Podcast summary
Episode 21 Michelle and Cultures
Michelle talks about her experiences of the differences and similarities of public awareness of child sexual abuse in South Korea, the US and Vietnam.
She also asks me a couple of questions.
Episode 21 Michelle has lived in South Korea, the US and Vietnam. I asked her about the differences and similarities of the ways that child sexual abuse is talked about (or not) in her experience.
This is the second part of two recordings of an interview with Dr Michelle M. Kang, who contacted me via my website. You can listen to the first part, Michelle and OLOH here.
Michelle says that the similarities are that people are unwilling to unfold their csa in public.
Some differences are more about the awareness of the public about csa. South Korea has good public awareness, including teaching young children in school how to protect themselves.
Statistics that Michelle found through her research suggest that there is a victim of csa in the US every 60 seconds (!). Public awareness is very high, though people are largely still unwilling to talk about their own abuse.
In Vietnam public awareness is very low. People do not want to talk about private things in public. Their public faces are very important.
I talk about how I think that public awareness in the UK of the prevalence of csa has increased over the past few years. This has been party driven by people making their voices heard.
Michelle asks me what were the biggest challenges I faced on my journey to recovery. The biggest one was believing myself. This was through therapy, such as with the counsellors at Safeline.
Michelle asks me what I will be doing in the future. I still do the occasional training session for Safeline. I am also a part of the organisation Angles, which facilitates people with lived experience interact in a positive way with the media.
The journey to recovery from child sexual abuse or any other form of abuse or trauma, is long and painful. However you choose to find support and help on that journey, it is worth it. There is hope for recovery.
Thank you for listening.
