Dear Editor

It is with much disgust and anger that I pen this letter. Every day when I pick up the newspaper, there is always a story about the molestation of young boys and girls by men who have been entrusted with the task of helping to mould these young people into the men and women of tomorrow.

These men and the actions they have taken are repulsive to say the least, and I feel no guilt in saying that they should be severely punished.

The justice system needs to make examples of them so that others who are engaging in such loathsome activities will be pushed to abandon them.

However, the truth is that paedophilia is not a problem that can be cured by harsh punishment (not to say that they should not suffer the consequences of their actions), but is one that requires serious introspection and many years of professional treatment and spiritual development.

The men in question have yielded themselves to a force stronger than themselves and the issues they struggle with are sometimes rooted in deep-seated problems from their childhood.

The reality is that the vicious cycle of sexual molestation and paedophilia continues to be perpetuated and our young girls and boys who are victims in some cases become perpetrators themselves.

So how can we stop these men from violating our young people? Firstly, there is no one answer to this question. It has to be a combination of things in order for there to be results. Nevertheless, I am of the opinion that as parents, we need to be more vigilant and trust people less with our children.

We need to start investigating the people we entrust our children to and spend more time getting to know our children.

We also need to listen to our children more, get to know their friends and the adults they trust other than us.

Lastly, we need to teach and explain to our children from an early age what sexual molestation is and how to speak out about it and help them to heal.