Sir, - On behalf of the National Network of Rape Crisis Centres I am writing to agree with, and hopefully add weight to, Harry Ferguson's excellent article "Demonising of `paedophile priests' means evading some real threats" (The Irish Times, April 29th).
Demonising certain child abusers in the media can detract from the real analysis and debate on child sex abusers which needs to occur in Ireland. It is the experience of the National Network of Rape Crisis Centres that, whilst we are certainly now supporting many survivors of clerical abuse, the vast majority of child sexual abusers could be classed as heterosexual "good family men". Has this been taken on board by the media, the public, and the judiciary. While child sexual abuse is monstrous, creating monsters out of child sexual abusers can be misleading, as was indicated by the title of a seminar by Ray Wyre, "Monsters don't abuse, nice men do". Children are sometimes aware enough to stay away from people who appear odd or bad. It is the grooming of victims by child abusers, when abusers create trust and behave as nice, generous, stable people, which frequently disarms children and parents and enables child sexual abuse to occur. - Yours, etc.,
Fiona Neary
National Network of Rape Crisis Centres' Augustine Street, Galway.