Police uncovering 'epidemic of child abuse' in 1970s and 80s

[RoyalCorgi]

Just wanted to draw attention to this.

www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2020/feb/05/police-uncovering-epidemic-of-child-abuse-in-1970s-and-80s

A couple of key points:

"New figures seen by the Guardian show that 4,024 allegations led to guilty verdicts at court after police investigations since 2014 into decades-old child sex offences."

"Chief Constable Simon Bailey, the national lead for child protection and abuse investigations, told the Guardian: 'We are now having to come to terms, as a society, and we are going to have to recognise and accept, that during the 1970s and 1980s in particular, there was widespread sexual abuse of children taking place.'"

When are people going to actually sit up and realise that child abuse is endemic? That when people like us bang on about safeguarding we're not doing it for fun or because we hate men or we're transphobic or whatever the fuck it is this week but because there is an actual massive problem of men sexually abusing women and children and it just goes on and on and on because people pretend it isn't happening? And that it will go on on and on until someone listens to us and takes it seriously?

Brilliant post chicken
I thought the Michael Jackson documentary "Finding Neverland" was eye opening about the extent of grooming and how clever paedophiles can be. One of the victims still struggles to see what happened to him as abuse not love

@Mockersisrightasusual

And the law has changed. Prior to 2003, there was no offence of 'sexual activity with a child.' Anything short of full intercourse was a grey area that was in practice never going to be prosecuted.

This is not quite right. The sentencing is much stiffer and the sexual offences act of 2003 has made some things a crime which were not specifically listed before, but there were other laws which allow prosecution.

I was sexually abused as a child in the late 70s/80s. It went to court last year and he was convicted. If it had just been me his sentence would have only been a couple of years, but because the case was joined with other victims (some post Sexual offences act) his sentence was tougher. They have to sentence within the regulations of that time.

He got 16 years. Not that he will serve all of that. Judge described him as a serial predatory paedophile, he should be in there for life

Bless you, toothfairy

The fact that yours is a historic case sort of proves my point. In the past, there would never have been a prosecution when it was a child's word against an adult's.

Even with adult witnesses, an abuser like Chris Woodhead was untouchable and was protected by David Blunkett.

for all the posters who have talked about their abuse on here. it's devastating, it really is.

I agree with the poster that I wouldn't allow my children to be alone with any male coach or whatever. For the past 8 years I have lived life on a constant radar for these things - like I said, fnding out a trusted friend had done these things changes you as a person.

I remember hearing an interview with a convicted scoutmaster - would have been about 2003, because my DS1 was a baby - who had been found guilty of abusing his scouts on a camping trip and of making indecent pictures of children. There was something about his voice that disturbed me. He only served a small sentence and minimised his crimes - which was exactly what my friend's "DH" did too.

His voice - I can't explain it - it had a querulous, breathless, excitement about it, while talking about this. I'd swear he was turned on talking about his crimes on the radio. His voice had the same 'excitement' about it as my serial dirty phone caller (in the 80s when I was teenager) had. Disturbing as fuck, these predators.

for all the posters who have talked about their abuse on here. it's devastating, it really is.

I agree with the poster that I wouldn't allow my children to be alone with any male coach or whatever. For the past 8 years I have lived life on a constant radar for these things - like I said, fnding out a trusted friend had done these things changes you as a person.

I remember hearing an interview with a convicted scoutmaster - would have been about 2003, because my DS1 was a baby - who had been found guilty of abusing his scouts on a camping trip and of making indecent pictures of children. There was something about his voice that disturbed me. He only served a small sentence and minimised his crimes - which was exactly what my friend's "DH" did too.

His voice - I can't explain it - it had a querulous, breathless, excitement about it, while talking about this. I'd swear he was turned on talking about his crimes on the radio. His voice had the same 'excitement' about it as my serial dirty phone caller (in the 80s when I was teenager) had. Disturbing as fuck, these predators.

Is it not all about power to some extent?

Gosh, I don't know, I mean there are people who think all sex is about power.

In terms of what I was saying, paedophiles are people who have a sexual attraction to pre-adolescent children, and it seems to be fairly up in the air what the origins of that are. But as far as I know it's straightforward in the sense of that is what is arousing to those people, and I think often they aren't aroused really by adults.

But there are other people who sexually abuse children who don't fall under that label, it's not that they are particularly sexually attracted to them, they probably are normally attracted to other adults. There seems to be some variety in their motives. In some cases it's just that they have access to kids but not so much to other sexual partners, or they do actually get off on the intimidation, or they for some reason don't want to or can't deal with adults. Sometimes it's that they were abused themselves and it's created other mental or social problems that leads to a cycle of abuse. People who abuse teens are also more like this, they have fairly normal sexual interests, there are other reasons they target people who are relatively young.

Someone upthread mentioned there have recently been more women being identified as abusers and IIRC they tend to fall into this second group, where it's more a crime of opportunity.

Is it not all about power to some extent?

Gosh, I don't know, I mean there are people who think all sex is about power.

In terms of what I was saying, paedophiles are people who have a sexual attraction to pre-adolescent children, and it seems to be fairly up in the air what the origins of that are. But as far as I know it's straightforward in the sense of that is what is arousing to those people, and I think often they aren't aroused really by adults.

But there are other people who sexually abuse children who don't fall under that label, it's not that they are particularly sexually attracted to them, they probably are normally attracted to other adults. There seems to be some variety in their motives. In some cases it's just that they have access to kids but not so much to other sexual partners, or they do actually get off on the intimidation, or they for some reason don't want to or can't deal with adults. Sometimes it's that they were abused themselves and it's created other mental or social problems that leads to a cycle of abuse. People who abuse teens are also more like this, they have fairly normal sexual interests, there are other reasons they target people who are relatively young.

Someone upthread mentioned there have recently been more women being identified as abusers and IIRC they tend to fall into this second group, where it's more a crime of opportunity.

The paedophile I know, it was all about power, and abuse. It was getting off on sadistic abuse - not an "attraction" to children. Without a single doubt. It was about hurting people who were weaker. This was what the police said to his wife (my friend).

She divorced him btw - but the police liaison also told her that 50% of wives stand by their husbands. There's food for thought - where are we as a society where wives stand by their husbands who have been convicted of child abuse?

ChickenonaMug I agree with you so much. Brilliant post.

I think there's some whitewashing going on in that article and I'm angry about it.

“These allegations and the vast majority of cases were never reported to the authorities.''
Jaw on floor. The absolute audacity of that statement. In so many cases when victims tried to get help, the authorities turned them away, blamed them, told them they would never be believed, that they would ruin a mans life.

The paedophile I know, it was all about power, and abuse.

Remember though, paedophile is a technical term, even though it's often used more broadly in everyday speech. Not everyone who abuses pre-pubescent kids is a paedophile, by definition that is about being sexually attracted to children.

But there are also abusers of children who do so because they are interested in something like power, and children create a lot of capacity to play that out, and there are quite a few where it is a crime of convenience, children are simply available to them and not able to complain easily, the individual would just as soon abuse someone who wasn't a child. In some of those latter cases there is some lack of capacity on the part of the abuser as well.
Of course someone could both be a paedophile and also be attracted to asserting power.

The absolute horror of historic sex abuse is the number of children one paedophile can abuse over a lifetime. The ratio of victims to perpetrator is staggering. I have no idea why that isn’t a reason for longer jail sentences and permanent place on sex offenders register and release conditions.

I hope they are going to look into how the police helped cover it up. Jimmy Savile always kept the police sweet always helping out with police charities etc, the result was that when Surrey Police contacted West Yorks about a woman making claims of abuse they were told "Jim gets a lot of these" and nothing was done.

The headline should not really be about sexual abuse of children being an epidemic in the 1970's and 80's because it was endemic then and it is endemic now.

I agree. For all the safeguarding policies, for all the “we are much better educated and less squeamish about sex now” talk, for all the “oOh weren’t the seventies awful realisations, children are still being systematically abused by men.

Systems, that aren’t challenged because reasons.

The cautionary tale of Peter Morrison MP, who was a known child abuser. This information was held by MI5 in case he was a security risk, and by the Tory party whips in case they needed to blackmail him. At no stage did anyone show any concern for his victims.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_Morrison#Allegations_of_child_abuse

There are a whole lot of peters high up in government and police forces.

where are we as a society where wives stand by their husbands who have been convicted of child abuse?

Do we know if they stand by them despite the acknowledged child abuse?

How many stand by them in the belief that their husbands/partners have been falsely accused/wrongly convicted?

Wasn't some of the David Challenor horror that both AC and DC's wife persisted in claiming that the victim as lying/complicit and that DC should never have been convicted even after the verdict and the evidence?

My headmaster was a paedophile in 70s 80s 90s who only abused boys. It was a small private primary school and he would pick three boys in the oldest class to live with him in his flat for the final year (now called year 6). No-one questioned this. So basically abuse in plain site.

The story broke when in early 90s when one of the boys now 16 spoke up about what had happened to him there. It was a small town and people didn’t believe him. I even heard my friend’s mum say that he was making it up for attention. Once the police started investigating there ended up being 44 counts of abuse against him and the bastard got 7 years. Not enough for the lives he ruined. I’m still haunted by my conversation with the boy who spoke up when he told me what happened. I’ve lost touch with him and although I’ve searched for him in social media I can’t find him.

It turned out the headmaster had already been convicted in New Zealand for abusing boys in the school he ran there. Somehow he managed to come to UK and set up a school without any problems.
He was an evil shit that used physical and verbal abuse to all pupils. I was terrified of him. He was definitely hiding in plain site. After it broke so many stories came out but at the time everyone dismissed them as him being a funny old man.

....and then there's "The History Boys"