Reporting your son

[Aqua55]

Looking at the rape culture in schools, and having a 7 month ds myself, i was wondering how many parents would report their school aged sons to the Police if they suspected or knew that they had committed a sexual assault.

But most of us love our children more than anything. Not necessarily saying that I wouldn't report mine, but I'm not shocked that some people are saying they wouldn't. Rightly or wrongly, it's human nature to want to protect your own child over all others.

I do agree that it's natural to want to protect your own child over others, but at all costs? How would that even be good for your child? Helping them to avoid prison and public disgrace is one thing, but they will still have to live with the burden of what they have done. You can't protect them from that.

Surely, the job of a parent is to help your child to be the very best version of themselves that they can be - not merely to make them look good to the rest of the world? How can you possibly achieve that if you try to rescue them from the natural consequences of their actions?

@AlexaShutUp

But most of us love our children more than anything. Not necessarily saying that I wouldn't report mine, but I'm not shocked that some people are saying they wouldn't. Rightly or wrongly, it's human nature to want to protect your own child over all others.

I do agree that it's natural to want to protect your own child over others, but at all costs? How would that even be good for your child? Helping them to avoid prison and public disgrace is one thing, but they will still have to live with the burden of what they have done. You can't protect them from that.

Surely, the job of a parent is to help your child to be the very best version of themselves that they can be - not merely to make them look good to the rest of the world? How can you possibly achieve that if you try to rescue them from the natural consequences of their actions?

I agree with what you said. But parents who do not report them would people think many things from: it could be an accusation, not ever seeing their child again, so called blame they would get from others (i.e. she is a bad mother his failing her fault mentality) and even if they want to help their child change their child will probably never want to see their parent again for reporting them. We hope people do the right thing, but all in all it is never an easy choice.

I guess I would just never even imagine that my child could possibly lead a normal, happy life after committing an awful crime like rape or murder, because I would assume that the basic morals learned in childhood would result in them being consumed by guilt and remorse anyway. Consequently, protecting their reputation or keeping them out of prison would seem to be of little importance. The real challenge, I think, would be dealing with the psychological fallout from what they had done and somehow trying to help them attempt to atone for it in some way. (Not that it is ever really possible to atone for some crimes, but I guess they could at least try to do as much as they could.)

How many people saying they would report they're sons believe their son is capable of doing such a thing? It's easy to say what you would do in a situation you're certain you'd never encounter.

I would but I'd have to take a long hard look in the mirror and take some of the responsibility. I started all these lessons at home from the age of 6/7. Never too young to start raising awareness of respect for all humans no matter what the gender/label/colour/social status/religion/ etc etc. We the parents are the ones who instil values into our children but some parents take their eye off the ball. Underage children are allowed to have social media and inappropriate games on their phones with no parental guidance or control. That is always going to be a risky strategy.

@Joeblack066

I raised my sons to know that they do not assault women? I would say those that didn’t, wouldn’t?

Aye, because that’s how simple it is...

Probably not unless I was 100% certain they were guilty, it was serious and I had no other way of dealing with it. I work in criminal justice and I know just how damaging the stigma is on people accused of such things. If it could be dealt with some other way without involving police I would choose that first. I would only go to the authorities if it was so serious and I knew for certain there was no other way to resolve it.

How far are the ones that say they'd never report their children willing to go? Where is the line I wonder?

Would you report if -
Your son is a paedophile and you caught them looking a child abuse images?
The same son goes on to work with children?
The same son has children with an unsuspecting woman?
Your grandchild confides in you that their parent (your child) is abusing them (sexually or otherwise)?

Would you put your child over any grandchildren?

Or another example, Chris Watts who murdered his pregnant wife and children, would you report then or is there literally no line at all that would make you report?

Or is the line that you wouldn't report if the victims were strangers?

I never said I wouldn't care about the victim. I would care and I'd feel very guilty for hiding the crime but I'd accept that I'd have to live with that guilt.
What if he dine it again and again? Would you live with more and more guilt.
I constantly tell my DC even when play fighting "No means No" "Stop means Stop" as soon as someone protests listen to them.

Groomed dc don't always say stop or no. To them it's normal...

I think really there are two moralities on the thread - one that says never report, and the other that engages with a wider moral sense to society.

The first doesn't recognise crime. In not reporting it, it never happened. Never.

The second recognises that crime might have happened

The second is what we all claim to want (and is certainly better for wider society) but the first is pretty common as you can see from the thread, and in such circumstances you have to fend for yourself.

Many women do the second. The mother of Aaron Campbell spotted her son who was then 16 years old, leaving the house on her CCTV. She reported it to the police to exclude him from the investigation into the rape and death of Aleisha Macphail, who was 6 years old. It was her honesty that helped secure the conviction of her son.

The ITV drama, A Mothers Son, covers this topic sensitively and is worth watching.

I have a 4 year old DS.

I think the problem is that we all want to believe we are ‘good’ mothers/parents and therefore our sons are good people. It’s easy to believe that rapists and murderers come from damaged and chaotic backgrounds, but the sheer numbers of them mean surely that can’t be true? Some of us perfectly nice, average, reasonable women are raising future offenders, and that’s really hard to get your head round.

My DS is my absolute heart. I can’t breath without thinking about him almost. I adore every centimetre of him. Do I think he’ll grow up to be the next Fred West? It’s unlikely. Could he grow up, in the society we live in, to sleep with his girlfriend when she’s drunk because he secretly feels entitled? It’s certainly feasible. Is he likely to grow up and be a paedophile or traffic children? Almost 100% definitely not. Could he, as a 17 year old boy, get involved with taking pictures and sharing them of the girls in the school changing rooms? It’s not outside the realms of possibility is it? Even if he isn’t the instigator.

I think we need, as parents, to be fully aware that our sons are capable of being perpetrators. I think we do need to adapt our parenting and I think that’s society wide, because whatever has been done for centuries is bullshit and doesn’t work.

Groomed dc don't always say stop or no. To them it's normal...

That’s so true. Especially if the perpetrator is in a position of trust and if the abuse started when the child was young.

The concept of consent doesn’t apply with children anyway.

I think the problem with the idea of reporting your own child is that regardless of how much someone sits here and says they would, most people are unlikely to immediately believe that their child is at fault unless there’s some serious irrefutable proof presented to them. It’s almost impossible to be as impartial as you would need to be when the person you are being asked to judge or to hand over is your own blood. I can hand on heart say I absolutely would report ANYONE if I knew them to be a perpetrator of whatever crime they are accused of. But would I immediately jump to a guilty verdict when presented with a story or a rumour of what my child had done? Probably not. Would I think rationally about it and take my relationship with them out of the equation when considering the “evidence” (and I’m specifically talking about situations where it’s he said, she said or similar rather than situations where the proof is presented to you in a way that you could never deny)? Probably not again. It’s just not the way a mother/father and son/daughter relationship works is it? To presume them guilty of everything they are ever accused of? And I think when you think about situations like those mentioned above- taking or sending photos, presuming consent when drunk with a long term partner etc etc it would be difficult for the conversation to go any way other than “yes but he’s not a bad lad....”.

It’s a massively grey area. I’d like to think the majority would absolutely report when presented with proof of a crime, but I suspect that same majority would presume their child innocent until proven guilty if it was anything but irrefutable. It’s just how human relationships work.

Have you all lost your bloody minds? You assume your sons are future offenders. Where is your faith in your sons? Do we think all girls work the streets? Nope. Get a bloody grip.

Well I think it is totally human to assume your children are innocent of a crime! On the other hand, its interesting what gets downgraded in this, which is the abuse of women and girls.

The challenge as a mother in that is pretty personal - you would have to believe that your best efforts were wasted. Even if you had been a terrible mother, you still wouldn't want the stigma of it.

In the end, I think its a nasty issue because we have confront that women and girls are really worth less in society, and its not just men who think this way, but women and girls too.

@ReginaFalange85, you seem to have a problem with reading comprehension. Nobody is assuming that their kids will be future offenders. It's a hypothetical discussion about how they think they would respond if that scenario were to arise. Can't you understand the difference?

My sons have respect and love for man and woman. Stop creating shit that isn't there.

@ReginaFalange85

Have you all lost your bloody minds? You assume your sons are future offenders. Where is your faith in your sons? Do we think all girls work the streets? Nope. Get a bloody grip.

Why are you struggling so much to understand a hypothetical conversation?

Every offender is someone’s son.

Parents like my GP’s sometimes end up with two decent law-abiding children and one absolute fucking horror. How people think they’d react to that, especially compared to how we know many do react, is an interesting discussion.

We aren't asuming anything.. For the purpose of the thread we are answering a sad hypothetical question.. Feel free to move along if it offends you...

Hypothesis is the creator of all the would, should coulds.

Yes, I would. I'd have to. Because it wouldn't just end there.

Hypothesis is the creator of all the would, should coulds.

OK