The study and discussion of child sex offending is replete with stereotypes of predators and molesters who prey on children. These stereotypes are often used to characterise child sexual abuse as the problem of a deviant minority, and so the only available response is to identify and incarcerate those responsible.
In contrast, in its final report, released today, the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse presented a socially and historically contextualised understanding of child sexual abuse. While accepting that some institutional abusers are “fixated, persistent” paedophiles, the commission found the majority are not.
Instead, it concluded that most institutional offenders are opportunistic or situational – that is, most offenders are not driven to abuse children by mental illness or perverse sexuality. Instead, institutional sexual abuse arises through an interaction of personal, situational, institutional and social factors.
[For more on this story by Michael Salter, go to https://theconversation.com/ro...responsibility-88564]
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