Quote:
Originally Posted by ~Christina A~
I think we hear about them less because people talk about it less. The idea of the abusive woman/mother just goes against the grain of our wonder-mom narrative that we have in our culture, but the bad-dad is a really common cultural stereotype. People are less likely to report abuse from a woman/mom/wife/sister, etc. than they are from a man.
I once did a story about incest perpetrated by women, and it was shocking to learn how often this happens. One of the commons among victims is that many of them felt like they could NOT come forward with this kind of abuse because it would be LESS BELIEVABLE to others. The idea of a woman molesting a child goes against our basic concepts of "mother/woman" in a whole different way than it does when we think about men doing the same thing.
To the second bolded: the worst abusers are the ones you'll least expect because they are masters at hiding their intentions. To think you can pick up on the intentions of someone who has genuine intent to harm - either male or female - is foolhardy. Don't get me wrong, I believe in intuition and going with your gut, but most people who have had children abused or injured or even killed by caretakers will tell you that they trusted that person completely and they even have a hard time believing the person did what they are accused of.
 This is one of those things to me that sometimes our "automatic response" has to be examined because it isn't necessarily fair or valid. |
I'm completely spinning off with this, but two Colorado teens who were convicted of first-degree murder when they killed their parents both came forward saying they were forced to have sex with their mothers. Andrika and I talked a little bit about them in the "children tried as adults" thread. They're both serving life without parole, and I think a huge part of that is our reluctance as a society to believe a mother could do that, although we're quick to point the finger at male caregivers. For one of the boys, the allegations of abuse weren't even brought up by his attorney.