Creative Therapeutics County Road, P. The fourteen chapters of this latest book by Richard Gardner are in keeping with Dr. Gardner's ability to produce timely and thoughtful analyses of problematical situations involving children. The first chapter sets forth what he sees as the basic problem. Our society has become obsessed with sexual abuse. Next, in Chapter 2, he presents a Freudian understanding of childhood sexuality.
He concludes that the normal child shows a wide range of sexual interest, fantasies, and sexual behavior, although adults have difficulty accepting this reality of childhood. In Chapter 3 he states his case for the belief that sexual abuse prevention programs do more harm than good. Based upon his experiences as a child psychiatrist, Chapter 4 briefly describes the development of a hypersexuality in our society with a change in mores in the direction of greater explicit sexual stimuli and a broader range of sexual behaviors.
In Chapter 5 he deals with nine factors that may account for parent's readiness to be involved in the obsessive preoccupation with sexual abuse. Chapter 6 is the longest and most strongly written. Gardner exposes the weaknesses, errors, and venality of self-styled "validators" who affirm and support claims of sexual abuse.
This chapter contains some of his harshest judgments and shows his highly critical view of the process by which the child protection system responds to an allegation of sexual abuse. Chapter 7 presents his view of what actually happens to children in the development of an allegation of sexual abuse. When the allegation is false, the child is victimized and abused by the system and adults who erroneously accept an allegation.
Chapters 8 through 12 are brief but pungent discussions of various professionals involved in handling sexual abuse allegations. They are physicians, prosecutors, judges, lawyers, and therapists.
