing racist say that "all" grooming gangs are Asian. But that culture is a relevant factor. I'm not sure it's helpful to deny that. The misogyny of individual men is a huge factor, but that many cultures have different social rules for women and girls is clearly true.