The spike in interest around Jeffrey Epstein’s charges could create an opportunity for discussing just how prevalent child sexual abuse is. But estimates vary...
Mona Chalabi in New York
The Guardian
Part of the difficulty of reaching a reliable estimate is that various surveys define child sexual abuse differently.
Federal prosecutors raided the home of the disgraced financier Jeffrey Epstein earlier this month, after charging him with sex trafficking. There, they say they discovered lewd photographs of girls as young as 14. Epstein is a convicted felon who was sentenced in 2008 for sex crimes involving a minor.
He was sentenced to a few dozen half-days in a cozy jail after a sweetheart plea deal.
The spike in interest around Epstein’s allegations could create an opportunity for discussing just how prevalent child sexual abuse is. Estimates vary, but not widely – somewhere between 8% and 12% of children in the US have experienced sexual abuse.
Part of the difficulty of reaching a reliable estimate is that various surveys define child sexual abuse differently. In 2013, Catherine Townsend sifted through dozens of studies for Darkness to Light, a US not-for-profit that aims to prevent child sexual abuse. Townsend used several criteria for inclusion such as:
Child sexual abuse includes any sexual act between an adult and a young child, regardless of whether force or coercion is used.
Child sexual abuse includes both contact and non-contact sexual acts.
Child sexual abuse includes forced or coerced sexual acts between two children when there is an age or power differential. This can include unwanted or forcible peer abuse.
A few years ago I talked to the woman who created the stats for either D2L or RAINN and asked why her numbers were so much lower than most other resources. She told me that they didn't include peer on peer sexual assaults - 'or the numbers would go way up'! The statistics from RAINN would make it appear to have been them as they seem to only include adult on child events, or perhaps, only officially reported events.
Their website says:
One in 9 girls and 1 in 53 boys under the age of 18 experience sexual abuse or assault at the hands of an adult.
Often there are inexplicable contradictions within various studies. For instance:
Studies by David Finkelhor, Director of the Crimes Against Children Research Center, show that:
1 in 5 girls and 1 in 20 boys is a victim of child sexual abuse;
Self-report studies show that 20% of adult females and 5-10% of adult males recall a childhood sexual assault or sexual abuse incident;
During a one-year period in the U.S., 16% of youth ages 14 to 17 had been sexually victimized;
Over the course of their lifetime, 28% of U.S. youth ages 14 to 17 had been sexually victimized;
Children are most vulnerable to CSA between the ages of 7 and 13.
28% of youths aged 14-17 had been victimized, while the most victimized group is between 7 and 13! What was their rate of victimhood - 30%, 40%. That accounts for almost 2/3rds of all children under 18, and yet the overall rate is 1 in 10? That makes no sense to me.
The CDC numbers are much higher with 1 in 3 girls sexually abused and 1 in 5 women raped. These numbers have been questioned with accusations of a feminist agenda and questionable methodology.
National Sexual Violence Resource Center: One in four girls and one in six boys will be sexually
abused before they turn 18 years old. NSVRC statistics seem to indicate that the violent crime rate is rising.
Personally, I have been using the stats 1 in 5 girls and 1 in 10 boys on a global scale. I suspect those are too conservative as there are countries where data reveals percentages for girls, and sometimes even boys, in the 35% range, and the only study done in India put the numbers above 50%, which I am quite certain is conservative.
Applying that statistic of 1 in 5 girls would indicate 10 million girls have been sexually abused in the USA so far in the 21st century. And we've not even talked about child pornography.
Many countries east of India have serious stigmas and are grossly underreported.
The overview of all the research looked at six different surveys published between 2000 and 2011 and found that the rate was significantly different between genders: about one in seven girls and one in 25 boys are sexually abused before they turn 18.
Overall, the research suggests that around one in 10 children are sexually abused.
In the US, relevant helplines can be found on the Rape, Abuse and Incest National Network website.
In the UK, the NSPCC offers support to children on 0800 1111, and adults concerned about a child on 0808 800 5000. The National Association for People Abused in Childhood (Napac) offers support for adult survivors on 0808 801 0331.
A directory of international child helplines can be found on the Child Helpline International website.
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