Do not minimize horrors of child sex abuse

We are writing to respond to a letter published June 9 from Brian Martel, who complained that Sara Minogue’s story on June 2 about a child sex abuse case was too descriptive.

Mianiqsijit Board, a community based counselling service in Baker Lake, commends Minogue for having the courage to report such a horrific issue.

Our board has been in existence since 1990 to deal with the terrible problem of child sexual abuse in our community. This terrible sickness is in every community in Nunavut along with all the other social problems you can think of.

Mianiqsijit counsels both family violence victims and offenders in both Inuktitut and English. It takes a lot of courage to deal with sexual abuse, especially when a child is a victim.

We have seen sexual abuse being minimized in courts (sometimes not interpreted properly); and through news media, where pornography is sometimes described in Inuktitut as “taking pictures.”

The more we minimize it, the more communities normalize it. We have to tell it like it is for people to realize that these terrible things happen to children and the more people are aware that it is not okay, the less it will be tolerated.

Mianiqsijit Board
Baker Lake