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Sunday 22 November 2009

The shameful truth is that we love our sex crimes

30 May 2009

Carol Sarler says that the enquiry into Catholic child abuse made the headlines because of a pervasive hypocrisy: a fixation on sex that lets us be both prurient and puritanical

In Ireland, some 2,000 adults who gave evidence of assault at the hands of Roman Catholic priests and nuns are, probably correctly, spitting tacks. The inquiry into their treatment when in children’s institutions has ruled that, although they did indeed suffer, no charges may be brought, no names shamed and, for what it’s worth, no bank balances swollen by damages sucked from the Vatican’s already depleted coffers. The decision might not seem just; on the other hand, it was all a very long time ago — so why, do we think, in recent weeks has this been one of the few stories to knock duck islands off their moats at the top of the news?

The clue, I suggest, is not that we all suddenly feel a burning need to sympathise with the suffering victims, but that sex was involved. So all anyone had to do was pick on that, splash it big, and they were on to a winner: even the BBC’s report put ‘sexual abuse’ into its opening sentence, leaving systematic, ritual beatings down at the dull end of its tale.

By the same token, when a Kentucky court recently convicted ex-private Steven Green for his derrings-do in Iraq, up came the headlines: ‘Soldier guilty of raping and killing 14-year-old girl’. Well, yes, he was. He also murdered the rest of her family, including her six-year-old sister. The papers weren’t even deferring to chronology, given that the family massacre took place first; it’s just that rape is a better draw, so it got first mention. Now, I concede, it’s not the easiest of league tables to draw up — but wouldn’t you have put a small child’s slaughter a few points ahead of a rape?

The Times, apparently, wouldn’t. A leader last week on the subject of rape was tersely headed ‘The Vilest Crime’. That’s it then. Finitely ruled: the vilest. So by definition more vile than, say, beating babies to a pulp or flying into tower blocks.

Meanwhile, one City lawyer might prove to be luckier than the indignant Irish above. Patrick Raggett, now 50, has been granted the right to claim damages from the Catholic Church because, he says, his life has been blighted by the childhood sexual abuse he received from a long-dead priest. Therapists have helped him to realise that certain things that have gone wrong in his life — work, booze, marriage, you name it — can be laid at the feet of a priest who ‘touched him inappropriately’. No physical pain or penetration, you understand, but the sum he seeks in damages is a whopping great £5 million. Golly. You wouldn’t get that if a masked loon with an axe had broken every bone in your body before tying you up and setting you alight.

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David Short

May 28th, 2009 6:21am Report this comment

Is this really the kind of nonsense the Spectator should publish?

Mr Green

May 28th, 2009 12:59pm Report this comment

I suppose the reason why sex crimes are figured higher then, say, murder is that with murder the victim's pain is no more. Whereas with a sex crime (or any other crime which inflicts psychological damage as much as it does physical) the victim is still very much alive and suffering.

Moira Hemson

May 29th, 2009 12:16pm Report this comment

Like Carol Sarler, I was similarly abused once as a young child, though not at knife point. I had accepted a lift from a stranger and when I made the mistake of telling my father about it, I got a sound clout for my troubles for getting into the man's car. This was the way of things 60 years ago. Ruined my life? Of course not! But could someone please let me know the name of a good lawyer....

JohnAnt

May 29th, 2009 2:42pm Report this comment

Bravely said, Carol Sarler - and absolutely true. Public prurience and the need to blame past grievances for present evils is at the root of a lot of victimhood culture.

Thomas Burger

May 29th, 2009 3:50pm Report this comment

Expect to get criticised for this article Carol, even though you are absolutely right. The Western world has some sort of sick fascination with anything "sexual", although as you correctly point out, rape is about power, not sex. To show this fascination for what it is [unhealthy], just stirs up the self righteousness indignation.

M

May 29th, 2009 6:46pm Report this comment

Please don't give this woman the column inches to print her rubbish. What are the victims of sexual abuse in the catholic church or other organisations meant to do, pretend it never happened and not seek justice? Are journalists to be silenced? I think it is the denial that is disgusting, not the reporting. And whatever happened in Guernsey seems to have been brushed aside. Lucky old CS, she goes through life without anything horrible happening to her.

Michel Bruno

May 29th, 2009 8:26pm Report this comment

Courageous article Carol. Our fixation with sexual crimes is indicitive of a society that is morally regressing.. as though following some kind of primitive tribal necessity to build everything sacred around sexual reproduction.
And yes it is highly damaging to society and to children, and yes, to many innocent adults. Those who put headlines such as 'hang the paedo' into the homes and minds of small children are just as much abusers as the peadophiles that they are fixated with.

Tara

May 30th, 2009 12:28am Report this comment

Well said. I was raped when I was 15 and whilst the rape itself was humiliating , painful and unpleasant. The worst part for me was the fear that something worse was going to happen. In terms of what has affected me and soured my life later on it wasn't the rape or the threatened violence but the reaction of my female friends to what happened. They found every excuse possible to justify it, accused me of lying- despite being nearby and hearing my calls for help and spread the most disgusting rumours about my conduct. That a 28 year old man was involved was never considered.

Today at the grand old age of 40, all my friends are male. When it comes down to it however brutal men can be, women are peerless in their ability to inflict deep emotional scar.

gwallan

May 30th, 2009 9:42am Report this comment

Ms Sarler...

I can certainly agree that the taking of a life should always be viewed as a greater crime than a non-fatal assault.

I also agree that our communities are way over the top in their outrage over sexual abuse.

However, as an advocate for victims of child sexual abuse, I am also well aware of the dangers posed to kids when adults engage them sexually. This engagement can be severely distorting to a child's development and it is no surprise that these victims are massively over-represented among all negative social indicators.

It is a fine line we walk when we make assertions about these issues.

Tread carefully Ms Sarler.

Tom

May 30th, 2009 5:48pm Report this comment

Very courageous column. Someone had to say it!

Western societies' fascination with sex crimes (both in the media and in the court rooms) is.. what's the word? PERVERTED?

The fact that murder of an entire family is not mentioned, whereas rape is, is just sickening.

The perverted public, and the victims advocates who don't have the moral compass to comprehend that worse crimes exist (just read some of the comments) are responsible for this situation.

Bjorn

May 30th, 2009 10:45pm Report this comment

Mr Gwallea,

nobody here is so cruel as to want you to lose your livlihood..we understand that these are pressing economic times for everybody..

Tim

May 30th, 2009 11:44pm Report this comment

Totally non PC,and a very sensible article.
We've made a culture of sex crimes,put them above all else.Yes they are terrible,but we all have to move on.Can a sex crime be any worse than a violent assault? Or the suffering of a front line soldier living with fear of death on a 6 month tour?
Well said Carol,and congrats to the Spectator for not being drowned out by the PC mob.

gwallan

May 31st, 2009 3:07am Report this comment

@Bjorn...

I am a tax consultant by profession. I am not paid for my advocacy.

The reasons for that engagement relate to my being a survivor of child sexual abuse and more than a decade of study into the surrounding issues.

Your sarcasm is misplaced. I've already stated that community reactions are too extreme. However I am also aware of the difficulties many victims DO face. I will not turn my back on hurt people because others who have no experience of that hurt over-react to the situation. Indeed sometimes that help involves keeping victims away from the stupid public outrage.

I have lived my life with a sense that I am obliged to use my experience, skills and knowledge - which by definition I gain from others - to help others. What's your excuse?

Simon Morris

June 1st, 2009 9:00am Report this comment

I absolutely agree. Bear in mind that the murderer of Baby P got 12 years for murder & life for raping a two year old. Dreadful as this crime is does not murder merit at least the same sentence?

Michael (Switzerland)

June 1st, 2009 6:48pm Report this comment

Of course there's some truth in the article, the British (and other) people are obsessed with and hypocritical about sex. But in this case there really was something more compelling: the extent to which an established, revered (by many) and ostensibly irreproachable organisation (i.e., the Catholic church) can for centuries hide and deny at the highest level serious crimes to defend its own two-faced members. It is a good insight into the behaviour of organisations, because it is far from unique, as anyone who has been following the recent revelations of MPs can confirm.

Dirty Euro

June 2nd, 2009 11:49pm Report this comment

We need a victimhood culture. We have a choice of an abusers culture or a victims culture i support the victim. What on earth are you doing complaining about people being upset about child abuse. Do you expect people to be grateful? What on earth are you on.

John Kimble

June 5th, 2009 1:23am Report this comment

Fantastic article.

Quite frankly the way we highligth rape as some sort of super crime which is somehow far worse than any other is a huge insult to all those victims of more serious crimes such as horrific violence, torture and murder.

You must be joking! In this country?!!

June 5th, 2009 3:03pm Report this comment

I believe the prurient 'rubbernecking' interest in such stories (Remember Soham, anyone? The saga went on for weeks and weeks.) is because of a kind of displacement activity that is peculiar to the British. Recently, I noticed in a high street chain bookseller one whole shelf given over to autobiographies of adults who had been abused in childhood. Not one or two such books but a dozen at least. Like, once there was 'chick lit', and now there is 'abuse lit'. Everyone's scrabbling to climb on the bandwagon because they know the interest is high and the vicarious prurience higher. Ka-ching!

Katie

June 12th, 2009 2:37pm Report this comment

Finally someone with common sense on this whole sorry mess. Thank you and keep writing. You are helping people.

Brad in Seattle

June 16th, 2009 11:40pm Report this comment

Sexual crimes are viewed as most heinous because society incorrectly views them as primarily affecting women. There is no more sacred creature than the female. Oh, sure, children (even sometimes boys) are occasionally the victim du jour, but they will never trump the victim status of the female. Men are just filthy beasts be mined for money and labor.