My Review

Reading Susan Clancy’s book “The Trauma Myth- The Truth About Childhood Sex Abuse – and It’s Aftermath”, I couldn’t help seeing the woman as a female version of Ralph Underwager giving his Padika interview where he discussed how children actually liked to have sex with adults and that it was society that made it wrong- not the actual act itself. In fact, you don’t have to get farther than the introduction when she writes… “In their well-meaning efforts to raise awareness that sexual abuse is damaging and is never the child’s fault, they have chosen to emphasize characteristics and dynamics of abuse (such as trauma, fear, violence, force, and threats) that do not characterize the experience that MOST VICTIMS have (emphasis mine).” No, according to Clancy’s “research”, most children enjoyed having sex with their abusers and it was society discovering the abuse that caused the traumatization. She says “In stricking contrast to the assumptions of the traumatogenic model, whatever was causing the psychological and cognitive damage these victims reported had nothing to do with trauma; very few victims reported any fear, shock, force, or violence at the time the abuse occurred.”

Not so with my personal experience with abuse. My father would wake me in the middle of the night enraged, beat me, and then become so aroused that it followed with my rape- over and over, night after night. But there is a more insidious reason for the writing of this book than just trying to normalize and pacify the sexual abuse of children. Writing a previous book entitled Abducted: How People Come to Believe They Were Kidnapped By Aliens- this author is a proud member of the False Memory Foundation and basically dismisses all claims of children being satanically ritually abused- which she states in the beginning of the book as well. Vying to be another Elizabeth Loftus- Clancy is a researcher in the field of memory. Her collaborative scientific research mainly focuses on the impacts of trauma on memory and individual susceptibility to false memory creation. In other words- she denies the abuse of children and does her best to minimize the effects on the victims by claiming that it was actually SOCIETY that harmed them and not the initial rape and molestation.

The book was incredibly hard to read- and I would have never known about it had I not googled Doug Mesner’s name and found his review on the book. Actually- Doug was the second person to initially review the book- and has a long conversation with a woman in the comment section where he is his general condescending self. This man is also aka Lucian Greaves- Satanist who is founder of The Church of Satan or something like that. Heralded by the False Memory Foundation as a fantastic journalist- I wonder if Clancy has worked with Mesner- both attending Harvard University. This man is well known for throwing a satanic rally for Rick Scott in Florida and pushing for a statue of the devil to be placed by the Ten Commandments in Oklahoma City. The fact that he was eagerly rushed to validate this book and it’s author says a lot about the book itself in my opinion.

The only thing I agreed on with this book was on page 8- where Clancy writes “In short, traumatic events produce profound and lasting changes in physiological arousal, emotion, cognition, and memory”. I never forgot my rapes- nor did I forget my satanic ritual abuse- none of which was forgotten nor remembered in therapy with hypnosis. I didn’t forget my trauma- but that is not saying that I didn’t spend years desperately trying too. With this said- it was difficult to read this book and get through it without feeling sick to my stomach. The views presented in this book are warped- and her opinions are skewed on behalf of those who would prey on children. She says over and over that abusers are not nice people- but then- the abuse is enjoyable to the children so we, as a society- need to relax about people raping children because her research shows that it generally is a loving and compassionate experience between children and adults. Funny – the North American Man Boy Love Association has been promoting the same idea for years now- but then considering that they were large contributors to the False Memory Foundation when it was forming- this is not surprising. However way you look at it- this book is just wrong and, I will add – disgusting to anyone who has been abused or knows a child who has been.

Below is Mesner’s comment section from his review. Considering that he just postulated his privates in pubic on a gravestone- his haughty manner is pretty unjustified in my opinion.