When Jack-Bob asked years later if he should report the abuse, a teacher replied ‘What’s the point?’
All names and identifying details have been changed.
Participants have given us permission to share their experiences.
Jack-Bob was a boarder at a school in England in the 1970s. He was subjected to a ‘sophisticated grooming process’ by his abuser, who was a teacher at the school.
He says he looked mature for his age and believes that may be why his abuser targeted him. The grooming went on for about three years before the abuse began and involved exposure to magazines and books with a sexual content. The abuser would leave this sort of material in classrooms. The magazines could not necessarily be considered ‘top shelf’ but they were certainly not meant to be seen by children. One of the books had explicit pictures and his abuser would leave them in classrooms that were accessible by pupils.
Jack-Bob recalls that conversations with his abuser became more ‘grown-up’. One particular discussion was about whether Jack-Bob was masturbating, and the teacher wanted to be specifically told about outcomes.
He does not remember how the abuse started and cannot recall all instances, but he knows it took place over about a year. Jack-Bob does remember one instance in a classroom and that another pupil was involved. At some point he began masturbating. His abuser joined in and took over and also performed oral sex on him. The teacher asked Jack-Bob to perform oral sex on him, but he refused.
Jack-Bob did not want to tell anyone at the time about the abuse says it was not in an environment where you would not tell anyone. He is convinced that there were other victims in the school and that people knew about the abuse. He describes a highly sexualised environment at the school.
He describes how the abuse affected him and made him a highly sexualised and overly confident teenager. He feels his concept of normality had changed. He has struggled over the years with why he let this happen and has felt disgusted by what happened to him. For years he wondered whether he should have said something. He says that now he has been able to put it to the back of his mind and rationalise it.
Jack-Bob feels that abuse of this nature could be prevented by not permitting staff to reside on school grounds and have access to pupils.