Reply to How to deal with family member who has been accused of sexual abuse

Forum Index » Family Relationships

Reply to "How to deal with family member who has been accused of sexual abuse"

Subject:

Emoticons





More smilies

Text Color: Font: Close Marks

[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]Op here. The victim is now an adult, and I don't think she's going to press charges. There's no forensic evidence. My husband does support the victim but he's also desperate to find some solid clue to indicate either the guy did it, or didn't. [b]He seems to be looking for some other reason she might be saying this.[/b] But I'm not seeing it.    I believe and support the victim.  I know there will never be an answer. [/quote]

Then your DH doesn't support the victim, sadly. And this is why people don't come forward. [/quote]

+1. Spending more energy on the hunt for other, more unlikely reasons for a 'lie being told', instead of believing what is likely based on a child's words is the problem. This would kill the survivor to know this denial/investigation is still going on.

For people like your DH, they would need to be in the room to see it. And even then a large % of people would look the other way. If he doesn't want to throw out the relationship with the abuser he needs to realize that he is doing exactly that with the survivor. His 'not choosing' is actually choosing- against the survivor of the abuse.

[b]I don't see how anyone with children can err on the side of extending a benefit of the doubt to an abuser.[/b][/quote]

Easy...all depends on who the accuser is and their relationship to that person.
Let's say it's your favorite cousin Jimmy that you grew up together with being accused, I bet you'd be reluctant to believe its true.
But if it's your distant Uncle Ted who you never really liked anyway then you'd have no hesitation about rendering a guilty verdict.
If you too are a human being with emotions (that can sometimes be misleading) and perceptions (which can sometimes be prejudicial) then you too should be able to see how people sometimes end up extending the benefit of the doubt.  If you're a robot or some alien from Vulcan with no emotions then it's understandable why you would find it oh so baffling.[/quote]

Oh, I see how people justify it to themselves. It still doesn’t change the bolded for me. Not sure how erring on the side of victims makes me a robot but I’ll take that as a compliment that my emotions are in the right place, on the right side of the issue.[/quote]

The reason why people hang out with sexual abusers is because they are too weak to stand up too the unit. They would rather hang out at Christmas with an abuser than alone. It's sad and weak.[/quote]

You can both be very, very clear that you side with the victim and demand a full explanation/apology/etc. and not shut someone out of your life.  I think different people have different lines for where it is appropriate to shut someone out entirely, and those differences are not necessarily "sad and weak."  [/quote]

They are sad and weak if they let the accused come to Christmas with children or anywhere with children. Sure... go have lunch and say you are sorry they can't be at family gatherings with children and the abused. The relationship must change.

But expecting the abused to endure a family party with the perp is sad and weak.[/quote]

Options

	Disable HTML in this message
	Disable BB Code in this message
	Disable smilies in this message

Review message

Search Recent Topics Hottest Topics