Fathers As Perpetrators

Already in this early piece from 1998, I broach the scandal of individual and societal cover-ups and non-response to sexualised violence: “not wanting to know” as a socially condoned reality.

Scraps of book pages pasted on ties reveal text fragments, such as “absolutely normal fathers” or “childhood”. Speared on butcher’s hooks the ties hang in a row on a rod, as silent witnesses to social conventions and negligence.

For the “tie-book” Fathers As Perpetrators, I drew on the book of the same name by sociologist Barbara Kavemann and lawyer Ingrid Lohstöter. Published back in 1984, this was one of the first ever studies in German to turn the spotlight on expert analyses of sexualised violence against girls and boys. The insights it offered then remain valid to this day.

Nowadays, plenty of books and research projects tackle the issue of sexual violence.

Today, nobody can say they didn’t know.

Sexual violence is no longer taboo. – But the offender’s identity is still taboo.

30 years of breaking the silence, 30 years of public campaigns, 30 years of gathering information about 30 years of breaking the silence, 30 years of public campaigns, 30 years of gathering information about the reasons for, and the extent of, sexualised violence against girls, boys and women* […] are 30 years gone by already without any adequate response to the fact that the number of victims-survivors is a clear indication of the number of  sexual offenders.