Groping versus sexual predators.

[i-need-a-martini]

Let me preface this post by saying that I thnk anyone that has sex with a child is evil and I do not support anyone who is this way inclined. 

However, as I read the Rolf Harris trial it seems to me that the now grown women he was handy with are taking this to the extreme. He doesn't seem to have done anything beyond being very handy. The only sex he had was with a girl who was in her 2os at the time and there is no crime against that. Yet the news report women standing in the dock sobbing and being emotional or describing their lives wasted by depression, drug and alc addiction all because Harris groped them once. In one case something happened when one of the girls was 5 so not even at an age to fully appreciate that a touch could be sexual.

I don't get it where these women are coming from. How can they be so vulnerable and have fallen apart so readily at something like this?

I come from a big Italian family so I am used to 'handiness'. As kids we learnt to duck certain relatives but it never occurred to me then (and nor does it now) that it was anything other than annoyance.

(I should also point out that I haven't read every article in the Harris case so if there is more to it that I am not seeing, let me know).

[polksaladallie]

It is sexual assault whoever is doing it.  That's what Harris has been charged with.

I do not consider a hand down the pants or under the shirt as innocuous "handiness".

IMO the aftermath depends on what the child has been told before, if at all, and how the child is treated after, if at all.  Sometimes the severity of these assaults causes a screwed up self image and an inability to have normal relationships.  Not everyone can shrug it off.

[polksaladallie]

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@**what_would_bob_do** wrote:

Umma, the femenist would have you for lunch. 

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Aren't you a feminist, Bob?   If not, why not?  

Apart from that, what does feminism gave to do with sexual assault?

[youcandoityoucandoityoucandoit]

I didnt mean to infer that anyone ought to just accept behaviour because they know the person -ie, a relative, I was just pointing out that there are differences in the situation. For example, imagine if both are strangers, there may be no warning of the assault, but if there is regular contact, there could be prior warning..as someone has mentioned here in another post.

Also, as much as I would like to live in a world where everyone is 'responsible for their own reactions' I wouldnt want to be a parent trying to explain to my young daughter if she had been assaulted that somehow she needed to be responsible for her own reactions. One might like to think that we ought to be able to cope with anything that happens, but I wont sit and judge someone who in this instance is an innocent victim of someone elses alleged crime.

[azureline**]

I would never expect a child to be responsible for their reaction to assault.

As an adult though we can choose how we let it affect us.

[cherry*135]

The main complainant ( daughters childhood friend) had 8 incidents of sexual activity with Harris over 11 years. That ended when she tried to blackmail him into giving her money for her boyfriends bird/animal sanctuary which he refused to do.

That is a very odd 'relationship'.

One of the complainants was 3 years out in the year given the abuse happened in Cambridge (where Harris claimed he had never been there until recently)

[youcandoityoucandoityoucandoit]

My understanding is that some of these assaults happened to children? What about if the assault happened when the person was a child, and its only as an adult that they have an opportunity to 'choose how it affects them'?

I cant even imagine what it would be like to have been assaulted and then, after telling someone, to not be believed...and although I would like to think I would be able to cope and somehow move on, Im not so sure.

It certainly wouldnt be the same for everyone. Maybe for some of these women, going to Court IS dealing with it..Imagine it.
It cant be easy for them, but maybe, just maybe, they might be able to heal some of the effects of the abuse.

[the*scarlet*pimpernel]

Can someone tell me what is Indecent Assault, and what is Sexual Assualt?

[freakiness]

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@youcandoityoucandoityoucandoit wrote:

I cant even imagine what it would be like to have been assaulted and then, after telling someone, to not be believed...and although I would like to think I would be able to cope and somehow move on, Im not so sure.

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Not only were they mostly not believed they were often called trouble makers and liars and threatened with physical punishment if they dared to repeat such stories.

[polksaladallie]

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@icyfroth wrote:

Sexual predators like Jimmy Saville, for instance, is a different matter altogether.

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The only difference between Harris and Saville is in the numbers of victims.  The same opportunistic behaviour occurred apparently.  They both used their popularity and renown to escape revelation.

[cherry*135]

And yet Harris' arrest & investigation was specifically mentioned as not being part the investigation into Savile.

There was the woman from Wollongong, NSW, that sold 'her story' to the press in the last year or two before the court case. She claims her boyfriend at the time made her do it, he was after the money.

I am not predicting the outcome of the case. Just there are a few odd things on both sides.. whether they are true accounts or not.