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Preamble:
Naming and defining adequately the human atrocities inflicted by perpetrators
of all forms of violence against infants, toddlers, children, youth
and adults is absolutely necessary if human relationships are to evolve.
Neglect, all forms of abuse, and political torture are becoming increasingly
more recognized and acknowledged; human trafficking and exploitation—off-street
and on-street—is just beginning to unfold as a violent reality of
our global societies and relationships. This can also be said of the
experiences of ritual abuse, satanic ritual abuse, and human experimentation
and mind-control. These latter forms of violent relational atrocities
do move violence beyond the reality of abuse into the reality of torture,
in our opinion, thus, we take the approach that the violence inflicted
in ritual abuse, satanic ritual abuse, mind-control and human experimentation
are forms of non-political torture. There are also experiences of
abuse that continue to be mislabelled as abuse which ought to be defined
as non-political torture, for example, spousal torture and child torture.
And, all forms of relationship violence are violations of the human
rights of infants, toddlers, children, youth and adults—young and
old—as defined under the United Nations Convention on the Rights
of the Child and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
Our web
site is just beginning—November
2002—so we have much work to do. For the present, we begin this section—definitions--by
presenting the Canadian perspective by referring to the 1993 National
Task Force Report, which studied violence against Canadian women.
The Canadian
Perspective
The Final Report of The Canadian Panel
on Violence Against Women stated:
Ritual abuse is defined as a combination of severe
physical, sexual, psychological and spiritual abuse used systematically
and in combination with symbols, ceremonies and/or group activities
that have a religious, magical or supernatural connotation. Victims
are terrorized into silence by repetitive abuse over time and indoctrinated
into beliefs and practices of the cult or group.
CLICK
HERE FOR EXCERPT FROM FINAL REPORT OF CANADIAN PANEL
(The Canadian Panel on Violence Against
Women. (1993). Changing the Landscape: Ending Violence ~ Achieving
Equality. 45-47. Ottawa: Minister of Supply and Services.)
Prevalence:
We do not know all the dynamics involved, the international
connections or relationships between different regions and different
cults. The Panel did, however, hear from many women from all
regions of Canada who named themselves as survivors of ritual
abuse … a phenomenon of violence was detailed that urgently requires
recognition in Canada.
(The Canadian Panel on Violence Against Women. (1993).
Changing the Landscape: Ending Violence ~ Achieving Equality.
45-47. Ottawa: Minister of Supply and Services.)
From our “kitchen table” research project:
During our interviews
and work with persons who have experienced forms of non-political
torture, such as spousal torture or ritual abuse-torture, we were
told that the word abuse does not sufficiently nor respectfully define
the inhumane atrocities that perpetrators inflicted; however, the
word torture does fit, thus, we use the wording ritual abuse-torture-RAT.
Definition Resources
All our papers are in pdf format
and you will need Adobe
Acrobat Reader to read the papers. To download Adobe just click
on the Adobe hyperlink and follow the directions.
Acts Of Torture
(17 pages)
Ritual Abuse-Torture: Defining
and Sharing Information (pamphlet)
Ritual Abuse-Torture:
Sharing Information & Self Caring Solutions ( 2 pages - pamphlet)
Ritual Abuse-Torture
Sharing Information & Self Caring Solutions ( 4 pages- fact sheet)
Seeing Inside the Ritual
Abuse-Torture Co-Culture (15 pages)
UN Definitions for Human Trafficking (2 pages)
And, please check back with us again!
Jeanne & Linda
November 8, 2002
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