Posted by Sadly I don’t find this hard to believe. Every day there are news reports about parents (and most recently a step-parent) being unspeakably cruel to children.
And it has been like this for many years, not just in Ireland. It used to be covered up and “justice” couldn’t be served because the abusive parents would be long dead.
I suppose we’re making progress if people are willing to report abuse.
However, we still have archaic laws that protect the abuser from public scrutiny under the misguided law that “protects the victim” by keeping them anonymous unless their other parent / legal guardian is willing to waive anonymity. This “protection” assumes – wrongly – that the victim will be shamed by the public. Maybe 50 years ago, ordinary people would have “shamed” the victim, but thankfully that attitude is dying out. Society is a little bit more civilised – but there’s still a sub-culture of abusers.
Who Watches the Watchers? 