Haleh Banani – How to protect your children from sexual abuse
AI: Summary ©
The speakers discuss the importance of protecting children from sexual abuse and empowering parents to teach them to be confident and upfront about their rights and responsibilities. They emphasize the need to educate children on what is right and what is wrong to avoid false accusations and false accusations. The speakers also emphasize the importance of empowering children to express their discomfort and fear when others do something inappropriate, monitoring their emotions, and protecting their own beliefs and emotions. They stress the need to educate children on the consequences of sexual abuse and to create a balance between their own beliefs and others.
AI: Summary ©
This information has the power to protect your
children from unimaginable harm, shield them from heartache,
and even preserve their faith.
Sexual abuse, especially when it happens within trusted
religious spaces, can deeply scar a child and
shake their relationship with Islam forever.
So today, we are equipping ourselves with tools
both psychologically and spiritually to safeguard our children
and keep their hearts connected to our faith.
It is a very difficult but essential topic,
protecting our children from sexual abuse.
As parents, as caregivers, as members of the
community, it is our duty to safeguard the
innocence and safety of our children.
Allah says in the Qur'an, يَا أَيُّهَا
الَّذِينَ آمَنُوا قُوَّ أَنفُسَكُمْ وَأَهْلِكُمْ نَرَٓى O you
who have believed, protect yourselves and your family
from fire.
How do we protect our family from fire
when the person that we are entrusting to
teach them the Qur'an takes advantage of
them?
How do we protect them when the person
who is getting them to memorize Qur'an
or getting them to learn about the Islamic
principles is the very perpetrator who is trying
to groom them for their own pleasures?
This is a very difficult topic to discuss,
and it is so prevalent, and many people
don't recognize how prevalent it is.
In the three decades that I have been
doing faith-based counseling, I have seen thousands
of Muslims, and it's been worldwide, and there
have been so many cases, hundreds and hundreds
of cases of child abuse, sexual abuse, and
a percentage of that sexual abuse has been
with the religious leaders.
It has been with whether the Qur'an
teacher, it has been with the imam, it
has been with an individual that the family
has trusted, it has been with someone that
they have thought that they are coming to
teach them about the deen.
This is one of the most dangerous things
that can happen to any child because not
only are they violated sexually, which is never
acceptable, but they are being manipulated by the
very people who are trying to teach them
the religion, the very people that the parents
who have trusted them, they have given them
their child.
We protect our children from strangers, from going
out.
Many parents are overprotective when it comes to
them going out with friends or going out
to the mall, but what they don't recognize
is that the danger that lurks within our
Islamic institutions, within the Qur'anic circles, and
this is not to cast doubt on every
member of our community.
There are plenty of individuals who are upright,
there are plenty of individuals who are God
-conscious, there are very individuals who are earnestly
working to help save our communities.
However, as parents, as caretakers, as community leaders,
we have a responsibility to follow certain principles,
to empower our children, for them to be
able to distinguish between what is right and
what is wrong, what is acceptable, what is
not acceptable, and so this is going to
be a very critical topic.
I don't want you to dismiss this and
think this does not happen, this is nothing
to worry about, this is a fluke.
I remember being in the Middle East, wanting
to give a talk to the mothers, telling
them within the school, I want to talk
to you about saving your children from being
sexually abused.
They dismissed it, some were outraged, they said
this doesn't happen in our communities.
And you know what I told them?
I said, you don't know what is happening
in the communities because the people who have
been sexually abused will not come to dinner
parties and talk about it.
They will not come to the masjid and
share their experiences.
This is something that they have so much
shame, so much anger, so much frustration, it's
something that is buried deep within them.
And many of the individuals that I have
spoken with, they have said that I am
the first person that they have ever exposed
their sexual abuse to.
And that woman could be 40 years old,
that man could be in his 50s, and
I will be the first person that they
will share it with.
So just because people are not talking about
their experiences does not mean that it's not
happening.
This is something that is prevalent, it is
so disgusting, and it is harming our communities.
And you cannot imagine the impact that it
has on a person's life for the rest
of their life when this happens.
And I will discuss one by one, I
will do a series, because this is such
an important topic and I want to address
it one at a time.
The first one that we are going to
discuss is how to protect our children.
First, we have to recognize that there is
a power dynamic.
We need to educate our children.
We need to let them know that what
is appropriate, what is inappropriate.
From very early on, when we are teaching
our children to be obedient, not to talk
back, not to speak up, not to question
anything, and they have their mind programmed to
follow authority, this actually breeds abuse.
What do I mean by this?
That if we don't empower our children to
speak up when something is wrong, if we
are not teaching our children to express their
opinion, to speak up, to build their confidence,
then what ends up happening is that any
authority figure can tell them what to do
and they will blindly listen.
And this is so dangerous.
That is why instilling your children with confidence,
with the ability to speak up, with the
ability to call out what is wrong is
one of the most important skills that a
child can gain.
Now, a lot of parents don't like to
do this because it makes parenting more challenging.
It's a lot easier to just say, you
know what, just be quiet, don't speak up,
just listen to what I say and follow
what I say.
And this causes children to just go along
with anyone who is an authority figure.
So teaching obedience, obedience to Allah is important.
Obedience to parents is important.
However, we have to also teach them to
be confident, to use their minds, to speak
up when something is wrong.
Now, when you teach children from very early
on about Hayat, Hayat which is modesty, this
is a very important concept for children to
learn that who do they undress in front
of, who is able to, let's say, help
them in the bathroom, who can see their
private parts.
And it's very important to tell them about
mom and dad are able to help you
and no one else should be seeing, no
one else should be touching.
And if this is not communicated to the
children, then they can be confused about what
is right and what is wrong, especially when
it comes from an individual that they trust
and the family trust.
Now, one of the things I remember from
being very young, I was maybe six years
old and my mom was very progressive.
She would read a lot of books of
psychology very way ahead of her times and
she trained me from when I was five
or six that no one is allowed to
touch me inappropriately.
And she even taught me that if someone
does, I have every right to protect myself,
I have every right to do what it
takes to guard against this.
Now, almost every case of sexual abuse that
I have seen in the past three decades,
when I asked them, did you ever get
a talk from your parent telling you what
is appropriate, what is inappropriate?
Every single one of them said, I never
got that talk.
I was confused.
I didn't know.
So we have to safeguard our children.
We have to teach them.
We have to prepare them.
You cannot just throw them to the wolves
and not give them the tools and the
way of thinking and the strategy to deal
with these difficult situations.
So one of the things that I would
tell my children when they were little, first
of all, it was about, you always have
to do age appropriate education.
So first it's about not letting anyone see
your private parts, not letting anyone touch your
private parts.
And I would actually tell them that no
matter who the person is, it doesn't matter
how much we love them.
It doesn't matter how much we respect them.
If they do anything inappropriate, if they touch
you or if they're not supposed to touch
you, if they tell you to do things
that you don't feel comfortable with, you have
our permission to get out of that situation.
You have our permission to do whatever it
takes to stop this.
Because many times children feel a sense of
pressure.
They feel that they have to please the
elders, that they have to do whatever they
say.
And many of the clients would tell me
if whether it was a family member, whether
it was a friend of the family, almost
all the time, I would say over 80
% of the time, it was someone the
family trusted.
It was either a family member or it
was someone that that was maybe a neighbor
that they trusted.
Maybe it was a cousin.
It was someone that had access to the
kids.
It's rarely a stranger.
Now it does happen where it could be
someone on the street, someone in the store
where a person will act inappropriately or on
the public transportation.
Sometimes in the Middle East that happens.
However, when it is prolonged sexual abuse, it's
usually maybe with male help at home.
That happens in the Middle East a lot
where it could be with family members that
they live in a joint system.
They have many family members and I had
this one client who told me there were
so many family members who were living in
the home with no supervision and she got
abused by several family members within that home.
So we have to be vigilant.
We have to teach our children that it
doesn't matter who it is.
You don't have to obey when someone is
telling you to do the wrong thing.
Allah has taught us not to even obey
our parents.
If they are telling us to worship an
idol, we are able to speak up against
that.
So what about equipping our children to recognize
that if someone is telling you to do
something wrong, to put an end to it
and to tell them, come to me and
I will believe not whatever you say, but
if anything happens to you, then it is
important to share with me and to ask
and to have that dialogue.
Now, if a child comes to you and
this is very critical, the child comes to
you and reports that something has happened.
They say, so-and-so touched me.
So-and-so did this, this and that.
You have to listen to this child and
take it seriously.
There are so many cases where an individual
has built up the courage.
They're a little kid.
They've built up the courage.
They have fought the shame.
They have fought the fear.
They have fought so much within themselves to
go and tell their parents about the abuse.
And what do the parents say?
You're making it up.
You're a liar.
You just want attention.
You don't know what you're talking about.
You have an active imagination.
This is the worst thing that could ever
happen to a person who has been violated.
When you dismiss them, when you actually say
that they are a liar and you don't
hear them out and you somehow blame the
victim, this is one of the worst things.
And it actually takes so much longer to
heal from this from a psychological perspective.
It is so much more difficult when you
are not believed.
So if a person has been sexually abused,
when a child has been sexually abused and
they tell their parents and when the parent
stands up and they let that person have
it, they fire the person, they protect them.
If it's a family member, they don't ever
let them have access to their kids again
and they stand up for that.
That is so therapeutic.
It is healing because the child feels that
they are protected.
When you ignore your child, when you dismiss
your child, when you tell them that they
are a liar and when you blame your
child, then you are allowing the abuse to
continue and that child will forever lose trust
in you.
That child will forever despise you and resent
you for not protecting them at a time
where they were helpless.
They were completely helpless.
So if you have a child coming up
to you, don't assume they're making this stuff
up.
Kids don't make up things like this.
A five-year-old telling you that they
were fondled, this is something they are reporting
to you.
Take it seriously.
I don't care who it is.
I don't care the person, if it's a
sibling, if it's a cousin, if it's a
nephew, whoever it is, your best friend, whoever
it is, listen to your child and don't
dismiss them because this is what can cause
and allow the abuse to continue.
So you have to realize that listening to
your child, first of all, letting them know
that whoever it is, you have permission to
get yourself out of there.
Whatever you need to do, get yourself out
of there.
Then believing your child when they are talking
to you.
Third thing is making sure that your children
are not unsupervised.
When you have big family gatherings, when you
have lots of cousins, you need to periodically
check on them.
They need to know.
People around need to know that you are
a vigilant parent.
If you are negligent, if you get caught
up with your own friends, with your own
activities, with your own troubles, whatever it is,
and then a child is left unprotected, they
are going to be a prey.
They are going to be a prey and
the predators notice that.
They notice when parents are busy.
They notice when parents are negligent.
They notice when parents do not check in.
So one of the ways that I would
safeguard my children, I would highly encourage everyone
to do the same, is when you have
a religious figure coming to your home and
you are getting them, let's say the Qur
'an, the Hafiz, whatever it is, make sure
it's in an open area.
I would have them sitting in the living
room.
I would have them in a place where
I would come and go periodically so that
there is supervision.
Now, Alhamdulillah, we were blessed with a very
righteous Shaykh.
May Allah preserve him.
Now, we don't know.
We can't just assume.
We can't just assume it's because, oh, we've
known him for so long, or because he
has this ijazah and that ijazah.
Some people have a PhD.
Some people have many ijazahs.
That does not prevent them from having a
diseased heart.
And that's something we'll get into, what causes
this.
But right now, we're talking about don't just
assume that because it's a person with a
certain degree, a certain length of beard, a
certain accomplishment, beautiful voice, somehow they are like
immune to doing these things.
Put your kids under your supervision.
Do not have them go in a room
and close the door and then hope for
the best and think that somehow that they're
safe.
You cannot do that.
Even if you are at a dinner party,
you're at your family's home.
Make sure that everyone knows that you check
on your children, that they are not just
forgotten.
Now, obviously, I do have to make it
like a little disclaimer that there are many
parents who are actually hyper vigilant and sometimes
maybe extremely paranoid.
And they don't let their kids breathe.
They don't let them go anywhere.
That's not healthy either because they're going to
want it.
They're going to feel suffocated.
They're going to want to, you know, just
run away.
And many do.
So, you have to keep it a balance
as they're getting older and more knowledgeable.
You give them more space and more freedom.
However, you are vigilant.
Now, one of the things that I would
always tell my children is that make sure
that if someone does anything inappropriate, what they're
going to say is that they will say,
I will kill you or I will kill
your entire family if you tell anyone.
So, there is a threat.
There's a threat that if you share, then
some harm will come.
Okay.
And some religious figures, unfortunately, will say, even
if you tell anyone, no one's going to
believe you because I'm so loved.
I'm so respected.
I'm so trusted, which this is just unbelievable
that someone can feel so untouchable.
Where is the humility?
Where is the God consciousness?
How can someone have this level of knowledge
and yet be so arrogant?
So, that in itself, that will be another
topic that why this happens and how it
happened.
But this is very critical for you to
empower your kids and tell them the tactic
that these people will use is to threaten,
to say that they will harm you, harm
the family.
And many people, many of these little children,
they carry the weight of the world because
they think that somehow by staying silent, they
are protecting their families.
They really believe that he will kill the
family.
And so, they allow the abuse.
They don't speak up.
And the reason the perpetrators threaten them with
this is because they don't want to be
caught.
They want to continue the sexual abuse.
So, when you tell your kids that, they
will know.
It's like, aha, I know this trick.
You have to empower them.
And another thing is that I would tell
my kids that if anyone tells you, and
I would always say this because we're living
in the Middle East and we had house
help.
And I would say this in front of
the house help.
And I say, if anyone ever tells you,
don't tell your parents, no, this is a
bad person.
Why in the world would anyone say, don't
tell your parent unless they're doing something wrong?
And I would let everybody know that this
is our view and this is where we
stand.
And the kids knew this.
So, when someone says, either I'm going to
threaten you or don't tell your parents, these
are red flags that go off and they
know this is something that is dangerous and
they become aware.
But when they don't know the tactics, when
they don't know what is right, what is
wrong, what is appropriate, what is inappropriate, they
just kind of go along with it.
And the damage that this does, the damage
of being sexually abused by a religious leader
is devastating.
Any kind of sexual abuse at any age
is devastating.
But this takes it to another level because
most of the times, those who have been
violated, those who have been sexually abused by
whoever it is, they draw strength upon their
faith.
They draw strength upon the fact that, I
will pull closer to Allah.
I will get through this.
It is through their faith.
They may go to religious leaders to get
that guidance, to get that strength.
But when it's the actual religious leader who
does this, then their faith, it's like a
candle that just goes out.
Where did they turn the person that they
trusted?
They betrayed them.
So this is why it's so much more
dangerous and you have to be so vigilant.
And you have to teach your children to
speak with you.
That's why you have to build a relationship
with your kids.
Have an open dialogue where they can talk
with you.
If you are not having a dialogue with
your kids, if they are not telling you
about the daily events and you are not
investing in having a relationship with them and
they're not telling you about the daily events,
they're not going to tell you about this.
I have had so many cases of sexual
abuse where I will tell them, did you
tell your parents about what was going on?
And they will say that I couldn't even
talk to my parents about school, about friends.
When you overreact, when you yell, scream, and
you overreact about the little things, then how
can they possibly trust you emotionally to share
the big things?
When I spoke to a group of 50,
60 Muslim youth in our community and I
gave them different scenarios, what if something happens
to you?
What if you're at a gathering, someone spikes
your drink, someone puts something in you, someone
tries to molest you, someone tries to *
you, will you go to your parents?
Not one, not one child raised their hand,
not one teen said, I will go to
my parents, even though I created scenarios that
were just horrific.
And I said, why wouldn't you go to
your parents?
They can't even handle the small things.
They will freak out.
They can't even control their anger for the
little things.
So how do you expect me to go
to them and talk to them about being
sexually abused, about being molested, about being raped?
Actually, one client of mine was raped.
She was in high school.
And when she came back, imagine, imagine the
fear, imagine the horror that she had to
go through.
Well, she put herself in a difficult situation.
It was, she compromised certain things.
And that does not mean that this is
something that we have to get angry at
the person if they have been abused.
When she came back and she reported the
* to her mother, her mother started hitting
her and getting mad at her and blaming
her.
Now, we have to learn how to deal
with these situations.
A person, when they are harmed, the first
thing they need is to be comforted.
The first thing they need is medical attention.
The first thing they need is maybe some
counseling, shaming them, getting mad at them.
Obviously, people make wrong choices.
They may be in the wrong place at
the wrong time, doing the wrong things.
I understand, but we need to educate.
Shaming, yelling, hitting is not going to solve
the problem.
It makes them actually despise their families and
their faith more because they felt that they
were not protected.
And for many of the youth, their parents
represent Islam.
So if the parent is not reacting in
the correct way when they are being abused,
they are going to distance themselves.
They are going to pull away from the
dean.
We have to educate our kids at any
age and prepare them mentally and emotionally.
And there have been cases of individuals being
raped even at an older age.
And it was because it may be some
bad choices.
And I had a client come to me
when her daughter was raped.
And she thought it was just the end
of her life.
She wanted to die.
The mother wanted to die because she thought
it was the end of the world.
And obviously, it is so hard.
It is so horrific to experience such a
thing.
And this individual was religious and was the
son of a very religious individual who did
this.
And it was very difficult.
It was very difficult for the mother.
It was very difficult for the girl to
understand.
However, if you take a situation like that
and say, okay, it won't make the situation
better by getting angry.
It won't make the situation any better by
just overreacting.
Actually, the way it was guided within the
sessions, they became closer than ever.
The mother and the daughter became closer than
ever because they were finally able to speak
to one another.
They were finally able to have a relationship,
not just being told what to do, when
to do it, how to do it, but
it was an actual relationship.
So what we need to do is recognize
that no matter how knowledgeable a person is,
no matter how much we love and respect
them, people are dealing with their own demons.
We have no idea.
You have no idea what people go through.
I have an idea what people go through
because they share with me.
They open up.
They could be very outwardly religious and people
will tell me, sister, I go to the
masjid five times a day, but I have
this addiction.
Sister, I come across as very charming and
loving and kind to others, but at home
I'm a monster.
So you have to recognize that many people
are living with demons within themselves.
Maybe they have psychological problems.
Maybe they have issues that they have not
resolved and you have to recognize, you have
to protect, but not just by over protecting.
I feel that we have enough parents who
are just so overprotective that they don't let
their kids breathe.
That's not healthy either.
We have to create a balance.
Educate your kids, teach them what's right and
wrong, but also give some level of freedom,
but also give that trust and that is
very critical to establish.
I pray that Allah protects our children, that
protects the children of our ummah, those individuals
who are so vulnerable.
They don't have a voice.
They can't understand even who to believe and
what to believe.
We have to be vigilant in taking care
of them.
They are our amanah.
We have to protect them and safeguard their
innocence.
This is one of the most important things
that you can do and I see the
impact of those who have been sexually abused.
They will have psychological disorders.
They will have personality disorders.
They will have issues in their relationships.
There will be trust issues.
There will be problems throughout their lives.
So what you can do to protect them,
that is absolutely the best thing you can
do, is educate, protect, but within limits where
you are not just, you can't just hide
them in the house and not let them
out and not let them have friends, not
let them do anything.
It is such a fine balance and it's
so critical to have that relationship with your
kids, to have them be able to trust
you, to talk to you, to share if
anything is wrong, and for you to manage
your own emotions, for you to be able
to regulate, and that is why it is
so important what I teach in the Mindful
Hearts Academy, teaching people, women especially, how to
regulate their emotions, not to be over reactionary,
not to yell and scream and shame.
These methodologies will just push your children away
and to instill confidence in your children so
that they can speak up for themselves.
Now obviously if they're very little it's hard,
but as they get older, instill that confidence
in them, teach them, and this is why
they are able to, like those individuals who
speak up, because there are individuals that were
in situations like this and they said, no
I didn't allow it to happen, I spoke
up for myself, I got out of that
situation because they had the confidence, and that's
why it's so important teaching your kids how
to have inner confidence.
So I pray that Allah protects our children,
that Allah protects those, and helps those who
have been sexually abused, may Allah heal their
hearts, help them to stay connected with you
despite all the challenges they've gone through, despite
the abuse, that they reconnect with you, ya
Allah, and rebuild their faith, and ya Allah
guide our leaders, those who have those inner
demons, ya Allah help them to get the
help that they need, and ya Allah help
us to protect our community from these perpetrators.
There has to be a zero tolerance for
this kind of behavior, and if we don't
have a zero tolerance then what's going to
happen is that it will happen again, and
again, and again, because people look at it
and say well nothing happened.
So we really need to safeguard our children
by teaching them these valuable, valuable tips so
that they are not damaged, that they don't
lose faith, and they don't get their lives
and relationships destroyed.
I pray that Allah will help us in
taking care of these beautiful amanahs that we
have.
As-salamu alaykum.