AUSTRALIA
The Conversation
Chris Goddard
Adjunct Professor, Child Abuse Prevention Research Australia, Monash University
The Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse is shifting its attention from Brisbane Grammar to St Paul’s School. In two weeks’ time, the commission will return to issues in Melbourne and Ballarat. Anglican, non-denominational and Catholic institutions in different states are being scrutinised.
The adults who survived the abuse finally get the opportunity they were denied as children: to describe the abuse, after years of being silenced, and to identify the perpetrators and those who failed to listen and protect them.
Other adults are called to explain what they did, if anything, to protect the children and to stop the offenders. They will be asked about what was done to silence the children and to protect the institution. Some of these people are important – for example, Cardinal George Pell and former governor-general Peter Hollingworth.
The silencing of children has as long a history as child abuse itself. So many myths are used to silence children and minimise crimes: children were said to lie, fantasise and be seductive.
Neerosh Mudaly and I wrote a 2006 book about children’s experiences of abuse and professional interventions, The Truth is Longer Than a Lie, which has now been adapted for a play of the same name. Its premiere is in Melbourne on November 11.
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