Katayun does nothing, she does not even acknowledge that her husband and son sap her of any sensibilities she might like to hold on to. She is overprotective of her son even though she loathes his behaviour on the days she cares to notice that she actually despises her husband. She just goes on punishing herself for ‘enjoying’ it when she was a child.

Boy-children are sexually exploited routinely at home and among known people—mostly males—for the same reasons as girl-children. The perpetrator knows he can get away with his cold and calculated acts because of the furtiveness which exists in families. Threats and blackmail, fear of the abuser, is one cause for a boy or girl’s silence in disclosing Child Sexual Abuse. There is the other, more powerful, one—children instinctively know that their disclosure will lead to denial and discomfort on the part of adults. And so the sexual abuse continues and the boy-children are traumatized as much as the little girls by their own kith and kin.

The boy-children also give in to the abuse, without a murmur, for a combination of the same reasons as girl-children:

• child abuse is still sanctioned; indeed, held in high regard in our society as long as it is defined as child rearing; ‘for your own good’ as the child is told when it is slapped hard or when a school teacher is allowed to whack a cane on its palms
• children are taught that a feeling of duty invariably produces love
• children are told that parents deserve respect simply because they are parents, children don’t deserve respect for the same reason
• children are told that parents and elders are always right
• children are taught to be hypocrites, liars and hiders of truths, for example ‘the way you behave is more important than the way you really are’
• children are not taught to be autonomous, they are expected to be obedient to adults
• children are not encouraged to question adult actions, such behaviour is seen as rebellious
• children are perceived as ‘belonging’ to adults and family members
• children’s duties are emphasized rather than their rights
• childhood itself is not valued by adults, it is seen merely as a phase of training to enter the adult world and any ‘discipline’ as part of this training is deemed normal and justifiable
• children do not realize that the abuser is violating a relationship of trust with them because the abuser is known to them
• the abuse is happening at home and children absorb that happening at home as being safe and consequently all right
• children do not realize what is happening is sexual and incorrect since the abuser has disguised it as a special privilege or an intimate game
• the abuser has both, access and authority over them since they are not strangers, so the sexual abuse is not commonly preceded by physical violence
• the abuser uses his power and position to silence the child including threats and emotional blackmail
• a few of the children ‘enjoy’ what is being done to them as part of the sexual awakening of their bodies