Hostname: page-component-5c6d5d7d68-wp2c8 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-08-15T02:22:14.690Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

The ‘Ritual’ and ‘Satanic’ Abuse of Children: Crop circles and the organised abuse of children require a careful and considered approach

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 March 2016

Chris Goddard
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Extract

If you go down to the woods today…

Matthew Arnold (1822–1888), the nineteenth-century English poet, wrote about the live murmur of a summer’s day’, presumably referring to bees, birds and other bugs humming around the countryside. A twentieth-century American (whom I believe to be a poet though not all would agree) wrote that The Times They Are A-Changin’ (1963). Nowhere have they changed more than in the English countryside. In 1991, it was the ‘live murmur’ of the summer’s night that was more likely to be heard. Out in fertile rural England the English people have discovered crop circles in their cornfields.

It is good to be in England in (the admittedly all-too-brief) summer, but quiet evenings in cornfields sleeping off the effects of English ales are a thing of the past. These days, find a cornfield and you will find half the media and a sizeable chunk of the English population. In some country areas, they say, it is quieter sitting in the middle of the road because you avoid the crowds. Crop circles in cornfields have seized the imagination of the public.

Type
Not the last word: point and counterpoint
Information
Children Australia , Volume 17 , Issue 1 , 1992 , pp. 27 - 34
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1992

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Bermant, C. (1991) ‘God-fearing Islanders Going Through Hell’ The Observer 17 March.Google Scholar
Brough, G. (1991) ‘Men Who Conned the World’ Today 9 September.Google Scholar
Cohen, P., Downey, R., Lunn, T. and Wilson, M. (1991) ‘Mapping Out a Hazy Course’ Social Work Today 23 (5): 10–11.Google Scholar
Fillmore, A. V. (1981) ‘The Abused Child as Survivor’ unpublished paper presented to the Third International Congress on Child Abuse and Neglect, quoted in Jones, D.N. et al (1987) Understanding Child Abuse Basingstoke: Macmillan Education.Google Scholar
Finkelhor, D. and Williams, L. M. (1988) Nursery Crimes: Sexual Abuse in Day Care, Newbury Park: Sage.Google Scholar
Gaskell, J. (1991) ‘Comfield Phantom Has Farmers Foxed’ The Sunday Telegraph 27 August.Google Scholar
George, C. (1991) ‘Growing Up in ‘The Family’: We Lived in Fear’ The Australian Women’s Weekly, May.Google Scholar
Gilbert, J. (1991) ‘Freedom to Seek the Truth’ Social Work Today 23 (8): 2.Google Scholar
Goddard, C. R. (1988) ‘What You See Depends On Where You Stand, What You Want to See, and What You Want to Tell Others You Have Seen’ Australian Child and Family Welfare, 13 (4): 18–19.Google Scholar
Goddard, C. R. and Tucci, J. (1991) ‘Child Protection and the Need for the Reappraisal of the Social Worker - Client Relationship’ Australian Social Work 44 (2): 3–10.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hall, A. (1991) ‘Sadness of Isle Where Innocence is on Trial’ The Sunday Telegraph, 1 September.Google Scholar
Hiller, P.C. and Goddard, C.R. (1990) ‘The Sexually Abused Child: Female and Male Victims Compared’ Children Australia 15 (3): 20–24.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Jones, D.P.H. (1991) ‘Ritualism and Child Sexual Abuse’ Child Abuse and Neglect 15 (3): 163–170.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Jonker, F. and Jonker-Bakker, P. (1991) ‘Experiences with Ritualist Child Sexual Abuse: A case study from the Netherlands’ Child Abuse and Neglect 15 (3): 191–196.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Krugman, R.D. (1991) ‘Ritual Abuse: A law enforcement view or perspective’ Child Abuse and Neglect 15 (3): 171–173.Google Scholar
Lloyd, D.W. (1991) ‘Ritual Child Abuse: Where Do We Go From Here’ Children’s Legal Rights Journal 12 (1): 12–18.Google Scholar
Lusk, R. and Waterman, J. (1986) ‘Effects of Sexual Abuse on Children’ in MacFarlane, K. and Waterman, J. (eds.) Sexual Abuse of Young Children: Evaluation and treatment, London: Cassell, pp.101–118.Google Scholar
MacRae, C. (1991) ‘Regime of abuse reveal ed at night–wing sect’s grim castle’ The Observer 8 September.Google Scholar
Minter, E (1991) ‘Paedophile Gets 12 Years’ Jail’ The Age 19 December.Google Scholar
Neale, G. (1991) ‘Everyday Story of a Crop Circle Hoax’ The Sunday Telegraph 8 Sept.Google Scholar
Putman, F.W. (1991) ‘The Satanic Ritual Abuse Controversy’ Child Abuse and Neglect 15 (3): 175–179.Google Scholar
Quine, B. (1991) ‘Child Rapist Jailed’ Herald–Sun 29 October.Google Scholar
Ridley, M. (1991) ‘How the Corn Field Hoaxers Run Rings Round the Gullible’ The Daily Telegraph 31 August.Google Scholar
Ross, N. (1991) ‘Baby Stab Mum Declared Insane’ Herald–Sun 29 October.Google Scholar
Ryan, K. (1991) ‘Children Visited Mr Baldy in Jail’ Sunday Herald–Sun 27 October.Google Scholar
Sharrock, D. (1991) ‘Experts Run Around in Circles Over Corn “Hoax”’ The Guardian 10 September.Google Scholar
Sweeney, P. (1991) ‘Police free youth from satanic cult’ Sunday Sun 17 March.Google Scholar