Everyone is influenced by their childhood experiences. Be those good or bad, those events shape us into the adults we are. I often ponder the kind of adult I may have become had my adolescence not been riddled with anxieties stemming from trauma and subsequent systematic failures. Though, in my moments of wondering and sometimes wishing that my life could have played out differently, I am aware that dwelling on the ‘what could have been’ serves to only cause further pain.
Going from junior school into secondary school saw the start of the events that ultimately shaped me. Bullying surrounding my weight became progressively worse as year seven waged on, amping up once I entered my second year. Unable to regulate my feelings surrounding the jibes from my peers, I turned to online strangers for comfort.
A website I used, which I shan't name, was advertised as “dating for teens.” Hindsight is a funny thing, and looking back on the existence of such a site twelve years on gives me a certain pause I did not have at the time. The website in question was 13+ and not being fully aware of the dangers that being online could pose at the time, I fibbed, adding a year to my age so that I could use it. This does, at times, lead me to put the blame on myself when I look back at the events that followed. A learnt habit that, if you have experienced any degree of childhood trauma, should be unlearnt. I digress.
Upon making my account on this website, almost instantaneously, I was met with a barrage of explicit content shared by older teenagers and some adults. Navigating that kind of content at a young age in and of itself can only serve to have a negative impact; something that is only going to increase as the Internet evolves. Amongst this stream of content, I found comfort in a sixteen year old who had reached out to me, his messages not reflecting others on this site. Ultimately, we moved forward with our conversation, adding each other on Facebook. For reference, I made it known quite early on that I was only twelve. It didn't take long for him to ask if we could meet in person, an offer that I excitedly accepted. Without sharing too many details, I will say that this meeting led to me being sexually assaulted. This was the start of a long and oftentimes traumatic decade for me, one that I'm still dealing with the repercussions of.
Following this assault, I confided in one of my school friends who subsequently told his mum. She told my school, the school informed my parents and my parents called the police. The initial police involvement was brief and impersonal, the majority of that evening spent in a car going from my home to where I was assaulted, from there to the hospital and from the hospital back home. It took a week for me to be formally invited to the station to give my statement; a daunting experience to say the least. Sitting alone in a room with a male detective, the blinds shut and a camera pointed at me is a memory that I haven't forgotten and has served as another source of discomfort when my mind dwells on this point in my life. Leaving the station that day was the first moment in which it became clear to me that this wasn't something I was to speak about. I attempted to engage my mum in conversation, or at least an expression of how I was feeling; something that was quickly met with indifference and some anger. There were a few more attempts by me to discuss my assault with my parents in the weeks and months ensuing, each of which fell on deaf ears. Subsequently, I retreated into myself, feeling as though I was a nuisance for wanting to discuss this plethora of confusing emotions that I had been experiencing since that day.
The investigation lasted for a year and a half, updates far and few. My parents got a number of courtesy phone calls here and there, each of which I had to beg to know the contents of. Police involvement ceased in 2014, as did any hope I still had of finding some semblance of peace. We were informed that, whilst they had enough to bring charges against him, there would be no point. The reasons given were something I have now come to expect with any case I hear about of this nature, though at fourteen years of age, those reasons were incomprehensible to me. His family had money. They were well regarded in their community. Those teaching him at his private school spoke highly of him. Whilst I lived in a council home, the only possible hope of having a solicitor represent my case being publicly funded, he had already been afforded a privately funded defense attorney. It didn't seem to matter that they had enough to bring charges against him, all that seemed to matter was social standing and money. I was devastated; a feeling that still lingers to this day. To make matters worse, I was given no resources in the time of and the time following the investigation. Antidepressants were offered, something that I feel was another failure by the system. My expectation at the time being that the Fluoxetine would fix everything; an expectation that those close to me had come to have too. I made-believe that things had improved, pushing down any thoughts and feelings that I had of that day; something made easier by the fact that I wasn't to discuss it at home in any capacity.
In my last few years at school, I was once again hit with moments that left me with a deep sense of distrust towards others. Similar instances to the aforementioned, coupled with harassment because of my gender identity, took place over the course of years 10 and 11. My grades dropped drastically during this time, having already wavered following my past assault. Whilst I won't go into the exact details of those two years, I will say that each instance was reported to the appropriate member of staff and each time I was told nothing could be done. This was just another moment in which it became clear to me that consequences were far and few for those who were in positions that exceeded my own in terms of age, social standing and academia. All sense of safety had been quashed by a system that had proven, time and time again, it didn't work to aid people like me.
Systematic failure has become somewhat of a cornerstone in this country's educational and judicial system. I say this, not as a person who believes this can't be changed, but as a person who has felt those failures multiple times throughout his life. My experience is not one that is uncommon. As reported by the Task Force on Justice in 2019, an estimated 5.1 billion people, two-thirds of the global population, are being failed by the justice system worldwide. Obviously, this doesn't only pertain to the UK and cases similar to my own, but it does serve as a bleak example of just how many people are being denied justice. In terms of failures in the school system, I know from first hand experience and from accounts by friends of mine, that reports of bullying and abuse are simply not heard. There is no way for me to know if this is due to a lack of funding in our education system, or a lack of caring by those who are supposed to. What I can say with certainty is this. These failures by those who have a duty of care are changing the way in which children and adolescents develop emotionally. Charles Spencer wrote recently about his experiences in private school; a poignant account of just how many children have been failed by systems that serve to protect abusers. Whilst we are both of different social classes, I'm reminded of the fact that fifty years on from his experiences and a decade on from mine, very little has changed.
Even something that may seem small to an onlooker can have a lasting effect. Unfortunately, bullying and abuse is something that will continue to take place. That isn't to say that the loneliness and the isolation that myself and many before me have felt has to continue. Often when I ponder the person that I may have become had I been heard, I hold onto the fact that perhaps this cycle of turmoil amongst those who have survived the unthinkable will end. That, perhaps, the system will no longer fail victims. Instead, my hope is that people who try to find help from those who have a duty of care, will be listened to. To me, these hopes seem reasonable. I am though, as always, conscious of the fact that these systematic failures continue to prevail, leaving generations of victims to find a way to move forward on their own.