Channel 4 documentary "Married to a paedophile" *MNHQ amended title*

[MissHavershamssis]

Channel 4 tonight aired a documentary whereby the words and experiences of women married to paedophiles were documented albeit actresses played the parts of the wives to preserve anonymity.

I absolutely cannot comprehend any woman who could remain married to a man who finds the abuse of children arousing. One wife rightly so chucked her husband out upon his arrest - yet is happy for their two daughters to have contact? The other woman was imo disgusting - welcomed her husband (who had viewed the most extreme categorises of child abuse over several months) back with excitement and 'wore her best dress' to meet him on his release from prison.

I absolutely am not of the vigilante stance where 'we should chop their bits off' etc, and believe in rehabilitation via the SOTP, but as a mother and daughter I cannot get my head around any woman who could remain with a partner who found children sexually attractive.

On a different forum a few years ago there as a woman who defended her partner to the death as he was attracted to pre-pubescent boys but didn't act on that attraction. Most people were horrified.

So I suppose my AIBU is - to not understand how anyone could stay with a partner who has a paedophile as a partner.

I think they are a number of reasons why women will still with their partners

Denial, they have been abused and are unable to recognize how damaged they themselves are, feel it was justified and often they are in love and simply won’t give them up

Many women are like this their relationships are all consuming parenting is something they just have to do and often fail and their children suffer.

I am very sorry GunpowderGelatine I’m not sure you will ever be able to understand I struggled to understand why my mother choose my stepdad over me (horrendous violence) spent years of emotional energy really wasted on trying to makes sense but it never will as I am NOT her. now I believe it was love it was all consuming for her

Iv a friend who has a stepfather who raised her. And went on to rape her. Her mother is now dying and her stepfather is staying in the house to help. It's a fucked up situation. Her mother knew this all along but now cus she's dying everything had been brushed under the carpet to keep the peace.

I think it's much more complicated than that, OP. Of course it's horrendous - and anyone who isn't putting the safety of their children first is an unfit parent. But I think some of these women are suffering from mental health issues of their own. I'm not excusing it, it is still wrong - but i think to question why they do it and put ourselves in their shoes and say "I could never do this" is a bit pointless. We aren't them. They probably live in a different reality to us. You'd have to, to be knowingly married to a pedophile.

Sorry if this has been said before but I would be unable to have sex with a man knowing he was imaging assaulting a child.
First hint.. "You're on your own jack, in fact I'll drop you at the police station"
I am not so deluded or desperate to have a "man" that I will put up with the scrapings of the moral barrel.
I'm not part of the vigilante squad but doesn't mean I have to give them an easy pass when they've possibly destroyed a life/family.
Also I would never place the blame on the victim... Honestly some women staying with sex offenders are just giving them the respectability so they can hide and reoffend. How many times do you hear the phrase " but he's married with kids, he seemed so normal"

I don’t think the jury is still out in regards to the rehabilitation of those that sexually abuse children

I think there was a time when there was a belief that these offenders could be fixed

I think thankfully that time has passed but unfortunately more children suffered because of these beliefs and ambitions of many psychologists, psychotherapists, probation officers and all others involved

That’s not to say that they shouldn’t have psychological support as many (the vast majority) will have been victims themselves

The best thing is to keep others safe from them is prison (which many are terrified of) secondly very very close monitoring which is actually impossible to do all the time but if they are living in some sort of supported unit hopefully there might be some level of monitoring

It may not be a choice to have certain thoughts we can all have not such nice thought but we push them aside. There is control over who you think about in a sexual way there is a choice who you fixate on and there certainly is a choice on all of your actions.

But many do have these thoughts and yes I do believe that more early intervention needs to be done, many will have a very skewed idea of sexual relationships due to their own upbringing (often abuse through the generations that is just accepted) if they have they right support maybe the step from having thoughts to justifying their thoughts and acting on them as others did to them may stop some.

I once represented one as a union rep. I was initially taken in by him - he was young, gay, seemed horrified by the allegations, had a very plausible story for why the indecent images were on his work laptop - his last relationship had ended badly and he had reported the ex for domestic violence, the ex was an IT expert and worked with the police on forensic tech investigations. He told me he thought the ex had accessed the laptop while he was working from home and installed the images from evidence files, then called the police (the person who reported him to the police actually was the ex). The images on the laptop were of girls (babies to about 9 or 10) being abused, as he was gay it seemed a bit strange that his tastes would be such. I was outraged on his behalf and started working through the evidence.

Our HR dept contacted me with their evidence bundle which included info from the police which completely changed everything. I had seen indecent images before when I worked in a regulatory role and had to investigate misconduct in a public sector profession, but what I saw in the evidence bundle here was sickening, and the installation timings (and corresponding clocking in times at work of the ex) showed he couldn't have been responsible and it was more than likely my client. He had been volunteering for a children's charity and his day job was a safeguarding lead with CEOP liaison. It was sickening and I will never take on another case like that as a union rep, ever.

People will not like this but this thread would put me off ever having another relationship if things didn’t work out with my partner and I.

So many time’s it’s step-dads. I just wouldn’t take the risk.

I am not for one minute saying that I understand why the wife/partner would stay but the people that commit these crimes are extremely manipulative. They just don't groom the children they abuse. They can charm and in a sense groom their own families and members of the or community.as well. How often have you heard people saying that you would never have guessed it would have been the accused before the truth came out? The perpetrators of these crimes rarely see what they are doing is wrong and somehow paint themselves as the victim of impulses etc. It's truly horrific for all those affected by the actions of that person, I just cannot fathom it.

Im not sure you can rehabilitate a Peadophile to be honest. But hasn't the P.I.E group now changed into the "Minor attracted persons" sounds a lot more palatable when reading it.

I can understand that concern.

Definitely not a violent person but i'd slap him into nect week and chop his balls off.