Feminist Theory of child sexual abuse

Feminist Theory of child sexual abuse In the 1970s and 1980s, feminist writers began to discuss the relationship of child
sexual abuse to the social environment (Herman, 1981; Rush, 1980). Feminists
believed that child sexual abuse was symptomatic of a patriarchal society in which males had power over females. One of the ways in which males were said to abuse
that power was through the sexual abuse of women and children. Abuse was thus conceptualized as an extension of socially normative behavior between males and females. As such, one of the striking questions posed by feminists was not why some
men abused, but why all men did not (Herman, 1990).
Feminists were unwilling to consider rationalizations for abuse, regarding them as diluting the focus on the offender’s behavior. Hence, their most important message to the developing knowledge base of child sexual abuse was that the
offender was always 100% culpable and responsible for the abuse. As such, much of the early feminist literature was reactionary, attacking theories that suggested anything
less than 100% culpability for the offender. Certain papers discussed Freud’s retraction of the seduction theory and its effect on victims of abuse (Herman, 1981; Rush, 1980; Westerlund, 1986). Others were written in reaction to family systems
literature and to reframe the role of the offender to the incest (Waldby, Clancy,Emetchi, & Summerfield, 1989), whereas others reframed the pejorative literature on
nonoffending mothers (Jacobs, 1990; McIntyre, 1981).
While experts on child sexual abuse have adopted the feminist position that the sexual abuse is totally the responsibility and culpability of the offender, not all mental health professionals so readily agree. Instead, most studies on attribution of
blame find that culpability continues to be distributed among the child, offender, and
nonoffending mother. Two different studies on professional attribution of blame
published in the 1980s found that mean scores for offenders ranged from 2.7 to 4.3 on a five-point scale, with five designating full responsibility (Jackson & Sandberg,
1985; Saunders, 1988). In a study published in 1993 (Reidy & Hochstadt), mean offender blame was 5.4 on a six-point scale. Further, for studies published in the 1990s, only between 65% and 84% of blame is attributed by professionals to the
offender (Johnson et al., 1990; Kalichman et al., 1990; Kelley, 1990; Reidy &
Hochstadt, 1993). In one ofthese studies (Kelley, 1990), only 12% ofthe respondents
held the offender entirely responsible for the abuse, although the offender was assigned
the greatest amount of responsibility (70%) for the abuse. Of concern as well,
professionals rate offenders as less culpable when they deny the abuse (Kalichman et
al., 1990). Of particular concern is the finding by Kelley (1990) that professionals
were more tolerant of, and recommended less severe sentences for, offenders who held a higher social status (a prominent attorney versus an unemployed alcoholic).
Another study (Hanson & Slater, 1993) found that therapists and police officers attributed varying amounts of responsibility to the offender based on his motivation
for the abuse. On a seven-point scale, responsibility ratings varied from 5.4 when the
offender related a personal history of child sexual abuse or was not getting along with his wife to 6.2 when the offender admitted to the offense and said that his
behavior was unacceptable. While these studies suggest that most of the blame is
now being placed upon the offender, there are disquieting findings. Studies find that
culpability is differentially related to characteristics ofboth the offender and the abuse
situation, suggesting that professionals do not yet agree that the offender is fully responsible for the abuse. In this sense, feminists have failed to have the impact on the
identification and conceptualization of child sexual abuse that they sought.
This failure to have the desired impact is acknowledged by feminists. When the feminist perspective of child sexual abuse was introduced in the 1970s, there was a
sense of optimism for change. “It was heady stuff, then, the finding of corroboration;
the high-energy dialogue; the sense of urgent purpose behind the research and analysis, the clear naming that signaled serious purpose” (Annstrong, 1996, p. 298).
Feminists believed that change would come simply by naming child sexual abuse
and by explicating and clarifying the societal factors they believed to be linked to
child sexual abuse. Obviously, change did not come in the expected manner. As Armstrong stated of the past 20 years, “The point of feminists speaking out about
incest in the first place seems all but irretrievably lost” (p. 299).
Why did the feminist movement not have the impact it expected? This is an
intriguing question given the important advances in the knowledge base in other areas of child sexual abuse. There are probably several reasons, but perhaps the most
important reason is that feminists were taking on awesome and deeply ingrained
societal forces. The feminist analysis suggests that patriarchy is the most important
contributor to sexual abuse. Yet patriarchy is deeply engrained and embedded within our culture. For the prevalence of sexual abuse to lessen, then, the very foundation of
society, and the foundation representing the most powerful, would have to change.
How could feminists expect the powerful majority to willingly give up that power?
Armstrong (1996) also advances another intriguing idea. She believes that the
medical model has done extreme harm to the movement to conceptualize child sexual
abuse as an abuse of power within society. By pathologizing victims, she suggests,
the medical model brings the focus to bear upon the victims’ psychopathology instead
of why they are abused. Symptomatology in victims becomes paramount and the offender as the central figure disappears, becoming only a “passive spectre” (p. 300).
In this shift in models, “there is an acceptance of the wounding itself that is both terrifying and dreadful. There is a profound pessimism in the implied tolerance”
(p. 300). Within this perspective, she suggests that it is the degree of wounding, not
the wrongfulness of that deed, that receives paramount interest. Of this paradox she
states, “In allowing ourselves to be led from the understanding of incest as socially
normative, supportive of male dominance, to the exclusive focus on florid symptoms,
exotic behaviors, we have been led from the truth of agony to the brink of comedy”
(p. 300).
Hers is an interesting perspective that may bear much truth. Perhaps though,
the medical model is a first step towards accepting the scope of the problem of child
sexual abuse. Society today is willing to concede the need to treat victims, although
it in no way appears ready to concede the need to change the underlying societal
structure that contributes to child sexual abuse. The medical model may therefore be
a transitional model between what was and what will be. The danger, however, is in
becoming lost in it and forgetting that a larger truth about child sexual abuse is being
overlooked and largely forgotten.