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Protecting the Gift
anonsouthernbell
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I recently read a Free Range kids thread that made me remember a book that I wanted to check out from the library by Gavin de Becker entitled Protecting the Gift.
I read the introduction today and thought I would share some of the
information in it as I found it really informative and eye opening.
Please excuse any typos as I typed the quotes up in Google docs and the
autosave messes up w/my typing...
?Of all the strategies that might bring to protecting children, do you suppose that worry is an effective one? I can tell you it is not.
I?ve been helping people manage fear and risk for almost a quarter-century and one of the ironies of worry is that it enhances risk. That?s because as you worry about some imagined danger, you are distracted from what is actually happening. Perception and not worry is what serves safety. Perception focuses your attention; worry blurs it. And most ironically, the things we worry about are often chosen specifically because they are more palatable than likelier possibilities. Here?s an example: It is easier for the worrier to wring his hands about the possible risk posed by an unknown molester who might wander into the neighborhood than to accept the intuition that someone who was invited into the house is sexually abusing a child. Before you banish that thought, understand that nearly 90 percent of sexual abuse is committed by someone the children know, not strangers.
Hard as it is to accept the idea that some well-liked neighbor or friend of the family might be sexually abusing a child, imagine the idea that it?s someone in your family. The denier doesn?t have to consider this because it?s so easy to replace that unwelcome thought with a warmer one like ?Not in this family.? Yet, one in three girls and one in six boys will have sexual contact with an adult, so somebody must be responsible. You can be certain that wherever it is happening, a denier is sitting in a box seat watching the performance that precedes the crime, watching a predator snake his way into a position of advantage, watching an adult persuade a child to trust him. During the beginning of sexual abuse, deniers will volunteer for the job of designing theories to explain the onset of a child?s sleep disturbances or eating problems or sudden fear of that same adult she liked so much just a week ago...
If a discussion requires exploration of some hard reality, the denier will first try to wriggle away ? ?Yes, I know all about that stuff; can we please change to a happier subject?? Under pressure, he or she will acknowledge a given risk, for as a seasoned veteran in a long battle with reality, the denier has learned that appearing to get it, to really get it, is the best defense against unwanted knowledge. And the denier is not stupid - to the contrary, there is brilliance in the creative ways, that his or her children can be excluded from the discussion. ?You?re so right,denier says, ?sexual abuse is an enormous problem, particularly for young teens. Thank God mine aren?t there yet.?
No, sorry, says reality, the most common age at which sexual abuse begins is three....
?Yeah, but that kind of pervert isn?t living in our neighborhood.?
Sorry, says reality, but that kind of pervert is living in your neighborhood. The U.S. Department of Justice estimates that on average, there is one child molester per square mile.
?Well at least the police know who these people are.?
Not likely, says reality, since the average child molester victimizes between thirty and sixty children before he is ever arrested. (And anyway, when he is arrested, there?s always a denier vouching for him with the familiar mantras: ?But he?s such a nice man,? or ?You can?t believe everything a child says.?)
When all the defenses against reality are taken away, the denier switches to resignation (literally resigning from responsibility): ?Well, there?s nothing you can do about it anyway.? This misplaced fatalism actually becomes fatal for some children...The final verse you hear as a denier scuttles away from responsibility is also the most offensive: ?Well, kids are resilient, When bad things, they bounce back.?
Absolutely not, says reality, they don?t bounce back. They adjust, they conceal, they repress, and sometimes they accept and move on, but they don?t bounce back. In fact, contrary to the apparent belief of some people, children don?t bounce at all....
because for virtually every cruelty done to a child, there is an audience of deniers that stays seated, sees the signals and quickly closes their eyes...? p. 14-17
?Denial is choosing not to know something even when the evidence is obvious. ? p. 18
?In her brilliant book, Parents Who Think Too Much, author Anne Cassidy discusses our obsession with the safety of children: ?The Suits of armor we provide them are as dangerous as the world we?re protecting them from.? p. 18
?Of all the strategies that might bring to protecting children, do you suppose that worry is an effective one? I can tell you it is not.
I?ve been helping people manage fear and risk for almost a quarter-century and one of the ironies of worry is that it enhances risk. That?s because as you worry about some imagined danger, you are distracted from what is actually happening. Perception and not worry is what serves safety. Perception focuses your attention; worry blurs it. And most ironically, the things we worry about are often chosen specifically because they are more palatable than likelier possibilities. Here?s an example: It is easier for the worrier to wring his hands about the possible risk posed by an unknown molester who might wander into the neighborhood than to accept the intuition that someone who was invited into the house is sexually abusing a child. Before you banish that thought, understand that nearly 90 percent of sexual abuse is committed by someone the children know, not strangers.
Hard as it is to accept the idea that some well-liked neighbor or friend of the family might be sexually abusing a child, imagine the idea that it?s someone in your family. The denier doesn?t have to consider this because it?s so easy to replace that unwelcome thought with a warmer one like ?Not in this family.? Yet, one in three girls and one in six boys will have sexual contact with an adult, so somebody must be responsible. You can be certain that wherever it is happening, a denier is sitting in a box seat watching the performance that precedes the crime, watching a predator snake his way into a position of advantage, watching an adult persuade a child to trust him. During the beginning of sexual abuse, deniers will volunteer for the job of designing theories to explain the onset of a child?s sleep disturbances or eating problems or sudden fear of that same adult she liked so much just a week ago...
If a discussion requires exploration of some hard reality, the denier will first try to wriggle away ? ?Yes, I know all about that stuff; can we please change to a happier subject?? Under pressure, he or she will acknowledge a given risk, for as a seasoned veteran in a long battle with reality, the denier has learned that appearing to get it, to really get it, is the best defense against unwanted knowledge. And the denier is not stupid - to the contrary, there is brilliance in the creative ways, that his or her children can be excluded from the discussion. ?You?re so right,denier says, ?sexual abuse is an enormous problem, particularly for young teens. Thank God mine aren?t there yet.?
No, sorry, says reality, the most common age at which sexual abuse begins is three....
?Yeah, but that kind of pervert isn?t living in our neighborhood.?
Sorry, says reality, but that kind of pervert is living in your neighborhood. The U.S. Department of Justice estimates that on average, there is one child molester per square mile.
?Well at least the police know who these people are.?
Not likely, says reality, since the average child molester victimizes between thirty and sixty children before he is ever arrested. (And anyway, when he is arrested, there?s always a denier vouching for him with the familiar mantras: ?But he?s such a nice man,? or ?You can?t believe everything a child says.?)
When all the defenses against reality are taken away, the denier switches to resignation (literally resigning from responsibility): ?Well, there?s nothing you can do about it anyway.? This misplaced fatalism actually becomes fatal for some children...The final verse you hear as a denier scuttles away from responsibility is also the most offensive: ?Well, kids are resilient, When bad things, they bounce back.?
Absolutely not, says reality, they don?t bounce back. They adjust, they conceal, they repress, and sometimes they accept and move on, but they don?t bounce back. In fact, contrary to the apparent belief of some people, children don?t bounce at all....
because for virtually every cruelty done to a child, there is an audience of deniers that stays seated, sees the signals and quickly closes their eyes...? p. 14-17
?Denial is choosing not to know something even when the evidence is obvious. ? p. 18
?In her brilliant book, Parents Who Think Too Much, author Anne Cassidy discusses our obsession with the safety of children: ?The Suits of armor we provide them are as dangerous as the world we?re protecting them from.? p. 18
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Re: Protecting the Gift
Francesca Pearl is here! Josephine Hope is almost 3!
You are more than welcome, I am glad that you found it useful. I am looking forward to reading the rest of his book as I feel that one of the best ways that I can protect my son is to be as informed as I can be on the subject.
Meghan - what district do you teach in? what age? I only ask bc I taught in Balt City for 5 years and we didn't have anything like that and I definitely think as you said it is a necessity!
that sounds wonderful!