To think that actually, there probably is a paedophile on every corner?

[MrsToadofToadHall]

When I first became a parent, back in the 2000s, I tended to think that some other parents were quite irrational about their fears regarding paedophiles. There seemed to be quite a lot of hysteria about child abductions whipped up in the tabloids, quite a few of the mums I knew looked very suspiciously on men who worked or volunteered with children, and I tended to think that although paedophiles unfortunately existed, they were in the minority and we shouldn't raise our children to be suspicious of every man just because he was a man, nor should we limit their independence due to fear of something that was very unlikely to happen. I suppose I was a bit "cool mum" and proud of my ability to rationalise and see through hysteria

In recent years, I've come to think that I was wrong. So many famous and prominent people have been exposed as having abused children and teenagers. Although I have always supported a certain level of sex ed in schools, elements of this have gone beyond a level I'm comfortable with. It seems to me to be more acceptable to expose children to sexual/adult issues at an earlier age. As well as this, recent revelations in my own fairly small community have caused me to reconsider - a teenager who abused younger relatives, it was brought to the attention of police and SS but in the end, all that could be done was refer him for optional counselling. Three or four men have been found out as they attempted to groom very young girls, some primary aged, via social media. Friends have also confided in me regarding their own childhood abuse. I know most of these men, and while I realise that abusers don't come with a big sticker on their forehead, most of them really were spectacularly ordinary and had wives and children

Obviously I still realise that the vast majority of men are fine, but my point is, I thought paedophiles were a few lone individuals, and now it seems there are far more of them about than I ever would have realised.

Does that make sense?

@PIKNIK20

Highly unlikely a girl is still pre-pubescent at 14 years old, so no, it doesn't fit the criterion for the DSM definition of a Paedophile. Not that age of the victim is the sole determining factor.

As for the 'one on every street corner'; well studies are few and far between, but if the UK is commensurate with other nations, they would suggest there are somewhere in the region of 290,000 - 300,000 paedophiles in the UK, not all of which will even realise they are paedophiles or will have actually committed offences against children, and roughly 900,000 to 1,000,000 men who will have committed some sort of sexual offence.

YANBU. I was exactly like you and used to think mums were being paranoid and over-anxious. But when I was pregnant with first our DD, me and DH found out that his (apparently normal seeming) dad had been caught looking at and collecting huge amounts of the most serious levels of online child sex abuse. This was absolutely devastating, as you can imagine. What was more devastating was the reaction of his family. They all closed ranks around him. They treated him as if he was the victim in all this and refused to accept that it was not safe to be around children, including our children. What's worse is that they treated me as a pariah for refusing to let him see our kids. During the court case (12 years ago), I spoke to the police investigating his case. They told me that they were absolutely over run with men who look at child sexual abuse online. There were literally 100,000s of them and they could not investigate them all. They also warned me that the prisons could not hold them all, and that it was very unlikely my FIL would not receive a prison sentence. They weren't wrong. He got sent on one of those courses for paedophiles (which don't work). The family were still claiming it was a "victimless crime" afterwards. The lessons I learnt were that 1) it is very common, 2) families cover up for the abuser and prefer to keep the peace than safeguard children, 3) the law is overwhelmed with these perverts, 4) be very careful with your kids

very unlikely my FIL would* receive a prison sentence. Wish you could edit MN posts

Yeah its scary the prevalence of it, it makes you wonder what are we missing in terms of dealing with it?? and is every paedophile a victim of abuse or some sadly born faulty i feel like still there's far more questions than answers in how its got this way. Yeah aswell regarding PIE wasn't Harriet Harmen involved with them ?

My experience is this:

Don’t underestimate how strongly people resist disruption. They will deny and doubt all evidence and refuse to carry out any risk analysis if it means splitting a family apart. They will base their decisions based on ‘s/he would never do that’. When faced with the stark reality of no more visits, no more holidays, an entire central-to-our-lives relationship destroyed on the word of a potential victim, people balk. I am no longer surprised that victims are so often ignored. People take the path of least resistance.

I’ve had to fight tooth and nail to protect my child from a very high risk family member who has had unproved but plausible accusations against them. We have been criticised and accused of ruining lives.

@beefcheeks I do agree we should still teach children. What I meant is that some children who are very young might not realise, or have the instinct or words, for what is happening, or the ability to avoid. Abusers are very adept at getting round the things they know children are taught, and at manipulating the adults. And what can you do when the adults all close ranks as in the previous poster, and others situation.

Shocking the scale of families who collude, minimise and cover up. Can be so hard to be the true 'adult' and stand apart from it knowing that you will be ostracised and not the abuser. What a world we live in.

Can I also just say re pp where police said the convicted abuser just abused one sex, so her children were theoretically safe- lots of abusers aren't fussy and will abuse any/both sexes if they have the opportunity. Female abusers included.

I think it is a far higher number than we let ourselves believe. I also think sex offences in general are far higher than we'd like to think.

I've done quite a few prison visits through my work and colleagues and I always say you can tell the sex offenders because they're the ones that look "normal".

DD is 3 so at the moment I always know where she is and who she's with but I know that's going to change in not so many years and that terrifies me.

I'm also a single parent and likely to stay that way for quite some time. As others have said, they prey on single women with children and I'd never forgive myself if something happened to DD and by someone who I'd invited into my home.

We've always told our kids that its OK to say "no", but recently found that our daughter (age 6) thought it was "rude" to say no to other children. I was really surprised as this is the opposite of what we've been telling her over the years. I'm wondering if she is learning these messages about "being nice" from other people/ cartoons, or if whilst we've been telling her it's ok to say no we've not been backing that up in practice. I'm now reviewing what messages we are giving her.

EZA15 sadly I can’t find the book I discussed upthread as it was such a long time ago. It has always stuck in my mind as it was unusual to have so much info directly from the Paedophiles themselves... although they are not trustworthy people and many of the stories could be related in order for them to achieve sexual pleasure from the fantasy iykwim? I’ve attached a similar book, I know I don’t need to tell you to please be careful, these kind of books can be very triggering. Although I agree with you that knowledge is power and your dc are very lucky to have you protecting them

I echo the opinions of many in this thread, I have been ridiculed and sneered at previously in these boards when I talked about peadophiles targeting single mothers, I’m very glad the scales have fallen for many.

During training the facilitator talked to us about how the Paedophiles would make themselves central to their targets life. They would groom the adults by pushing the boundaries, such as just walking in their home and helping themselves to a drink without asking and extending it more and more. You need someone to pick up the kids- of course I’ll do it! You’re short £20 for petrol...no problem.
It’s a behaviour that’s similar to the woman beater who goes to the pub and has a pint. He knows when he goes home he’s going to beat her.... tommorow he’ll be really sorry and say he was drunk. He wasn’t really.
None of it is accidental, it’s all planned.

I would also like to mention that I take umbrage with some of the tone and language- child sex abuse survivors are exactly that- SURVIVORS. Too often they are discussed as if they are broken, their lives are ‘ruined’ and that they never recover.

The posters in this thread who are talking about how difficult it is for men are at best misguided at worse ignorant.
This is not a discussion where concern for or about men should be centred, and if you are centering men then you’re part of the problem.

Millions of us women manage every day to raise our dc alone, poor, without support in a society where everything is stacked against us.

for all you survivors , mothers and women out there who’re getting shit done. I applaud you all.

When I was about 13/14 and definitely into puberty but also clearly a young girl, a group of us were on the train once chatting at high volume and we could see a young (20s) good looking man looking at us and we were sort of acting up for his attention.

Anyway, a couple of weeks later I was on the train on my own and he was there again and gave me the absolute come on even though he knew how young I was (as I said I was doing GCSEs in two or three years) and the worst part was, he was a teacher at the local very very highly regarded private school.
At the time, I felt flattered but now I look back and am absolutely horrified.

Agree with all of this. Someone asked how could a survivor of abuse then let it happen to their own children. Many don't, but think about how as a child their boundaries were systematically pushed and eroded, psychologically, for a long period of time at such a young impressionable age when they are still trying to understand the world. When they grow into adults these broken boundaries don't just snap back into place, they don't trust their own judgement, their experiences / the way relationships seem to work may feel 'normal' as they are used to it- and, not forgetting, if other adults had colluded and minimised these experiences, it can be additionally difficult for the child to assert themselves as an adult.

Unfortunately Op, you are absolutely correct.
My dh was always reluctant to let my dcs attend sleepovers because of the fear of abuse.
These abusers are always the ‘nice’ normal people. I have a relative who was taken to court for abusing his friend’s daughters. He got off and is free to do the same thing again. This man is the usual ‘Pilar of the community’, is a school governor and sits on committees . His wife is aware that her husband is a pervert, but chooses to stick by him.
Also, there are many children who have been abused by other children.
My friend was asked to privately tutor an eleven year old boy who was she was told was a school refuser. He lived with his father. My friend taught him for a few months and it was only when she stopped tutoring him that she found out that this young boy had abused his younger sisters and his female cousin.

Pillar

Logically I’d say no.. but the fact that last year I found out one had been living opposite us for last couple of years suggest that it’s a very real possibility!
I now feel ill at letting dd play out with her friends in the little park right in the middle of our houses whilst they all do gymnastics and dances etc.. knowing he was there

It's institutionalised from the royal family down. You only have to look at the inquiry to realise that. We're still failing the most vulnerable looked after children, decade after decade. Personally, having seen the extent of it back in the early 2000's (family law), I am always suspicious of any one volunteering their time to spend with young people. My kids aren't going to sleepovers, guides, scouts, swimming clubs, private schools, grammar schools etc. They're everywhere.

It's actually quite comforting to read about the number of parents on this thread who really understand the dangers and know how prevalent CSA actually is. It gives me hope, almost, knowing that the stuff I went through (and the experiences of many on this thread) is far less likely to happen to children now as awareness grows, or if it sadly does then it will be dealt with appropriately by the loving adults in their lives.

Something else I'd like to add is that it's important to be aware of the stereotypes around victims who have come forward, as well as the stereotypes about abusers. My family went through every 'reason' in the book to explain why I'd come forward about what my father did: I was 'crazy' (mentally ill if they were being kind), my memories had been implanted, I wanted to ruin the family for some reason, I had 'hallucinated my experiences' (yes, that was a real thing that someone actually said), I had imagined it, I wanted attention, I needed a way to 'act out my vulnerabilities' (?), blah blah blah. I don't think my family members actually believed any of this shite, it was just the only way they could cope, but people outside the family - friends, colleagues etc. - DID believe it, and so continue to this day to allow my father to be around their children. The 'kind of person' that the victim is does not matter in the slightest. The second someone tells you 'X was accused of doing Y to Z, but Z has mental health issues etc.' you disregard the second bit and focus on the first part of the statement. That's the important part, the part they want you to ignore, the part they're desperately trying to downplay so that they can minimise and deny.

Some of these family friends have known my father twenty years. Something I realised was that, in hearing what had happened, they realised that their now grown up/teenaged children may also have been at risk when they were kids (through no fault of the parents, because how could they have known?) and these parents can't cope with the knowledge that something so easily could have happened to their own much-loved children, so they shut it down. I'm learning, as I grow and heal, that denial is a hell of a thing.

I work for a local authority and often have to deal with people without accommodation.
Most persons I've seen coming out of prison and into the community have been inside for 1.DV or abuse of a female (often sexual) 2. Drugs related 3. Sexual abuse of a child or related to this.
I often have to speak to these MEN, not encountered a woman yet, and they usually seem normal - some even seem nice! - they play the victim, expect assistance. Often accommodated right next to schools / parks / families with kids. Many are even supported by their own families and welcomed back in to family life even with children there.
They reoffend. Are accused anyway.
Rarely is there a conviction and I am so angry about the whole thing.
I see these men - right in front of my eyes - getting away with it!

Apparently they tend to be left handed and shorter than your average male. I’m super paranoid about it as you can Probably tell.

But that's about 'true" paedophiles.

Most child sex abusers are not true paedophiles.

They are just exploitative, no integrity, opportunistic men who may be sociopaths/psychopaths.