Dangers of internet predators - ‘Brainwashing’ of 13-year-old

ANY parent who still basks under the illusion that the internet is nothing more than a fun place for younger teenagers to enjoy should take account of the words of the father of a young Irish girl who was contacted online by a cunning Canadian paedophile and seduced into having sex with him.

“She was brainwashed,” the Irish father told the court in Alberta, describing the circumstances in which Jashua Robert Tremblay, a 34-year-old married man, groomed his then 13-year-old daughter online before coming to Ireland to have sex with her.

The girl’s father — a sole parent — was horrified when he discovered that his young daughter had been lying constantly to him, pretending to be staying with friends when, in fact, she had arranged to meet Tremblay. He told the court that his daughter had become so intoxicated with the older man that she had become delusional and had dreamed of moving to Canada and marrying him on her 18th birthday.

It all sounds like the stuff of a young adult novel, but it is all, painfully true.

At the court hearing in Canada, a defence psychologist attempted to belittle the actions of Tremblay, suggesting that they were “primarily a misjudgment regarding the basic rules of courtship”. It would be disturbing for any parent to be asked to accept that the statutory rape of their child was nothing more than a ‘misjudgment’ on the part of the perpetrator. Even more disturbing, though, is the realisation that an otherwise sensible and loving child would be so taken in by a stranger 3,000 miles away that they would lie to their loved ones and embark on an illicit sexual encounter.

What this case serves to highlight is that every parent should understand that younger teenagers are adults in the making and still need a guiding hand, even if they reject it and rebel against it.

Most — even those coming from warm and loving homes — are often very unsure of themselves as they search for their sense of place in the world beyond their immediate family and close friends.

Like younger children, they still need to be loved and nurtured but they also need to be guarded against the dangers posed by modern life — in particular, the internet. Just as we teach toddlers to hold an adult’s hand when crossing the road, we must also be alive to the dangers of other forms of dangerous traffic.

The world wide web may be the greatest invention since the printing press but its huge benefits can sometimes belie its dangers. Most parents and carers of youngsters are aware of cyberbullying and are alert to it. But they may not have the same concern for internet predators.

As this young girl has found to her cost, people like Tremblay are expert manipulators, able to foster a relationship with a teenager from one end of the world to the other.

Most prey on a young teenager’s desire for acceptance, their need for love, dreams of romance and their sexual curiosity — all normal preoccupations for a youngster, but fuel for internet predators.