Why is Sexual Abuse Destructive to a Child?

V (previously Eve Ensler), author of The Apology⁽¹⁾ refers to child sexual abuse as a Spiritual Attack. A human has to tap into the darkest, most vile energy source to perpetrate child sexual abuse and they ultimately aim to crush and kill that child’s Spirit. Perpetrators intentionally snatch away the child’s wonder and joy, replacing it with terror and shock. A child’s psychological, emotional, physical and sexual well being is attacked and destroyed through the process of sexual abuse. Healthy neurodevelopmental pathways are obstructed. Attachment to caregivers is shattered and self perception becomes distorted, impacting negatively on the child’s sense of self.

This heinous act creates a lifetime of shame that if not healed, becomes self destructive and is projected onto other people throughout the survivor’s life. Sometimes, if the child remains unhealed, the projection of this trauma is disastrous as it can create the perfect recipe to develop a future child sexual abuse victimiser⁽²⁾.  Child sexual abuse is the greatest threat to humanity because a person cannot fulfil their life purpose if their entire being has been destroyed and they never recover, creating a world full of extremely traumatised individuals.

Sexual Trauma Creates Sexual Trauma

Sexual Trauma creates Sexual Trauma which means that this vile energy source multiplies itself and amplifies to create further sexual trauma when projected onto another human being. This manifests as unhealthy sexual relationships; self-destructive, risky or self harming behaviours; developing a fear of sex; rejecting one’s own sexuality; or projecting unhealthy sexual behaviours onto children or adults.

Understanding that many perpetrators of pre-pubescent children were also child sexual abuse victims, is an important element that we are missing within Australian research and solutions. Though, most survivors do not project sexual trauma onto children, but rather internalise the energy to develop self-destructive behaviours, beliefs and attachments. We still need to talk about this extremely damaging cycle of victim to abuser because victimisers are responsible for destroying many, many lives.

There is no denying the existence of intergenerational sexual trauma passed from generation to generation. These victims became abusers because they were not given an opportunity to disclose or they weren’t believed when they did disclose, and the signs and symptoms were ignored or not identified. These children were not provided with an effective early intervention program to help them heal and re-wire the neuroplasticity of the brain to re-develop healthy neurological pathways about attachment and sex. When a child is sexually abused at critical neurological developmental stages, it creates Reactive Attachment Disorder which is responsible for molding a child’s brain to develop inappropriate beliefs and attachments to children and sex. 

Australia’s greatest societal failure is not investing enough funding into early intervention programs and preventative educational programs for child victims to stop the cycle from victim to abuser. We cannot fall into a trap of refusing to face the truth because it is triggering, uncomfortable and confrontational.

If we understand this issue from every angle in its absolute truth, we are informed, empowered and can make lasting change with holistic solutions rather than only offering talk therapy to child survivors. Identifying child victims and helping them heal as an early intervention strategy is imperative to creating a safe, new world where children can achieve their dreams, unaffected by trauma. This is the most important work for humans right now; protecting and healing children, our future Change Agents. 

Australian Society Gives Perpetrators Free Reign

In 2023, perpetrators are getting more brazen, taking bigger risks and inflicting greater damage to children. They are raising the stakes at the level of depravity committed against children, due to desensitisation caused by the violent, pornographic content they are consuming. They’re well aware that our systems for identifying them and holding them accountable are completely ineffective. Perpetrators know that hardly anyone believes children’s disclosures, so they remain undetected⁽³⁾. In a 2021 survey by the Australian Childhood Foundation, almost 70% of adult respondents believed that children made up stories about being abused or were uncertain whether to believe children when they disclosed abuse⁽³⁾. Despite the fact that 98% of child disclosures about sexual abuse are found to be true⁽⁴⁾.

A child’s’ verbal disclosure is not enough evidence to prove a perpetrator guilty beyond a reasonable doubt. It becomes an adult’s word against a child’s in the court of law because there are usually no witnesses. Perpetrators will spend years successfully grooming the adults around them so any allegation is quashed, with their allies quickly stepping in to defend their reputation. Most perpetrators are not identified, and if they are, they are rarely charged and convicted. I would guesstimate that 2% of perpetrators have been imprisoned, with 98% living and working in our communities. If a perpetrator is convicted, the prison sentences are minimal and totally inadequate with them being released back into the community quickly.

A Perpetrator Has Multiple Victims

Many predators have perfected their ‘craft’ over decades so that they never get caught. Predators are collecting as many victims as they can, like trophies. The average statistic for a person to disclose sexual abuse is 23.9 years, with the rate being higher for men⁽⁵⁾. This means each perpetrator has almost 25 years to collect more victims. 70% of child sex offenders have between one and 9 victims, while 20% have 10 to 40 victims^(6). This is why providing opportunities for disclosure is so important.

A child who has been coerced and threatened into silence over several months or years will not just tell you that they have been keeping a secret. They are terrified of the consequences to them, their loved ones and even the perpetrator. Most children don’t know that what they are experiencing is wrong because the perpetrator has normalised the abuse and most of our schools, caregivers and service providers are not teaching children protective behaviours education.

Australians Are Too Uncomfortable To Talk About It

Silence is a perpetrator’s best friend. As a community, we must start openly telling children repeatedly and consistently every day:

• If someone asks you to keep a secret about your body (private part or their private part), tell someone
• If someone shows you a video about people’s private parts, tell someone
• If someone tells you they will hurt you, hurt people you love or that your mother or father will hate you, won’t believe you or that it’s your fault, it is not true. They are pretending to make you keep their secret.
• Tell everyone until it stops.

The solution is so simple. We aren’t confusing children by placing the responsibility on them to decipher between safe and unsafe secrets. A clever manipulator will tell a child that theirs IS a safe secret. Children younger than 5 are being exposed to porn. Children as young as 6 are sexually assaulted at school by other students, due to exposure to porn⁽⁷⁾. 

We’ve been talking about how to deliver this message for decades and we’ve lost focus to just deliver the message already! We have passively stood back and enabled predators to harm our children because we are too scared to talk about child sexual abuse. This message has to be delivered every day across all child service providers because if the school fails to deliver this message effectively, the local Surf Club can provide the backup. Ultimately, delivering this message will save lives.

It is up to us, in our communities, to take control of this situation. If you are a teacher or a principal and you haven’t received a disclosure this year, the message is not being delivered effectively. Why? More than 1 in 3 girls and 1 in 5 boys are victims of child sexual abuse⁽⁸⁾. Australian society has become much more sexualised and pornified within the last 20 years. Demand for child abuse material online has increased dramatically.  Figures show that in 2021, the Internet Watch Foundation acted against more than 200,000 websites containing child sexual abuse material⁽⁹⁾. That is 15 times more than in 2011, when there were just over 13,000 reports of abusive content⁽⁹⁾. 

The ‘Coacher’

Our society is so fearful of giving children opportunities to disclose sexual abuse because of the narrative that women are ‘coachers’. There is an agenda being pushed that women who advocate for children after disclosures, have ulterior motives. The belief is that vindictive women are making false allegations against perpetrators because women are scorned, bitter or mentally unstable. It feeds into a historical narrative about women being seen as hysterical, liars and conniving manipulators.

The basic human need for the denial of such atrocities against children is so great that the community will hold onto the coaching narrative, even if it means children remain unsafe. As a community, we can be open to disclosures without the impact of coaching by saying to children, “if anything like this happens, you can tell one of your Safe People”.

The Myth of ‘Safety’ – Blue Cards

Just because a person has a Working with Children Card and Police Clearance, it does not mean that they are not a perpetrator. Many perpetrators have these clearances. Obtaining these clearances give us a false sense of safety and security for our children. Why? Most perpetrators never get caught, so they can easily get clearances. We need additional layers of safety and protection for our children, especially children with disability or neurodivergence. We are not hearing about the rampant sexual abuse of children with disability or neurodivergence because we do not have any preventative or protective measures in place to catch these acts or to identify victims.

‘The Perfect Victim’ – Children with Disability or Neurodivergence

Children with disability or neurodivergence are being sexually assaulted repeatedly and by multiple offenders⁽¹⁰⁾. Children with disability or neurodivergence are 7 times more likely to be sexually abused than neurotypical children⁽¹¹⁾. This statistic is based on American and Canadian studies during the late 1980s⁽¹²⁾ and this statistic is massively under reported due to the inability of victims to report, provide physical evidence or be believed. An increase in access to violent and fetish pornography has exacerbated child sexual abuse and led to more violent offences against children. 

Children with disability are especially vulnerable because of their extended dependence on caregivers, particularly 1 on 1 care⁽¹⁰⁾ (; multiple caregivers in different settings; schools, residential facilities, foster care, group homes, service provider activities). At least 50% of Autistic children are non-verbal or minimally verbal⁽¹³⁾  and these children make the perfect victims because they cannot report the assaults.

If more than 1 in 3 neurotypical girls and 1 in 5 neurotypical boys are sexually abused and children with disability or neurodivergence were at a least 7 times more likely to be abused than neurotypical children in 1989, what would the actual figure be for children with disability or neurodivergence in 2023? We don’t know because there is limited funding going into this research in Australia. 

Australia’s Greatest Shame

We aren’t here to convince people of these facts. This has been discussed for decades and nothing is working to stop child sexual abuse on a mass scale. The sexual abuse of children is getting worse, with more victims and more heinous offences. Children now have to try to heal knowing that their images and videos will be shared for their entire lives on the dark web with thousands of predators, all around the world. Australian society is teaching boys to sexualise and victimise girls by refusing to introduce age verification laws to view pornography and by allowing children to be sexualised in mass media. Frankly, porn is ruining children’s lives because it makes our society unsafe for children and voyeuristic. 

We, survivors and families of survivors, are the Australian communities best resource to learn from, because we have been targeted by these perpetrators. We know how they think, how they behave, who they target and how they get away with it. So, listen up! It is time to shatter the illusion that our children are living in safe communities, because they are not. Sacred Justice has the solutions to help children heal and to empower our communities to implement long lasting change.