Organized sexual abuse – by Michael Salter (2014)
[CAUTION: The content of this book is highly triggering. This overview is highly triggering. It mentions some details of organized and ritual abuse that are highly emotional and triggering. Take responsibility for your own well-being. This is disturbing and you are warned]
Written for:
- people who want to understand more about organized and ritual abuse
- people who prefer data und research over confusing stories on Youtube
- people who are sick of the mystification of organized and ritual abuse and want to see the psychology behind it
- people with strong nerves and the ability to regulate themselves
Special focus:
- qualitative study with survivors of organized and ritual abuse
- understanding the history and psychology of organized and ritual abuse
- demystifying organized and ritual abuse
What it is not:
- specifically written for survivors. It does not hold back with common details.
- believing in abusers having supernatural abilities
- written by someone who doesn’t have first hand experience standing up against abuser groups
- a guide on how to leave an abuser group
- falling for conspiracy theories
Language: What makes this hard to read is not difficult language, it is difficult content. We hear a bit about research and numbers and those findings are properly explained. Because details of abuse are explicitely named and explained in the context of organized and ritual abuse, it will be highly triggering and the generally gentle and professional tone won’t prevent it.
Book: I think this is one of the best science-based books on ritual abuse we currently have. It is not cheap, but every single chapter brings an unusual clarity. The qualitative study analyses the reports of real survivors. It is not just scientists talking about us. This one is based on talking with us in a scientifically organized way.
Overview:
Chapter 1: Introduces organized sexual abuse as a setting with 2 or more perpetrators and 2 or more victims. Explains the discourse over the past 40 years and why survivors are often dismissed. Separates organized sexual abuse from pedophilia/mental health issues. Looks at toxic masculinity, domination, dehumanization of others and group experiences as psychological factors.
Chapter 2: Introduces 4 areas where organized sexual abuse takes place (networks, institutions, family, ritual). Explains why there is so little data/research and what research there is. Overview of numbers from research. Explains the differences between the 4 contexts based on data. Includes the role of women in organized abuse.
Chapter 3: Explains the roots of organized and ritual abuse in the classic sadism, liberalism and libertinism of the 18th century. Social ideology of the time creates the foundation for organized male groups that try to break with the value system of the world around them to gain power while going unpunished.
Chapter 4: looks at the 80’s and 90’s and organized denial, specifically the ‘satanic panic’ and the false memory foundation, their arguments, how survivors were mistreated, what evidence was ignored and how misinformation was spread. Explains how people found psychological pleasure in disbelieving and disregarding survivor reports and the consequences for helpers and survivors.
Chapter 5: Mike Salter shares his own story of trying to help a friend who is a survivor of organized abuse to get safe when he was a young man. It includes his friend being re-victimized, him being threatened with death and his place being vandalized. The full toolbox of intimidation. His friend gets away eventually. He shares how the sceptical literature makes little sense to him after these first hand experiences.
Chapter 6: Shares insight from survivor reports, abuser strategies within organized abuse and why they worked, details of torture and violence, family dynamics that contribute to organized abuse and power dynamics in institutions.
Chapter 7: a deeper dive into familial organized abuse, the most common setting. Explains why families engage in organized abuse, how they benefit, how life gets separated into two worlds for the kids, more abuser strategies in the way kids are raised and trained and dissociation is achieved. Introduces DID as a result. More about the male and female roles in organized abuse. A lot of details of abuse settings, proceedings and events told by survivors themselves.
Chapter 8: explains the psychology of sadistic abuse, how control, fantasies of being all-powerful, violence and not being caught create a sense of connection within the group. The collective dehumanization of a victim is considered an group experience and not a form of personal sexual pleasure that drives actions. Describes selection, grooming and manipulation of vulnerable kids using detailed survivor reports. Includes deception techniques to make kids believe the abusers have supernatural powers and reports of torture and conditioning to invade the minds of children.
Chapter 9: explains ritual abuse as a logical continuation of the ideology of organized abuse. Explains different kinds of possible ideologies used for organized abuse and how most abusers probably don’t believe in them themselves. They are strategies of control. It is suggested that masks and rituals help abusers to overcome their last bit of humanity and enable them to torture and kill. They also support hierarchy and a sense of belonging to the group. There are more survivor reports with details of abuse and abuser strategies, including programming.
Chapter 10: This chapter talks a lot about the power to create life (forced impregnation) and to take life (forced abortions and killings of premature babies) as a driving psychological factor to create an ecstatic state of god-like power over life and death. It is based on survivor reports and includes details of events.
After reading
This is the best book on information about organized and ritual abuse that I have read so far. It contains a lot of data and references to studies and the results of a qualititive study with survivors of organized abuse. It is more successful at demystifying organized and ritual abuse than any other book I know. The sober, clear and logical way Salter explains abuser strategies and abuser psychology is exceptional. Especially the way he explains organized abuse as a continuation of Sade-ism and 18th century ideology is eye-opening. The personal interviews contain a lot of useful details about abuser strategies and common experiences. It is a collection of important information for advocacy and support-people.
It is utterly heart-breaking to read. I am glad that I did because there is so much useful data to help support-people who have to argue for the sake of survivors. But there is an inner wish that I could forget about it all and not know. Some of the reports are similar to my own experience. But Salter describes the whole spectrum of what people are capable of and it goes far beyond my own experience. It makes me want to use ‘human’ as the worst curse word out there.
I believe that people who experienced organized abuse and who are not stable can hurt themselves when reading this. I also believe that those who are stable will get terribly triggered and dissociate a lot but they might also find some comfort in realizing they are not alone and how similar abuser strategies are across different abuser groups. There is a method to the madness. They all use the same dirty tricks. It is possible to leave the ideology behind and look at their behavior from an outside perspective that analyses their experience and intentions. It knocks abusers from their seemingly powerful position. They are just bad people who want to be drunk with power and the only way they can get there is to abuse vulnerable people.
Helpers who engage in support or advocacy should know this book because of the deep insight into cultural, scientific and historical issues surrounding it and the amount of abuser strategies and common experiences it shares. The data is invaluable for professional discourse. It does not include strategies on how to help people. It is meant to help you understand what organized and ritual abuse is all about.
Most books on this topic contain talk about psychic abilities and stuff that cannot be proven. I am always a bit upset about it because it makes the whole book look unreliable. Salter only writes about solid information and personal reports. There is no weird stuff in here. That makes it a good book to give it to people who are interested in the topic but sceptical of things that sound like conspiracy theories.
This is a book you should know about. I will not recommend it to survivors directly because it is highly triggering. But you should know it exists and that you can point it out to others who might need the information.