3 Oct 2012

Victim blaming and child abduction

Victim blaming is a concept more usually associated with rape. A woman goes out in a short skirt, she gets raped, she was asking for it. A woman gets drunk, she gets raped, she shouldn't have got drunk. Instead of blaming the man who chose to rape her, she is blamed for putting herself in his path in the first place. The insinuation is that the perpetrator could not help it, and it was the woman's fault. It is a dreadful reaction.

However, since the abduction of April Jones, I have noticed the same response repeatedly, aimed at her parents. The child was out playing with a friend after school, and someone abducted her. Those are the bare facts. The fact the child was only 5 and playing outside at 7:30pm has horrified some people. One person on my facebook list went to far as to accuse her parents of neglect and say that if April is found alive, she should be put into care. Many others have simply asked "Why was she playing outside so late?" The insinuation is clear: her parents are to blame for letting her out to play.

Now, hang on a minute. Your thoughts on what is an appropriate age for a child to play out late will be entirely subjective, based on where you live. There's no way my two would be allowed out where I live: it's a busy road and I don't know many neighbours. However, in my old village, I'd have been more than happy to allow them out to play with schoolfriends.
7:30pm seems late, but again, it's subjective. If you're still in 'summer mode' (which I certainly was until a few days), you may not realise how late it is, or think "ten more minutes won't hurt" or "I'll just finish this job and then I'll go and get her".

It's all completely irrelevant. It would not make any difference if the child was playing out at 3pm or 3am. Nothing gives a person the right to abduct a child. A child is not a dropped five pound note, that you might consider picking up if no clear owner was evident. A child is a small person, and whoever abducted her did so with grim intent. If she hadn't have been out, it would have been a different child, or maybe he would've waited and snatched her at a different, more socially acceptable time.

When  Myra Hindley, murderer of at least four children, was asked by a journalist why she abducted, raped and murdered Lesley Anne Downey, she replied "It was her mother's fault. She shouldn't have been out so late."

Victim blaming is merely a way to detach yourself from the horrors of what has likely happened to that little girl. Abduction is any parents worst nightmare. The guilt her mother must feel right now is far beyond anything most of us can comprehend, or would ever want to be able to understand. Stop blaming the parents, start blaming the monster who knows where she is.

No comments:

Post a Comment