Message #10 board "P_Metaphysical (Mag Articles)"
Date : 22-Jan-93 15:57
From : Simon Novali
To   : All
Subj : Lanning (7 of 11)

victimization is not only not a counterindication of abuse, but is 
in fact a corroborative indicator of extreme physical, 
psychological, and/or sexual abuse. I do not believe it is a 
coincidence nor the result of deliberate planning by satanists that 
in almost all the cases of ritual abuse that have come to my 
attention, the abuse is alleged to have begun prior to the age of 
seven and perpetrated by multiple offenders. It may well be that
such abuse, at young age by multiple offenders, is the most 
difficult to accurately recall with the specific and precise detail 
needed by the criminal justice system, and the most likely to be 
distorted and exaggerated when it is recalled. In her book _Too 
Scared to Cry_ (1990), child psychiatrist Lenore Terr, a leading 
expert on psychic trauma in childhood, states "that a series of 
early childhood shocks might not be fully and accurately 
'reconstructed' from the dreams and behaviors of the adult" (p. 5).
 
-- c. NORMAL CHILDHOOD FEARS AND FANTASY.

The third possible answer may be *normal childhood fears and 
fantasy*. Most young children are afraid of ghosts and monsters. 
Even as adults, many people feel uncomfortable, for example, about 
dangling their arms over the side of their bed. They still remember 
the "monster" under the bed from childhood. While young children may 
rarely invent stories about sexual activity, they might describe 
their victimization in terms of evil as they understand it. In 
church or at home, children may be told of satanic activity as the 
source of evil. The children may be "dumping" all their fears and 
worries unto an attentive and encouraging listener.

Children do fantasize. Perhaps whatever causes a child to allege 
something impossible (such as being cut up and put back together) is 
similar to what causes a child to allege something possible but 
improbable (such as witnessing another child being chopped up and 
eaten).

-- d. MISPERCEPTION, CONFUSION, AND TRICKERY.

Misperception, confusion, and trickery may be a fourth answer. 
Expecting young children to give accurate accounts of sexual 
activity for which they have little frame of reference is 
unreasonable. The Broadway play _Madame Butterfly_ is the true story 
of a man who had a 15-year affair, including the "birth" of a baby, 
with a "woman" who turns out to have been a man all along. If a 
grown man does not know when he has had vaginal intercourse with a 
woman, how can we expect young children not to be confused?

Furthermore some clever offenders may deliberately introduce 
elements of satanism and the occult into the sexual exploitation 
simply to confuse or intimidate the victims. Simple magic and other 
techniques may be used to trick the children. Drugs may also be 
deliberately used to confuse the victims and distort their 
perceptions. Such acts would then be M.O., not ritual.

As previously stated, the perceptions of young victims may also be 
influenced by any trauma being experienced. This is the most popular 
alternative explanation, and even the more zealous believers of 
ritual abuse allegations use it, but only to explain obviously 
impossible events.
 
-- e. OVERZEALOUS INTERVENORS.

*Overzealous intervenors*, causing intervenor contagion, may be a 
fifth answer. These intervenors can include parents, family members, 
foster parents, doctors, therapists, social workers, law enforcement 
officers, prosecutors, and any combination thereof. Victims have 
been subtly as well as overtly rewarded and bribed by usually well-
meaning intervenors for furnishing further details. In addition, 
some of what appears not to have happened may have originated as a 
result of intervenors making assumptions about or misinterpreting 
what the victims are saying. The intervenors then repeat, and 
possibly embellish, these assumptions and misinterpretations, and 
eventually the victims are "forced" to agree with or come to accept 
this "official" version of what happened.

The judgment of intervenors may be affected by their zeal to uncover 
child sexual abuse, satanic activity, or conspiracies. However 
"well-intentioned", these overzealous intervenors must accept 
varying degrees of responsibility for the unsuccessful prosecution 
of those cases where criminal abuse did occur. This is the most 
controversial and least popular of the alternative explanations.

-- f. URBAN LEGENDS.

Allegations of and knowledge about ritualistic or satanic abuse may 
also be spread through *urban legends*. In _The Vanishing 
Hitchhiker_ (1981), the first of his four books on the topic, Dr. 
Jan Harold Brunvand defines urban legends as "realistic stories 
concerning recent events (or alleged events) with an ironic or 
supernatural twist" (p. xi). Dr. Brunvand's books convincingly 
explain that just because individuals throughout the country who 
never met each other tell the same story does not mean that it is 
true. Absurd urban legends about the corporate logos of Proctor and 
Gamble and Liz Claiborne being satanic symbols persist in spite of 
all efforts to refute them with reality. Some urban legends about 
child kidnappings and other threats to citizens have even been 
disseminated unknowingly by law enforcement agencies. Such legends 
have always existed, but today the mass media aggressively 
participate in their rapid and more efficient dissemination. Many 
Americans mistakenly believe that tabloid television shows check out 
and verify the details of their stories before pulling them on the 
air. Mass hysteria may partially account for large numbers of 
victims describing the same symptoms or experiences.

Training conferences for all the disciplines involved in child 
sexual abuse may also play a role in the spread of this contagion. 
At one child abuse conference I attended, an exhibitor was selling 
more than 50 different books dealing with satanism and the occult. 
By the end of the conference, he had sold nearly all of them. At 
another national child sexual abuse conference, I witnessed more 
than 100 attendees copying down the widely disseminated 29 "Symptoms 
Characterizing Satanic Ritual Abuse" in preschool-aged children. Is 
a four-year-old child's "preoccupation with urine and feces" an 
indication of satanic ritual abuse or part of normal development?

-- g. COMBINATION.

Most multidimensional child sex ring cases probably involve a 
*combination* of the answers previously set forth, as well as other 
possible explanations unknown to me at this time. Obviously, cases 
with adult survivors are more likely to involve some of these 
answers than those with young children. Each case of sexual 
victimization must be individually evaluated on its own merits 
without any preconceived explanations. All the possibilities must be 
explored if for no other reason than the fact that the defense 
attorneys for any accused subjects will almost certainly do so.

Most people would agree that just because a victim tells you one 
detail that turns out to be true, this does not mean that every 
detail is true. But many people seem to believe that if you can 
disprove one part of a victim's story, then the entire story is 
false. As previously stated, one of my main concerns in these cases 
is that people are getting away with sexually abusing children or 
committing other crimes because we cannot prove that they are 
members of organized cults that murder and eat people.

I have discovered that the subject of multidimensional child sex 
rings is a very emotional and polarizing issue. Everyone seems to 
demand that one choose a side. On one side of the issue are those 
who say that nothing really happened and it is all a big witch hunt
led by overzealous fanatics and incompetent "experts". The other 
side says, in essence, that everything happened; victims never lie 
about child sexual abuse, and so it must be true.

There is a middle ground. It is the job of the professional 
investigator to listen to all the victims and conduct appropriate 
investigation in an effort to find out what happened, considering 
all possibilities. Not all childhood trauma is abuse. Not all child 
abuse is a crime. The great frustration of these cases is the fact 
that you are often convinced that something traumatic happened to 
the victim, but do not know with any degree of certainty exactly 
what happened, when it happened, or who did it. 

7. DO VICTIMS LIE ABOUT SEXUAL ABUSE AND EXPLOITATION?

The crucial central issue in the evaluation of a response to cases 
of multidimensional child sex rings is the statement "Children never 
lie about sexual abuse or exploitation. If they have details, it 
must have happened." This statement, oversimplified by many, is the 
basic premise upon which some believe the child sexual abuse and 
exploitation movement is based. It is almost never questioned or 
debated at training conferences. In fact, during the 1970s, there 
was a successful crusade to eliminate laws requiring corroboration 
of child victim statements in child sexual abuse cases. The best way 
to convict child molesters is to have the child victims testify in 
court. If we believe them, the jury will believe them. Any challenge 
to this basic premise was viewed as a threat to the movement and a 
denial that the problem existed.

I believe that children *rarely* lie about sexual abuse or 
exploitation, if a lie is defined as a statement deliberately and 
maliciously intended to deceive. The problem is the 
oversimplification of the statement. Just because a child is not 
lying does not necessarily mean the child is telling the truth. I 
believe that in the majority of these cases, the victims are not 
lying. They are telling you what they have come to believe has 
happened to them. Furthermore the assumption that children rarely 
lie about sexual abuse does not necessarily apply to everything a 
child says during a sexual abuse investigation. Stories of 
mutilation, murder, and cannibalism are not really about sexual 
abuse.

Children rarely lie about sexual abuse or exploitation. but they do 
fantasize, furnish false information, furnish misleading 
information, misperceive events, try to please adults, respond to 
leading questions, and respond to rewards. Children are not adults 
in little bodies and do go through developmental stages that must be 
evaluated and understood. In many ways, however, children are no 
better and no worse than other victims or witnesses of a crime. They 
should not be automatically believed, nor should they be 
automatically disbelieved.

The second part of the statement - if children can supply details, 
the crime must have happened - must also be carefully evaluated. The 
details in question in most of the cases of multidimensional child 
sex rings have little to do with sexual activity. Law enforcement 
and social workers must do more than attempt to determine how a 
child could have known about the sex acts. These cases involve 
determining how a victim could have known about a wide variety of 
bizarre and ritualistic activity. Young children may know little 
about specific sex acts, but they may know a lot about monsters, 
torture, kidnapping, and murder.

Victims may supply details of sexual and other acts using 
information from sources other than their own direct victimization. 
Such sources must be evaluated carefully by the investigator of
multidimensional child sex rings.

-- a. PERSONAL KNOWLEDGE.

The victim may have personal knowledge of the sexual or ritual acts, 
but not as a result of the alleged victimization. The knowledge 
could have come from viewing pornography, sex education, or occult 
material; witnessing sexual or ritual activity in the home; or 
witnessing the sexual abuse of others. It could also have come from 
having been sexually or physically abused, but by other than the 
alleged offenders and in ways other than the alleged offense.

-- b. OTHER CHILDREN OR VICTIMS.

Young children today are socially interacting more often and at a 
younger age than ever before. Many parents are unable to provide 
possibly simple explanations for their children's stories because 
they were not with the children when the events occurred. They do 
not even know what videotapes their children may have seen, what 
games they may have played, or what stories they may have been told 
or overheard. Children are being placed in day care centers for 
eight, ten, or twelve hours a day starting as young as six weeks of 
age. The children share experiences by playing house, school, or 
doctor. Bodily functions such as urination and defecation are a 
focus of attention for these young children. To a certain extent, 
each child shares the experiences of all the other children.

The odds are fairly high that in any typical day care center there 
might be some children who are victims of incest; victims of 
physical abuse; victims of psychological abuse; children of cult 
members (even satanists); children of sexually open parents; 
children of sexually indiscriminate parents; children of parents 
obsessed with victimization; children of parents obsessed with the 
evils of satanism; children without conscience; children with a 
teenage brother or pregnant mother; children with heavy metal music 
and literature in the home; children with bizarre toys, games, 
comics, and magazines; children with a VCR and slasher films in 
their home; children with access to dial-a-porn, party lines, or 
pornography; or children victimized by a day care center staff 
member. The possible effects of the interaction of such children 
prior to the disclosure of the alleged abuse must be evaluated, 
Adult survivors may obtain details from group therapy sessions, 
support networks, church groups, or self-help groups. The 
willingness and ability of siblings to corroborate adult survivor 
accounts of ritual abuse varies. Some will support and partially 
corroborate the victim's allegations. Others will vehemently deny 
them and support their accused parents or relatives.

-- c. MEDIA.

The amount of sexually explicit, occult, anti-occult, or violence-
oriented material available to adults and even children in the 



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 * Origin: The Northern Lights 916-729-0304 (1:203/444)
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