ON ONE level, it is a story of repulsive abuse. But perhaps more disturbing is the reaction of the victims, because some of them gave the impression that they did not mind that much.
A gang of Asian men are currently on trial, accused of child-prostitution offences against vulnerable teenage girls as young as 13. They face 55 charges, including inciting child prostitution, grooming, and rape.
They allegedly drew the young girls into their circle by befriending them, and buying them drink and drugs. They then eased them into prostitution, and drove them around the country for sex in places such as car parks.
The prosecution maintains that the girls were being raped, sold, or lent out like sexual commodities. But what is also clear is the extent to which these girls are said to have co-operated in their own sexual exploitation. The prosecutor warned jurors that they would “neither like, nor be impressed by, the behaviour, attitudes, or morals” that some of the victims displayed. “You will hear”, she said, “about highly sexually promiscuous behaviour which you will probably find shocking.”
You might imagine that the men created a climate of fear to keep the girls onside. But more important than fear was a sense of belonging. What some of these girls most craved was to belong, and they did not mind too much how or why.
Belonging is a basic human need. Some of us are more sociable than others, but we all like to have affili-ations — places where we are known, and possibly even loved. Some stay in unhappy marriages because belonging trumps anything else. Some stay in jobs because it is as near to a home as they have ever had. And some stay in a church where they have been harmed because it is where their friends are; it is a place where they belong. Many people report, after leaving a church, that no one from there speaks to them again — and that is a high price to pay.
Belonging can be deeply reassuring. But, equally, the need to belong can diminish us as people. We want to be part of something, and we sell our souls to do it. And perhaps here is the answer to that old chestnut: how could ordinary German people participate in the Holocaust? From an early age, when they joined the Hitler Youth, they belonged somewhere. It is a profound need for which some people will endure or enact almost anything.
“It’s not good to be alone,” said God in the Garden of Eden, but this is not always true. The genius of healthy belonging lies in not belonging; at the heart of good belonging is solitude, where we belong to no one, and can remember who we are and what we want to live, be, and do.
As Cardinal Basil Hume said: “We shall never be safe in the marketplace unless we are at home in the desert.”
www.simonparke.com