Hannah Marsh
IT’S late, and it’s been on the news all day, heading up bulletins on Six Music as I’ve packed (or pretended to pack) up the flat.
But it’s also important, because something was brought to national attention today that marks the level of misogyny so deeply ingrained in our society that a female child victim can be blamed for the sexual abuse she suffered at the hands of a male paedophile in a court of law.
Barrister Robert Colover was prosecuting for the Crown Prosecution Service in the case of paedophile Neil Wilson – who walked free from court with a suspended sentence, more on that later – when he reportedly described the 13-year-old victim as predatory in her actions and sexually experienced.
His implication that a child could bring sexual abuse upon herself and was somehow asking for it or to blame for the vile abuse and breach of trust inflicted upon her by a grown man was seemingly upheld by the judge in the case, Nigel Peters, who took into account that the girl looked older than she really was and said she had been egging Wilson on when he handed out the lenient sentence.
In my mind there is only one predator here.
He’s a paeodophile named Neil Wilson, who was found to have child porn and bestiality on his computer and who pleaded guilty to two counts of making extreme pornographic images and one count of sexual activity with a child, not his vulnerable victim who was subjected to his abuse.
There are those who will defend the barrister and the sentence arguing that some young girls do look older than their years and who do dress in a way seemingly aimed at attracting male attention.
I’m not trying to say that all 13-year-old girls are angels, curly haired maidens collecting flowers and taming birds, for goodness sake I’ve been a 13-year-old girl, I know what some 13-year-old-girls get up to.
I know the confusing, embattled years as you attempt to emulate popstars and celebrities, braving the cold in as few clothes as possible, trying to get served in pubs and newsagents to buy fags and revelling in cat calls at your rolled up school skirt, be a grown up.
But nothing that a 13-year-old girl does gives any excuse for a decision made by a man in his Forties who decides to treat a child as a consenting adult.
She’s a child, and if she’s sexually experienced and ‘predatory’ chances are she has her own issues and is extremely vulnerable.
You don’t tend to be ‘sexually experienced’ at 13 years old when your experience of sex has been healthy.
We don’t know anything about the girl – that’s how our legal system works, anonymity for victims of sexual offences unless they themselves choose to lift it, and long may it stay that way.
But we don’t need to to make the judgement that Robert Colover’s comments were crude, offensive and plain wrong.
Sadly though, they’re indicative of a misogyny so ingrained in our culture and society that rather than being reprimanded by the judge hearing the case, his court colleague appeared to take a similar view, dishing out the laughable sentence, which is currently being investigated itself by the attorney general for possible leniency.
As a journalist and once-regular court hack that comes as absolutely no surprise.
Covering cases of abuse and violence it wasn’t uncommon for the (usually female) victim in such cases to have their character assassinated in such a way that left them blamed and attacked in a court of law, an unpleasant undercurrent running beneath that hinted women sometimes bring abuse by men upon themselves through their own behaviour.
The culture of victim blaming, of women – and children, children for goodness sake – as harlots, painted sirens, wicked women who lure and taunt helpless men into acts of violence and depravity is as insulting to men as it is to women.
It suggests that any man – your brother, your father, your husband or boyfriend – is capable of being having their head turned by a foxy, dolled up teen-child who sets out to use her womanly ways to seduce them.
It lends the man who preyed on and abused a vulnerable child a Carry On-ish air of ‘honest guv, I had no idea she was 13, you’d never have guessed it *giggle*’ and the judge the cartoonish aspect of sympathising with the caught-with-his-trousers-down fellow: ‘*nudge, nudge, wink, wink* Alright, we understand, now be off with you and don’t let me see you in my court again this week you cheeky monkey.’
On a more sinister note, it paints all men as potential paedophiles, the line between right and wrong simply the chance circumstance of a tempting teen with the sexual wiles of an adult wafting her tantalising titties in his direction.
Bullshit.
Of course David Cameron weighed in, describing the comments rather tamely as inappropriate, and giving the watery statement that we need a criminal justice system that stands up properly for its victims.
But to be honest it’s hard to take DC seriously on matters of sexual abuse and victim blaming.
I’m certainly not saying that the Sun Page Three equates to the sexual abuse of a child as in this case, but evidence has been building of the damaging effect the notorious daily appearance of a youthful beauty in just her pants has on young women and girls forced to endure its presence on news stands, on the breakfast table, on the bus and often it seems, thrust at them mockingly by their male classmates.
Of course its not the same as abuse at the hands of a paedophile but it’s damaging, bullish, offensive and powerful and smacks of an attempt to viciously patronise women, keep them in their place, control them by painting them as the Sun says they should appear and behave and reeks of the same deeply ingrained misogyny that needs routing from our society.
So if Dave is all that bothered about supporting victims, why doesn’t he change his tune on Page Three – for the record he said that he felt it was up to consumers whether or not they bought the Sun so there was essentially no problem with the best selling paper in the country featuring a large picture of a woman in her pants as its most prominent indication of a feminine role.
Maybe we need a Prime Minister who stands up for his country’s victims as well.
But more importantly we need a society that sees victims of abuse as victims, not perpetrators, that doesn’t seek to blame them for the dreadful abuses they suffer at the hands of knowing, culpable individuals with the choice and power to act or not act on their impulses.
One that doesn’t call an abused child a knowing, wily whore.
That’d be a good start.
The Equalist 