End the silence on male child abuse

While problems faced by the girl child have been discussed, the abuse of the male child has been overlooked and unrecognised. National Crime Records Bureau statistics for 2018 recorded 21,605 child rapes, of which 204 were of boys. This, child rights activist Divya Vaishnava says, suggests that the issue is grossly under-reported.

Boys suffer high levels of violence, including sexual abuse, which, in turn, makes them more prone to violence as they grow into adults. In the film Anatomy of Violence, based on the perpetrators of the 2012 Delhi gang rape, Deepa Mehta sensitively portrays the brutalisation suffered by the rapists during their formative years, so much so that they seemed, according to testimonies, immune to the sufferings of the victim. In fact, one of them blames her for making them act the way they did.

Boys are easier targets for predators in many ways as they are not as supervised or protected as girls are. There is considerable shame and stigma attached to abuse of the boy child — he is expected to be strong in a patriarchal society. Such a society deters the boy child from being given help; it is something he is left to deal with by himself.

Film maker Insia Dariwala, who conducted an online survey of 160 men a few years ago, found that 71% of the respondents had been abused as children; and among those who had been abused, 84.9% said they had not told anyone about it due to notions of shame, guilt, fear and confusion. It is not just adults who are responsible for this abuse; in unsupervised situations, as in those of street children or children in slums, the perpetrators are often older children, says Indu Prakash Singh, who has done extensive work on the abuse of slum children.

The male child who has suffered sexual abuse may end up with psychological problems,

BOYS HAVE TO BE TOLD BY TRUSTED ADULT FIGURES THAT ADMITTING TO ABUSE IS NOT A SIGN OF WEAKNESS OR TAKEN TO MEAN THAT THEY WERE COMPLICIT

trauma, depression, suicidal thoughts, substance abuse, and a tendency towards violence. We rarely speak of these issues, even though they have a bearing on male violence against women in later life.

Patriarchy forces a male abuse survivor to keep quiet even in adulthood, for fear of being labelled as weak. The issue of abuse of the male child should be brought into the discourse and parents, teachers and the community should be more involved in addressing this. Boys should be taught about what constitutes abuse. Many young boys, especially those without parental or other adult supervision, don’t even understand that they have been sexually abused.

When the MeToo movement opened up stories about women who had been abused but had kept quiet, it caused a backlash against men in power. Now boys, who have been abused or are at risk of being abused, need to hear from survivors about their stories, so that they can seek appropriate help in time. The government needs to focus on the issue. It is silence that emboldens the perpetrator. Boys have to be told by trusted adult figures that admitting to abuse is not a sign of weakness or taken to mean that they were complicit. It is time to end the silence on the abuse of the male child.