The difference
| Posted by Chill on 06 Feb 2010 at 12:54 am |
Apropos of nothing, just some random thought.
Though it is certainly true that men are more likely to be child molesters, but because far, far more children are in the care of women it is almost certainly true that the higher absolute number (and probably by a long shot, too) of molestations of kids around the world are perpetrated by women.
Also, there’s the fact that at least in the US (not sure how it is in other countries), actions that would get a man in trouble would often not be looked at twice (or even reported) if done by a woman.
Anyone who molests a child — not that I think children are precious snowflakes — obviously has mental issues, but I always enjoy poking holes in people’s sacred notions because they lead to sloppy thinking. Just statistically speaking, the fact is that most abuse of children in absolute terms is probably done by women is extremely hard to argue against considering that worldwide upwards of 90% of child-care is done by women.
There was this Dr. Phil show about a woman who breastfed her 9-year-old. Nobody agreed with me that this was child abuse. Of course, if we had a father giving his body parts to his school-age child to suck on for no other purpose than his own gratification, imagine what would happen to that father.
There is a huge double standard that brands as child abuse certain things done by a man which – were they to come from a woman – nobody would condemn.
Stumbled across this via Metafilter, which I also thought was interesting.