TRAGIC REALITY OF WHY AND HOW PEOPLE SEXUALLY ABUSE CHILDREN AND ADOLESCENTS. MAY BE YOU HAVE AIDED IT IGNORANTLY

By Nnabugwu Chizoba and Osim Jones Usim.

The rising cases of sexual Abuse of children and adolescents, demand urgent steps by parents, guardians, schools, teachers, churches, mosques, school administrators, individuals and groups to stem the scourge. The rate at which the pursuit of economic activities is diverting the attention of the society from the child and adolescents of today, is not only worrisome but also injurious.

38 year old nursing mother, Madam Cecilia lives in Jos, the Plateau state capital with her family. 3 days ago, she was discussing with her neighbor on the rising cases of child abuse. From her words, the look in her face and body language you can see the pains she felt about the situation. On a very close interaction with her it was quite glaring how innocently unaware she was, about how children and adolescents can be sexually abused, and how some actions or in-actions of hers, though ignorantly may have been aiding the occurrence of the same act that she vehemently condemns. 

The mere thought that her ignorance may have provided a festering ground one way or the other for anybody in the act of child abuse and molestation to carry out the nefarious activity, and yet remains her greatest associate, threw up a look of worry and concern. This feeling of culpability and self-damnation, revealed her urgent need to be educated the more on the issue. 

This reason and the fact that a lot of people are ignorant like Madam Cecilia, was enough reason to re-embark on this campaign. The aim is to create public awareness and enlightenment, on the issues considered necessary to mitigate frequent cases of child molestation and abuse, presently on the increase in the society. 

Having said that, we wish to begin this renewed campaign with a remark: 

To protect the children and adolescents from sexual abuse, it is helpful to know something about the different reasons people commit acts of sexual abuse and the situations in which these acts are most likely to occur or take place. 

It is equally important to note that some people have a stronger sexual interest in children or adolescents than in adults. This category of people may get aroused by the idea of sex with a child or adolescent or they may crave the feeling of power that they get from being able to molest the focus group of this discourse (children or adolescents). These are the Abusers who go about to seek attention of children or adolescents to molest or abuse sexually. They usually have many victims over a long period of time. 

Often, they get access to their victims by befriending the child or adolescent’s parents and most times offering to take their victim to places or to babysit. They may also take on a volunteer role, working with children and adolescents. They are usually unmarried, yet some of them are married people with children. Some of them do not seem to have many, adult relationships (other than those that give them access to their victims) and often have a history of moving from one community to another (frequently to avoid detection or prosecution by the law). 

Child and adolescent Abusers can be categorized into:

Abusers who usually target pre-pubertal children (children who have not started developing the sexual characteristics of an Adult body. The ones under this category are called Pedophiles.

 

The other category are:

Abusers who usually target pubertal children (adolescents). They are called hebephiles. 

More often children and adolescents are sexually abused by someone who prefers to have a close, intimate relationship with someone in their own age group. The Abusers doesn’t usually have sexual feeling towards someone who is too young, but turns to the child or adolescents as a “substitute” for the peer relationship that they would like to have. The relationship with the victim may start out normally, but as the Abuser starts to feel close to the victim and to get some of their need to feel accepted by them, they “sexualize” the relationship. They may start to think of the victim as their lover, boyfriend, or girlfriend, and to see the victim as being more mature than is the case. 

More often than not, they convince themselves that the victim enjoys the sexual activity. The sexual behavior with the victim is usually an attempt to make the feelings of closeness and acceptance more intense. These are the Abusers who are hard to spot.

RED FLAGS

You should be concerned if there is someone who is paying more attention to your child or adolescent than to anyone in their own age range; who seems to want to determine them (keep them from spending time with people of their own age). Or who seems to be treating them as though they were someone older. Very often, parents of a child  or adolescent who has  been sexually abused by such a person will say that they found the Abuser’s  interest in the victims a bit strange, but found it hard  to believe  that this was the ‘kind of person’ who would do such a thing.

As parents, guardians, school owners, teachers, church/mosque leaders, school administrators, and individuals, it‘s been observed that from time to time, children or adolescents are molested or abused by someone who has difficulty separating physical intimacy (physical contact with another person, such as hugging, tickling, massaging, or sitting close to someone). Any physical contact with a person of the preferred sex may lead to their becoming sexually aroused, whether they want to get aroused or not. Children, especially young children are very physical (sitting on the laps, wanting to be hugged or tickled etc.) and even adolescents may like to wrestle with or be tickled by adults, with whom they have a close relationship. Sometimes in these situations an adult, who would not normally sexually molest someone gets sexually aroused and ‘impulsively’ (without giving much thought to what they are doing) touches the victim in a sexual way.  This is more likely to happen if the Abuser has been drinking.

Continue keeping date with for the continuation of discussion on Child protection from sexual abuse and molestation. Thank you.