Ian Watkins, Child Abuse, Moral Panic, Power and Rape Culture

As Ian Watkins of Lost Prophets appeared in court, thousands of people added their voices to the chorus of shock, horror and condemnation.

Trigger Warning and Content Note for discussion of rape, child abuse, domestic violence, victim blaming.

Moral Panic

Many outraged individuals fled to twitter and facebook in order to wish him maximum sentence, black eyes, hanging and prison rape. They also inadvertently wished these Christmas tidings upon Ian H Watkins from Steps, with a newspaper even publishing his photo. H isn't the first to get caught in the crossfire of the anti-paedo brigade. In 2000 a paediatrician was attacked by an angry mob and forced to leave her home as it was vandalised. This kind of vigilante injustice is relatively uncommon in comparison to vandalisation of walls in cyberspace. But with technological advances come other possibilities, such as hacking into emails, finding people's identities and their addresses and phone numbers (both by the govt or by civilians). This can be used for good or for ill, depending on what the user sees as deserving of punishment. It has been used to help survivors to convict their assailants, and it has been used to stalk women for speaking out about rape and harassment. The times it has been most useful is when it has been used to gather information about the event and bring this to light, rather than personal information for the public to attack by. 

Moral panic over paedophilia isn't anything new. It scaremongers parents into a fierce protectionism of their children very easily. Otherwise liberal, lefty or narko individuals will bite when their children are threatened. Avid readers of the tabloid newspapers have their fears constantly preyed upon with gory details of stranger danger and become ever more paranoid, whilst simultaneously wanting to read more. Often these fears are used by the right wing, or by others wanting to divide the working class, to feed into prejudices. Fear of 'paedos' has been used to undermine the rights of the LGBT community, and more recently, it has added fuel to the likes of the EDL against Muslims, by mixing genuine concerns about religious rights with overt wilful ignorance and hatred. It is a very powerful tool for manipulation.

Rape Culture and Conviction

You would think, then, that child abuse is taken very seriously in this country. You would think that the convictions would be high, or that the cases would be few. You would be wrong. In fact less than 10% of offences result in conviction. It would seem to me too, that older children appear to go through much the same fiasco as young women above the age of consent, despite a straightforward law meaning that anybody below that age is deemed incapable of consent. It seems as if when people look at the individual stories of abusers, that actually, the perpetrator's side is often emphasised with to the point where the victim is seen as being partially to blame, even if that victim is 12 years old.

There are few ways to convict a rapist, consent being nigh impossible to prove or disprove beyond reasonable doubt without evidence of physical harm done to the victim. Instead the victim is queried on her sexual history, her mental health, her relationship with the accused, her outfit, why she was where she was or if she was drinking, all of which work against her, but do nothing to challenge the behaviour of the accused. There are many reasons why society prefers to make the victims responsible for the crimes of others, ranging from full blown patriarchal rape culture to women wanting to feel some control over their lives and what happens to them, or to feel like they will be safe if they follow certain guidelines to protect themselves and their children.

Overwhelmingly, fear of rapists and paedophiles is based in a fear of "stranger danger" and monstrous sexual predators who stalk their innocent victims and often claim the lives of those they kidnap and assault. Sadly these things do happen, so I cannot dispel the fear, however, this is a very small proportion if these crimes. The vast majority of sexual crimes are committed by friends, family, neighbours, carers, partners and those few people you would trust to look after you. The anti-paedo brigade and vigilantes usually only go after the most cut-and-dry of cases, where the victims and the situation meet with their prejudices about who seems like a "real" abuser or a "real" victim; the people who fit their narrative.


So why are these cases so much more furiously attacked than others?

Watkins' Case

Two of the victims is are small children. It's very hard to blame a baby of being complicit.
There is video evidence of it happening - often child abuse is swept under the rug because people do not trust the testimony of children.

Watkins is not related to the child. The women involved with this case, like in most cases of child abuse, were related to the child. The figurehead known to the public, however, was a stranger/acquaintance. The abuse could not be misunderstood as anything other than abuse.

Watkins is a man. This fits the narrative of a "paedo" much easier. Most physical and sexual abusers are men in any set of statistics, but this also fits into the fear-mongering press narrative that men cannot be trusted with children, and that a man interacting with a child is suspicious. We are hearing much more about him than the women involved in this abuse (due also to his fame). It also increases the assailant's status as powerful and capable of controlling or hurting others.

Men like to distance themselves from rape culture and the public choose to misunderstand what rape, abuse and paedophilia are. This is especially worthy of analysis!

Causes of rape and sexual abuse

(The quick answer is rapists, but...) What causes rape? What causes child abuse? The dominant narrative blames men's passionate sexual urges for sexual attacks. Sexual attacks on adult women, by men, are seen as natural things that happen when factors cause men to lose control of themselves. Women are often seen as to blame for loosening the control that men have over themselves. This often extends to adolescent girls, who can be seen as enticing Lotita's if they show any autonomy or sexual desires themselves, or do not follow strict standards on what makes someone seem like a child. Being attracted to young (wo)men - even underaged (ebophilia) - is somewhat natural, especially as one transitions into an adult. We had feelings for people who looked that way when we were young ourselves, and that doesn't entirely dissolve. Many prominent men and women have been excused of the abuse of adolescents, regardless of the willingness of the participants.

Babies, on the other hand, the vast majority of the population do not understand sexual attraction for. A small sub-sect of society that find children sexually attracted must be to blame, they think. Paedophilia directed at babies and small children is not something that most adults could understand, and don't want to understand. When you look at sexual deviance as the cause of rape, it becomes largely overlooked, except for those which step over the line of our understanding: causing extreme physical pain to the victim, causing distress by kidnapping, or being sexually involved with young children or 'innocents'.

Power and Abuse

What they miss is that sexuality plays a miniscule role in rape in comparison to patriarchy and male entitlement, and of course, power. Most men who rape adult women know they were in the wrong, but many do not class it as rape. They think they were being sexually selfish, or thought that the women owed them sex for tempting them or engaging with them. This behaviour is often excused by other men  and women and seen as perfectly understandable. "Boys will be boys". Many of those attacking 'Paedos' will welcome these men into their group of friends, even those who's victims were underage.

Others rape as punishment. They knowingly exert power over others using sex as a tool of domination. Some men will attack a woman they think is a 'slut', and whether they get away with that will depend on whether society agrees. Many gang-rapes are based on this idea, from religious right on public buses in India to frat parties on USA campuses. Many men are raped and attacked for being perceived as gay. This would be extremely ironic were rape about sex rather than sexism. Many lesbians experience 'corrective' rape, and it is used against transgender and otherwise genderqueer people from deviating from their gender roles.

On a domestic level rape is used as punishment against partners to beat into submission or as a response to cheating or lying, or witholding sex. Many adults also molest children in various ways to hurt them as punishment. The adult may not see this as sexual in nature, but as part of their more socially acceptable corporal punishment regime, or to keep children quiet.

The other way that power is important, is that many who rape enjoy exerting power over others, whether for sexual reasons, to feel stronger, or an extreme lack of empathy and disregard of others making the excitement of getting away with the act seem worth it to them. Whilst this group of people may attack strong people as punishment or a challenge, more commonly it is important to this group to get away with it. There is a reason why most attackers are known to their victims. Often attackers are not only bigger and stronger than their choice of victim, or with more societal standing, but they choose victims that they are responsible for, or in a way have taken ownership of. A woman who cannot afford to leave her relationship or has a history of mental illness and will not be believed, an older sister whose parents would never believe her little brother knows what he's doing, a father, an uncle, a mother, who have control over their child entirely, and can hide stories and wounds with ease, who can hold a dozen threats over their head if they tell the other parent, the carer who's victim is unable to speak or too senile to be believed, the bully who knows the younger boy will be too ashamed to talk to anybody. These are the common stories.

'Paedophilia'

As this controversial (and over-sympathetic towards paedophilia) article points out: 
Only 20% of child sexual abusers are considered 'true paedophiles'.

This means that the paedo-scaremongering is largely unfounded, and that abusers who take advantage of their situation are far more common than those who actively seek out children. This means that we need to turn our heads away from the minority of paedophiles and towards our society. Towards our notions of power, towards our notions of masculinity and of consent. 

How this relates to Watkins

Getting back to the specific case of Watkins we can see all these ideas surfacing. From what information we have, it took a long time for the perpetrator to realise the severity of his own actions, which may be down to excessive drug use amongst other things. Full report here.

Prosecutor Christopher Clee QC has told the court about two phone calls Watkins made to a female friend from Parc Prison after his guilty pleas.

On November 27, the day after he admitted he was a paedophile, he said of the court hearing: "It was like either me go up there and say 'Come on, it wasn't that bad, nobody got hurt'. I do my charm or do I end up making things worse for myself or do I just say I was off my head and can't remember?"

Discussing his possible sentence, he added: "I'm going to put a statement on the 18th now just to say it was megalolz, I don't know what everyone is getting so freaked out about."

In another conversation the following day he said: "It's so hard. There's a lot of ****ing meaningless bull**** like chat that I did to show off when I was ****ing off my head."There was no medical evidence, nobody was harmed at all.

"I'm not a paedophile, I'm not. You know I plead (sic) guilty just to avoid a trial, not realising 'Hang on, that makes me look a bit guilty' but I would never harm anybody." 

When asked if he would still issue a statement saying his conduct was "megalolz" he replied: "No, it's just lols now."

Earlier comments suggest that even in disgusting cases like this, the perpetrator did not picture himself as the 'monster paedo villain' of public imagination, and instead saw his actions as humorous antics which got out of hand. His lawyer says that he has no preference for children sexually and so possibly, not recognising himself as a paedophile, dismissed himself as a child sex offender.

We see a similar mindset to the internet troll who enjoy pursuing their victims into a perverse game where the joke is on the victim for not knowing that the troll is only playing despite the game having real disastrous effects on the victims. It doesn't dawn on them that they actually have been doing those things that they have been joking about. The women involved were young mothers, and big fans who were introduced to hard drugs by Watkins, one of which was suffering a personality disorder and post-natal depression. Both were victims of Watkins' exploitation but also fully culpable for their actions. 

Watkins' defence lawyers have also told the court that he is not the first rock star to get carried away by the effect of adulation from fans, and end up taking advantage of it.

Sally O'Neill QC, for Watkins, says one of his "obsessions" was filming himself having sex. The court has also heard how Watkins received a lot of sexual offers from fans over social media. 

Sally O'Neill says Watkins was "bombarded" with messages - some of "extraordinary depravity" - 24 hours a day, seven days a week

The defence plays upon the idea of sexual temptations of fans throwing themselves at him. In this case it didn't work, but very often the public is swayed by this idea, as many of us take advantage of the situation when we are in a position of power. I have known people with online fame let girls do stupid things on webcam to please them, even egging them on whilst there are other people watching that the girl doesn't know about. It's easy to excuse. "She said she was older. Nobody made her do it. She did it herself just because she was told to. It's her own fault."

However, there may be more to this as Watkins appears to have specifically targeted fans to gain access to their children, and that there are cases dating back a few years of teenage girls having been molested or raped by him. This was overlooked as is often the case when girls are of a certain age, until this case was brought up with the babies and small children. He also possessed 90 images of children. Many offenders who do know the severity of their cases seem to play the innocent if they think that the public will agree with them.

Conclusion

The latest charges came as a complete shock to those who knew him, but perhaps if they understood what abuse and rape really mean they would be less surprised that his previous actions led to this.

This brings me to my opinion: The same attitudes which think that someone can deserve violence, and especially rape, for their actions leads to someone thinking they have the right to rape those they perceive did wrong. Rape is never okay, in prisons or in homes or on the street. If there is ever a case for violent vigilante justice against rape and paedophilia , it should be defensive or victim led - not decided on by reactionary macho men who participate in spreading rape culture! We need to stop pretending that rapists are monsters, so that those we cant picture as monsters may still be held accountable for their actions - so that we don't think an innocent or ignorant man being held to account is worse than being raped. The very idea that one's life or reputation is ruined more by conviction than by the abuse itself has a huge effect on conviction rates. It is possible to empathise and understand without being sympathetic and letting people off with a tap on the knuckles and further normalising behaviour.