Children Victims Of Sexual Violence Can Even Become Perpetrators When They Are Adults

Illustration of preventing sexual violence (Photo by Dim Hou on Unsplash)

JAKARTA - Assistant Deputy for the Protection of Women's Rights in the Household and Vulnerability of the Ministry of Women's Empowerment and Child Protection (KPPPA) Valentina Gintings has terrible data. They found that the perpetrators of sexual violence turned out to be victims of sexual violence as a child.

"Most of them are pedophiles who are victims of childhood violence," said Valentina in the program "Domestic Violence, Should We Be Silent?" which was followed in Jakarta, Thursday, February 17, as reported by Antara.

The analysis shows that the trauma experienced in childhood is carried over into adulthood so that they become perpetrators of sexual violence.

"The wound then carried over, couldn't be resolved, then was in a family environment that kept terrorizing him until he grew up so that it finally carried over and then they could be the perpetrators," he said.

Valentina said it took a lot of money and effort to heal traumatized victims of sexual violence. Children experience a considerable impact when they become victims of violence, be it physical, psychological or sexual violence.

"The feeling of trauma, revenge, then closing themselves off, when they experience violence the impact is quite large," he said.

Moreover, according to him, domestic violence (KDRT) has increased during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Valentina explained that according to the survey, one in four women had experienced some form of violence.

"The results of the survey, one in four women said they had experienced some form of violence," he said.

Most of the factors that drive the occurrence of domestic violence are economic.

"Most of the cases in the household occurred due to economic factors, especially during this pandemic," said Valentina.*