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1. |
The newborn child is
always innocent. |
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2. |
Each child needs among other things: care, protection, security, warmth,
skin contact, touching, caressing, and tenderness. |
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3. |
These needs are seldom sufficiently fulfilled; in fact, they are often
exploited by adults for their own ends (trauma of child abuse). |
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4. |
Child abuse has lifelong effects. |
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5. |
Society takes the side of the adult and blames the child for what has
been done to him or her. |
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6. |
The victimization of the child has historically been denied and is still
being denied, even today. |
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7. |
This denial has made it possible for society to ignore the devastating
effects of the victimization of the child for such a long time. |
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8. |
The child, when betrayed by society, has no choice but to repress the
trauma and to idealize the abuser. |
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9. |
Repression leads to neuroses, psychoses, psychosomatic disorders, and
delinquency. |
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10. |
In neuroses, the child's needs are repressed and/or denied; instead,
feelings of guilt are experienced. |
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11. |
In psychoses, the mistreatment is transformed into a disguised illusory
version (madness). |
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12. |
In psychosomatic disorders, the pain of mistreatment is felt but the
actual origins are concealed. |
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13. |
In delinquency, the confusion, seduction, and mistreatment of childhood
are acted out again and again. |
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14. |
The therapeutic process can be successful only if it is based on
uncovering the truth about the patient's childhood instead of denying
that reality. |
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15. |
The psychoanalytic theory of "infantile sexuality" actually protects the
parent and reinforces society's blindness. |
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16. |
Fantasies always serve to conceal or minimize unbearable childhood
reality for the sake of the child's survival; therefore, the so-called
invented trauma is a less harmful version of the real, repressed one. |
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17. |
The fantasies expressed in literature, art, fairy tales, and dreams
often unconsciously convey early childhood experiences in a symbolic
way. |
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18. |
This symbolic testimony is tolerated in our culture thanks to society's
chronic ignorance of the truth concerning childhood; if the import of
these fantasies were understood, they would be rejected. |
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19. |
A past crime cannot be undone by our understanding of the perpetrator's
blindness and unfulfilled needs. |
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20. |
New crimes, however, can be prevented, if the victims begin to see and
be aware of what has been done to them. |
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21. |
Therefore, the reports of victims will be able to bring about more
awareness, consciousness, and sense of responsibility in society at
large. |