Peer-to-peer abuse: Victim's parents call for changes to guidelines

[LangCleg]

BBC reporting on the terrifying and increasing levels of sexual assault in our schools. Extract (but do read the whole thing):

The parents of a six-year-old girl who was sexually assaulted by classmates have called for a record to be set up showing all sex abuse between children.

Bella - not her real name - was abused by two boys at her London school almost every playtime for six weeks

The government said schools should be reporting peer-to-peer abuse and Ofsted inspectors should be highlighting if the school did not do so.

But Ofsted said it would be impossible to judge if incidents were being noted.

Statutory guidelines introduced by the Department for Education (DfE) last year and updated for this September said all teachers and staff must read part of the Keeping Children Safe in Education Guidance, which explained what peer-on-peer abuse was and the types of sexual violence of which staff should be aware.

But no reporting mechanism was introduced to make sure each teacher read the guidance and no timescale by which that should have happened.

www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-london-49084906

Society talks a good talk but does not respond in kind to child abuse

I agree with this. Society prefers to turn its head away.

However - this topic is not about CSE or CSA. Nothing to do with adult abusers or the survivors of their abuse.

It is about school children sexually harassing, assaulting or even raping each other. And peer-on-peer obscures the fact that mostly boys are sexually harassing, assaulting or even raping mostly girls in our schools.

It would be nice if we could concentrate on this actual topic because the problem is increasing and the response has been wholly inadequate.

Not rtft but started

Person who is saying that, essentially, it's fine to obscure that is mainly male on female assaults as this 'erases' male on female and same sex assaults is out of line. If eg 90%of assaults are male on female that is important info and does not 'erase' anyone fgs.

Rape in uk is defined as penetration with a penis so before police moved to self id in crime stats, it was a crime that only a man could commit. Assault by penetration carries the same seriousness in law.

Age of criminal accountability in uk is 10 so this statement
'For 14 yr old on 6yr old, the higher age would be accounted for in the 14yr olds sentence in terms of awareness of right and wrong. But the crime is still a juvenile crime'
Is utter and total bollocks

That's as far as I got for one poster to post so many total inaccuracies in such a short time needs addressing.

Assuming other people will have a well. But, wow.

In the example given it was two boys assaulting a girl. Peer on peer makes it sound like an even thing, peer (to me) implies someone of equal 'ability', 'experience', 'standing' etc. So firstly no two pupils of the same age ganging up and attacking one is not 'peer'!

But also, even if it were on pupil attacking another, then is this really a peer situation? One pupil knows about sexual assault enough to inflict it on another. One knows how to get another pupil alone, assault them, perhaps frighten them into not reporting.

Would we really describe a 30 year old man raping a ep year old woman as a peer assault?

It's a sexual assault of a child or children perpetrated by a child or children. It's not catchy but more accurate.

The story in the bbc article made me well up.

How anyone can read that and be compelled to post such a load of shit is beyond me.

What's the agenda I mean that's seriously shocking

For anyone reading yes 14 yo boys raping a6yo girl are criminally liable, the suggestion that well they're all kids it's a juvenile matter just no.

I believe the age of criminal responsibilty in uk is way too low. But. Less of the bullshit please.

raping a 30 year old woman ...

I believe the age of criminal responsibility is 10 in England. Is it the same in the rest of the UK?

'This type of abuse usually reflects that both children have experienced abuse themselves. The child being abused by the classmate obviously but the other child has experienced some inappropriate exposure to sexual behaviour to even attempt this type of behaviour.'

The hell?

Children must have already been victimised in order to be victims?

This thread is appalling.

I see the person who is unaware of uk laws and yet posting as if they are fully informed has not apologised but accused uk of being stuck in the 1950s.

Right ho.

Italian yes England it's 10 fair point.

England Wales 10
Scotland 12

It's a sexual assault of a child or children perpetrated by a child or children. It's not catchy but more accurate.

Not really, Italian. We have rising levels of sexual violence happening between pupils in our schools. And the perpetrators are mostly boys.

It's overwhelmingly a sex-based issue. Which peer-on-peer obscures.

Ni 10

The case identified in the OP were all in the one class and aged 6. Yes I suspect the 6 year old who instigated the abuse was most likely abused themselves. I’m out I have been completely misrepresented here. Not a topic I can just debate it is too personal.

I see the person who is unaware of uk laws and yet posting as if they are fully informed has not apologised but accused uk of being stuck in the 1950s.

Given that they are posting from a country where child marriage is legal in some states, this does seem a bit rich.

Children must have already been victimised in order to be victims?

Not only that, children must have been victimised to be perpetrators.

Clearly this is bullshit. It may be of relevance amongst younger children but many sexual assaults in schools occur at secondary level and the perpetrators are pubescent boys.

I suspect the rise in sexual assaults has far more to do with ready access to pornography than poor ickle victimised teenage boys.

Errol sexual abuse of boys is already taken more seriously, when it comes to light.

Yes there is certainly under reporting from male victims of sexual abuse, do we really know if its more than under reporting from female victims?

The assumption from certain quarters is that female victims invariably report and male ones don't. That assumption means that the victim sex is more evenly distrubuted.

That's based on a lot of assumptions though.

The little girl in the article didn't report. Her parents only found out ( don't read further if not read article as don't want to be upset)

When they asked why she couldn't sit down.

Anyone reading that story and quibbling over it, I don't understand. It made me nearly cry. 6 is tiny. She was subject to 6 weeks of sexual abuse, multiple times a day. The school did nothing. They had even walked in and called her 'silly'.

How do you solve a problem if you don't name it accurately?

The situation with schools around this is a microcosm of society and how it views females, males, sex offences.

Because its children, in a place they should be safe, and they have to go by law unless officially opted out, it gets some news columns.

But nothing is done? Afaik racist homophobic stuff is recordable, sex(m/f) is a more frequent driver of abuse. Sexist abuse, sexual assault etc. As with the hate crime laws though, sex is excluded. Why?

Children are being raped in school ffs. This should be a national scandal with everyone pulling out the stops to stop it.

The teachers here, as in other cases I've seen in media and on here, had witnessed the abuse and dismissed it / told the girl off.

This as I say is a microcosm of how sexual offences by men against women are viewed generally. Ie not that bad, he got carried away, look he's said sorry etc etc

Excellent thread highlighting the increased sexual assault in schools by boys on girls, and the nonsensical ‘newspeak’ that names it as ‘peer on peer’. If you can’t name sex you can’t name sexual assault. #sexmatters

From a twitter thread

As with the hate crime laws though, sex is excluded. Why?

Because there aren't enough prisons, courts, police, specialist schools to deal with all the perpetrators?

Because then society would have to admit sexual assaults/harassment are endemic?

Because men might actually have to change instead of virtue signalling?

Quite, Arnold.

I agree with littlebrowndog that it should be called sexual assault. I very much feel like the 'peer on peer' phrasing tries not to stigmatize the perpetrators. And it obviously needs statistics to be recorded on sex and age of perpetrator and victim, if you want to implement meaningful measures.

As the mom of a boy, I am keenly aware that they can become victims, too. Which is, why I am vigilant when he might be around other, particularly older boys. And no, as annoying and transgressive as an unwanted kiss can be for a child (I've been there), this is not the type of stuff I fear (referring to a previous poster here).

And society always blames or ridicules the victims. Here is a story of a family who ultimately moved, after their son was sodomized with a pencil by some of his team mates. Their dad, a coach, thought nothing of it.

www.salon.com/2013/06/24/rape_culture_punishes_boys_too/

(I understand some on here won't be thrilled I dig out the one story where a boy was victimized, when girls are victims 10x as often, but aside from my probable bias, because I have a son, I do believe we won't make any headway as long as boys grow up in a culture where they seem to only have the choice to be victims or victimizers).

I'm really sorry, this question is going to sound stupid, but by reporting are pp meaning that the victim has reported, or that whomever the victim has reported to taken the incident further and reported to the appropriate authorities?

I only ask because as a parent I was in a difficult situation where DS1 and another child spoke to me about a neighbourhood teen who was showing many kids pornography (not nudes actual internet videos). I spoke with parents of the children (not the perpetrator) and quite a few were reluctant to actually do something about it, except ban their kids from playing with her. I reported to social services and police, because I was quite concerned that her behaviour was an indication of abuse at some point I. Her past and the fact that she was interacting with men on porn sites.

.

I think reporting means reporting to the school.

Schools in my experience are very reluctant to involve outside authorities.

When my own daughter was sexually assaulted by a boy who had already similarly assaulted numerous other girls in their final year at primary school the police were only involved because Mr Whatshisknickers sat in the head teachers office, phone in hand, and flat out asked whether she was calling the police or he should?

(the police incidentally took the matter very seriously and provision was made to ensure our daughter and the boy were in different classes when they entered high school despite it being a relatively minor assault, but that was 12 years ago now and things seem to have changed for the worse)

A lot of head teachers, unfortunately, view arse-covering as their default response. (Way back in the 70s my mum taught in a rough inner city comp at the height of football hooliganism when the "Inter City Firms" were running riot. Turned out some of the boys had been making "kung fu throwing stars" for use at football matches in the school metalwork shop! The head's immediate response was "how do we stop the police being involved?" He was most affronted to be told this would not be possible.)

I realise everything should be guided by the victim's needs, and that many victims may not want to report, but I'd strongly advise any parents to go straight to the police in parallel with going to the school. If the school is any good, they'll understand why you've gone to the police too. If the school's shit, you won't have wasted weeks being given the run-around by their restorative justice scheme.

It was an issue I flat out asked my son's potential secondary schools about - because I don't want him to be in an environment where this isn't taken seriously.