Trust Your Gut

By Kathryn Berlá, Ed.D.

A few days after the U.S. Rep. Mark Foley/Congressional page scandal broke, I found myself accessing the news Web site where the transcripts of the inappropriate e-mails and text messages were posted. It isn't unusual for me to noodle around the Web reading news stories, but it is unusual is for me to spend time reading posts from other readers. For some reason, I scrolled through many of the reaction postings from the first day or so after the story had broken. At that time, Foley had already been confronted with some “questionable” e-mails he had sent a page, and had resigned his seat.

What was remarkable to me about the postings was the number of people who were calling into question the teen-age page's feelings about the nature of the e-mails. Specifically, many posters dismissed the page's discomfort, stating that he was clearly overreacting and reading too much into the fact that, among other things, the Congressman had asked him to send a picture of himself. (At that time, the communications with the overtly sexual content had yet to be published.) I saw many postings stating that this was a “non-story,” and that the boy and his parents were hypersensitive. By now, of course, we know that this was indeed a very serious situation as more and more damning evidence has come to light. The point of this article, however, has nothing to do with politics, investigations or even justice. It is about educating more people about how sex offenders actually operate, and above all, how important it is for all of us to trust our own instincts when it comes to self-protection.

It is well known and universally accepted among those who treat sex offenders that there is a pattern of behavior that accompanies every offense. Among pedophiles (adults attracted to pre-pubescent children) and ephebophiles (adults attracted to post-pubescent children), part of the pattern involves a process called “grooming.” The offender will often spend time grooming other adults in order to get the adult community that surrounds the child to accept, and even welcome, the molester's involvement with the child. Often an offender takes on a role that normalizes their contact with children, such as being an activities leader. More directly, the molester will engage in grooming the child or children he is targeting. This is a process the molester goes through to break down the child's resistance to sexual activity and to engage the child in the activity.

The child molester will groom a particular child using techniques such as targeting the most vulnerable children, engaging the child in peer-like activities (playing games) or granting special “grown-up” privileges to a child (offering alcohol, extending curfews) that make the child feel special. Offenders will also isolate children, so that illicit behavior can be kept secret, and they are very skilled at testing children's reactions slowly before proceeding. If a child gives signals that they are going to tell about inappropriate behavior, the offender will then move on to another child.

Children (and adults for that matter) often have very good instincts about people. Unfortunately, there are many reasons why we become skilled at ignoring or talking ourselves out of our gut reactions. That is not to say that we can always “see it coming,” but it is true that our bodies and subconscious are very capable of signaling danger even when we don't have the ability to put it into words. There are a range of books exploring the validity of “gut” or “snap” decisions, from the recent bestseller “Blink,” by Malcolm Gladwell, to the popular self-defense and protection guides put out by Gavin de Becker, a leading expert of the prediction and management of violence. Both authors make a strong case for the validity of our gut instincts. That is why it was so disturbing to me to read the dismissals when the teen-ager said that the e-mails from Foley were “sick.” We have the luxury now of 20/20 hindsight, and certainly there are many additional issues complicating this story. Also, we cannot become a society where we convict an individual based on another's “gut feeling.” However, we can be a society that does not condemn or dismiss gut feelings when it comes to feeling antsy, uncomfortable or downright creeped-out by someone else's behavior. Thankfully, that page's parents listened to him and trusted his, and their own, feelings.

It is not uncommon for me to encounter children whose parents encourage or even demand that they hug or kiss strangers and distant relatives good-bye under the guise of having good manners. It is not difficult to see how we become socialized out of trusting and following through with a sense of enforcing the boundaries of our personal space. I know that those parents are well meaning, but forcing a child to have physical contact with someone they don't know just doesn't make intuitive sense, and it certainly isn't teaching the child that their preferences for their own bodies count for much.

Once we understand the techniques employed by those individuals interested in violating children, it may become easier for more people to accept the validity of someone's gut reaction. Looking back, we are able to see other typical predator techniques that Congressman Foley employed, including offering alcohol to minors, and secrecy. Hopefully now, more of us will understand that the teen-ager's feelings toward the Congressman's request for a picture may have been based on more than the words in the e-mail. His reaction also may have been rooted in a subconscious sense of danger. And he was right.

Kathryn Berlá, Ed.D. is a licensed psychologist with a private practice in Louisville. She can be reached at 502-412-2226.