“….we teach kids about tornado drills, fire drills, bus drills, yet nothing on sexual abuse….” says Erin Merryn, author and survivor after being abused and molested as a child.
Erin Merryn is a champion that is not only changing laws in our country, she is educating parents, schools and children about sexual abuse prevention programs.
Today with our digitally-driven society we have more concerns – online predators.
With over 95% of kids that have access to the internet, it is imperative that children are taught from a very young age that stranger danger is not only ‘in real life’ it also pertains to cyber-life.
Did you know that most kids that are molested or sexually abused know their perpetrator?
According to RAINN:
- 34.2% of attackers were family members.
- 58.7% were acquaintances.
- Only 7% of the perpetrators were strangers to the victim.
In Erin’s story, it was a relative. She is part of the statistic above which is why it is so important we learn from people like Erin and others about speaking up and how to report sex crimes.
With the internet, admittedly, it can be more difficult to monitor your kids and who they are chatting with virtually especially with all the social media apps and sites today.
From the moment your child receives their first keypad they will already know about stranger danger IRL, and hopefully you have already started the conversation about it as it pertains to their cyber-life. Selecting their friends wisely, as we know, it can and will affect their digital footprint.
Online predators, unfortunately, are very good at what they do – snaring their prey, so parents need to be smarter!
