Quote Originally Posted by Marigold2 View Post
Richard if I may. Your question on why children who are abused do not speak up at the time. I can answer that easily. Fear, shame, gulit.
My cousins were sexually abused by their father. Since my one cousin is two months my senior her and I were very very close. I knew all about the abuse. We were between 12 and 14 when this was going on.
I wanted her to tell, she was terrified. My dad was a cop at the time. I never said a word. She knew my aunt her mother would not believe her and still worst she was afraid her mother would do nothing to stop it for fear of losing her home. I tried for years to have her tell, she told me over and over again if I did tell she would kill herself. That is a heavy burden and I could not risk that. So at 13 I did nothing.
The truth finally came out when her father was chasing her through the house and she climbed on the roof to get away from him and my younger aunt showed up and said "what the hell are you doing on the roof".
He was brought to court but my cousins were too terrified and ashamed to testify. Their lives were ruined be this.
The priests have 'god' on their sides.

I took a sex ed class and we touched on kid abuse. I have no children, but I dated a gal who was molested as a child and saw the "death" of parts of her soul.

People who abuse kids need to be exposed as soon as possible-but there are times that the system can work against the innocent.

One thing that is very sketchy about reinforcing the "If someone bad touches you in your special place" mantra is that we empower kids with the idea that they have a voice should they be abused, but, it can also be used as a 'weapon' against any adult they may have a difference with.

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My sis hit my niece in the arse with a shoe. Because my niece had never pushed my sis to the point of corporal punishment? My niece was devastated, confided with a friend that "MOM beat me with a shoe" and the school, cops and social services had to be called in to make sure that no kid was hurt in the writing of this post!!!

Embarrassing? Yeah, but at the cost of keeping a child safe? I have to say that erring on the side of caution is good, but, we have to take time to really look at what may have transpired in each case.

I know that the topic was the church and child abuse and apologize for taking it out-of-bounds. C.A. is a real problem and not JUST a church problem. It's a problem that need to be exposed for what it is, A crime against children.

But, we also have to empower-I really hate that term-our children to use that knowledge with common sense.