The staggering cost of silence: child abuse victims and stolen innocence, Child sex abuse is a taboo topic for some parents, New Laws in Turkey Against Child Abuse

The staggering cost of silence: child abuse victims and stolen innocence By Jerome Elam, Michael Reagan April 29, 2014

....The CDC estimates that 1 in 4 girls and 1 in 6 boys are sexually abused before the age of 18.

Worldwide 550 million children are survivors of child abuse according to the Center for Advanced Studies in Child Welfare.

The National Center for Missing and Exploited Children reports that there are currently 617,000 registered sex offenders in the United States, and typically 100,000 of those are unaccounted for. Other pedophiles are not on records or in databases. Pedophiles like Jerry Sandusky walk silently among us, and Sandusky showed us just how well they disguise themselves.

April is National Child Abuse Awareness month and it is an important time for everyone to reacquaint himself or herself with the information that is necessary to recognize the signs of child abuse and stop predators before another child suffers.

Research has shown that an average victim of child sex abuse has to tell at least seven adults before being believed.

According to the Journal for the American Medical Association only 1 in 20 cases of child abuse are reported.

It is critically important that every parent and adult responsible for the care of a child educate and empower themselves with the knowledge to stop predators.

If we work together we can stop the stolen innocence of our children and that of others by spending a few hours educating ourselves....
http://www.foxnews.com/opinion/2014/04/29/staggering-cost-silence-child-abuse-victims-and-stolen-innocence/


Child sex abuse is a taboo topic for some parents
By Kelly Wallace, CNN Wed April 30, 2014

....Jill Starishevsky, a New York City assistant district attorney in the child abuse and sex crimes bureau and author of the book "My Body Belongs to Me," shared a story about an upper-middle-class New York family, a story that still gives me chills two years after I first heard it.

A mom goes shopping, leaving her 11-year-old daughter and 9-year-old son home. The daughter is miserable and moping around the house so much that her brother asks her, "What's your problem? Why are you so sad all the time?" said Starishevsky. He then says something like, "It's not like Grandpa ... is boinking you."

At that moment, the 11-year-old realizes that her grandfather, her mother's father, is doing to her brother what he has been doing to her for the past three years. The children decide they need to tell their mother when she gets home.

....Many of us aren't talking to our children about sexual abuse, even when the statistics make it crystal clear why we should be: As many as one in four girls and one in six boys is sexually abused before their 18th birthday, according to research by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

....So, in between prosecuting sex crimes and mothering her three children, Starishevsky wrote a straightforward book targeting 3- to 8-year-olds with rhymes and simple illustrations. Getting a publisher turned out to be easier than expected, but there was one problem.

In the book, Starishevsky doesn't just allude to the abuse. She includes it.

"My uncle's friend came over and sat down next to me, and touched me in that place that no one else can see," she writes, with illustrations of a fully clothed child sitting near the uncle's friend, who is also fully clothed. You don't see the abuse but it's clear it just happened.

The publisher wanted that line to come out, according to Starishevsky. "They said, 'Well we don't think parents would like the book with the line in. You have to take it out. Allude to it but you can't actually say it.' "

Starishevsky refused and the publisher backed out, so she self-published the book in 2009, and eventually got the attention of Oprah Winfrey's television producers. She appeared in a segment on "The Oprah Winfrey Show" in 2011....
http://www.cnn.com/2014/04/29/living/sexual-abuse-talking-to-kids-parents/


NEW LAWS IN TURKEY AGAINST CHILD ABUSE
by AA 30.04.2014
ANKARA — A series of draft laws covering child and sexual abuse are set to be made public, Turkey's family and social policies minister has said....

The bill will increase the punishment for sexual crimes committed against adults as well as children. Forced marriages penalized Under the proposed laws, those who commit abuse would undergo psychiatric or chemical treatment to "set the perpetrator to normal mode," Minister Islam said.

The bills will also ensure that any perpetrator who has committed a sexual crime against children is forced to stay away from them for the rest of their lives. Another draft law will also penalize forced marriages. Islam said that children under the compulsory 4+4+4 education system (four years of primary education at a first level, four at second and four at secondary education) would not be allowed to enter a forced marriage. A 12-year-old child will be obliged to go to school until she is 18 and the education system will help prevent forced marriages, she added.
http://www.dailysabah.com/nation/2014/04/30/new-laws-in-turkey-against-child-abuse