tag:theconversation.com,2011:/us/topics/pedophilia-36339/articlesPedophilia – The Conversation2022-03-31T15:02:10Ztag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1787372022-03-31T15:02:10Z2022-03-31T15:02:10ZA warning about popular love songs aimed at young girls<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/451376/original/file-20220310-27-1ntwjqf.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=4%2C1%2C729%2C419&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Young girls are prime targets for the romance business.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">(YouTube)</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>The love and break-up songs that abound on the internet almost exclusively target young girls and teenagers, who play them over and over again, ensconced in the intimacy of their bedrooms.</p>
<p>The singers who enter the secretive, imagined worlds are very real to these young girls. They embody youth, beauty, wealth, autonomy and strength of character. They are also a powerful factor of socialization in what I call communicational violence. This term refers to a form of violence in which verbal messages contradict non-verbal messages, preventing people from making informed decisions.</p>
<p>Parents are rarely averse to their daughters listening to music, but parents should be aware of some warning signs.</p>
<p>I decode some of these love songs, which can initially seem harmless, in a chapter of the book <em>Feminist Practices and Research on Domestic Violence</em>, <a href="https://www.puq.ca/catalogue/livres/pratiques-recherches-feministes-matiere-violence-conjugale-3840.html">available in French as of March 2022</a>. The analysis reveals that the songs combine seduction and violence. They introduce a false understanding of conjugal love in the minds of young female listeners. Through my expertise in popular culture, artistic creation and anthropology, I strive to reveal the greedy underbelly of the music industry, which commodifies pubescent feelings.</p>
<p>Parents may want to consider a short list of points when evaluating their daughters’ music listening habits, because they are naive to the insidious nature of their favourite artists’ songs. The songs of the young singer-songwriter Olivia Rodrigo, who won <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5yako9d1jUU">New Artist of the Year at the 2021 American Music Awards</a>, offer some good examples.</p>
<h2>Beware of complacent reviews</h2>
<p>Music critics can sometimes be complacent or even superficial in their analysis of popular music. An example of this — and this is just one of many — can be found in a <a href="http://abcnewsradioonline.com/music-news/2021/4/8/olivia-rodrigo-spills-deja-vu-secrets-ive-never-watched-glee.html">review of Olivia Rodrigo’s single “Deja Vu”</a>. I was very surprised the reviewer would suggest there was nostalgia behind the line: </p>
<p>“You play her piano, but she doesn’t know/That I was the one who taught you Billy Joel.”</p>
<p>If you ask girls, or consult the online <a href="https://www.urbandictionary.com/">Urban Dictionary</a>, you’ll learn that “playing piano” refers to female masturbation. “Billy Joel” is a discreet way of talking about fellatio by using the artist’s initials, BJ.</p>
<h2>Beware of that ‘déjà vu’ air of Hollywood cinema</h2>
<p>The <a href="https://www.teenvogue.com/story/olivia-rodrigo-deja-vu-music-video">song’s video</a>, corresponds to the male gaze often represented by the camera in Hollywood films. The camera observes Rodrigo as a voyeur would peer at women’s bodies through a mirror, screen or hole in a wall, feeding a patriarchal conception of the world. </p>
<p>The term “male gaze” was coined by film critic <a href="http://www.columbia.edu/itc/architecture/ockman/pdfs/feminism/mulvey.pdf">Laura Mulvey in her essay “Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema,” published in 1975</a>, a cinematographic practice that she denounced.</p>
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<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/cii6ruuycQA?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">Video clip of the song ‘Deja vu’ by Olivia Rodrigo.</span></figcaption>
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<p>The video’s first few seconds show a young woman licking a scoop of strawberry ice cream, with an erect spoon in it. The words <em>chorus</em> and <em>verse</em> are used strategically, and refer to vaginal and anal sexual practices. Verse <a href="https://www.insider.com/queer-sex-what-is-a-top-bottom-verse-2021-2">can refer to a man who doesn’t have a top or bottom preference when having sex with another man</a>.</p>
<p>But to seize the implicit message of this video, one has to be especially attentive to the images presented in synchronicity with these two words. One young woman faces the camera (chorus), then another turns her back to it (verse). The lyrics suggest declarations of love can be made by the lover during the transition from penile-vaginal sex to penile-anal sex:</p>
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<p>“I bet you even tell her/How you love her/In between the chorus and the verse.”</p>
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<h2>Beware of harassment justified by female jealousy</h2>
<p>The video for “Deja vu” features Rodrigo mimicking her female rival. She chooses the same flavour of ice cream, wears the same outfits, repeats the other’s movements and goes to the same places by the same means. This visual script expresses a jealous obsession that seems to be denied by the detached tone of the title lyrics: “Do you get deja vu?”</p>
<p>Take, for example, the beautiful green “Angie” dress created by <a href="https://mollygoddard.com/products/angie-dress-bronze">designer Molly Goddard</a>. Worn by Rodrigo, or by her rival, the dress is a subtle, yet clear, evocation of the <a href="https://www.facebook.com/bbcthree/videos/2171179673136265/">psychopathic character Villanelle</a>, who also wears <a href="https://www.standard.co.uk/insider/fashion/london-fashion-week-molly-goddard-aw19-a4068906.html">extravagant Goddard dresses</a> in the series <a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt7016936/"><em>Killing Eve</em></a>. </p>
<p>The link between Villanelle and Rodrigo is consolidated in the scene where Rodrigo, dressed in the Goddard dress, uses a sledgehammer to destroy the image of her rival on the screens feeding her obsession.</p>
<p>From this disturbing perspective, it is reasonable to conclude that this song trivializes harassment motivated by female rivalry. For that matter, don’t we say that we’re “green with envy?”</p>
<h2>Beware of pedophilic connotations</h2>
<p>In another one of Rodrigo’s hit songs, <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?%20v=hWq_ma9ZDxk">“drivers license”</a>, the male gaze imposed by the camera seems to have pedophilic tendencies. This is suggested by the marked presence of three symbols of childhood: the overalls Rodrigo wears, the capitalization error in the title of the song and the toy keyboard on which the young woman repeatedly plays a simple tune that accentuates its juvenile character.</p>
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<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/ZmDBbnmKpqQ?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">Video clip of the song “drivers license” by Olivia Rodrigo.</span></figcaption>
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<p>But the most blatant sign of the video’s pedophilic gaze is the physical posture the singer assumes in all the scenes where she plays the toy piano: She lies on her stomach and leans on her elbows with her knees bent so as to cross her feet above her thighs. This posture is a clear reference to Stanley Kubrick’s <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b94tzbyDV9U"><em>Lolita</em> (1962)</a> as well as <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZZuh-YXWu_8">Adrian Lyne’s 1997 version</a>. These films tell the story of a man who becomes sexually attracted to a teenage girl and pursues an inappropriate relationship with her.</p>
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<img alt="Young woman lying flat on a bed looking at a gentleman" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/447126/original/file-20220217-23-17w2d99.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/447126/original/file-20220217-23-17w2d99.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=308&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/447126/original/file-20220217-23-17w2d99.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=308&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/447126/original/file-20220217-23-17w2d99.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=308&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/447126/original/file-20220217-23-17w2d99.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=388&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/447126/original/file-20220217-23-17w2d99.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=388&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/447126/original/file-20220217-23-17w2d99.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=388&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Olivia Rodrigo’s posture is reminiscent of Stanley Kubrick’s ‘Lolita’.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">(YouTube)</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Beware of the transition from dream to reality</h2>
<p>Violent communication uses manipulative or coercive language so that one partner can exert control over the other. It can include gestures, voice intonation, word choice, silences and other aspects of communication, such as speed of delivery, punctuation, posture or context of enunciation. </p>
<p>Songs can socialize young girls and adolescents to accept violent communication from their partners in their romantic relationships. </p>
<p>There is no reasonable way to keep young girls from these songs. At home, one possible solution is to use these songs as a tool to raise awareness about what violent communication looks like in a romantic relationship.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/178737/count.gif" alt="La Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Sylvie Genest ne travaille pas, ne conseille pas, ne possède pas de parts, ne reçoit pas de fonds d'une organisation qui pourrait tirer profit de cet article, et n'a déclaré aucune autre affiliation que son organisme de recherche.</span></em></p>Five red flags parents should listen for in popular songs.Sylvie Genest, Professeure à la Faculté des arts, Université du Québec à Montréal (UQAM)Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1754302022-01-21T17:36:37Z2022-01-21T17:36:37ZPope Benedict accused of mishandling sex abuse cases: 4 essential reads<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/441854/original/file-20220120-9596-uwbjln.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=119%2C0%2C4550%2C3087&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI sits in St. Peter's Basilica Dec. 8, 2015. A long-awaited report on sexual abuse faulted his handling of four cases.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://newsroom.ap.org/detail/Germany%20Church%20Abuse/7c5686fae1ce465db291417e735c83d8?Query=benedict&mediaType=photo&sortBy=arrivaldatetime:desc&dateRange=Anytime&totalCount=17139&currentItemNo=4">AP Photo/Gregorio Borgia</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>When <a href="https://theconversation.com/popes-resignation-is-a-recognition-of-human-frailty-in-an-ageing-world-12148">Pope Benedict XVI resigned in 2013</a> – the first leader of the Catholic Church to do so in more than half a millennium – the sexual abuse crisis had already roiled the church for years. </p>
<p>During the conservative theologian’s papacy, the church <a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/SB10001424052748704178004575350551503573886">revised canon law</a> and <a href="https://www.deseret.com/2010/11/20/20154678/vatican-issuing-guidelines-on-sex-abuse-to-bishops#pope-benedict-xvi-delivers-his-message-to-cardinals-he-summoned-for-a-day-of-reflection-at-the-vatican">announced new guidelines</a> in an effort to respond to clergy abuse.</p>
<p>But <a href="https://apnews.com/article/pope-francis-pope-benedict-xvi-reinhard-marx-germany-europe-c75f721f469f969d05348703c093e53d">a new report</a> accuses Benedict of having mishandled at least four cases of sexual abuse when he was an archbishop in Munich, Germany, in the 1970s and 1980s. The investigation, which covers abuse in the diocese from 1945 to 2019, concluded that the former pope failed to properly act on claims or punish priests – claims Benedict has rejected.</p>
<p>The accusations against a living, if retired, pope underscore how dramatically the sex abuse crisis has shaken the church. Here are some of The Conversation’s many articles examining the crisis over the years – both its roots and the potential routes for reform.</p>
<h2>1. Years of scandal</h2>
<p>High-profile reports have consistently put the crisis in headlines for the past 20 years, particularly <a href="https://www3.bostonglobe.com/metro/specials/clergy/">The Boston Globe’s famous “Spotlight” investigation</a> in 2002 and the film it inspired in 2015. </p>
<p>But the paper trail documenting patterns of abuse – and cover-ups – <a href="https://theconversation.com/the-catholic-churchs-grim-history-of-ignoring-priestly-pedophilia-and-silencing-would-be-whistleblowers-102387">goes back to at least the 1950s</a>, according to <a href="https://artsci.case.edu/faculty/brian-clites/">Brian Clites</a>, an expert on clergy sex abuse. That’s when U.S. bishops began referring priests to church-run treatment centers, rather than reporting abuse to independent authorities. “Hush money” payouts followed.</p>
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<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/239512/original/file-20181005-72100-1a4uyg1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/239512/original/file-20181005-72100-1a4uyg1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/239512/original/file-20181005-72100-1a4uyg1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/239512/original/file-20181005-72100-1a4uyg1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/239512/original/file-20181005-72100-1a4uyg1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/239512/original/file-20181005-72100-1a4uyg1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/239512/original/file-20181005-72100-1a4uyg1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<span class="caption">Victims or their family members react after a Pennsylvania grand jury released a report on clergy sex abuse in 2018.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.apimages.com/metadata/Index/Pennsylvania-Dioceses-Sex-Abuse-Investigation/c201adfa98774d4588df745e59c49e53/9/0">AP Photo/Matt Rourke</a></span>
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<p>By the 1990s, as lawsuits mounted, “the national outcry forced dioceses across the country to create public standards for how they were handling abuse accusations,” Clites writes, “and American bishops launched new marketing campaigns to regain trust.”</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/the-catholic-churchs-grim-history-of-ignoring-priestly-pedophilia-and-silencing-would-be-whistleblowers-102387">The Catholic Church's grim history of ignoring priestly pedophilia – and silencing would-be whistleblowers</a>
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<h2>2. Speaking up – and out</h2>
<p>Two barriers to bringing abusers to justice, <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-the-catholic-churchs-hierarchy-makes-it-difficult-to-punish-sexual-abusers-89477">many experts argue</a>, are the church’s hierarchy and canon laws, which regulate the church and its members.</p>
<p>But <a href="https://press.vatican.va/content/salastampa/en/bollettino/pubblico/2019/12/17/191217b.html">in 2019</a>, Pope Francis modified the “Rule of Pontifical Secrecy,” which required that sensitive information about the church be kept confidential. Over the years, <a href="https://cruxnow.com/february-abuse-summit/2019/02/no-secret-that-pontifical-secrecy-is-taking-a-beating-at-popes-summit/">critics alleged that the policy allowed officials</a> to withhold information about sexual abuse cases, even from victims or legal authorities. Francis’ announcement lifted the rule for three situations: sexual abuse of minors or vulnerable persons, failure to report or efforts to cover up such abuse, and possession of child pornography by a cleric.</p>
<p>Even with this change, however, transparency may prove elusive, argues law professor <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=wI3ku0oAAAAJ&hl=en">Christine P. Bartholomew</a>. She <a href="https://theconversation.com/pope-ends-a-secrecy-rule-for-catholic-sexual-abuse-cases-but-for-victims-many-barriers-to-justice-remain-129434">outlines other practices</a> that can be used to conceal information and work around mandatory reporting requirements. </p>
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<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/pope-ends-a-secrecy-rule-for-catholic-sexual-abuse-cases-but-for-victims-many-barriers-to-justice-remain-129434">Pope ends a secrecy rule for Catholic sexual abuse cases, but for victims many barriers to justice remain</a>
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<h2>3. Celibacy controversy</h2>
<p>Other analysts trying to understand the roots of the sex abuse crisis focus on the rules of the priesthood itself – especially that priests be male and celibate.</p>
<p>But it hasn’t always been that clear cut. <a href="https://neareasternstudies.cornell.edu/kim-haines-eitzen">Kim Haines-Eitzen</a>, an expert on early Christianity, outlines how views on marriage <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-views-on-priestly-celibacy-changed-in-christian-history-102158">have shifted</a> ever since the first century. The early Christian leader Saint Paul seemed to endorse marriage “reluctantly,” she writes, as “an acceptable choice for those who cannot control themselves.” </p>
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<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/234498/original/file-20180831-195325-e1n00o.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/234498/original/file-20180831-195325-e1n00o.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=441&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/234498/original/file-20180831-195325-e1n00o.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=441&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/234498/original/file-20180831-195325-e1n00o.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=441&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/234498/original/file-20180831-195325-e1n00o.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=554&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/234498/original/file-20180831-195325-e1n00o.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=554&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/234498/original/file-20180831-195325-e1n00o.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=554&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<span class="caption">The French Baroque painting ‘Saint Paul writing his Epistles.’</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Probably_Valentin_de_Boulogne_-_Saint_Paul_Writing_His_Epistles_-_Google_Art_Project.jpg">Valentin de Boulogne/Museum of Fine Arts, Houston</a></span>
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<p>Attitudes toward sex and marriage continued to cause controversy for centuries, contributing to schisms between the Catholic and Eastern Orthodox Church, and later the Protestant Reformation. This is still the case today, as some Catholics advocate that <a href="https://apnews.com/article/pope-francis-ap-top-news-international-news-germany-europe-c3cd8c5c7a4b4811b9cc3ba4452a9963">married men be allowed to become priests</a>.</p>
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<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/how-views-on-priestly-celibacy-changed-in-christian-history-102158">How views on priestly celibacy changed in Christian history</a>
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<h2>4. Change is possible</h2>
<p>Changing a 2,000-year-old institution is hard, but not out of reach.</p>
<p>As a scholar of religious change, <a href="https://sociology.sas.upenn.edu/people/melissa-wilde">Melissa Wilde</a> pinpoints moments when the Catholic Church <a href="https://theconversation.com/the-catholic-church-resists-change-but-vatican-ii-shows-its-possible-102543">changed course</a>. Chief among them was Vatican II, the seminal church council in the 1960s that made significant reforms to worship, such as conducting the Mass in parishioners’ own language, rather than Latin. </p>
<p>With the church mired in crises, “the church needs more than reflection,” she argues. “It needs another council.”</p>
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<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/the-catholic-church-resists-change-but-vatican-ii-shows-its-possible-102543">The Catholic Church resists change – but Vatican II shows it's possible</a>
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<p><em>Editor’s note: This story is a roundup of articles from The Conversation’s archives. It is an updated version of <a href="https://theconversation.com/the-catholic-church-sex-abuse-crisis-4-essential-reads-169442">an article</a> originally published on October 7, 2021. It has been updated to include the January report accusing Pope Benedict of mishandling sex abuse cases.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/175430/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
A German report accused retired Pope Benedict XVI of mishandling several cases of sexual abuse in the 1970s and 1980s. Here are a few of our related articles on the Catholic Church’s crisis.Molly Jackson, Religion and Ethics EditorLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1694422021-10-07T12:26:00Z2021-10-07T12:26:00ZThe Catholic Church sex abuse crisis: 4 essential reads<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/425124/original/file-20211006-21-171j69a.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=160%2C53%2C6993%2C5030&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">People pray for the victims of child sex abuse during a special service at a Catholic church outside Paris on Oct. 5, 2021. A new French report estimates that more than 200,000 children were abused by clergy since 1950.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://newsroom.ap.org/detail/FranceChurchSexAbuse/070e55348b9d4601a1cbcd8c285a4cb8/photo?Query=%22sainte%20jeanne%22&mediaType=photo&sortBy=&dateRange=Anytime&totalCount=4&currentItemNo=1">AP Photo/Michel Euler</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Revelations about sexual abuse in the Catholic Church have been emerging for decades. But in the seemingly never-ending stream of investigations and accusations, some stand out.</p>
<p>That will likely be true of <a href="https://www.ciase.fr/rapport-final/">the report</a> released Oct. 5, 2021, which estimates that more than 200,000 children have been abused by clergy in France since 1950. </p>
<p>The authors of the French study <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2021/10/05/world/europe/france-catholic-church-abuse.html?searchResultPosition=1">spent three years</a> reviewing testimony from nearly 6,500 people. They then came up with their overall projection based on broader demographic data, and made dozens of recommendations: from case-by-case compensation to more sweeping reforms, such as that French bishops consider ordaining married men and giving women a louder voice in church decision-making.</p>
<p>The French report’s specific findings may be new, but the underlying issues are not. Here are some of The Conversation’s many articles examining the Catholic sex abuse crisis over the years, both its roots and the potential routes for reform.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/239509/original/file-20181005-72130-131u9un.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/239509/original/file-20181005-72130-131u9un.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/239509/original/file-20181005-72130-131u9un.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/239509/original/file-20181005-72130-131u9un.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/239509/original/file-20181005-72130-131u9un.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/239509/original/file-20181005-72130-131u9un.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/239509/original/file-20181005-72130-131u9un.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The Vatican has known about priestly pedophilia for many decades.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.apimages.com/metadata/Index/Italy-Vatican-Cardinal-Law/d96c6b3b78f242a5894e6ef8151f1e93/10/0">AP Photo/Andrew Medichini</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>1. Years of scandal</h2>
<p>High-profile reports have consistently put the crisis in headlines for the past 20 years, particularly The Boston Globe’s famous “Spotlight” investigation in 2002 and the film it inspired in 2015. </p>
<p>But the paper trail documenting patterns of abuse – and cover-ups – <a href="https://theconversation.com/the-catholic-churchs-grim-history-of-ignoring-priestly-pedophilia-and-silencing-would-be-whistleblowers-102387">goes back to at least the 1950s</a>, according to <a href="https://artsci.case.edu/faculty/brian-clites/">Brian Clites</a>, an expert on clergy sex abuse. That’s when U.S. bishops began referring priests to church-run treatment centers, rather than reporting abuse to independent authorities. “Hush money” payouts followed.</p>
<p>By the 1990s, as lawsuits mounted, “the national outcry forced dioceses across the country to create public standards for how they were handling abuse accusations,” Clites writes, “and American bishops launched new marketing campaigns to regain trust.”</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/the-catholic-churchs-grim-history-of-ignoring-priestly-pedophilia-and-silencing-would-be-whistleblowers-102387">The Catholic Church's grim history of ignoring priestly pedophilia – and silencing would-be whistleblowers</a>
</strong>
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</p>
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<h2>2. Speaking up – and out</h2>
<p>One major barrier to bringing abusers to justice, <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-the-catholic-churchs-hierarchy-makes-it-difficult-to-punish-sexual-abusers-89477">many experts argue</a>, are the church’s hierarchy and canon laws, which regulate the church and its members. </p>
<p>But <a href="https://press.vatican.va/content/salastampa/en/bollettino/pubblico/2019/12/17/191217b.html">in 2019</a>, Pope Francis modified the “Rule of Pontifical Secrecy,” which required that sensitive information about the church be kept confidential. Over the years, <a href="https://cruxnow.com/february-abuse-summit/2019/02/no-secret-that-pontifical-secrecy-is-taking-a-beating-at-popes-summit/">critics alleged that the policy allowed officials</a> to withhold information about sexual abuse cases, even from victims or legal authorities. Francis’ announcement lifted the rule for three situations: sexual abuse of minors or vulnerable persons, failure to report or efforts to cover up such abuse, and possession of child pornography by a cleric.</p>
<p>Even with this change, however, transparency may prove elusive, argues law professor <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=wI3ku0oAAAAJ&hl=en">Christine P. Bartholomew</a>. She <a href="https://theconversation.com/pope-ends-a-secrecy-rule-for-catholic-sexual-abuse-cases-but-for-victims-many-barriers-to-justice-remain-129434">outlines other practices</a> that can be used to conceal information and work around mandatory reporting requirements. </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/pope-ends-a-secrecy-rule-for-catholic-sexual-abuse-cases-but-for-victims-many-barriers-to-justice-remain-129434">Pope ends a secrecy rule for Catholic sexual abuse cases, but for victims many barriers to justice remain</a>
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<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/234498/original/file-20180831-195325-e1n00o.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/234498/original/file-20180831-195325-e1n00o.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=441&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/234498/original/file-20180831-195325-e1n00o.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=441&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/234498/original/file-20180831-195325-e1n00o.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=441&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/234498/original/file-20180831-195325-e1n00o.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=554&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/234498/original/file-20180831-195325-e1n00o.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=554&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/234498/original/file-20180831-195325-e1n00o.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=554&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The French Baroque painting ‘Saint Paul writing his Epistles.’</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Probably_Valentin_de_Boulogne_-_Saint_Paul_Writing_His_Epistles_-_Google_Art_Project.jpg">Valentin de Boulogne</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>3. Celibacy controversy</h2>
<p>Other analysts trying to understand the roots of the sex abuse crisis focus on the rules of the priesthood itself – especially that priests be male and celibate.</p>
<p>But it hasn’t always been that clear cut. <a href="https://neareasternstudies.cornell.edu/kim-haines-eitzen">Kim Haines-Eitzen</a>, an expert on early Christianity, outlines how views on marriage <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-views-on-priestly-celibacy-changed-in-christian-history-102158">have shifted</a> ever since the first century. Saint Paul seemed to endorse marriage “reluctantly,” she writes, as “an acceptable choice for those who cannot control themselves.” </p>
<p>Attitudes toward sex and marriage continued to cause controversy for centuries, contributing to schisms between the Catholic and Eastern Orthodox Church, and later the Protestant Reformation. This is still the case today, as some Catholics advocate that <a href="https://apnews.com/article/pope-francis-ap-top-news-international-news-germany-europe-c3cd8c5c7a4b4811b9cc3ba4452a9963">married men be allowed to become priests</a>.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/how-views-on-priestly-celibacy-changed-in-christian-history-102158">How views on priestly celibacy changed in Christian history</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<h2>4. Change is possible</h2>
<p>Changing a 2,000-year-old institution is hard, but not out of reach.</p>
<p>As a scholar of religious change, <a href="https://sociology.sas.upenn.edu/people/melissa-wilde">Melissa Wilde</a> pinpoints moments when the Catholic Church <a href="https://theconversation.com/the-catholic-church-resists-change-but-vatican-ii-shows-its-possible-102543">changed course</a>. Chief among them was Vatican II, the seminal church council in the 1960s that made significant reforms to worship, such as conducting the Mass in parishioners’ own language, rather than Latin. </p>
<p>With the church mired in crises, “the church needs more than reflection,” she argues. “It needs another council.”</p>
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<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/the-catholic-church-resists-change-but-vatican-ii-shows-its-possible-102543">The Catholic Church resists change – but Vatican II shows it's possible</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p><em>Editor’s note: This story is a roundup of articles from The Conversation’s archives.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/169442/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
A French report on the scale of sexual abuse by Catholic clergy is the latest revelation in the crisis, but its roots go back decades – or more. Here are a few of our many related articles.Molly Jackson, Religion and Ethics EditorLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1133272019-03-14T10:39:10Z2019-03-14T10:39:10ZWhat will happen to Michael Jackson’s legacy? A famed writer’s fall could offer clues<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/263697/original/file-20190313-123545-1vbjluj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C108%2C880%2C546&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Norman Douglas, photographed in Florence, Italy in 1935.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/a7/Norman_Douglas_1935.jpg">Carl Van Vetchen/Library of Congress</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>There’s no question that Michael Jackson changed music history. But how will history remember Michael Jackson? </p>
<p>Since HBO released the new documentary film “<a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt9573980/">Leaving Neverland</a>,” which detailed allegations by two adults who say that they were molested by Jackson as children, the musician’s legacy – already complicated – is up in the air. </p>
<p>Jackson is not the first notable artist to be accused of sexually abusing children. Some, like <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/film/2018/jan/30/hollywood-reverence-child-rapist-roman-polanski-convicted-40-years-on-run">Roman Polanski</a> and <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2018/05/24/arts/moses-farrow-woody-allen-dylan-abuse.html">Woody Allen</a>, are still living and producing art that provokes discussion. </p>
<p>But there are other alleged child abusers who have died and whose works, once considered great, have faded into obscurity, in no small part because it is almost impossible to memorialize them without creating the impression of condoning their behavior.</p>
<p>The writer Norman Douglas is a prime example. The subject of a biography I’m working on, Douglas had a reputation for molesting children. After his death, he became an off-limits topic for biographers, and while he had his defenders, he ultimately couldn’t escape historical erasure.</p>
<h2>Rumors do little to dim a budding star</h2>
<p>During the first half of the 20th century, Norman Douglas was a literary star. Friends with Joseph Conrad, D.H. Lawrence and Aldous Huxley, he was best known for his bestselling 1917 novel “<a href="https://books.google.com/books?id=1AuGDwAAQBAJ&lpg=PP1&dq=south%20wind&pg=PP1#v=onepage&q&f=false">South Wind</a>.”</p>
<p>Virginia Woolf <a href="https://books.google.ca/books?id=_bInAQAAMAAJ&q=The+Essays+of+Virginia+Woolf:+1912-1918&dq=The+Essays+of+Virginia+Woolf:+1912-1918&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwiQqMLrx_3gAhWjCTQIHYASD3UQ6AEIKDAA">sang its praises</a> in the Times Literary Supplement. Graham Greene <a href="https://books.google.ca/books?id=xX8aAQAAMAAJ&q=Graham+Greene+my+%22generation+was+brought+up+on+south+wind%22&dq=Graham+Greene+my+%22generation+was+brought+up+on+south+wind%22&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwiz6M25yP3gAhUIsp4KHVQKDzwQ6AEIPjAE">recalled</a> how his generation “was brought up on South Wind.” When the hero of Evelyn Waugh’s “<a href="https://books.google.com/books?id=CSE2P06rVUoC&lpg=PP1&dq=Brideshead%20Revisited&pg=PP1#v=onepage&q&f=false">Brideshead Revisited</a>” arrives at Oxford after World War I, he brings with him only two novels, “South Wind” and Compton Mackenzie’s “<a href="https://books.google.com/books?id=RBBbAAAAMAAJ&dq=Sinister%20Street&pg=PP1#v=onepage&q&f=false">Sinister Street</a>.” </p>
<p>But today Douglas is entirely forgotten.</p>
<p>The reasons why artists’ works go forgotten vary. In Douglas’ case, it’s fair to say that his erudite writing style went out of fashion. </p>
<p>But there’s more to the story. During his lifetime, Douglas was notorious for his <a href="http://archive.spectator.co.uk/article/11th-december-1976/18/the-boys-in-the-sand">relationships with children</a>. In 1912, he lived with a 14-year-old boy in London while he was working at The English Review. Four years later, he was arrested in London for acts of gross indecency with a 16-year-old. After his release on bail, Douglas fled to Italy, where laws regulating sex between men and boys were more lax. He settled in Florence, where his celebrity only grew. </p>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/263742/original/file-20190313-123525-123vd7z.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/263742/original/file-20190313-123525-123vd7z.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/263742/original/file-20190313-123525-123vd7z.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=845&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/263742/original/file-20190313-123525-123vd7z.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=845&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/263742/original/file-20190313-123525-123vd7z.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=845&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/263742/original/file-20190313-123525-123vd7z.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1062&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/263742/original/file-20190313-123525-123vd7z.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1062&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/263742/original/file-20190313-123525-123vd7z.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1062&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Norman Douglas plays with an Italian boy named Marcello, whom he likely sexually abused.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Pino Orioli, 'Moving Along' (London: Chatto & Windus, 1934).</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Visitors to the city, like Huxley and Lawrence, would seek him out in the city’s cafés. The radical journalist and heiress Nancy Cunard, who met Douglas in Florence in 1923 and became a close friend, <a href="https://books.google.ca/books?id=NDRKAAAAMAAJ&q=nancy+cunard+grand+man&dq=nancy+cunard+grand+man&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjF1Lfzzv3gAhXRvp4KHUFOBjYQ6AEIKDAA">recalled</a> the “aureole of legend” that surrounded him.</p>
<p>Douglas was always attended to by Italian boys who worked for him as messengers or cooks, and endless rumors circulated about Douglas’ relationships with these boys. A diary entry written by a friend of Douglas’ described how Douglas performed fellatio on a boy named Marcello. Brothers Sacheverell and Osbert Sitwell <a href="https://books.google.ca/books?id=NDRKAAAAMAAJ&q=nancy+cunard+grand+man&dq=nancy+cunard+grand+man&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjF1Lfzzv3gAhXRvp4KHUFOBjYQ6AEIKDAA">warned Cunard</a> that Douglas was dangerous. D.H. Lawrence’s widow, Frieda, <a href="https://books.google.ca/books?id=XSbhuQEACAAJ&dq=tedlock+frieda+lawrence+memoirs+and+correspondence&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwi7ycf6z_3gAhWVvJ4KHRtiCDwQ6AEIKDAA">told her friend</a> Dudley Nichols that Douglas was “the only wicked man I have known, in a medieval sense.”</p>
<h2>Scrutiny grows</h2>
<p>Britain’s strict libel laws, the norms of politeness and the power of Douglas’ celebrity seemed to prevent people from writing publicly about his sexual relationships with boys while he was alive. </p>
<p>But you can’t libel the dead. </p>
<p>When Douglas died in 1952, debate about his memory erupted in the press. The first signs of the battle to come appeared in the obituaries. British diplomat Harold Nicolson noted Douglas’ shocking “indulgences” <a href="http://archive.spectator.co.uk/issue/29th-february-1952">in a death notice</a> for The Spectator. </p>
<p>Nicolson’s article prompted 50 or 60 letters of protest from Douglas’ friends, but there was no holding back the tide. In 1954, Douglas’
former friend Richard Aldington published a book of vicious recollections about the writer titled “<a href="https://books.google.com/books?id=M9e5vQEACAAJ&dq=Pinorman&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjY3rqDq_3gAhXETd8KHeDyBKcQ6AEIKjAA">Pinorman</a>,” a portmanteau of Norman and his friend <a href="http://www.romagnadeste.it/en/i5010305-alfonsine-giuseppe-orioli-1884-1942.htm">Pino Orioli</a>. Aldington didn’t mince words. He called Douglas a <a href="https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/pederast">pederast</a> whose path in life was “strewn with broken boys and empty bottles.” </p>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/263712/original/file-20190313-123525-1g9oz77.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/263712/original/file-20190313-123525-1g9oz77.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/263712/original/file-20190313-123525-1g9oz77.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=829&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/263712/original/file-20190313-123525-1g9oz77.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=829&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/263712/original/file-20190313-123525-1g9oz77.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=829&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/263712/original/file-20190313-123525-1g9oz77.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1041&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/263712/original/file-20190313-123525-1g9oz77.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1041&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/263712/original/file-20190313-123525-1g9oz77.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1041&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Author Graham Greene was a staunch defender of Douglas and worked to protect his reputation.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/7c/Graham_Greene%2C_Bassano.jpg">Wikimedia Commons</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Douglas’ friends were outraged. Cunard wrote to Aldington’s publisher accusing him of libel and threatening to wage a “collective protest.” She rallied Douglas’ friends to lambaste the book in reviews. Her own review for the periodical Time and Tide was titled “Bonbons of Gall.” Graham Greene wrote to a friend that he intended to “kill” Aldington’s book, and he penned a review for The London Magazine that was so incendiary it could not be published for fear of libel charges from Aldington, who was very much alive.</p>
<p>Greene maliciously sent Aldington the review and asked for permission to publish it. Naturally, Aldington refused and reached out to friends for help putting together a pamphlet attacking Douglas’ defenders. Frieda Lawrence contributed a story about how Douglas once casually offered her a boy of 14, saying that he preferred them younger. But the pamphlet was so intemperate that a lawyer said it would run afoul of the libel laws and could not be published.</p>
<h2>The danger of choosing to forget?</h2>
<p>Aldington was forced to retreat. With “Pinorman” disparaged by its reviewers, Aldington was discredited. It seemed that Douglas’ friends had won the battle.</p>
<p>But Aldington won the war. The truth was out there, and Douglas’ reputation was permanently injured. </p>
<p>In the decades that followed many would-be biographers tried their hand at writing Douglas’ story; time and again they failed. Douglas simply could not be remembered as a great writer in the face of the allegations against him. Only one comprehensive biography, titled “<a href="https://books.google.ca/books?id=CVcPAAAAMAAJ&q=holloway+norman+douglas&dq=holloway+norman+douglas&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjlqduc0v3gAhVMqZ4KHX_GDCUQ6AEIKDAA">Norman Douglas</a>,” has ever been published about him. It came out in 1976, during a rare moment of sexual openness; even so, the publisher almost nixed the manuscript after 10 years of work by its author, Mark Holloway.</p>
<p>Today Douglas is a forgotten writer. When the truth about his sexual relations with children was fully exposed after his death he became an impossible figure to memorialize. </p>
<p>Over time, it’s likely that Michael Jackson’s memory will be similarly eroded. The television show “The Simpsons” <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2019/03/08/entertainment/simpsons-michael-jackson/index.html">has already pulled its 1991 episode</a> featuring Jackson. His name will likely be taken down from public monuments. People will be hesitant to produce new versions of his music. His influence will live on, but it will be difficult to commemorate his work. </p>
<p>Perhaps that is for the best. But maybe it isn’t. </p>
<p>Reluctance to preserve the memory of the extensive history of sex between adults and children leaves society ill-equipped to recognize and handle child sexual abuse today. A culture that is caught up in narratives that identify pedophiles as monsters has a hard time recognizing when beloved figures, like Michael Jackson, <a href="https://theconversation.com/michael-jackson-as-an-expert-in-child-sexual-abuse-heres-what-i-thought-when-i-watched-leaving-neverland-113160">are molesting children right before its eyes</a>. </p>
<p>There is need for history to remember abusers and to remember them in all their complexity. If Jackson’s memory is preserved, maybe it will be easier to see the present more clearly.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/113327/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Rachel Hope Cleves receives funding from the Social Science and Humanities Research Council of Canada.</span></em></p>There’s a reason many today have never heard of Norman Douglas: After his death, more and more came forward with stories of his sexual relationships with boys, and he soon faded into obscurity.Rachel Hope Cleves, Professor of History, University of VictoriaLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1098522019-02-12T11:44:24Z2019-02-12T11:44:24ZSex robots are here, but laws aren’t keeping up with the ethical and privacy issues they raise<p>The <a href="https://twitter.com/search?q=robots+in+super+bowl+ads">robots</a> are here. Are the “sexbots” close behind? </p>
<p>From the <a href="https://twitter.com/drudge_report/status/1003816451117969409">Drudge Report</a> to <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2019/01/19/style/sex-robots.html">The New York Times</a>, sex robots are rapidly becoming a part of the national conversation about the future of sex and relationships. Behind the headlines, a <a href="https://futureofsex.net/robots/state-sex-robots-companies-developing-robotic-lovers/">number of companies</a> are currently developing robots designed to provide humans with companionship and sexual pleasure – with a few already <a href="https://www.zdnet.com/article/robot-love-why-romance-not-just-sex-with-machines-is-a-foregone-conclusion/">on the market</a>.</p>
<p>Unlike sex toys and dolls, which are typically sold in off-the-radar shops and <a href="https://ewsingles.com/how-to-hide-a-sex-doll/">hidden in closets</a>, sexbots may become mainstream. A 2017 survey suggested <a href="https://today.yougov.com/topics/lifestyle/articles-reports/2017/10/02/1-4-men-would-consider-having-sex-robot">almost half of Americans think</a> that having sex with robots will become a common practice within 50 years. </p>
<p>As a <a href="https://www.fxshen.com">scholar of artificial intelligence, neuroscience and the law</a>, I’m interested in the legal and policy questions that sex robots pose. How do we ensure they are safe? How will intimacy with a sex robot affect the human brain? Would sex with a childlike robot be ethical? And what exactly is a sexbot anyway? </p>
<h2>Defining ‘sex robot’</h2>
<p>There is no universally accepted definition of “sex robot.” This may not seem important, but it’s actually a serious problem for any proposal to govern – or ban – them.</p>
<p>The primary conundrum is how to distinguish between a sex robot and a “sexy robot.” Just because a robot is attractive to a human and can provide sexual gratification, does it deserve the label “sex robot”?</p>
<p>It’s tempting to define them as legislatures do sex toys, by focusing on their primary use. In Alabama, the only state that still has an outright ban on the sale of sex toys, the <a href="https://codes.findlaw.com/al/title-13a-criminal-code/al-code-sect-13a-12-200-2.html">government targets devices</a> “primarily for the stimulation of human genital organs.” </p>
<p>The problem with applying this definition to sex robots is that the latter increasingly provide much more than sex. Sex robots are not just dolls with a microchip. They will use self-learning algorithms to engage their partner’s emotions.</p>
<p>Consider the “Mark 1” robot, which resembles the actor Scarlett Johansson. It is regularly <a href="https://www.telegraph.co.uk/women/life/female-robots-why-this-scarlett-johansson-bot-is-more-dangerous/">labeled a sex robot</a>, yet when I interviewed its creator, Ricky Ma Tsz Hang, he was quick to clarify that Mark 1 is not intended to be a sex robot. Rather, such robots will aim to assist with all sorts of tasks, from preparing a child’s lunch to keeping an elderly relative company.</p>
<p>Humans, of course, can navigate both sexual and nonsexual contexts adeptly. What if a robot can do the same? How do we conceptualize and govern a robot that can switch from “play with kids” mode during the day to “play with adults” mode at night?</p>
<h2>Thorny legal issues</h2>
<p>In a landmark 2003 case, <a href="https://www.law.cornell.edu/supct/html/02-102.ZO.html">Lawrence v. Texas</a>, the Supreme Court struck down Texas’ sodomy law and established what some scholars have described as a right to <a href="https://chicagounbound.uchicago.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=2535&context=journal_articles">sexual privacy</a>. </p>
<p>There is currently a <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-otc-mootness/come-for-the-sex-toys-stay-for-the-newly-created-circuit-split-on-mootness-idUSKCN1B42F2">split among circuit courts</a> in how Lawrence should be applied to state restrictions on the sale of sex toys. So far, Alabama’s ban has been upheld, but I suspect that all sex toy bans will eventually be struck down. If so, it seems unlikely that states will be able to wholesale restrict sales of sex robots generally. </p>
<p>Bans on childlike sex robots, however, may be different.</p>
<p>It is not clear whether anyone in the U.S. already owns a childlike sex robot. But even the possibility of child sex robots prompted a bipartisan House bill, the <a href="https://www.congress.gov/bill/115th-congress/house-bill/4655/actions?r=69">Curbing Realistic Exploitative Electronic Pedophilic Robots Act</a>, or CREEPER. Introduced in 2017, <a href="https://motherboard.vice.com/en_us/article/vbqjx4/a-new-bill-is-trying-to-make-child-sex-robots-illegal">it passed unanimously</a> six months later. </p>
<p>State politicians will surely follow suit, and we are likely to see many attempts to ban childlike sex robots. But it’s unclear if such bans will survive constitutional challenge.</p>
<p>On one hand, <a href="https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/458/747/">the Supreme Court has held</a> that prohibitions on child pornography do not violate the First Amendment because the state has a compelling interest in curtailing the effects of child pornography on the children portrayed. Yet the Supreme Court has <a href="https://www.law.cornell.edu/supct/html/00-795.ZO.html">also held</a> that the <a href="https://www.congress.gov/bill/104th-congress/house-bill/4123">Child Pornography Prevention Act of 1996</a> was overly broad in its attempt to prohibit “child pornography that does not depict an actual child.”</p>
<p>Childlike sex robots are robots, not humans. Like virtual child pornography, the development of a childlike sex robot does not require interaction with any children. Yet it might also be argued that childlike sex robots would have serious detrimental effects that compel state action. </p>
<h2>Safe and secure?</h2>
<p>Perhaps someday sex robots will become <a href="https://www.mdpi.com/2218-6581/7/4/70">sentient</a>. But for now, they are products. </p>
<p>And a question almost entirely overlooked is how the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission should regulate the hazards associated with sex robots. Existing sex products are <a href="http://naasas.com/safe-sexual-products.htm">not well regulated</a>, and this is cause for concern given the multitude of ways in which sex robots could be harmful to their users. </p>
<p>For example, dangers lurk even in a seemingly innocent scene where a sex robot and human hold hands and kiss. What if the sexbots’ lips were manufactured with lead paint or some other toxin? And what if the robot, with the strength of five humans, accidentally crushes the human’s finger in a display of passion?</p>
<p>It’s not just physical harm, but security as well. For instance, just as a human partner learns by remembering what words were soothing, and what type of touch was comforting, so too is a sex robot likely to store and process massive amounts of intimate information. What regulations are in place to ensure that this data remains private? How vulnerable will the sex robot be to hacking? Could the state use sex robots as surveillance devices for sex offenders?</p>
<h2>Sexbots in the city</h2>
<p>Whether and how governments regulate sex robots will depend on what we learn – or what we assume – about the effects of sexbots on individuals and society.</p>
<p>In 2018, the Houston City Council made headlines by <a href="https://www.chron.com/news/houston-texas/houston/article/City-Council-moves-to-block-sex-doll-rental-shop-13278056.php">enacting an ordinance</a> to ban the operation of what would have been America’s first so-called robot “brothel.” At one of the community meetings, an attendee <a href="https://www.cnbc.com/2018/10/04/houston-blocks-sex-robot-brothel-from-opening.html">warned</a>: “A business like this would destroy homes, families, finances of our neighbors and cause major community uproars in the city.”</p>
<p>But dire predictions like this are pure speculation. At present there is no evidence of how the introduction of sex robots would affect either individuals or society. </p>
<p>For instance, would a man who uses a childlike sex robot be more or less likely to harm an actual human child? Would robots be a substitute for humans in relationships or would they enhance relationships as sex toys might? Would sex robots fill a void for those who are lonely and without companions? Just as pilots use virtual flight simulators before they fly a real plane, could virgins use sex robots to safely practice sex before trying the real thing?</p>
<p>Put another way, there are far more unanswered questions about sex robots than there are actual sex robots. Although it’s hard to conduct empirical studies until sexbots are more prevalent, informed governance requires researchers to explore these topics urgently. Otherwise, we may see reactionary governance decisions based on supposition and fear of <a href="https://campaignagainstsexrobots.org/">doomsday scenarios</a>. </p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/IuS5huqOND4?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">The TV show ‘Westworld’ depicts how humans interact with sex robots and other machines infused with artificial intelligence.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>A brave new world</h2>
<p>A fascinating question for me is how the current taboo on sex robots will ebb and flow over time.</p>
<p>There was a time, not so long ago, when humans attracted to the same sex felt embarrassed to make this public. Today, society is <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/14681994.2017.1397950?casa_token=N06n-dnbghYAAAAA%3Aj87j-43TyNQ60aHzSwIzBi3qz5VEzydwAuOcXQfRk_7QB2-dBRTSnozFPSTlAjZunRXY2K5ixHG7IWM&">similarly ambivalent</a> about the ethics of “digisexuality” – a phrase used to describe a number of human-technology intimate relationships. Will there be a time, not so far in the future, when humans attracted to robots will gladly announce their relationship with a machine?</p>
<p>No one knows the answer to this question. But I do know that sex robots are likely to be in the American market soon, and it is important to prepare for that reality. Imagining the laws governing sexbots is no longer a law professor hypothetical or science fiction.</p>
<p>It’s a real-world challenge that society is about to face for the first time. I hope that the law gets it right.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/109852/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Francis X. Shen does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Intimacy with robots is closer than you think, and cities are already fighting the advent of sexbot brothels. Yet society has barely begun to explore their implications.Francis X. Shen, Associate Professor of Law, University of MinnesotaLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1023872018-10-09T10:42:36Z2018-10-09T10:42:36ZThe Catholic Church’s grim history of ignoring priestly pedophilia – and silencing would-be whistleblowers<p><a href="https://www.npr.org/2018/08/15/639001271/how-parishioners-are-reacting-to-the-pennsylvania-grand-jury-report">Widespread public shock</a> followed the recent release of the Pennsylvania grand jury report that identified more than 1,000 child victims of clergy sexual abuse. In fact, as I know <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?hl=en&user=JRrX5fAAAAAJ">through my research</a>, the Vatican and its American bishops have known about the problem of priestly pedophilia <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/27639072">since at least the 1950s</a>. And the Church has consistently silenced would-be <a href="http://www.bishopaccountability.org/Whistleblowers/">whistleblowers from within its own ranks</a>.</p>
<p>In the memory of many Americans, the only comparable scandal was in Massachusetts, where, in 2002, the Boston Globe published <a href="https://www.bostonglobe.com/arts/movies/spotlight-movie">more than 600 articles</a> about abuses under the administration of Cardinal Bernard Law. That investigation was immortalized in the 2015 award-winning film, “Spotlight.” </p>
<p>What many Americans don’t remember, however, are other similar scandals, some even more dramatic and <a href="https://nyti.ms/2Ov8LU2">national</a> in <a href="https://nyti.ms/2O0y2pB">scope</a>. </p>
<h2>Doubling down on secrecy</h2>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/239509/original/file-20181005-72130-131u9un.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/239509/original/file-20181005-72130-131u9un.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/239509/original/file-20181005-72130-131u9un.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/239509/original/file-20181005-72130-131u9un.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/239509/original/file-20181005-72130-131u9un.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/239509/original/file-20181005-72130-131u9un.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/239509/original/file-20181005-72130-131u9un.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The Vatican has known about priestly pedophilia for many decades.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.apimages.com/metadata/Index/Italy-Vatican-Cardinal-Law/d96c6b3b78f242a5894e6ef8151f1e93/10/0">AP Photo/Andrew Medichini</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>While the problem of priestly pedophilia might be centuries old, the modern paper trail began only after World War II, when “treatment centers” appeared for rehabilitating abusive priests. Instead of increased transparency, bishops, at the same time, developed <a href="https://www.attorneygeneral.gov/report/">methods</a> for denying and hiding allegations of child sexual abuse.</p>
<p>During the 1950s and 1960s, bishops from around the U.S. began referring abusive priests <a href="https://www.bostonglobe.com/news/special-reports/2002/04/02/priest-treatment-unfolds-costly-secretive-world/deAcdZXnaXuLvHcPbNip7L/story.html">to church-run medical centers</a>, so that they could receive evaluation and care <a href="http://www.bishop-accountability.org/reports/1996_Sipe_PreliminaryExpert.htm#thirdphase">without disclosing</a> their crimes to independent clinicians. </p>
<p>Fr. Gerald Fitzgerald, who began his ministry in Boston and Quebec, was among those who advocated prayer over medicine. In 1947, Fitzgerald moved to New Mexico and founded the Servants of the <a href="https://en.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/paraclete">Paraclete</a>, a new order of Catholic priests devoted to healing <a href="https://nyupress.org/books/9780814781470/">deviant clergy</a>. His belief in faith healing reflected a vocal minority of Catholic leaders who still viewed <a href="http://admin.cambridge.org/academic/subjects/psychology/history-psychology/psychology-and-catholicism-contested-boundaries?format=HB&isbn=9781107006089">psychology as a threat to Christian faith</a>. </p>
<p>Fitzgerald based the Paracletes in New Mexico. From 1947 to 1995, the state became <a href="https://www.press.uillinois.edu/books/catalog/82xff6ty9780252031595.html">a dumping ground</a> for pedophile priests. As <a href="https://americanstudies.unm.edu/about-us/people/faculty-profiles/kathleen-holscher.html">Kathleen Holscher</a>, chair of Roman Catholic studies at the University of New Mexico, has observed, this practice <a href="https://rewire.news/religion-dispatches/2018/08/27/from-pa-to-new-mexico-colonialism-and-the-crisis-inside-the-crisis-of-catholic-sexual-abuse/">forced New Mexico’s parishes</a> to absorb, in effect, abusive priests from across the country. </p>
<p>Other priests sent to the Paracletes were returned back into ministry in their home diocese, reassigned to new parishes that had no way of knowing about their abusive past. </p>
<p>This system was sustained, in part, by the fact that few diocesan personnel files recorded past accusations by children and parents. As <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2018/08/09/nyregion/aw-richard-sipe-a-leading-voice-on-clergy-sex-abuse-dies-at-85.html">Richard Sipe</a>, a psychologist who worked at a similar Catholic treatment center later revealed, bishops generally masked past accusations by instead <a href="http://www.awrsipe.com/Click_and_Learn/CODE-WORDS-TO-HIDE-SEX-ABUSE-Rev-2015-05-01.pdf">recording code words</a> like “tickling,” “wrestling” or “entangled friendship” in personnel files.</p>
<p>By 1956, Fitzgerald became convinced that pedophilia could not be treated, even as he continued to believe that prayers could cure other illnesses, such as alcoholism. He <a href="https://www.ncronline.org/news/accountability/bishops-were-warned-abusive-priests">petitioned U.S. bishops</a> to stop sending him their child abusers, advocating instead for firing abusive priests and permanently removing them from ministry. </p>
<p>Fitzgerald eventually appealed directly to the Vatican, and <a href="http://www.baltimoresun.com/bs-mtblog-2010-04-vatican_knew_of_clergy_abuse_i-story.html">met with Pope Paul VI</a> to discuss the problem in 1963.</p>
<h2>Hush money</h2>
<p>It is unclear when the Church began <a href="https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/12941/render-unto-rome-by-jason-berry/9780385531344/">using hush settlements to silence victims</a>. The practice, however, was so widespread by the 1980s that the Vatican assigned church lawyers to adjust <a href="http://www.hup.harvard.edu/catalog.php?isbn=9780674028104">their insurance policies</a> in order to minimize additional liabilities. </p>
<p>These included Fr. Thomas Doyle, a nonparish priest who specialized in Roman Catholicism’s internal laws; Fr. Michael Petersen, a trained psychiatrist who believed that priests with abusive disorders should be treated medically; and Roy Mouton, a civil attorney who <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/lifestyle/2002/08/04/a-fall-from-grace/6f2b6f77-5318-44c5-9692-964a66ca1647/?noredirect=on&utm_term=.ca274dfd584e">represented</a> one of the church’s most notorious pedophile priests. </p>
<p>Together, they authored <a href="http://www.bishop-accountability.org/reports/1985_06_09_Doyle_Manual/">a 92-page report</a> and submitted it for presentation at the 1985 meeting of the National Conference of Catholic Bishops, the Church’s apparatus for controlling and governing American priests. </p>
<p>The document estimated that American bishops should plan to be sued for at least US$1 billion, and up to $10 billion, over the following decades.</p>
<p>Several of the nation’s most powerful cardinals <a href="http://doi.org/10.3390/rel7010009">buried the report</a>. </p>
<p>In response, Doyle mailed all 92 pages, along with an executive summary, to every diocese in the United States. Yet there is no evidence that any bishops headed the report’s warnings.</p>
<h2>1992: The nation’s first scandal</h2>
<p>During the 1980s, victims began to speak out against the church’s systemic attempts to mask the scope of the crisis. In 1984, <a href="http://www.bishop-accountability.org/news/1985_05_23_Berry_TheTragedy.htm">survivors of Fr. Gilbert Gauthe</a> refused to be silenced by hush money, instead choosing the painful path of initiating public lawsuits in Louisiana. Gauthe ultimately confessed to <a href="http://www.bishop-accountability.org/news3/1988_04_04_Sherman_LegalSpotlight_John_Engbers_ETC_1.htm">abusing 37 children</a>.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/239511/original/file-20181005-72110-1aekobj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/239511/original/file-20181005-72110-1aekobj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=383&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/239511/original/file-20181005-72110-1aekobj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=383&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/239511/original/file-20181005-72110-1aekobj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=383&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/239511/original/file-20181005-72110-1aekobj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=482&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/239511/original/file-20181005-72110-1aekobj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=482&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/239511/original/file-20181005-72110-1aekobj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=482&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Representative of SNAP, Survivors’ Network for Those Abused by Priests, talk to the media during a press conference in Rome, in 2010.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.apimages.com/metadata/Index/Italy-Vatican-Priests/ca597a917b46437eaaa1c3f12a0331f2/2/0">AP Photo/Pier Paolo Cito</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>As these stories became public, <a href="https://us.macmillan.com/books/9781250049803">more and more victims</a> began to bring lawsuits against the Church. In Chicago, the nation’s first two clergy abuse survivor organizations, Victims of Clergy Sexual Abuse Linkup (LINKUP) and the Survivors’ Network for Those Abused by Priests (SNAP), were created in 1987. </p>
<p>In 1992, survivor <a href="https://nyti.ms/2BY7ezc">Frank Fitzpatrick’s public allegations</a> led to revelations that Fr. James Porter had abused <a href="http://www.jasonberryauthor.com/works/leadusnot.html">more than 100 other children</a> in Massachusetts. Widespread shock followed at the time as well as after Fitzpatrick’s appearance on ABC’s “Primetime Live,” when news anchor Diane Sawyer interviewed Fitzpatrick and 30 other Porter victims.</p>
<p>The <a href="https://global.oup.com/academic/product/pedophiles-and-priests-9780195145977?cc=us&lang=en&">national outcry</a> forced dioceses across the country to create <a href="https://www.dbqarch.org/offices/human-resources/policies/">public standards</a> for how they were handling abuse accusations, and <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/1993/06/18/us/bishops-struggle-over-sex-abuse-by-parish-priests.html">American bishops</a> launched new marketing campaigns <a href="https://books.google.com/books/about/When_Values_Collide.html?id=vuggS8HlUO8C&printsec=frontcover&source=kp_read_button#v=onepage&q&f=false">to regain trust</a>. </p>
<p>In spite of <a href="http://www.usccb.org/issues-and-action/child-and-youth-protection/charter.cfm">internal pledges</a> to reform their culture of covering up abuses, the Pennsylvania grand jury report demonstrates that the Church’s de facto policy remains unchanged since the 1950s: Instead of reporting rape and sexual abuse to secular authorities, bishops instead <a href="https://www.attorneygeneral.gov/report/">continue to transfer predatory priests</a> from one unsuspecting parish to the next.</p>
<h2>Victims with no hope of justice</h2>
<p>The issue of clergy sex abuse has also unleashed broader questions about justice and faith: Can courtrooms repair souls? How do survivors <a href="http://www.hup.harvard.edu/catalog.php?isbn=9780674984592&content=reviews">continue to pray</a> and attend Mass?</p>
<p><a href="https://search.proquest.com/docview/1720843581/abstract/70A0EFDF42A04BD7PQ/1?">As a scholar who studies communities of clergy abuse victims</a>, I have asked Catholics to share their thoughts about the current crisis. Many of them tell me that “at least” Boston’s Cardinal Law “went to jail.” That leads to an awkward moment when I have to refresh their memory. </p>
<p>Cardinal Law was neither indicted nor arrested. Instead, Pope John Paul II transferred Law to run one of the Vatican’s most cherished properties, the Basilica of Saint Mary, essentially rewarding Law for his deft cover-up of the abuses in Boston. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/239512/original/file-20181005-72100-1a4uyg1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/239512/original/file-20181005-72100-1a4uyg1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/239512/original/file-20181005-72100-1a4uyg1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/239512/original/file-20181005-72100-1a4uyg1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/239512/original/file-20181005-72100-1a4uyg1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/239512/original/file-20181005-72100-1a4uyg1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/239512/original/file-20181005-72100-1a4uyg1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Victims of clergy sexual abuse or their family members react after the release of the report by Pennsylvania grand jury.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.apimages.com/metadata/Index/Pennsylvania-Dioceses-Sex-Abuse-Investigation/c201adfa98774d4588df745e59c49e53/9/0">AP Photo/Matt Rourke</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>In fact, no American bishops or cardinals have ever been jailed for their role in covering up and enabling child sexual abuse. Civil settlements have <a href="http://www.hup.harvard.edu/catalog.php?isbn=9780674028104&content=toc">held the Church accountable</a> only financially. A combination of political complacency and expired statutes of limitations has prevented most survivors from obtaining <a href="http://www.cambridge.org/catalogue/catalogue.asp?isbn=9781107673120">real justice</a>. </p>
<p>Outraged by this lack of justice, survivors urged the International Criminal Court at The Hague to investigate the Vatican for <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2011/09/14/world/europe/14vatican.html">crimes against humanity</a>. The International Criminal Court declined, citing the fact that many of the alleged crimes occurred before the court was formed, and were thus <a href="https://www.ncronline.org/news/accountability/international-criminal-court-declines-pursue-crimes-against-humanity-case">beyond the scope</a> of the court’s “temporal jurisdiction.”</p>
<p>To date, the highest-ranking priest tried in an American court is Philadelphia’s Monsignor William Lynn, who was charged with conspiracy and two counts of endangering children. His <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2012/06/23/us/philadelphias-msgr-william-j-lynn-is-convicted-of-allowing-abuse.html">2012 conviction</a> for one count of endangerment was vacated by the Pennsylvania Supreme Court in 2016. He now awaits an unscheduled retrial. </p>
<p>Even as scholars and <a href="https://dailytheology.org/2018/08/17/statement-of-catholic-theologians-educators-parishioners-and-lay-leaders-on-clergy-sexual-abuse-in-the-united-states/">theologians have called for all of the American bishops to resign</a>, there has been little talk of criminal prosecutions. If yesterday’s survivors do not find justice, tomorrow’s children will not know safety. </p>
<p>As the Pennsylvania grand jury emphasized: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>“There have been other reports about child sexual abuse within the Catholic church… For many of us, those earlier stories happened someplace else, someplace away. Now we know the truth: it happened everywhere.”</p>
</blockquote><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/102387/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Brian J Clites does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>While the problem of priestly abuse might be centuries old, its modern paper trail began after World War II, when ‘treatment centers’ appeared for rehabilitating priests. Many were send to New Mexico.Brian J Clites, Instructor and Associate Director, Case Western Reserve UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/949152018-04-22T19:11:14Z2018-04-22T19:11:14ZThe causes of paedophilia and child sexual abuse are more complex than the public believes<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/215554/original/file-20180419-163995-1o0mzpp.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Members of the public believe child sexual abuse and paedophilia can be attributed to one of four main causes.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/download/confirm/697857949?src=Wzndu74B7wFk6EyoTPHkrQ-7-27&size=huge_jpg">Shutterstock</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>The public often feels intense loathing and anger towards paedophiles and those who sexually abuse children. A raft of sex offender policies such as Western Australia’s <a href="https://www.communityprotection.wa.gov.au/LocalSearch">publicly accessible register</a> of “dangerous and high risk offenders” has been introduced globally to appease an increasingly hostile, punitive and vocal community.</p>
<p>What the public thinks about the causes of child sexual abuse is important, because what people think causes a problem informs what they believe should be done. </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/whats-in-a-name-online-child-abuse-material-is-not-pornography-45840">What's in a name? Online child abuse material is not 'pornography'</a>
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<p><a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/01639625.2017.1335526%E2%80%8B">My recent research</a> examined what the public think causes paedophilia and child sexual abuse. I found there were four common causal explanations, and while each had some truth to them, they ultimately missed the complexity of the actual causes.</p>
<h2>‘Born that way’ or cycle of abuse?</h2>
<p>I analysed nearly 800 comments posted by members of the public to four online forums created following the announcement of a new program for reintegrating sex offenders in South Australia. </p>
<p>The forums are a rich source of data on public views about causality, particularly since people’s comments are “off the cuff” rather than telling the researcher what they want to hear.</p>
<p>People posting on the forum put forward four causal explanations for paedophilia and child sexual abuse. </p>
<p>The first common view was that paedophilia is a sexual orientation akin to homo- or heterosexuality. This is the belief that paedophiles are simply “born that way”:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>They do it because their sexual orientation is children.</p>
<p>If their brain says it’s children [there is] nothing anyone can do to change that.</p>
<p>U can’t “cure” a persons eye colour! And u can’t cure the way these child rapists think or behave.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Others believe that paedophilia and/or child sexual abuse is caused by mental illness, making reference to “a mental health issue”, and the need for “mental health support” and to help “the mentally ill”. </p>
<p>Typical comments include:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>[…] paedophilia is also a sort of mental illness. Their brain isn’t “wired” correctly, causing them to be sexually attracted to children.</p>
<p>[…] they have a brain malfunction and they cannot change.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>In line with <a href="https://www.frameworksinstitute.org/assets/files/PDF_sexualviolence/AmericanPerceptionsofSexualViolence.pdf">previous research findings from the US</a>, I found that members of the public also commonly view paedophilia and child sexual abuse as a manifestation of the cycle-of-abuse theory. </p>
<p>This refers to the notion that child sexual abusers were themselves abused as children, and go on to perpetuate the abuse as adults. </p>
<p>For example, posters to the online forums repeatedly referred to the “vicious cycle” of abuse. Others claimed that:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Most of them have been sexually abused as kids.</p>
<p>They are almost always manifesting their own abuse.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Finally, many members of the public believe that child sexual abuse simply reflects a choice on the part of the perpetrator, referring to perpetrators’ “choice to take a child’s life and innocence away”, the “choice they have made to permanently destroy a child’s life by raping them”, and their “sick cowardly choice that they make to destroy a child”. </p>
<p>Some even characterise sexual interest in children in and of itself as a choice: “They have made a choice between having sexual feelings towards children over having sexual feelings towards adults”. </p>
<h2>What’s really going on</h2>
<p>First, it’s important to understand that paedophilia and child sexual abuse are <a href="https://aic.gov.au/publications/tandi/tandi429">not the same thing</a>. “Paedophilia” refers to an enduring sexual interest in prepubescent children, which may or may not be acted on. </p>
<p>Not all those who sexually abuse children are paedophiles, with many abusers acting opportunistically or due to something other than a sexual preference for children. This distinction isn’t always well understood.</p>
<p>Secondly, the reality of child sexual abuse is far more complex than any of the four explanations suggest. While it is a truism that anyone who abuses a child chooses to do so, it is not the case that people with paedophilia choose to have this sexual attraction.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.researchgate.net/publication/51983497_Is_Pedophilia_a_Sexual_Orientation">Research</a> increasingly suggests that a paedophilic orientation is innate. But this does not explain all child sexual abuse, because not all paedophiles act on their sexual interest in children, and many child sexual abusers do not have paedophilia. </p>
<p>There is some truth to the cycle-of-abuse explanation too, but again the reality is more complex. It is clear that most victims of child sexual abuse do not become perpetrators. Most victims are female, while most perpetrators are male, and there is <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/27436859%E2%80%8B">no direct link </a>between victimisation and perpetration. </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/child-sex-abuse-doesnt-create-paedophiles-60373">Child sex abuse doesn't create paedophiles</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>However, male victims of child sexual abuse are <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/27436859%E2%80%8B">over-represented</a> among perpetrators of child sexual abuse. This suggests that that for males, victimisation is a risk factor for later offending. A <a href="https://aic.gov.au/publications/tandi/tandi429">range of factors</a>, including the severity of the abuse, the age of the victim, and the gender of the perpetrator, appear to shape this risk.</p>
<p>There is also some truth to the public belief that paedophilia and child sexual abuse reflects a mental disorder, but only in some circumstances. </p>
<p>According to the <a href="https://dsm.psychiatryonline.org/doi/book/10.1176/appi.books.9780890425596">Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders</a>, paedophilia can only be classed as a disorder if it causes distress or impairment to the individual, or if acted on would cause harm or risk of harm to others. </p>
<p>So are members of the public right about what causes paedophilia and child sexual abuse? The short answer is “yes and no”. </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/we-need-to-support-paedophiles-to-prevent-child-sex-offending-44845">We need to support paedophiles to prevent child sex offending</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>While they adhere to a number of explanations that are correct in some circumstances, the problem is that most people strongly adhere to only one explanation.</p>
<p>In reality, the causes of paedophilia and child sexual abuse are multiple and complex. Given that public opinion influences law and policy, it is critical that the public is better informed about this important issue.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/94915/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Kelly Richards does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Recent research found that members of the public have four common explanations for paedophilia or child sexual abuse. But the reality is more complex, with multiple causes often at work.Kelly Richards, Senior lecturer, Queensland University of TechnologyLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/880742018-01-22T23:37:10Z2018-01-22T23:37:10ZWhat are chronophilias?<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/202608/original/file-20180119-110094-cgi170.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=224%2C4%2C2651%2C1763&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Some people have unusual attractions to specific age groups.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://unsplash.com/photos/BIiC3Dmkv9g">Varshesh Joshi on Unsplash</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/">CC BY</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Mr. Smith was a 27-year-old man referred for psychological treatment after sexually offending against a 13-year-old boy. He initially denied the charge, but eventually admitted to sexually abusing multiple youth. He later admitted he’d been attracted to boys since his own adolescence.</p>
<p>Mr. Smith is actually a case composite from my <a href="https://www.apa.org/pubs/books/4317136.aspx">first book on pedophilia</a>. But the description is representative of stories I’ve heard from the hundreds of individuals I’ve talked with as a <a href="https://linkedin.com/in/mcseto">psychologist and researcher</a> over the past 25 years.</p>
<p>Most men are sexually attracted to sexually mature young adults. But a small minority of men are sexually attracted to other age groups, from infants to the elderly. These age-based attractions are called chronophilias.</p>
<p>My research focuses on chronophilias and sexual offending against children. Recently, I’ve started to think about these age-specific attractions as <a href="https://doi.org/10.1007/s10508-016-0799-y">sexual orientations for age</a>, similar to how we understand sexual orientation for gender. This is quite different from the traditional way that psychologists view chronophilias, as sexual preferences that are distinct from someone’s identity.</p>
<p>This idea – that chronophilias can be understood as sexual orientations for age – is provocative, because it raises ethical, legal and scientific questions about how we think about sexual orientation, the etiology of sexual preferences and how we respond to sexual offenses against minors.</p>
<h2>Attraction to an atypical age group</h2>
<p>The best-known atypical chronophilia is pedophilia, referring to sexual attraction to prepubescent children (no physical changes due to puberty). Pedophilia has received the most attention because it helps explain many cases of child pornography use and child sexual abuse.</p>
<p>Hebephilia (some physical puberty changes, but still obviously immature) is becoming better known to researchers and the public. Though ultimately rejected, the American Psychiatric Association considered including hebephilia in the latest version of its diagnostic manual (<a href="https://www.psychiatry.org/psychiatrists/practice/dsm">DSM-5</a>), where it would have joined pedophilia as a recognized mental disorder.</p>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/202897/original/file-20180122-182959-cwvbv0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/202897/original/file-20180122-182959-cwvbv0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/202897/original/file-20180122-182959-cwvbv0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=684&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/202897/original/file-20180122-182959-cwvbv0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=684&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/202897/original/file-20180122-182959-cwvbv0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=684&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/202897/original/file-20180122-182959-cwvbv0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=860&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/202897/original/file-20180122-182959-cwvbv0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=860&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/202897/original/file-20180122-182959-cwvbv0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=860&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Many people first heard the term ‘ephebophilia’ when media used it in reports about U.S. Senate candidate Roy Moore and his alleged behavior toward teenaged girls.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.apimages.com/metadata/Index/Alabama-Senate-Moore/e74ad41156944cd58e8fbcf015d9fb57/2/0">AP Photo/Brynn Anderson</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>There are other lesser-known chronophilias, including attraction to infants or toddlers (nepiophilia) and sexually maturing teens who are not yet adults (ephebophilia). Ephebophilia can explain some cases of statutory rape involving “consensual” relationships between adults and teens who are under the legal age of consent. Surprisingly little research is available about these crimes, <a href="https://classic.ntis.gov/assets/pdf/st-on-cd/PB2007105633.pdf">even though they are frequent</a>, with approximately one in four rapes recorded by police in the U.S. involving statutory cases. </p>
<p>Other atypical chronophilias focus on middle-aged persons (<a href="https://www.thecut.com/2016/08/liking-middle-aged-people-is-probably-a-sexual-orientation.html">mesophilia</a>) or the elderly (<a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/2062191">gerontophilia</a>). There is almost no research on mesophilia or gerontophilia, probably because acting on them is legal, as long as the other person consents. </p>
<p>The typical attraction to young sexually mature adults is called teleiophilia. Being drawn to this age category makes biological and evolutionary sense. Acting on this age attraction is most likely to lead to reproductive success (having children). Being attracted to someone who is prepubertal, pubertal or post-menopausal would not lead to offspring. Scientists would expect the traits underlying these attractions to be less likely to appear in future generations since they wouldn’t be passed on.</p>
<h2>Where do chronophilias come from?</h2>
<p>Like sexual orientation for gender, pedophilia (and perhaps other chronophilias as well) is often experienced as something that someone discovers about themselves as he grows up. Like their peers, these young males become attracted to children their own age or younger – imagine a 12-year-old developing his first crush on an 11-year-old girl at his school. Unlike their peers, whose age interests shift as they grow older, males with pedophilia continue to be sexually attracted to young children. Picture the same boy, now 17, who is still attracted to his kid sister’s friends instead of his high school peers.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/202898/original/file-20180122-182968-1shhvyp.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/202898/original/file-20180122-182968-1shhvyp.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/202898/original/file-20180122-182968-1shhvyp.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=389&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/202898/original/file-20180122-182968-1shhvyp.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=389&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/202898/original/file-20180122-182968-1shhvyp.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=389&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/202898/original/file-20180122-182968-1shhvyp.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=489&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/202898/original/file-20180122-182968-1shhvyp.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=489&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/202898/original/file-20180122-182968-1shhvyp.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=489&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">USA Gymnastics doctor Larry Nassar pled guilty to criminal sexual conduct toward girls. There’s a strong cultural taboo against adults acting on attractions to children.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.apimages.com/metadata/Index/Doctor-Sexual-Assault-Gymnastics/1161d68d6fb94aecb316cde5e33e6ab9/1/0">AP Photo/Paul Sancya</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>I think chronophilias are the result of errors in age detection, where heterosexual male preferences for youth cues like big eyes and smooth skin are not offset by sexual maturity cues like full breasts and curvy hips. For pedophilia, hebephilia and ephebophilia, the youthfulness cues dominate; for mesophilia and gerontophilia, the preference for youth cues is actually reversed. </p>
<p>I refer only to men here because that’s whom almost all the research on chronophilias has focused on. And men are much more likely to show variations in their sexual age interests than women. For example, one study found men were <a href="https://doi.org/10.1111/jsm.12734">more than twice as likely</a> as women to report ever having sexual fantasies about a child under age 12. </p>
<p>It’s not clear why or how age detection gets scrambled. There is growing evidence that pedophilic men are more likely to show prenatal and early childhood signs such as neurodevelopmental problems, have experienced <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/14574100">head injuries</a> and be <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/17634757">lower in IQ</a>. Researchers have also found that pedophilic men have differences in their <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18039544">brains’ white matter</a> in areas that are involved in networks that help process sexual stimuli. </p>
<p>Even less is known about other atypical chronophilias. Developmental studies are rare because scientists (and parents) are reluctant to include children and adolescents in sex research. Instead, we rely on studies asking adults to remember their earlier lives or looking at <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/27733213">developmental markers</a> with adults. </p>
<p>There are many other important questions that remain to be addressed. When do chronophilias emerge and how stable are they over a person’s lifetime? What are the female experiences of chronophilias? What might be effective treatments to prevent acting on sexual interests in children and underage adolescents?</p>
<p>We don’t really know how many people have chronophilias. But given my estimate that <a href="http://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-28526106">up to 1 percent</a> of men have pedophilia, it’s vital for researchers to understand the causes of chronophilias and how best to respond to cases involving young people or nonconsent.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/88074/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Michael Seto receives research grant funding from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council, Canadian Institutes of Health Research, and the University of Ottawa Medical Research Fund. </span></em></p>Psychologists don’t know much about why people have age-based sexual attractions – such as pedophilia – or how best to help people not act on sexual interests in children.Michael Seto, Forensic Research Director at the Royal Ottawa Health Care Group and Associate Professor of Psychiatry, University of TorontoLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/873282017-12-13T19:07:24Z2017-12-13T19:07:24ZBetween innocence and experience: the sexualisation of girlhood in 19th century postcards<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/194246/original/file-20171112-29374-1c71nia.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">French postcard of Lili (before 1904), 'playing around'.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Author provided</span></span></figcaption></figure><p><em>In our sexual histories series, authors explore changing sexual mores from antiquity to today.</em></p>
<p>We often hear that we are living in a <a href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/3347564/The-generation-of-damaged-girls.html">corrupting, visually saturated, consumer culture</a>, which threatens the innocence of girlhood. But representations of young girls in the European postcard trade at the turn of the 20th century cast doubt on this notion of an ideal, more innocent past.</p>
<p>From the mid-1890s until the first world war, Europeans had a love affair with collecting postcards. Created in 1874, the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Universal_Postal_Union">Universal Postal Union</a> established standardised postal regulations at accessible rates for its member nations; this greatly contributed to the postcard craze. In bigger cities, cards needed just a few hours to arrive at their destinations. The world was at one’s fingertips.</p>
<p>Rival publishers vied for attention with collectors’ competitions, impressive exhibitions, and artistic innovations. It did not take long for alluring postcards to flourish in the light-hearted social context of the time. European publishers showed great ingenuity in avoiding local censorship. They played with the boundaries of what was socially and legally acceptable. </p>
<figure class="align-left zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/194245/original/file-20171112-29364-1v5gd6r.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/194245/original/file-20171112-29364-1v5gd6r.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/194245/original/file-20171112-29364-1v5gd6r.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=923&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/194245/original/file-20171112-29364-1v5gd6r.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=923&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/194245/original/file-20171112-29364-1v5gd6r.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=923&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/194245/original/file-20171112-29364-1v5gd6r.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1160&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/194245/original/file-20171112-29364-1v5gd6r.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1160&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/194245/original/file-20171112-29364-1v5gd6r.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1160&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Postcard (c. 1900), published in Italy by C.R.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Author provided</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Yet the trend of erotic postcards did not just bring cheeky smiles and cheerful eroticism. A quick look at one Italian postcard (c. 1900) highlights more disturbing aspects. Elevated on a pedestal, a pre-pubescent model is the privileged object of our gaze. Side lightings magnify her blond mane, and sculpt her flawless skin. A neutral backdrop focuses the attention on her statuesque body. This little goddess is a work of art. </p>
<p>Let us study the precise nature of this ideal.</p>
<p>Three eggs hide the sitter’s bosom. They allude to the symbol of fertility, while playing with the visual resemblance between the shape of breasts and eggs. A deftly positioned piece of cloth emphasises her hips thereby defining an inviting triangle. This veil of modesty also denotes the art of teasing in a game of hide and seek. </p>
<p>The artist tainted the model’s lips with a vivid red, a similar hue to the plinth’s velvet. The colour conveys a brazen sexuality immediately contradicted by the candour of the model. What strikes one’s attention is precisely the discrepancy between these sexual innuendos and the sitter’s youthful naivety. She proudly smiles, unaware of the paedophilic gaze she may entice in the adult viewer. The end result is deeply unsettling and exploitative. </p>
<p>In another unattributed French postcard (before 1904), we follow the adventures of Lili who is described as “playing around”. The caption informs us that she has a springtime smile, and that she is ready to wear her bedside wreath. Her white apparel and the laced clothing convey the idea of virginal innocence and freshness.</p>
<p>Still, her inviting pose, coquettish manners, and bare shoulder leave the viewer perplexed. There is an uneasy tension between the artificiality of the setting and the model’s impression of spontaneous cheerfulness. It is difficult not to read in this staged vignette an eroticised performance for adults at the expense of the young model.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/194246/original/file-20171112-29374-1c71nia.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/194246/original/file-20171112-29374-1c71nia.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/194246/original/file-20171112-29374-1c71nia.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=387&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/194246/original/file-20171112-29374-1c71nia.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=387&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/194246/original/file-20171112-29374-1c71nia.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=387&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/194246/original/file-20171112-29374-1c71nia.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=486&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/194246/original/file-20171112-29374-1c71nia.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=486&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/194246/original/file-20171112-29374-1c71nia.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=486&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The full postcard of Lili ‘playing around’.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Author provided</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>The ‘erotic virgin’</h2>
<p>In both postcards, the sitters epitomise the photographers’ quest for both pristine morality and brazen sexuality. The ambivalent girl exemplifies what scholar Hanne Blank names, the “erotic virgin”. </p>
<p>In her book, <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/225909.Virgin">Virgin: The Untouched History</a>, Blank highlights a recurrent theme in pornographic tropes: “the tale of the skilled ‘conversion’ of resistant virgin into willing wench”. In these coded scripts, virgins hold a dormant sexuality ready to be activated by “the magic of the ‘right’ male wand”. </p>
<p>Blank links the modern fetishising of virginity to the rise of capitalism during the industrial revolution. Young girls left rural areas with the hope of finding better prospects in the city. Economically and socially vulnerable, they were easy prey for unscrupulous employers and brothel owners. The temptation of a pristine body was even greater as venereal diseases were rampant. </p>
<p>The burgeoning mass media culture played a pivotal role in establishing the virgin as an object of sexual lust. As the possibilities of reaching a wider audience increased, so did the virgin’s lucrative potential. By drawing on the dual characterisation of female sexuality as virtuous and vicious, the industry capitalised on fantasies of both innocence and experience.</p>
<p>This new eroticised visual culture drew the attention of legislators, philanthropic organisations, and religious groups. Concerns of child protection reformers ranged from the growing recognition of the child as a vulnerable being in need of protection to a more general fear of moral corruption. </p>
<p>Still, photographs of coquettes were risqué yet charming. Under the celebration of a candid femininity, they catered for both male and female audiences. More than a marginal phenomenon, the sexualisation of girlhood in the social fabric denotes a collective fascination with the young body as a modern ideal of femininity. </p>
<h2>A socially ingrained phenomenon</h2>
<p>The first world war sounded the death knell of the postcards age. During the conflict, <a href="https://www.bl.uk/world-war-one/articles/patriotism-and-nationalism">propaganda postcards</a> had helped feed the nationalistic fervour but overall, demand for postcards plunged. The attraction of youthful femininity though, did not wane. Another medium offered more exciting prospects and creative potential than serialized postcards: the cinema. </p>
<p>Tendentious 19th century postcards, Brooke Shields’s auctioned virginity in Louis Malle’s movie Pretty Baby (1978), and virginity pornography pervasive on the internet, all create the same sexual scenario. Their protagonist has been a little Eve who tempts Adam in the Garden of Eden.</p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/X11Zlw1NcVo?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
</figure>
<p>Though technology evolves constantly, the sexualisation of girlhood is a socially ingrained phenomenon and the commodification of the female being as virgin and whore remains unchanged. </p>
<p><em>Tomorrow: Alastair Blanshard on the myth of the ancient Greek ‘gay utopia’.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/87328/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Elodie Silberstein receives funding from Monash University for a Graduate Research Scholarship.
She is a member of the Darebin Women’s Advisory Committee (DWAC) which provides guidance to the City of Darebin on gender policies.</span></em></p>Eroticised postcards featuring young girls in playful poses were collectables at the turn of the 20th century. These images challenge the notion that childhood was once more innocent than it is today.Elodie Silberstein, PhD candidate in Film, Media and Communications, Monash UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/734782017-02-28T15:48:09Z2017-02-28T15:48:09ZIssue of children who sexually abuse other children is not something that can be ignored<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/158570/original/image-20170227-26326-1kw9iwm.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">shutterstock</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>A recent string of high profile cases involving “celebrity perpetrators” along with a series of <a href="https://www.iicsa.org.uk/">ongoing inquires into historical child abuse</a> in the UK has brought <a href="https://www.childabuseinquiry.scot/">sexual abuse into the public consciousness</a> in an unprecedented way. </p>
<p>Similar inquiries are also underway internationally – notably the ongoing <a href="https://www.childabuseroyalcommission.gov.au/">Australian Royal Commission</a> into institutional responses to child sexual abuse, which has spent the last four years hearing testimony from thousands of Australian survivors. </p>
<p>It is arguable that the <a href="http://www.itv.com/news/2017-02-27/shameful-period-of-british-history-child-sex-abuse-inquiry-begins/">media attention</a> given to these high profile cases has <a href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/women/life/why-abuse-victims-wait-until-their-twilight-years-to-come-forwar/">increased the number of people coming forward</a> to disclose their experiences of abuse. But while this is obviously a good thing, the way these cases are often portrayed and covered, tends to reinforce unhelpful stereotypes. </p>
<p>This includes the idea that all abuse is carried out by adult paedophiles preying on vulnerable children. And as a consequence, means that the issue of child sexual abuse committed by other children is significantly downplayed. </p>
<h2>Juvenile abusers</h2>
<p>Official figures indicate that between a fifth and a third of all cases of child sexual abuse in the UK <a href="https://www.nspcc.org.uk/preventing-abuse/child-abuse-and-neglect/child-sexual-abuse/sexual-abuse-facts-statistics/">involve “perpertrators” under the age of 18</a> – but the figures could in fact be much higher. </p>
<p>In a random UK general population survey of more than 6,000 people, a staggering two-thirds of the sexual abuse reported by respondents in their childhoods, had been <a href="https://www.nspcc.org.uk/globalassets/documents/research-reports/child-abuse-neglect-uk-today-research-report.pdf">committed by other children</a>. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/158571/original/image-20170227-20702-h3ksmb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/158571/original/image-20170227-20702-h3ksmb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/158571/original/image-20170227-20702-h3ksmb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/158571/original/image-20170227-20702-h3ksmb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/158571/original/image-20170227-20702-h3ksmb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/158571/original/image-20170227-20702-h3ksmb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/158571/original/image-20170227-20702-h3ksmb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The hidden problem of children sexually abusing children.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Shutterstock</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Even when reports of child and adolescent perpetrated child sexual abuse gains media attention, it is often portrayed in a way that presents the children as mini versions of adult sex offenders, or “<a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/2082860">paedophiles in waiting</a>”. </p>
<p>The reality of course is somewhat different – with many high profile studies suggesting that most children and young people who commit sexual offences in their adolescence do not then carry on <a href="http://commissiononsexoffenderrecidivism.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/09/Caldwell-Michael-2010-Study-Characteristics-and-recidivism-base-rates-in-juvenile-sex-offender-recidivism.pdf">sexually offending in adulthood</a>. </p>
<h2>Protection vs criminalisation</h2>
<p>For many of these child perpetrators, their own histories of abuse play a role in their offending behaviours. This is often part and parcel of an enmeshed experience of trauma, neglect and pain – which has also been shown in our research.</p>
<p>We conducted the largest UK study of young people who had sexually abused other children. Of the 700 children we spoke to, we found that 50% of young abusers had themselves been victims of sexual abuse. Our research also showed that 50% had experienced <a href="http://dro.dur.ac.uk/11288/1/11288.pdf?DDD34+mvrl45+mvrl45+mrnv91+mvrl45+dul4eg">physical abuse or domestic violence</a> in their lives.</p>
<p>Seen through this lens, we need to respond to these cases carefully. Yes, we need to protect victims and stop these children from abusing, but our interventions shouldn’t stop there. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/158572/original/image-20170227-18526-1nkun5f.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/158572/original/image-20170227-18526-1nkun5f.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=500&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/158572/original/image-20170227-18526-1nkun5f.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=500&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/158572/original/image-20170227-18526-1nkun5f.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=500&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/158572/original/image-20170227-18526-1nkun5f.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=629&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/158572/original/image-20170227-18526-1nkun5f.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=629&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/158572/original/image-20170227-18526-1nkun5f.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=629&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Many of these children have experienced abuse themselves.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Shutterstock</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>We need services that can offer expert help to children and their families to prevent further victimisation and help them lead offence-free lives in the long-term. </p>
<p>Such services are sadly lacking at the moment, but the recently launched <a href="https://www.nspcc.org.uk/services-and-resources/research-and-resources/2016/harmful-sexual-behaviour-framework/">NSPCC operational framework</a> should help agencies to get their acts together as this framework provides a structure for <a href="https://www.nspcc.org.uk/services-and-resources/impact-evidence-evaluation-child-protection/impact-and-evidence-insights/developed-harmful-sexual-behaviour-framework/">local safeguarding children boards</a> to help them implement their policies and practice responses.</p>
<h2>Realities of abuse</h2>
<p>We also need to have better awareness of the realities of child sexual abuse – along with the issue of children and young people who harm others sexually. Because a lack of public knowledge around this promotes a distorted and stereotypical view of child sexual abuse. This can often lead to the overplay of some risks – such as “stranger danger” – while underplaying others.</p>
<p>Failing to understand the specific needs of children and young people who present with harmful sexual behaviours also means that they are more likely to receive inappropriate criminal justice responses that are designed with adults in mind. </p>
<p>This can include being placed on the sex offender register or, in the US, “community notification schemes”. These publish details of young people and adult sex offenders, including their addresses, offence details and photographs online. </p>
<p>Such measures, being inherently adult focused, at best fail to provide a balanced response to the issue of harmful sexual behaviour. And at worst, they may cause <a href="https://www.hrw.org/sites/default/files/reports/us0513_ForUpload_1.pdf">irreparable developmental damage to children</a> who fundamentally need our help.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/73478/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Simon Hackett receives funding from the Economic and Social Research Council. </span></em></p>What drives a child to commit sexual abuse?Simon Hackett, Professor in the School of Applied Social Sciences, Durham UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.