The untold story of how a culture of shame perpetuates abuse. I know, I was a victim
It was with a lump in my throat and tears in my eyes that I read about the horrific cases of abuse and neglect revealed in the Rotherham report this week.
Much of the media coverage has focused on how men of mostly Asian descent preyed on vulnerable young white victims. The details of this abuse are awful. But what has largely been ignored is the report’s finding that sexual abuse has been systemically under-reported among Asian girls due to deeply entrenched cultural taboos – obscuring the reality that there is a similarly rampant problem of minority girls being abused by members of their own community.
I have first-hand knowledge of this problem. I’m coming forward to publicly share my own story in the hope that I can encourage others to do the same and help tear down the wall of silence that perpetuates further abuse.
I grew up in a small community of a few hundred British-Pakistanis in Skipton, less than 60 miles from Rotherham. When I was 10 a neighbour started sexually abusing me. Paralysed by shame, I said nothing.
At 18 I was fortunate enough to receive an offer to study at Oxford University. I was enthralled with the exciting new world around me and tried desperately to fit in. I replaced my traditional shalwar kameez with jeans. I bared my shoulders and cut my hair. I socialised more than I studied and became president of the Oxford Union.
An internship at Goldman Sachs led to a job in private equity in London, and after a few years I moved to the US to get my MBA from Harvard Business School. But all the while, I knew the girls I had grown up with didn’t have the same opportunities – and that my abuser was probably still preying on other children.
It was only after a decade away from Skipton that I was finally able to garner the courage to return and testify against my abuser. When I first told my mother about the abuse I’d suffered, she was absolutely devastated. The root of her anger was clear: I was heaping unbound shame on to my family by trying to bring the perpetrator to justice. In trying to stop him from exploiting more children, I was ensuring my parents and my siblings would be ostracised. She begged me not to go to the police station.
If I’d still been living in Skipton, surrounded by a community who would either blame me for the abuse or label me a liar, I’m not sure I could have rejected her demands.
Once the police began the investigation another victim came forward. Sohail described how he too had been abused almost 20 years before I was. Due to our combined testimony, the perpetrator was jailed for eight years.
Within a few weeks another young woman in the community, emboldened by the conviction, told the police that a relative had raped her for several years. It had started before Sara was in her teens. We have supported her through the process of taking this to court.
Although Sohail and I had removed a proven paedophile from the community and helped empower another woman to end her torture, we were not celebrated. On the contrary, we were shunned.
The Rotherham report cites a home affairs select committee finding that cases of Asian men grooming Asian girls did not come to light in Rotherham because victims “are often alienated and ostracised by their own families and by the whole community, if they go public with allegations of abuse”.
This was our experience exactly – and the experience of everyone I’ve since spoken to. In each situation, victims and their families faced tremendous pressure to drop their cases.
During our investigation it became clear that for three decades many other women had suffered at the hands of our abuser, but they had refused to testify against him because of the indelible stigma it would bring. I learned that the parents of at least one of the victims had known their child had been abused but had done nothing. We also discovered that the larger community had long been aware of rumours of abuse by my neighbour but had chosen to ignore them – even when Sohail had attempted to come forward several years earlier.
This refusal to condemn perpetrators persists even after their conviction. Soon after our case, another convicted sex offender was released back into our community and was accepted as if nothing had happened. It was clear that the same would happen with our abuser.
Much has been made about the religious background of the offenders in the Rotherham report. But this problem isn’t about religion race: it’s about a culture where notions of shame result in the blaming of victims rather than perpetrators.
Although painful to read, the Rotherham report presents an opportunity. It’s an opportunity for leaders in the British-Pakistani community to stand up and speak out about the sexual and physical abuse in their midst. The Asian community isn’t unique in having evil-doers, and the overwhelming majority of its men and women are good people who care about protecting others.
I am and always will be proud of my Pakistani heritage, but I firmly believe community leaders must take responsibility for the fact that the taboos that prevent others from identifying perpetrators and supporting victims enable further abuse. And those taboos must be challenged.
The report also presents an opportunity to overhaul the public institutions that have failed in their responsibility to protect the defenceless – which includes everyone from the police to schools to social services.
On multiple occasions, beginning when she was 12, Sara went to her local GP and to walk-in clinics wearing her hijab to get the morning-after pill. She was never asked if she needed help. When she approached the police to share her story the CPS initially told her it would not pursue the case because there was too little evidence. It’s a testament to her resolve that she pushed back, demanding a chance to seek justice.
The system failed her, just as it has thousands of other children of all backgrounds.
We now have the chance to change that, and there are four immediate steps we should take to address this problem.
First, we need better training of social workers and police to effectively identify victims. The Rotherham report cited that one of the reasons for the widespread under-reporting of abuse among minority communities was the authorities’ focus on communicating with male leaders, who ignored the problem. Women and girls need to be included in these conversations, and government officials need to broaden the scope of their inquiries.
Second, we need mandatory reporting by people of authority when they signs of potential sexual abuse. One of the most damning parts of the Rotherham report was that schoolteachers were discouraged from reporting potential cases. For Sara, mandatory reporting by doctors serving young children could have saved her years of abuse.
Third, we need improved support for victims when they come forward. Sara’s case has been drawn out for far longer than expected, during which time she has faced pressure to withdraw her testimony. She has been passed from one counsellor to another, and struggled to get the help she needs to overcome her trauma. We need a judicial process that recognises the cost of delayed prosecutions for victims and better counselling services.
Fourth, we need a single person in each community who is accountable for ensuring these and other relevant policies are implemented. There are a lot of people with partial responsibility for this problem, but for this to be an effective, coordinated, comprehensive response, we need one individual who takes full responsibility for ensuring child sex exploitation is addressed and who can be held accountable for real change.
Some of these policies are already being implemented. But they are not being implemented everywhere, and they are not being implemented quickly enough.
The biggest risk of this terrible situation is that once the shock of this report dissipates, it will get swept under the rug, just like three previous reports in Rotherham. We cannot let that happen. We don’t need any further reports: we need system-wide change in the way we approach fighting sexual abuse against children of all backgrounds. This is not a problem in Rotherham or a problem in Oxford or a problem in Rochdale. This is a problem in the United Kingdom. And we need to tackle it together.
In the words of Edmund Burke, “The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good [people] to do nothing.” Let’s not be those people.
Some names have been changed to protect anonymity.
Biography:
Ruzwana Bashir is co-founder and CEO of Peek.com, the one-stop shop to discover and book activities. She previously worked at Gilt Groupe, Blackstone and Goldman Sachs. She has an MBA from Harvard Business School where she was a Fulbright scholar, and a BA from Oxford where she was president of the Oxford Union.
Beyond Rotherham: Muslims are also silent victims of sexual abuse
When emphasis is placed on reputation, image and taboo, it can be difficult to access and support vulnerable girls in some Muslim communities
• Slavoj Žižek on Rotherham: it is our duty to ask difficult questions
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- theguardian.com, Tuesday 2 September 2014 10.24 BST
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It’s tiring work being a Muslim in the UK today. If we aren’t being asked to defend the actions of extremists, we are distancing ourselves from the “Asian gangs” who are preying on vulnerable white girls to sexually exploit. The report on the extent of sexual abuse in Rotherham, and the failure of the authorities to protect the young girls they were responsible for is yet another story that has been blamed on failures of “multiculturalism” in the UK. Sensationalist news stories cry out that Asian men target young white girls due to unresolvable “cultural issues” or “unhappy marriages”, or simply because of a lack of respect for white, British girls.
The truth is that Muslims have also been silent victims of sexual abuse. Alexis Jay’s report last week raised a number of concerning points regarding the sexual abuse victims of Pakistani heritage, stating that: “The Board should address as a priority the under-reporting of exploitation and abuse in minority ethnic communities.” She went on to conclude that “one of these myths was that only white girls are victims of sexual exploitation by Asian or Muslim males, as if these men only abuse outside of their own community, driven by hatred and contempt for white females. This belief flies in the face of evidence that shows that those who violate children are most likely to target those who are closest to them and most easily accessible.”
Ruzwana Bashir bravely came forward on the weekend about her own experiences of abuse in the Pakistani community, and the cultural issues that have contributed to the idea of shame around those who come forward. This shame is not just restricted to Pakistani culture. I grew up as part of a mixed Muslim community made up of people from many different backgrounds. First-hand accounts from young girls who had been groomed by older men online or at school were not unusual. Girls as young as 13 or 14 were being targeted by those who played on their vulnerabilities. Because many of these girls were already hiding some of what they were doing from their parents, it was difficult for them to speak out when things escalated out of hand.
One girl of Moroccan descent, aged 14, lied to her parents so that she could go for dinner with someone she had met online. He was 21. She felt she couldn’t tell anyone afterwards that she had been raped. As teenagers, we became aware that some younger guys were being recruited by much older men in London who would send them out to find “nice young Muslim girls”, preferably virgins.
The UK Muslim Women’s Network published a report in September 2013 that looked into cases of sexual exploitation of Asian girls and women. It highlighted that they were most vulnerable to men from their own communities who were conscious of cultural norms, using them to manipulate victims into not reporting their abuse. Although based on a small study of 35 cases, the report warned that girls, from mostly Pakistani Muslim backgrounds, were “not being made aware of the predatory nature of some men and boys, and the consequences of being lured by them – they are not being adequately warned in order to safeguard themselves”.
It also said that consequently “most victims had not received or been supported by long-term aftercare and when the family became aware of any abuse they re-victimised them, which meant not believing them, blaming them, forcing them into a marriage, forcing them to leave the family home and in one case forcing the victim to have hymen repair surgery prior to a forced marriage”.
Of course, sexual abuse is not inherent in Islam. It should also be pointed out that this is a problem that needs to be tackled by the community, not a feature that defines it. However, the importance given to reputation, public image and taboo makes it difficult to access and support girls living in some Muslim communities. When authorities are failing girls without these complications, there is little hope for those who fear the response of their families or communities.
There was a feeling among my friends that the charities that dealt with child abuse wouldn’t know how to deal with the complexities of the situations facing children from ethnic minorities. Whether true or not, this image needs to change. More women from ethnic minority communities involved in establishing lines of communication for girls who otherwise remain voiceless would help, as would education for girls about the risks they face, how they can protect themselves and who is available to support them. Schools need to deal with the uncomfortable issues that have been ignored for so long, letting girls know they have the same rights and protection as any other person, regardless of their gender, ethnicity or religion.
Numbers of under-18s accused of sexual offences against other children have increased by nearly nine per cent in a year. Figures collated by the NSPCC following a Freedom of Information request to police forces in England and Wales show that in 2013/14, 4,209 children were accused of sexual offences compared to 3,868 in 2012/13. That represents an increase of 8.8 per cent. Peter Wanless, chief executive of the NSPCC, said easily available online pornography appears to be a factor behind young people committing sexual offences. “We know that for many older children pornography is now part of life,” he said. “Easy access to hard core, degrading and often violent videos on the internet is warping young people’s views of what is normal or acceptable behaviour. “It is also feeding into ‘sexting’ where teenagers are creating and distributing their own videos and images that are illegal and have led to prison sentences.” Wanless added that for very young children who have been accused of offences, some as young as five, questions must be asked about the environment in which they are growing up. “It could be that they have seen sexual activity that they are just too young to understand and are copying what they’ve seen,” he added. The NSPCC said the data revealed that most victims knew their alleged abuser with some of the most common crimes being teenage boys abusing female acquaintances. Although most abusers were male there was a small proportion of female abusers as well as both male and female victims. Crimes included serious sexual assaults, rape, and obscene publication offences. Wanless said that recognising the warning signs early and taking swift action was essential as harmful sexual behaviour can be turned around if caught early. “These children are not beyond help,” he said. “If we act quickly and children receive therapy such as that provided by the NSPCC’s ‘Turn the Page’ service we can stop them becoming adult sex offenders. “And, most importantly, their victims need support to overcome what has happened to them. “Sexual offences, whether committed by another child or an adult, can have lifelong consequences.” Alan Wood, president of the Association of Directors of Children’s Services (ADCS) said some young people who sexually abuse others are themselves victims of abuse and services must work to break the cycle of victims becoming perpetrators of the future. “Other children may struggle to understand boundaries as a consequence of exposure to inappropriate material such as online pornography, violent films or computer games, or extreme literature,” he added. “ADCS fully supports a full public debate of the issues surrounding the safeguarding and protection of children in an increasingly digital world that exposures children to new risks that they would not have faced in previous generations and where adults and agencies, thankfully, are getting better at recognising the nature of abusive behaviour.” Recent research by Research in Practice at the Dartington Hall Trust on harmful sexual behaviours by children and young people highlighted the need for local authorities to develop a more robust, joined-up response on the issue.
These Pakistanis have adopted the British values of grooming young children. They are the product of the British schooling with non-Muslim monolingual teachers. I have been doing Jihad in the field of education for the last 40 years so that each and every Muslim child should be in a state funded Muslim schools with bilingual Muslim teachers as role models during their developmental periods. I would like to see Muslim children developing Cultural, linguistic and spiritual identities so that they could keep themselves away from western barbarity of anti-social behaviour, binge drinking, drug addiction, teen age pregnancies and abortion and lot of other evils but people like you do not want to see Muslim children in Muslim schools in the name of integration. Now you have seen the result in the form of sexual grooming of young children which is a common occurrence in your culture.
Numbers of under-18s accused of sexual offences against other children have increased by nearly nine per cent in a year. Figures collated by the NSPCC following a Freedom of Information request to police forces in England and Wales show that in 2013/14, 4,209 children were accused of sexual offences compared to 3,868 in 2012/13. That represents an increase of 8.8 per cent. Peter Wanless, chief executive of the NSPCC, said easily available online pornography appears to be a factor behind young people committing sexual offences. “We know that for many older children pornography is now part of life,” he said. “Easy access to hard core, degrading and often violent videos on the internet is warping young people’s views of what is normal or acceptable behaviour. “It is also feeding into ‘sexting’ where teenagers are creating and distributing their own videos and images that are illegal and have led to prison sentences.” Wanless added that for very young children who have been accused of offences, some as young as five, questions must be asked about the environment in which they are growing up. “It could be that they have seen sexual activity that they are just too young to understand and are copying what they’ve seen,” he added. The NSPCC said the data revealed that most victims knew their alleged abuser with some of the most common crimes being teenage boys abusing female acquaintances. Although most abusers were male there was a small proportion of female abusers as well as both male and female victims. Crimes included serious sexual assaults, rape, and obscene publication offences. Wanless said that recognising the warning signs early and taking swift action was essential as harmful sexual behaviour can be turned around if caught early. “These children are not beyond help,” he said. “If we act quickly and children receive therapy such as that provided by the NSPCC’s ‘Turn the Page’ service we can stop them becoming adult sex offenders. “And, most importantly, their victims need support to overcome what has happened to them. “Sexual offences, whether committed by another child or an adult, can have lifelong consequences.” Alan Wood, president of the Association of Directors of Children’s Services (ADCS) said some young people who sexually abuse others are themselves victims of abuse and services must work to break the cycle of victims becoming perpetrators of the future. “Other children may struggle to understand boundaries as a consequence of exposure to inappropriate material such as online pornography, violent films or computer games, or extreme literature,” he added. “ADCS fully supports a full public debate of the issues surrounding the safeguarding and protection of children in an increasingly digital world that exposures children to new risks that they would not have faced in previous generations and where adults and agencies, thankfully, are getting better at recognising the nature of abusive behaviour.” Recent research by Research in Practice at the Dartington Hall Trust on harmful sexual behaviours by children and young people highlighted the need for local authorities to develop a more robust, joined-up response on the issue.
I’m surprised we’re not top! our teenagers are selfish, disgusting, loud, drunks and trouble makers when they are out and that includes girls.. This country’s youngsters are embarrassing and they are the same when they are abroad…I don’t know what’s happened… Why is this not surprising? most teenagers now days have terrible morals, horrible personalities and think that the most important thing in the world is looking good, being popular and being in a relationship. Most girls are fake looking and trashy and boys have lost that ‘gentleman’ quality about them. Teenagers nowadays are vile and I say this a NINETEEN year old. It disgusts me that being smart, virginal or sensible is seen as ‘stupid’ or ‘not cool’. It’s so sad.
Western girls of 9 and 11 are having babies out of wedlock but they are not allowed to marry at such ages. Thanks to sex education in primary schools. Obviously a lot of people are ignorant about sex education in our primary schools, which is a lot more explicit than a display in Boots. Children are sexually aware at an early age and therefore are encouraged to experiment with their bodies which is not wise.
The native Brits have double standards and are hypocrites; they don’t mention the fact that the majority of men who go to countries in East Asia looking for under aged sex are natives European men.
This is sickening. It’s no wonder Great Britain is in such a bad shape. Ten years old British girls are having babies out of wedlock. They are not allowed to get married but are allowed to have babies. Teenage pregnancy rate in Great Britain is the highest in Western Europe. It is a civilised country and Yemen is a backward country because it allows young girls to get married.
Britain is bottom of the league of 21 wealthiest countries in the world for the wellbeing of children, according to Unicef. The internationally recognised figure for child abuse in this country is 1.million children. The NSPCC describe one in ten children as having endured child sexual abuse. A recent report by Young Minds announced that one in 12 young people are said to self-harm. The age at which prostitution starts in Britain is 12.
Will the Jimmy Seville case be the tipping point? Has he, in being a revered member of the establishment, brought the child abuse truth into spaces that are more familiar than the ghettos of Britain? It is, paradoxically, his celebrity and our preoccupation with the celebrity culture that has kept this news alive for some two weeks. It would be a tragedy if this horror story didn’t lead to the substantial change of attitude required to make a difference.
Bernard’s says it is working with more than 1,000 children who have been groomed, abused and trafficked for money, and the problem is growing. This is sickening. It’s no wonder Great Britain is in such a bad shape. Ten years old British girls are having babies out of wedlock. They are not allowed to get married but are allowed to have babies.
Teenage pregnancy rate in Great Britain is the highest in western Europe. It is a civilised country and Yemen is a backward country because it allows young girls to get married. It is also gross hypocrisy for the police to prosecute paedophiles when the government is overseeing boy scouts being given condoms from the age 11 and girls of the same age being told it is OK to have sex if they use ‘protection’. Boys and girls at age 11 are not allowed to marry but they can have sex and produce children. Every parent is worried about his child being indoctrinated into the idea that gay and sexual promiscuity is “normal” modes of behaviour. At the same time, all parents have the right to control their children and it is their Duty to control them.
However, each year in England and Wales around 300 under-13s become pregnant. Since 2002 there have been 63,487 pregnancies among under-16s including 15 aged ten, 39 aged 11, 268 aged 12, 2,527 aged 13, 14,777 aged 14 and 45,861 aged 15. So it is clear that many young people either don’t have the information, access to help and advice, or the self-confidence to take precautions or say ‘no’.
The thought of being a virgin on your wedding night forget it, where are our morals and values. The answer, down the toilet. These are children having sex, getting pregnant exploring with partners. Just where is society going, I’m not psychic but from what’s going on in society today the future does not look pretty.
More than a quarter of young women today lost their virginity when they were below the legal age of consent, NHS figures reveal. This does not surprise me at all, Britain has the most teen pregnancies in the whole of Europe. . Very sad that despite sexual education in schools nothing has really changed in the last 30 years, if anything it has become worse. Britain has the highest rates of abortion, STDs, crime, obesity, divorce, illiterate school leavers, teen pregnancies, excessive drinking and drug use. Makes me ashamed.
Some 27 per cent of 16 to 24 year-olds admit they were 15 or under when they had sex for the first time.
One in eight of this age group have already had sex with at least ten different partners. MPs and campaigners yesterday blamed the ‘pornification of society’ for encouraging young girls to dress themselves up as sex objects before they have even reached puberty. Critics say the rise in promiscuity over the generations is linked to increased sex education in schools that has ‘broken down the natural inhibitions of children with regard to sexual conduct’.
This research confirms why the UK has the highest teenage BIRTH and ABORTION rates in Western Europe !!!!!!!
What’s the point of the legal age being 16 when you are being taught at school that it’s ok as long as you practice safe sex. Nothing about love, respect, serious relationships or more importantly abstinence! Oh and something needs to be done about BOYS, too! Girls can’t be the only ones responsible for resisting pressure you know. More sex education in schools = more teenage pregnancies= more abortions. One of the problems is that now in schools we are taught safe sex at an early age, and not abstinence. The message was basically that sex at a young age is fine as long as it’s practiced safely. It should be taught that at such a young age, neither protected or unprotected sex is ok. The message is simply not clear enough.
Indiscipline, incivility, binge drinking, drug addiction, gun and knife crimes, teenage pregnancies and abortion are part and parcel of British schooling. These are the reasons why majority of Muslim parents would like to send their children to Muslim schools with Muslim teachers as role models during their developmental periods. Only less than 5% attend Muslim schools and more than 95% keep on attending state and church schools to be mis-educated and de-educated by non-Muslim monolingual teachers.
There are hundreds of state and church schools where Muslim children are in majority. In my opinion, all such schools may be opted out as Muslim Academies. There is no place for a non-Muslim child or a teacher in a Muslim school.
IA
http://www.londonschoolofislamics.org.uk
What a racist comment …
“There is no place for a non-Muslim child or a teacher in a Muslim school.”
There should be no religon in schools..
You are blaming the girls who have been raped, so typical of an ignorant man..