to think you'd have to be insanely naive to believe paedophiles DON'T target single mothers?

[ZoeCM]

I've seen this several times - not just on MN, but on other parenting sites as well. Poster asks when she should mention to a man she's interested in that she has kids, as she doesn't want to attract paedophiles. The other posters act as though she's some sort of paranoid nutter.

Why the hell wouldn't child abusers seek out single mothers? It's got to be the single easiest way to get access to a child. He dates the mother, asks her to move in after a year or two, and then he's literally living with a child. How many women are going to refuse to leave their child alone in the house with their partner/husband now and then?

There's far less safeguarding involved in moving in with a family than there is working with children. And if a child tells their mother that their teacher/football coach/whoever has abused them, the mother will go straight to the police. If they tell her their stepdad abused them, a lot of women will be torn.

It's well-documented that there are so many people out there who were sexually abused by their stepfathers growing up, so why do people act as though this is an urban legend? Is it guilt/denial about the risks of bringing an unrelated man into your children's home?

Nobody suggested people should not to date until their children are 18. This is trotted out over and over again every time people say that people shouldn't give unrelated men unsupervised access to their children. The two things are entirely different and it's perfectly possible to do the former and not the latter.

I think a lot of people are naive to how many pedophiles are around in general. They're everywhere 😔

How do you know that the sex offenders do this? Do they tell you? Is that part of your job - talking to sex offenders and trying to understand them?

Why would you disbelieve this? I had a relationship with a man who was manipulative and deceitful ( as I discovered). He wasn’t a pardophile but he absolutely used calculated and planned manipulations and deceits to secure women’s trust and gain sexual access to them.

There are some really manipulative men out there and they pose as the nice, decent men.

That bastard really opened my eyes to how this shit operates.

What do you think probation officers do and prison offender managers and key workers in prisons? And course facilitators who run courses for sex offenders?

I don't disbelieve it @againstthestorm (think you might be judging me by your standards there ;)) - I just wondered how she knew. I know some people who work with sex offenders get told information by them thats all.

Well, it's obvious - don't mention your children in your dating profile. And ultimately, it's best not a move a partner into your home until they've grown up.

Not a single person has said "never date a man", or "all men are paedophiles", or "stepfathers are the only people who ever abuse children". People are setting up these strawman arguments because they don't want to admit that they've prioritised their own wants above their children's safety.

This is literally the plot of Lolita. Where a man targets a single mother and abuses her daughter.

People think of Lolita as a temptress, but in the book she is obviously an abused child while the unreliable narrator tells us she is "asking for it". This culminates in the mother dying (I can't remember exactly, but I think the abuser has a hand in it) and then him being given custody of the daughter.

So this method of child abuse has been recognised for a long time.

I'd forgotten about Lolita! Yes, a classic study in grooming

Various roles over many years including running therapy groups but also security and intelligence management and liaison with law enforcement. So hearing about this subject from multiple angles. And the men in therapy groups who had committed terrible crimes were pretty much all abused children themselves so could explain from both perspectives. It's a dark and horrible subculture I'm glad to be away from.

Grim. And we've seen enough cases where - having first shagged the mother, and then the grandmother - the man hasn't waited for the daughter to grow up first.

I’ve read Lolita and to me it is obvious she is an abused child. But I have read it in a book group, and heard people talking about it on here, and so, so many people buy into the narrator’s narrative that she is a temptress/ seducer. It’s really shocking how quickly people buy into an abuser’s narrative and place blame and agency on the child.

But then, Hollywood stars rushed to defend Polanski and he was a convicted child sex abuser who fled justice…

We really have not made anywhere near as much progress as we think.

See my post above. Appallingly, many ordinary educated people see it as a study of a child sexually seducing an adult man.

If men in therapy groups are talking about their tactics, I can see why those groups were evaluated as counter-productive. They must have just picked up tips from each other!

No, @againstthestorm it was the treatment programme that was counter-productive, not the talking therapy I refer to above. Programme= set subject matter delivered to offenders. Talking therapy as in therapeutic community = offenders taking responsibility for their actions. Very different dynamics at work and very different outcomes. Therapeutic community approach has really good outcomes for completers in terms of reduced reopening.

Accredited programmes use strength based approaches, focussing on what’s going well in their lives and building on protective factors.

No programmes are just blokes sitting round sharing tips! A huge amount of work goes into offender programmes and they are delivered by highly skilled professionals who have worked in the criminal justice system a long time.

It's true we've made hardly any progress.

Humbert was what is called in fiction an "unreliable narrator".

A careful reader should find herself or himself initially sympathising with Humbert, and then, having been lulled into a sense of trust, be shocked out of that trust. It should be an unforgettable experience, that shows you how you could be manipulated into supporting the unforgivable, and you should carry it with you for the rest of your life.

Unfortunately, many people seem to skip step 2.

Christopher Hitchens wrote a remarkable essay about Lolita, and I wonder if I can find it online.

This is the essay from Hitchens.

I liked his description of how it felt to read one of Humbert's euphemisms for abusing her, once Hitchens had had daughters of his own: I found myself almost congealed with shock.

If you're reading it properly, that's the effect it should have; it's not a love story!

My problem was I was too young when I read it. I was about 13 and I DID sympathise with Humbert. It was only when I was much older than I understood he was an unreliable narrator. I need to read it again with older/wiser eyes I think. Gonna read that essay now too.

If you were 13, don't judge yourself harshly for that! I've seen plenty of adults who should know better make the same mistake.

I suppose seeing adults gush over Humbert is another educational experience to thank Nabokov for. It does illuminate how easily people are gulled into excusing abusers within their own family circle.

it certainly makes it easier for them

these men seem to have a second sense for being able to find people that can easily manipulate. Anyone of us can be manipulated by these men but they are able to sense vulnerability

best way to keep your children safe it’s not introduce them to partners and if you do get to know their background any hint of something isn’t right then it isn’t right and move on

Yeah, this is what happened to Tia Sharp. Spent lots of time at her gran's place because her dad was useless, and her mum was busy doing drugs with her boyfriend. Gran was living with her own daughter's (Tia's Mum's) ex. He started secretly filming Tia (whom he'd known since she was a toddler) when she was twelve, and ultimately murdered her. Mum and Gran told the press how horrified they were that the public blamed them partly for Tia's death. Because, of course, there was no way anyone could have predicted that a man who'd slept a woman and her daughter would go for the granddaughter as well

That was exactly the case I had in mind. I'm also trying to remember a case from the South of England.

S