Ritual Abuse Definition

Ritual abuse can be defined as organised sexual, physical, and psychological

abuse, which can be systematic and sustained over a long period of time.

 It involves the use of rituals, with or without a belief system. It usually involves

 more than one person as abusers. Ritual abuse usually starts in early childhood

and involves using patterns of learning and development to sustain the abuse

and silence the abused.

Evidence of Ritual Abuse

People are always demanding evidence of the existence of ritual abuse so that

they can believe more readily that it happens or deny its existence more

rigorously. Unfortunately, the abusers do not usually proof lying about for

others

to find. They do not want the world to know what they are doing and therefore

do their best to carefully dispose of evidence.

Beliefs, Myths and Facts about Ritual Abuse

There are a wide range of beliefs and myths regarding ritualised abuse and the

survivors of it. If people could only keep a more open mind rather than simply

 believing what they read in the press or have heard on the grapevine, we might

 eventually arrive at the more factual information. If we close our minds and

 dismiss accounts of survivors of anything, we will never know the truth. Even

 if it turns out that only one person in the world has experienced ritual abuse,

in any of its forms, we need to know about it.

Beliefs, Myths and Facts about Survivors of Ritual Abuse

One of the most important things to understand about any survivor of any kind

 of abuse is that generalisation is not useful. People are individuals with

 individual responses. It is better to get to know individuals rather than

swallowing the many myths that abound.

Why Don't Ritual Abuse Survivors Tell?

Ritual Abuse survivors are taught from an early age that no one will believe

them. The fact that this tends to be true re-enforces this.

What are the Rituals?

It is useful to know what people mean when they use the word ritual in the

context of ritual abuse.

Why is it so hard to accept or believe?

It is hard for ordinary people to believe that ritual abuse happens. It is easier to

deny that it doesn't. Unfortunately, that denial of it doesn't make it go away.