A Victim or Not?
By Linda Watson-Brown
Originally published in The Scotsman, June 4, 2001
The abuse began when Becky was three. Her father, her elder brother and four other men were the main perpetrators. Her memories are not immediately related to what was done to her body, or to her mind. Rather she recalls the details. As her story unfolds, she places great emphasis on recollections of rain on windows, of the sound of calloused hands on her clothing, of the type of sweets she was given after it was over.
But these are no more than evasions. What Becky knows, and what Becky can verbalise all too well, was as commonplace in her life as the weather or the confectionery. Her weekly rapes, and the cataloguing of her attacks, are boxed off in her mind in a way that she can deal with. She is calm, and she never breaks down as she outlines her childhood world. That composure alone is a frightening thing as it brings to mind the expressions on the faces of so many of the children involved in child pornography. While some are ingrained with fear and terror, many are blank, with eyes that are dead and responses that are conditioned by years of abuse.
Now living in Central Scotland, Becky was born in Manchester and lived there until she was 22. When she arrived in Glasgow three years ago, she had experienced not just a decade of rape, but a further eight years in adult pornography.
"I have a huge chunk where I can't let myself remember too much," she reveals. "I know it started when I was three, because I remember wearing a dress I got for that birthday when it all began. The first time was a Friday night, which was my Mum's night out for bingo with my auntie and some friends. My Dad would always get some mates round, and my Mum thought he was such a marvellous person for giving her this night off. My brother was 12 years older than me, and he was the one who came to get me. The first time I was playing in my room and he said some people wanted to see me. I went downstairs and there was a whole row of them, drinking and smoking and laughing so, so loudly."
What Becky goes on to reveal is difficult. Not just in terms of any decent person having to read this and imagine how a three-year-old baby could actually endure the abuse which was inflicted on her, but for other, darker reasons. A society like ours which denies and minimises the extent of degradation and cruelty which children suffer is also one which will find it hard to accept that there will be those reading this story and getting pleasure from it. How far do we go in reporting the stories of the Beckys of our world when the explicit recalling of her life will bring sexual enjoyment to some of those who peruse it?
"I was raped and I was buggered. I was forced to perform oral sex on grown men. All the time they would laugh and they would actually ignore me, even although I was the heart of it all. I remember one man trying to give me money one night and my dad getting really annoyed at him. They took photos of it, and then they moved on to filming it. Once they were finished, I would be shooed back to my room so that they could watch what had just happened. It's funny but I remember the thud of the player as they put the tape in when I left the room rather than what they had actually just done to me. I have no idea when certain memories should be placed because I have put so much of it away. I remember it in chunks. The beginning of it, then the first few months, then—when I realised it wasn't going to stop—whole blank years until I was about nine or ten. I don't know which men were at what time, I don't even know what house we were in, I don't remember who had the cine-camera or when we got our first VCR. But I remember wallpaper, and aftershave, and little things like that.
"A few years ago, my brother contacted me and said that he still had the tapes. He was taunting me and saying that he could watch me suffer anytime he wanted to and I could do nothing about it. I've no idea who can access them or whether they are still being passed around. In some ways I want to see them because that would prove to me what happened, but I know that I'm the last person who'll get them. They're for other people, not for me."
The weekly ritual continued for ten years, only stopping when Becky started to menstruate. "I've thought about that. I suppose it's quite simple. They wanted a child, they didn't want someone who was obviously growing up. In a way, I didn't really care. I was immune to it by that time. I just had to get through it. I never told anyone until I was 15, when my Dad died."
Becky's dismissal of what happened to her is not constant. She swings between saying that she hardly ever thinks of her childhood to saying that it is always in her mind. She says in one breath that she has no contact with her family and then, in the next, reveals that she has a step-sister she yearns to visit. Her story is revealed in layers, and she is wary of exposing herself to public scrutiny. "I do feel that people will blame me, not just for what happened then, but for what I turned into."
What Becky "turned into" is not so surprising. A year after the abuse ended, she was drawn into adult pornography. She was 14 when another family member began taking photographs of her. She was introduced to a local "film-maker" and began to feature her in amateur, then professional productions. "I have to laugh when people talk about the 'glamour' business. There's not much glamorous about being 14 and feeling that you are so worthless that you deserve all of this horrible stuff that you actually consent to. There's nothing too glamorous about having glycerin painted on your vagina to make it look as if you're enjoying yourself. Now, looking back, all that happened was that I was constantly raped onscreen for years. I was just this thing for people to use, but no-one held a gun to my head, so that makes it fine, doesn't it?"
By the time Becky was of an age at which she could legally have sex, she had been abused by her father's circle for ten years, raped on a weekly basis by between three and six men at a time. At the age of 14, she was appearing in adult pornography, dressed to look younger, presented in a way to recall her earlier abuses. By the time she was 16, everything was legal. She stayed in the adult industry for eight years, during which time she was offered a sterilisation to prevent unwanted pregnancies. She agreed to the operation. "I didn't want any kids. I knew what would happen to them. I knew I could never protect a child, so the best thing I could do would be to make sure they were never in that position." Becky claims that the pornography industry frequently offers these options. "I ended up with a hysterectomy—it was all done privately and it was all paid for by my manager. I can't say I really care one way or the other."
Her nightmare continues even though she is trying to build a life for herself. When she was 22 she met the very type of person she thought didn't exist—a good man. "I became involved with David against my better judgment," she laughs. "I kept telling myself it wouldn't work, he would turn out to be a user too. I couldn't believe anyone would be good. It's his whole family too, which amazes me. That he could have had such a normal childhood stuns me. His parents know what I went through, and I still feel the most miraculous thing of all is when they give me a hug, as if it wasn't my fault. As if I matter."
It was with David's help that Becky left pornography. But this isn't a fairytale. Becky has David, but she also has the scars from her past. She spends a lot of time going from one therapy session to another. She thinks she wants to work with children, but is scared of what would happen if one of them disclosed abuse to her. "I don't think I could deal with that. It's too close to home." She is also constantly aware that her past—a past which she had little control over—could come back to haunt her at any moment.
"Every time I go into a shop, I think I'll see myself on a video cover or on a magazine. This stuff has an incredibly lengthy shelf life; that's why it's so profitable. The material they have of kids may be ten years old or it may be done yesterday. A lot of them don't care, but a lot of them want fresh children who are being abused for the first time. They've got a price on their heads. People who think there are no links between child pornography and the adult industry are so deluded. Maybe they want to be. I spent more time in a school uniform posing for porn than I ever did at a real school. I've been dressed up to look pre-pubescent, I've posed surrounded by toys, I've been 20 and described as a child, I've been 14 and passed off as an adult. It's all part of the same thing. I have no idea how you'll stop it—but you can't even begin to try if you don't accept that the children are the victims in all of this."
