Marina Hyde asks why wealthy, powerful men still associated with Jeffrey Epstein despite knowing about his crimes (Never forget Epstein’s little helpers – the powerful men who knew about his crimes, and helped him out anyway, 3 February). As a church minister who has been involved in dealing with a small number of historical allegations of abuse, may I make the following observations. The Methodist church has a robust safeguarding policy, with mandatory training for everyone who works or volunteers in the church, and there is much work being done to help us hear the voices of those abused.
Despite all this, when an allegation of historical abuse is made, congregations find it almost impossible to believe that the elderly man they have known, loved and respected for decades could be guilty of such a crime. The accuser is often younger, female and had left the church decades before, so is a stranger. I have also observed families of the accused, especially wives, absolutely deny that their loved one could be capable of such things, despite evidence, court cases and convictions.
In conversations with professionals who have far more experience than I, my observations have been accepted as common in many safeguarding cases. If ordinary church folk – intelligent people, many of whom work or have worked in the caring professions – find it so hard to comprehend and accept the evidence, why are we surprised that wealthy, powerful men have ignored the evidence against Epstein?
It is not enough to say we must hear the voices of the abused – we must also listen, and believe their words, when our gut reaction is to deny the allegations against people we know. That is a very hard thing to do and needs intention.
Rev Glayne Worgan
Sale, Cheshire
• Marina Hyde’s last sentence, about women and girls learning that Epstein’s helpers didn’t care about the exploitation, is key. Epstein’s survivors, and others like me who were sexually assaulted and trafficked as children, will always carry the pain of recognising that so many others knew about the crimes but said nothing. We didn’t matter. Child exploitation is just sex in many adult men’s eyes.
For me, there is a silver lining in now being clear-eyed about how society views the sexual abuse of children. I can let go of any guilt that I carry about not having tried hard enough to stop the assaults. Had I spoken out, it would have been hard to find someone brave enough to listen, justice would not have been pursued, and I would have endangered myself further.
Name and address supplied
• Thanks to Marina Hyde for cutting through the noise engulfing the fallout from the latest Jeffrey Epstein files release. It’s been sickening to hear these grotesque revelations. But almost as sickening is the immediate rush in some quarters to use this violation and exploitation of young women and girls as a convenient springboard for an attack on certain political or constitutional bogeymen.
For some, it appears more important to see this horror show as a means to call for the abolition of the royal family, or to attack a particular tribe in the Labour party, or even to pontificate about some other political cause de jour. Some newspaper comment threads were a disgrace; the victims were reduced to mere proxies for righteous rage about this, that or the other – in effect, dehumanised all over again.
Surely we’re better than this? For the sake of Epstein’s victims, I bloody well hope so.
Colin Montgomery
Edinburgh
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