To ask you for your best advice protecting children from harm?

[Roxee]

Just that really. Having read other threads on here, it scares me a bit how complacent some users are with suggesting that abusers are no risk, and heartens me some of the really good advice on here (I.e: about talking to children about 'tricky people')

The best advice I ever got was that once someone shows any pervy behaviour, is that most child sexual abuse is about access rather than preference. Most children get abused by men who aren't specifically sexually interested in children, but will just male do with sexually abusing whoever they can get their hands on, so any adult with a history of dodgy behaviour, even if it doesn't involve children, should be avoided keep them away from your children, as the vast majority of people who sexually abuse children are opportunistic sexual predators who just abuse whoever they can get their hands on, rather than specifically having a sexual attraction to children.

That advice meant I kept DC away from very 'nice' and charming seeming man who would later go to prison for raping children.

So please tell me your best advice on child safety, it really could help someone protect their kids

The best advice I ever got was that once someone shows any pervy behaviour, keep them away from your children,

you needed to be told that?

Give them the skills to be independent. Doing everything for them, chauffeuring them everywhere into their teens (if there's a reasonable alternative), tracking their every movement, and banning them from everything won't help them in the long run.

Make sure your children have the tools to recognise when things aren't right and the language to be able to explain what's made them feel uncomfortable and to feel safe in your reactions.

Things like the nspcc pants rule help.

@Alongtoe because you would be surprised. Plenty of people will send a child off to contact with a man who had sexually abused the child's mother, for example, and then be surprised when the man sexually abuses the child, because he has no prior history of abusing children.

Or people will know that "Uncle Y is a bit of a Peeping Tom but he's harmless" and then be very shocked when he moves on to hurting their kids because he has no history of abusing kids

I wasn’t talking about “people”

i was asking you whether you needed someone to tell you not to have your children spend time with people displaying pervy behaviour?

Accept that there are bad people. Accept that you can not protect your children from everything.

give your children all the tools to have good self respect/ self esteem and all the skills to speak out about bad things that happens.

systematic abusers are very careful about who they pick to abuse and are less likely to pick children / people who will understand right from wrong and speak out. they are also less likely to pick children who have parents who will also speak out and believe their children.

We are teaching our kids that we are a no secrets family. Surprises are fine (eg for birthday) no secrets

@Alongtoe because familiarity and family ties can obscure all kinds of things. For me, that advice came from a helpful Web page. I was reading up because I had concerns about someone who everyone was telling me should be around my DC, and that I was being unkind not letting them around my DC. The stats on most child abuse being by opportunistic sex offenders and/or people with control issues rather than specifically dedicated paedophiles gave me enough ammo to feel justified in refusing all contact.

I think it would be helpful to a lot of people to have an advice thread on this issue so they are resistant to pressure from friends and family to put their child at risk.

The biggest threat to the safety of children is a step parent.

this does not mean step parents are awful people, but statistically they are more likely to harm your child more than anyone else.

trust your instincts and teach them to trust theirs as well.

I think this is a really good topic. I show my kids clips, eg. Where a man goes to a park and says to the mum "If I asked your kid to come with me, would they?" And the mum says "no, no, not my child, they know not to do that, we've talked about it" and the man goes up to the kids and says "hey, I've got a puppy, want to see it?" And the kids almost all say "Yeah!" And walk off holding hands with the man.

There is a similar clip/"social experiment" by the same guy where he pulls up in an ice cream van and says that the kids can have a free ice cream if they come in the van to choose it. He did it time and again and I think there was only one kid who grabbed her brother and bolted in the other direction. The rest all got in the van. Terrifying.

I've spoken at length about not taking sweets from strangers, but there are loads of cafes, or barbers etc where the staff give a lollipop to my kids, with a wink and a smile for being good. I wish they wouldn't. It tramples the message.

There is also a clip of a man at a train station holding his child's hand with one hand and his phone with the other, and someone approaches, asks for directions and the man let's go of his child's hand to point down the road and a third man grabs the child while the man is distracted. I'm sure we all think "no, no, I wouldn't make that mistake" but it happens in literally seconds, and at a train station the kid could be miles away in any direction within minutes.

Flipping heck

someone displaying “pervy behaviour” wouldn’t be in the vicinity of my children. Ever.

and any family member encouraging me otherwise displays such awful judgement that I also wouldn’t want my children around them

Build the sort of relationship with your kids so they feel are able to tell you. Give them the message from toddler age that their feelings around their bodies are ok and help them understand consent. Give them the language to be able to talk about private parts and sexual acts. Avoid portraying “stranger danger” in a way that makes them think it’s a bogeyman in dark shadows. Enable them to trust their instincts. Avoid victim blaming when talking about situations where children have found themselves in dangerous situations.

I was assaulted sexually as a child. Telling was not an option. I didn’t have the words or the relationship with parents to tell. I lived in a family where I know it would have been a source of shame (my shame). I couldn’t have even imagined what names I’d give to the body parts involved. It meant an attacker wasn’t held to account and probably continued / escalated abuse on others.

Following on from this, one piece of advice I was given was to call genitals by the correct terms. I saw something once about a girl who was upset that her uncle had licked/kept touching her "cookie" and the girl was told "it's fine, uncle is just messing around" or something like that.

I second having a strong open relationship with your child where no subject is off the table. Set clear boundaries for your child and help them do the same with others. Show them what safe, respectful relationships look like so they know when they don’t feel safe with others. Give them the language to explain how they’re feeling and above all listen to them. Let them know no matter how bad they think a situation is, or what they think they might have done wrong, you’re there for them and they can bring you anything at all that worries them.

You can’t stop every bad thing happening particularly as they grow more independent but them knowing they’ll always be safe with you no matter what is hugely protective.

@Koolforkats sorry that this happened to you

Encourage them to talk and share about their days. Build a safe and trusting relationship where they know and feel that whatever happens they can come to you. Set aside protected time for a family pow wow to talk about whats been good about the week and any struggles. We have very few blanket rules, but the main one is 'no secrets in families' and Friday evening 6pm is pow wow - even eldest at uni video calls to join. Protecting our DC isn't about removing risk and danger it's about supporting them to recognise it and manage/reduce potential risks.

Something that most people don’t know, and is rarely spoken about, is that the most common perpetrators of CSA are siblings (not stepfathers or fathers or uncles). It’s something that just doesn’t occur to us while we’re busy protecting our children from ‘outside’ abusers.

I saw something once about a girl who was upset that her uncle had licked/kept touching her "cookie" and the girl was told "it's fine, uncle is just messing around" or something like that.

While correct language is certainly protective, this example is more about adults being dismissive of children’s upset. A 5 minute conversation about what was upsetting her would have given her space to explain what was going on. In the many disclosures of sexual abuse I’ve listened to (I’m a social worker) I can count on one hand the number who used anatomically correct language, and were still able to communicate what was happening to them and be understood.

Parents and professionals need to listen properly, unpick the reason for being upset, instead of expecting the child to tell you in a way you can hear. Yes correct language helps but it’s not by far the most protective action you can take.

I think it would be really helpful for people outline specific red flags, like the cookie example that @Hoohaz gave and @Jellycatspyjamas gave insight about, as most people understand the broad brushstrokes of staying safe, but then falter in specific situations like the one described

It's a bit controversial/radical, but I think having a parenting style which centres on communication and curiosity rather than using judgement and shame means they're more likely to talk to you when they perceive something bad or weird has happened, rather than hiding it. That means not telling off/punishing/what I say goes no questions, but more problem solving and collaborative approach.

Let your kids know that they can tell you anything about anyone . Also make it plain to others that you are there for your kid 100% and you believe them . I think it’s often unpopular kids or scapegoats that get targeted as the predator thinks that no one will support or believe.

Make sure they have the confidence to talk to you and that they will always be believed.

Yes that was my thought too!

My advice is gone further: keep any enablers away from children. I wouldn’t, for example, let anyone who think Michael Jackson wasn’t a pedophile with 20 feet of my kids. These attitudes from people mean they’d ignore it if they saw something untoward happening. We also need to send a message to enablers that they are unsafe and their attitude is unacceptable

Other than that: educating and empowering children to know about abuse and grooming, not being afraid to have the tough conversations and always always always talking to them about the people in their life.

I think specific red flags are hard, because it’s so often quite subtle things for example I always listen to the way adults speak about and to the children in their lives, and the way children react and respond. There’s often something “off” that I can’t put my finger on but that makes me look closer.

It’s also the case that people who abuse kids are very very skilled at what they do. They know how to quickly build relationships with the parents, appear helpful and trustworthy - no one would ever know and the community is shocked when it call comes out. Or they’re very obviously a bad one but have bullied and abused mum into submission and she either can’t see, can’t stop it or is prepared to sacrifice her child to save herself.

Fundamentally I wouldn’t introduce a new partner to children until I was absolutely sure of him - which isn’t 3 months in. I wouldn’t have someone new live in my house if my kids weren’t fully on board. Very clear boundaries around privacy for everyone at home - including the kids, we have “if the doors closed you don’t come in without permission” rule.

It’s not about being paranoid and looking for risk round every corner, it’s giving your kids the life skills to keep safe. You’ll never be able to reduce risk to zero, and people can get quite obsessed and have some very odd ideas about what constitutes safeguarding.

Stop moving random men into your house if you have children and get to know someone fully before worrying about your biological clock put children before yourself