By Khan Ansur
Many don’t hear that cry. Some ignore it. Few worry for it.
Very few understand the intense pain underneath the cry.
(Anonymous)
Children are the most essential population of every society. The future of every nation lies with children. I would say, “There is no future, if there are no children”. When we are so aware of their importance, we have the responsibility to ensure their safety from all the things that can cause them any harm. There is no option left for us except to save this vulnerable population with all our capabilities. But unfortunately we, as a society, have failed them miserably and have not protected them as supposed to be. Taking Child Sexual Abuse (CSA) as an example, we see a torn picture of our children who have been and are being continuous victims of sexual abuse. As a society, we have always been trying to avoid and giving deaf ear to this undeniable as well as uncomfortable verity. It is the verity which is difficult to grasp and act upon as verity has been and will always remain acrid. It is the Child Sexual Abuse (CSA) which is silently devastating our children and making them vulnerable day after day. World Health Organization (WHO) defines Child Sexual Abuse (CSA) as “the involvement of a child in sexual activity that he or she does not fully comprehend is unable to give informed consent to, or for which the child is not developmentally prepared and cannot give consent.” The Child Sexual Abuse (CSA) involves the activities like oral-genital contact, intercourse, attempted intercourse, fondling of genitals directly or through clothing, exhibitionism or pornography or exposing children to adult sexual activity and the use of child for pornography or sexual activity (Child Abuse and Neglect: Challenges and Opportunities, 2013, p. 62-70). I am writing its definition in order to clear all doubts as well as misconceptions related to this issue of important concern.
Children and CSA
Sexual abuse decimates the psychology of children. Small children develop confusions of different nature and same happens with adolescents who develop different set of confusions. The prominent confusion in small children comes into the form of some questions as in, why was I badly touched into my genitals? Is the activity good which I and the person got involved into? What am I going to do if my parents / caretakers get to know about it? These questions are always haunting small children and create disturbances into their daily life at a great level. Whereas adolescents, if they experience sexual abuse, develop questions like, why did my body respond to this act? What will I do if it happens again? The unfortunate part of our society is, if, at all, they get courage to disclose it, their revelations are disbelieved and put on doubt. What happens after that, they feel guilty and start blaming themselves and unfortunately continue to get sexually abused. In the case of adolescents, blackmailing also happens if they are not adhering to the demands of the perpetrator. If it remained unsolved, it may not relieve them until death and eventually it will haunt them through continuous nightmares. Unless and until these questions are solved and their confusions are cleared, they are not going to live a normal life as they are supposed to. They will always remain in this thought that “it was their mistake only” which made their life miserable. And this kind of experience, not only affects children’s psychology, but it also hampers their overall development badly.
Lockdown and CSA
CSA is more dangerous than any pandemic and we should never forget that it gets more dangerous and horrendous when children are confined at one place. Nowadays we are going through a lockdown along with our children and it is more likely that many children will get sexually abused during this phase of our lives. It becomes imperative for people to know that the distinguishing characteristic of Child Sexual Abuse (CSA) is hidden in its secret nature (Michael Rutter, Child and Adolescent Psychiatry 5th Edition, 2008, p. 440), as it is often done in secret manner so as to leave no evidence for those who care for children and who have the power to evade it. I fairly remember a 13 year old girl, Farrukh (name changed), who was brought to our nodal center for child and adolescent mental health services namely Child Guidance and Well-Being Center – CGWC by her father with fearfulness, frequent loss of consciousness episodes and anger outbursts as chief complaints. In the first session of her screening, the adolescent remained calm and said same as her father did. In the next session, after building strong rapport with her, making her comfortable in sharing her issues and ensured confidentiality, she revealed that she was sexually abused by her cousin brother on and off. “My cousin brother would often visit our home and abuse me. He would insert his hand into my back and rub it frequently. This act would always make me uncomfortable and distressful. I feel helpless to do anything.” She narrated it in a lamenting tone. Similarly, a 16 year old girl, Rashida (name changed), was registered in our center and was diagnosed with Clinical Depression. Her mother reported that Rashida developed behavioral issues after when her father expired and when she remarried; her health started deteriorating day after day. The academic performance of Rashida, as per her mother, was witnessing a significant decline. However, after conducting separate sessions with Rashida, it came to the fore that the adolescent was being maltreated by her foster father and was sexually abused by her foster brother (the son of her foster father with whom her mother married). “I am alone”, “I am not being understood by anyone”, and “I should end my life so that I will attain peace” were her inner thoughts and, as reported by her mother, she had attempted suicide to get rid of the pain she was going through on daily basis, but she failed. During my career as a Psychiatric Social Worker (PSW) in the CGWC, I have come across number of such children and adolescents who had experienced sexual abuse at the hands of their immediate relatives.
It should be remembered that Child Sexual Abuse (CSA) occurs mostly at home and abuser is often known to the child (National Sexual Violence Resource Center, 2011, p. 2). I know, as I said it earlier, it is an uncomfortable verity to us but we are left with no option except to accept this. Significantly, according to the report of Social Welfare Department, J&K has reported 16 Rape and 64 molestation cases during the lockdown (as reported in Kashmir Life dated April 29, 2020). Now the situation of adults, who, to some extent, are capable enough in evading any untoward incident, is before us. When they too are not safe, how are we going to lay our heads on beds peacefully with the notion that our children, the powerless population of our society, are safe? As a matter of fact, I came to know that, after the eleven days of lockdown; more than 92,000 calls were received for help against child sexual abuse (as reported in www.arre.com dated April 09, 2020). These facts as well as reports speak only about our continuous silence upon this grave issue which is turning our children helpless to a great extent. We are giving deaf ear to the CSA as well as its more devastating element, known as incest, which is being committed at our homes. The tragedy is; these cases are unreported.
Final Word: As parents / guardians / caretakers, in any situation, the responsibility lies on our shoulders only to take immediate measures and it becomes incumbent for us to take due precautions in order to save our children from any man-made calamity in the form of abuse, more specifically sexual abuse. If we do not act on time, our children are going to suffer forever and ultimately we are going to have no future.
Khan Ansur is working as a Psychiatric Social Worker (PSW) at Child Guidance and Well-Being Center (CGWC) in IMHANS, Kashmir being supported under the Mental Health and Psycho-Social Programme of UNICEF.
