Why I wrote Night Shadows
For a modern society, the statistics on child sexual abuse in the United States not only are staggering but also abhorrent. According to the US Department of Justice’s National Sex Offender Public Website (NSOPW), 33% of sexual assaults occur when the victim is between the ages of 12 and 17. Importantly, 82% of all juvenile victims of sexual abuse are female, with about one in five female high school students reporting physical and/or sexual abuse by a dating partner. Even more distressing is the fact that teens 16 to 19 years of age were three-and-one-half times more likely than the general population to be victims of rape, attempted rape, or sexual assault.
Anyone who has followed the day-to-day news in the US and Canada should not be surprised by these statistics. The media has put real names to the numbers . . . names such as Daisy Colemen of Maryville, Missouri, who, after accusing a high school senior of sexual assault and was bullied, was hospitalized after a suicide attempt. Or Rehtaeh Parsons from Halifax, Nova Scotia, who after allegedly being gang-raped and bullied, was hospitalized after she tried to hang herself on April 4, 2013. She was taken off life support three days later. Colman and Parsons were not alone. According to Suicide.org, numerous rape victims have suicidal thoughts; many die by suicide.
Nor do the living escape their tormenters. With 90% of teens and young adults online, the potential for abuse is significant, especially with the greater majority of those having a profile on a social network. In fact, nearly 80% of teens send and receive photos and videos online, some almost certainly pornographic. Nude selfies are not uncommon, with revenge porn—defined as sexually explicit media that are publicly shared online without the consent of the pictured individual —becoming increasingly common. The Internet always was a dangerous neighborhood; with time it has become more so, and more toxic, as well.
I don’t know if child sexual abuse has yet reached what the US and other health authorities might consider ‘epidemic proportions.’ But I do know I am seeing an increasing number of cases in the newspapers, on television, and on the Internet, among other media, where young women are assaulted and raped, subsequently harassed and bullied by their attackers and/or peers, and in some cases, driven to suicide. And the pity of it is, for many of these victims, there is no justice.
This novel is an attempt to shine a spotlight on the problem of teen rape. Though many may see it as another Detective Louis Martelli, NYPD ‘ripped from the headlines’ mystery/thriller, know it is fiction through and through . . . the characters, the crimes, the dialogue, everything. It’s a fabrication. But still, this is an important story if for no other reason than to raise awareness of a scourge that is harming our children, the most precious part of our lives.
Anyone who has followed the day-to-day news in the US and Canada should not be surprised by these statistics. The media has put real names to the numbers . . . names such as Daisy Colemen of Maryville, Missouri, who, after accusing a high school senior of sexual assault and was bullied, was hospitalized after a suicide attempt. Or Rehtaeh Parsons from Halifax, Nova Scotia, who after allegedly being gang-raped and bullied, was hospitalized after she tried to hang herself on April 4, 2013. She was taken off life support three days later. Colman and Parsons were not alone. According to Suicide.org, numerous rape victims have suicidal thoughts; many die by suicide.
Nor do the living escape their tormenters. With 90% of teens and young adults online, the potential for abuse is significant, especially with the greater majority of those having a profile on a social network. In fact, nearly 80% of teens send and receive photos and videos online, some almost certainly pornographic. Nude selfies are not uncommon, with revenge porn—defined as sexually explicit media that are publicly shared online without the consent of the pictured individual —becoming increasingly common. The Internet always was a dangerous neighborhood; with time it has become more so, and more toxic, as well.
I don’t know if child sexual abuse has yet reached what the US and other health authorities might consider ‘epidemic proportions.’ But I do know I am seeing an increasing number of cases in the newspapers, on television, and on the Internet, among other media, where young women are assaulted and raped, subsequently harassed and bullied by their attackers and/or peers, and in some cases, driven to suicide. And the pity of it is, for many of these victims, there is no justice.
This novel is an attempt to shine a spotlight on the problem of teen rape. Though many may see it as another Detective Louis Martelli, NYPD ‘ripped from the headlines’ mystery/thriller, know it is fiction through and through . . . the characters, the crimes, the dialogue, everything. It’s a fabrication. But still, this is an important story if for no other reason than to raise awareness of a scourge that is harming our children, the most precious part of our lives.
No comments have been added yet.
