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Otago Daily Times
April 15 2003
Peter Ellis
Letter to Editor, by Suzanne George, Dunedin
[Abridged. - Ed.]
I perceive a mind-set and inconsistency in Lynley Hood's research into
alleged child sexual abuse in her book, A City Possessed. She states (ODT,
19.2.03), "credibility will be destroyed if [biographers] ignore their
responsibility to tell readers the whole story, without fear or favour".
That rule applies to all so-called academia. I challenge the apparent failure
to fully investigate why, during the 1970s, a critical mass of women (not
necessarily radical feminists) took decisive action against both sexual and
domestic violence, why there was a proliferation in women's studies courses,
and a perceived failure to fully explore recovered memory, among other
one-sided inconsistencies.
Since publication of her book, Ms Hood has emotively criticised the so-called
witch-hunt of "sexual abuse hysteria" - judges accessing website
sex movies, schoolmasters accessing website child pornography, worldwide
exposure of Roman Catholic paedophile priests, sexual harassment, ACC
payouts, CYFS.
Justice Minister Phil Goff has again stated her book uncovered no new
evidence worthy of fresh investigation. An apparent lack of reasoned argument
leaves me at a loss to know where Ms Hood draws her ethical line in the sand.
It is wrong to demonise any class of people, particularly the sexually
abused.
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