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Child sex
abuse hysteria and the Ellis case |
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The wisdom of
Gordon Waugh - Index |
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The
"research" by Dr Shirley Julich on sexual abuse, reported in your
article "Abuse carries steep price" (Aug 15), ranks her high
amongst those skilled in breathtaking sophistry. Her study lacks academic
rigour and is outrageously misleading. No-one disputes that
sexual abuse occurs and is abhorrent. No-one knows the actual prevalence of
sexual abuse, but many make guesses.
Findings about sexual abuse are not a matter of impression, theory,
opinion or speculation. They must be evidence-based on facts properly
determined from empirical scientific methodology. Her
"research" is similar to a raft of other retrospective studies
which drew fatally flawed conclusions from unverified data. The quite silly
idea that one in every four females and 9 per cent of males are sexually
abused by age 16 has long since been discredited. During her six years of work, Dr Julich
apparently did not raise her head to do a reality check. She gathered data from a miniscule sample of 21 "survivors" and reports from a self-help "survivor" group. She must prove she externally corroborated the abuse allegations and that her thesis properly accounted for the well-known range o |
