The taboo regarding sexual abuse is speaking out about it. Society doesn’t want to believe such things can occur in our culture, so silence and secrecy are encouraged. Survivors capable of challenging that taboo are met with doubt and disparagement. Good people convince themselves what that they suspect could not be happening, or someone would have said something.
In this climate of denial, the burden is on survivors to fight feelings of guilt, shame, and fear and stand up to the institutions where the guilt and shame belong. Institutions use their vast resources to denigrate the motives and credibility of those who dare tell what happened to them.
The multiplying effect of social media makes it impossible to deny this epidemic any longer. More victims take courage seeing others come forward and perpetrators get exposed.
Yet, with all this attention, we have barely scratched the surface of the problem.
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