Our Politics
generationFIVE works to change the root causes of child sexual abuse, so that we can truly prevent it. We work to respond to present and past experiences of CSA in ways that help to change the community and social norms that perpetuate it. We organize to change our community and social values and norms, so that child sexual abuse no longer happens. gen5 holds a vision of liberation, justice and sustainability for all of our futures.

To address child sexual abuse, we need to look at the bigger picture…the social systems and norms in which it happens at such astounding rates. By social norms we mean the beliefs and practices regarding power, sexuality, the ideas about children and ownership, etc. that are promoted by the broader society, and then the institutions that perpetuate these ideas and practices. We need both an individual and systemic understanding of CSA to be effective in our response and prevention strategies.

We are living in a broader social context that teaches power-over relations, private ownership (parents/family) of children, a dismissal of children’s accounts (legal), mixed messages and little education about human sexuality (it is bad, shame based, and it is used to sell us everything from cars to deodorant), and the ongoing mixing of sex and violence. We are not taught to address pain and trauma deeply, but rather mask symptoms or blame the individual for their distress. Child sexual abuse is about having power over another person and using that power sexually. The norms that allow for this behavior are sadly, ever-present in our society.

generationFIVE looks at these social causes of child sexual abuse and then at real dynamics of the issue…who abuses, who says nothing, the community costs for speaking up, and the criminal justice solutions offered that most people don’t find relevant enough to use. To impact and prevent CSA, we ask questions like:

o What do the high numbers of victim/survivors and offenders of CSA tell us about our family and community beliefs and practices? What do we pass on that let’s child sexual abuse continue generation to generation?

o What is it in our social norms and institutions that creates this many offenders, survivors and bystanders to child sexual abuse?

o What are our public systems and institutions missing- so that child sexual abuse rates are not decreasing? What mistakes are we repeating?

generationFIVE is an anti-violence organization that recognizes that our goal of ending child sexual abuse cannot be realized while other systems of oppression are allowed to continue. In fact, systems of oppression and child sexual abuse have an interdependent relationship: a power-over system that benefits some at the expense of others and uses violence, creates the conditions for child sexual abuse (i.e. gender inequality, class exploitation, racism, violence and threat for difference), while in turn the prevalence of child sexual abuse fosters behaviors (obedience to authority, silence, disempowerment, shame) that prevent people from organizing effectively to work for liberation, healing and change systemic forms of violence.