Former victims not surprised by sex scandal

[Spazito]

The appalling Penn State scandal has sent shockwaves through the college football universe, but it comes as no surprise to former NHL players Theoren Fleury and Sheldon Kennedy, both victims of sexual abuse.

Fleury and Kennedy were molested by former coach Graham James while playing for the Western Hockey League's Moose Jaw Warriors in the mid-1980s. And they believe the charges laid against former Penn State assistant football coach Jerry Sandusky, who has been accused of sexually assaulting at least eight boys over a 15-year period, are part of a widespread epidemic that remains shamefully under-reported.

"Obviously, I'm not surprised," said Fleury, a veteran of 16 NHL seasons who released a tell-all autobiography in 2009 revealing the harrowing details of his abuse by James, and his subsequent battle with drugs and alcohol. "This is the biggest epidemic that we have on the planet. This is happening every day, every second, every hour, every minute; some innocent kid is being victimized."

snip

"You can go through every single facet of life and community, and find that person who is in power, that at some point in their lifetime knew something about sexual abuse and didn't say anything about it," the 43-year-old Fleury said.

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http://www.canada.com/sports/Former+victims+surprised+scandal/5678565/story.html

"This is the biggest epidemic that we have on the planet. This is happening every day, every second, every hour, every minute; some innocent kid is being victimized."

When will we, as a society actually deal with this horrendous crime with the seriousness it deserves, I wonder.

[CaliforniaPeggy]

1. I wonder too if we'll ever really deal with it, and with its causes.

It is heartbreaking.

[Fumesucker]

2. K&R

[Grey]

3. K&R.....

[SoutherDem]

4. Is this the Catholic sex scandal part 2?

If you think about it coaches are in shower rooms anyway.

[Spazito]

6. No, it is child abuse/rape and it's everywhere....

not only in the Catholic church, not only in Sports, it is everywhere and we do little to stop it. Why is that?

[valerief]

11. It's been around since recorded history. So has war. Why don't we stop either? Men must love to hurt

other people, especially the most vulnerable. Why is that?

[Spazito]

14. It is not a question, imo, of isolating out gender in terms of the offenders....

it is a question of stopping the criminal acts committed against children, our most vulnerable. We need to address the crimes in a comprehensive way rather than point fingers to one gender or another. both have been complicit in committing or enabling these crimes.

[valerief]

15. How is raping children different from waging war from the POV of the aggressor?

No different to me. It's inflicting violence on the vulnerable.

[Spazito]

16. In mixing child abuse/rape with war, you dilute the message....

and when the message is diluted, little gets done because it makes it easier to ignore. The issue is child abuse/rape not war and if we are ever going to begin to address the issue, we must not dilute the message by throwing everything in but the kitchen sink, imo.

[lunatica]

5. May this abuse be outed everywhere it exists

[Whisp]

7. it's not sex, it's rape.

I bristle when I hear that - especially when it's on the news.

rape is not sex. it's violence.

[Spazito]

9. Yes, I agree...

The terminology, legal and otherwise, is used to minimize what is done to the children. Abuse and rape are abuse and rape, not molestation, not sex. It is a violent crime which is not addressed as a violent crime. The penalties for child abuse/rape/pornography are little more than slaps on the hand, imo, compared to the penalties accorded in other violent crimes.

[valerief]

12. +1000

[barbtries]

8. then the whole penn state debacle

can serve as a vehicle for good. hopefully.

[valerief]

13. Has the Catholic Church exposure stopped anything? I doubt it. nt

[barbtries]

17. ggod point

though i would certainly hope so, i don't know.

[malaise]

10. And in all sports

"This is the biggest epidemic that we have on the planet. This is happening every day, every second, every hour, every minute; some innocent kid is being victimized."

[saras]

18. Do you people actually BELIEVE this??

"This is the biggest epidemic that we have on the planet. This is happening every day, every second, every hour, every minute; some innocent kid is being victimized." Are you SERIOUS?

Think about it, then look around you. Surely, in that handful of people you know, there's an abuser, right. Maybe more than one. There has to be. There are so many of them and they're everywhere, they don't all avoid society and join some child sex fraternity. So exactly how paranoid are you going to get about your neighbors, your family, your friends? Will you soon be screaming "rapist! child rape!" at any physical contact whatsoever? Eye contact? Physical proximity?


In addition, the fact that this subject reliably provokes in otherwise sane Americans an instant lynch-mob mentality, a sneering, raving "never mind the law, or the facts - he's BAD and we want him to SUFFER" attitude that scares me at least as badly as the Tea Party, because historically these attitudes ALWAYS let the biggest criminals get away with it and are used to go after innocents on the fringe.

Our ordinary law is doing just fine busting child molesters. It arrests, prosecutes, convicts, and sentences pretty reliably, much better than say, with financial misdeeds - as soon as the public, i.e. witnesses, step up and do THEIR duty. I don't see any sign that we need more laws, or more emotion. A systematic dismantling of privilege - that's another matter, and though it's not where the impulse to crime comes from, it IS where the expectation of getting away with it comes from.

Sandusky didn't GET AWAY with it because he's evil. He got away with it because lots and lots of people - not just a couple - respected power and privilege who shouldn't have. Otherwise he would have messed with one kid, got instant and harsh feedback, and MAYBE concluded that, like a villa in the Alps, or a private space station, sex with kids is just not something he's going to get to have this lifetime.

[Spazito]

19. Do I believe it, yes, I do....

Law enforcement believes it is only the tip of a very ugly, very big iceberg. Why do you believe it is not?

[emcguffie]

20. These numbers from Wikipedia....

from: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Child_sexual_abuse

In North America, for example, approximately 15% to 25% of women and 5% to 15% of men were sexually abused when they were children.<11><12><13> Most sexual abuse offenders are acquainted with their victims; approximately 30% are relatives of the child, most often brothers, fathers, uncles or cousins; around 60% are other acquaintances such as 'friends' of the family, babysitters, or neighbors; strangers are the offenders in approximately 10% of child sexual abuse cases.<11> Most child sexual abuse is committed by men; studies show that women commit 14% to 40% of offenses reported against boys and 6% of offenses reported against girls.<11><12><14> Most offenders who sexually abuse prepubescent children are pedophiles,<15><16> although some offenders do not meet the clinical diagnosis standards for pedophilia.<17><18>