The role of trust in protecting the vulnerable

Who is worthy of unequivocal trust in dealing with the vulnerable? Simple answer: nobody. No one is implicitly trustworthy to deal with the vulnerable without account.

Not one person is owed the power of trust without an equal and opposite accountability expected of them and, indeed, required of them.

If you have a child or know an adult who has been traumatised through abuse or have a child at any age with significant special needs. Are they vulnerable? Yes.

What about a woman in the company of a man with malevolent intent?

Or the man in the company of a woman with coercive intent?

A person in the company of a person with malicious intent?

Or, the worker who is coerced into a particular action to keep his or her job. It’s all the same. Vulnerable people or people in vulnerable situations.

When we think of people who not in the vulnerable set dealing with those that are, we see that there is a power imbalance that is potentially manipulated. We don’t have to view them as guilty as much as ensure even and strict standards apply to protect those who can’t be expected to protect themselves.

If it’s my child, I’m thinking everyone I trust to care for them is capable of treating them inappropriately, including family and best friends, let alone coaches and others. That makes me think twice about my actions regarding when and how I expose my child to their trust.

Why do I do this? One abuse is way too many. As a parent, I can’t afford any lapses on my own part. If you are the trusted adult I leave my child with, I’m cautious for their benefit, for yours, and for mine. Sorry, it’s the way it has to be. In fact, I retract the apology. It’s unnecessary. A child deserves safety.

It’s my experience that those who understand my safeguards are easier to trust. Those who wonder why I’m worried about protecting a vulnerable person are a concern. Those who get upset when I seek assurance for safety are least trustworthy.

Why is the global church in a sex abuse crisis right now? Probably for the same reasons it always will have been wherever the powers that be have a particular entitlement mentality and they have no serious accountability. Is the sex abuse only relevant to our present time? No, of course it isn’t. It’s always been there. Only now is it being exposed.

The narcissist leader or organisation will exploit vulnerabilities for the simple reason that they can. And some are brazen in their sense of entitlement, and doubly manipulative to betray the trust of those not only that they abuse, but also those who extend to them the power to abuse.

But let me get back to the role of trust in terms of work with the vulnerable.

If you have a child, what is your starting point for anyone who interacts with their little vulnerable life, who has power over them in terms of maturity, voice, physical and psychological power?

Do you implicitly trust them?

Knowing that 1-in-4 girls and 1-in-6 boys will suffer some form of sexual abuse before they turn 18. Knowing that even if they aren’t sexually abused in a particular scenario, they’re even more vulnerable to a misuse of power to verbally, mentally, emotionally or spiritually abuse them. Knowing what we do know about a section of our population. And knowing that most if not all have the capacity to abuse if wise systems of accounting aren’t in place and aren’t used properly. Yes, of course, many of us think even the thought of abusing another human being as abhorrent, but we cannot assume others think and will behave this way even if they say they do and will.

If you have ever heard of the ‘swiss cheese model’ you will quickly determine why there are occasionally air traffic disasters or medical procedures that go wrong. These are all due to a series of system failures that occur latently and human failures that occur at the point of incident. Now, in the case of abuse those who might exploit opportunities to abuse the vulnerable are let through, because of systems failures. They get through a system. Without its checks and balances.

A system designed to serve the vulnerable that doesn’t have a bias toward protecting them is abominable.

The role of trust in protecting the vulnerable is cut and dried in my view. The vulnerable require protection. They get the care and trust is always subservient to that.

In terms of risk, abuse of the vulnerable is such an unacceptable consequence, all likelihood of abuse should be eliminated, as far as possible and as far as that depends on us.

Photo by Fabian Gieske on Unsplash