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Introduction

In the Netherlands satanic ritual abuse was discussed briefly during two occasions: the publication of the research into the reliability and validity of the diagnosis multiple personality disorder of Nel Draijer and Suzette Boon and the publication of the report of the Werkgroep Ritueel Misbruik. Since the discussion in the Netherlands took a very different course as for instance in the United States, it is of interest to know why there was no soil for the allegations about satanic ritual abuse, why the mpd movement was not able to get more support from colleagues and more positive media attention for her ideas and why the discussion was so short.

Mpd movement

In 1984 and 1985 the founders of the mpd movement, the psychiatrists Bennett G. Braun, Roberta G. Sachs and Richard P. Kluft, held workshops in the Netherlands about the multiple personality disorder. On that occasion Braun c.s. also talked about their clinical experiences with cult survivors. From that moment on, a small group of Dutch psychotherapists diagnosed more and more of their patients as suffering from multiple personality disorder. They also alleged that a few of these mpd patients had developed this mental disorder due to satanic ritual abuse in their childhood.

Oude Pekela

A few years later the idea of satanic ritual abuse had found its way to the conservative religious community in the Netherlands. In 1989 some parents alleged in newsmagazine Tijdsein published by the religious broadcasting company Evangelische Omroep that their children had witnessed satanic ritual abuse in school and that children were ritually abused in Oude Pekela in 1987. In that case only ‘normal’ sexual abuse was reported then to the authorities, who were not able to find any proof of the alleged abuse. According to Tijdsein, the parents, as well as psychiatrist Gerrit Mik, who examined 25 of the 70 allegedly abused children in Oude Pekela, told the investigating officers about the ritual slaughter of children and adults, but the authorities in Oude Pekela would have denied that. Until then Fred Jonker and Ietje Jonker-Bakker, two general practitioners from Oude Pekela who had examined several of the children, always had said that the children were sexually abused by unknown men. However, two months after the allegations about satanic ritual abuse were made by some parents in newsmagazine Tijdsein, Jonker and Jonker-Bakker gave a lecture at the Institute of Education of London University. On that occasion they alleged that the children in Oude Pekela were both sexually and ritually abused. In the 1990s they published their allegations in several articles, but their findings were heavily criticised by American and Dutch scholars.

Reports of satanic ritual abuse

In 1991 both the Youth Protection and Probation Branch from the Justice Department and the Chief Inspectorate for the public health service of the Netherlands were for the first time officially informed about satanic ritual abuse by a child custody agency. On 17 September 1992 the Youth Protection Inspectorate wrote to the minister of Public Health and the state secretary of Justice that until August 1992 youth protection agencies in the provinces Noord-Holland and Utrecht had reported the satanic ritual abuse of eleven juveniles. Although the authorities now officially knew about satanic ritual abuse, no further steps were taken. Only when secular media reported that satanic ritual abuse is prevalent in the Netherlands on account of the findings of the psychotherapists Suzette Boon and Nel Draijer, did the state secretary of Justice appoint the multidisciplinary Workgroup Ritual Abuse.

Werkgroep Ritueel Misbruik

On 21 April 1994 the Werkgroup Ritual Abuse concluded that satanic ritual abuse probably does not take place in the way it is described in the stories and it is unlikely that these stories are wholly true. The workgroup suggest that the stories could be a replacement for other traumatic occasions. The victim would use the story then as a defence mechanism to process other, less extreme traumatic experiences. According to the Werkgroup Ritual Abuse it is also possible that some patients through suggestive questions of their mpd therapist wrongly got the idea that they were a victim of satanic ritual abuse. Finally, the workgroup thinks it is possible that these stories are contemporary legends, which disperse as an epidemic through a network of mpd therapists and victims.

Discussion about satanic ritual abuse

The publication of the report of the Workgroup Ritual Abuse caused a short discussion in the media and in scientific literature. In this discussion, critics and sceptics had a dominant role. Only in a few scientific magazines mpd therapists gave their opinion on multiple personality disorder and satanic ritual abuse. Thanks to the scant role of the mpd movement in the Netherlands and the strong counter movement of critics and sceptics, satanic ritual abuse has never been seen by the authorities, the media, legal practice and the public as a big social problem. Because of that relatively few books and articles on the phenomenon of satanic ritual abuse have been published in the Netherlands. So far Hervonden herinneringen en andere misverstanden by Hans Crombag and Harald Merckelbach, which contains a chapter on satanic ritual abuse, has been the most influential book on the subject.

While the debate about satanic ritual abuse has caused both a moral panic and a modern witch hunt in the United States, in the Netherlands the issue of satanic ritual abuse was hardly more than a storm in a tea cup. According to criminologist Tjalling Beetstra, the similarities and differences in the social, religious and political structure of the United States and the Netherlands seems to a certain extent to have been decisive for the way in which these societies have responded to satanic ritual abuse and other moral issues.

1. Boon, Suzette and Nel Draijer, Multiple Personality Disorder in the Netherlands: A Study on Reliability and Validity of the Diagnosis, Amsterdam/Lisse, Swets en Zeitlinger, 1993.
2. Werkgroep Ritueel Misbruik, Rapport van de Werkgroep Ritueel Misbruik, Den Haag, Ministerie van Justitie, Directie Staats- en Strafrecht, April 1994.
3. Boon, Suzette and Nel Draijer, Multiple Personality Disorder in the Netherlands: A Study on Reliability and Validity of the Diagnosis, Amsterdam/Lisse, Swets en Zeitlinger, 1993, p. 6; Boon, Suzette and Onno van der Hart, Dissociëren als overlevingsstrategie bij fysiek en seksueel geweld: Trauma en dissociatie 1, in: Maandblad Geestelijke volksgezondheid, Jrg. 43, Nr. 11, 1988, p. 1197-1207.
4. Beetstra, Tjalling A., Massahysterie in de Verenigde Staten en Nederland: De affaire rond de McMartin Pre-School en het ontuchtschandaal in Oude Pekela, in: Peter Burger and Willem Koetsenruijter (Eds.), Mediahypes en moderne sagen: Sterke verhalen in het nieuws, Leiden, Stichting Neerlandistiek Leiden, 2004, p. 53-69; Tijdsein (EO), 14 June 1989.
5. Jonker, Fred and Ietje Jonker-Bakker, Experiences with Ritualist Child Sexual Abuse: A Case Study from The Netherlands, in: International Journal on Child Abuse and Neglect, Vol. 15, Nr. 3, 1991, p. 191-196; Jonker, Fred en Ietje Jonker-Bakker, Onderzoek in Oude Pekela, in: Maandblad Geestelijke volksgezondheid, Jrg. 49, Nr. 3, 1994, p. 251-276.
6. Beetstra, Tjalling A., Massahysterie in de Verenigde Staten en Nederland: De affaire rond de McMartin Pre-School en het ontuchtschandaal in Oude Pekela, in: Peter Burger en Willem Koetsenruijter (red.), Mediahypes en moderne sagen: Sterke verhalen in het nieuws, Leiden, Stichting Neerlandistiek Leiden, 2004, p. 58-62 and 65; Crombag, Hans F.M. en Harald L.G.J. Merckelbach, Hervonden herinneringen en andere misverstanden, Amsterdam/Antwerpen, Contact, 1996, p. 183-186; Putnam, Frank W., The Satanic Ritual Abuse Controversy, in: International Journal on Child Abuse and Neglect, Vol. 15, Nr. 3, 1991, p. 175-179; Wessel, Ineke en Harald L.G.J. Merckelbach, Onderzoek in Oude Pekela (2), in: Maandblad Geestelijke volksgezondheid, Jrg. 49, Nr. 5, 1994, p. 554-556.
7. Fauwe, Loes de, Ritueel misbruik van kinderen voor satan, in: Het Parool, 12 June 1993.
8. Aanh. Hand. II, 1992-1993, Nr. 770.
9. Boon, Suzette and Nel Draijer, Multiple Personality Disorder in the Netherlands: A Study on Reliability and Validity of the Diagnosis, Amsterdam/Lisse, Swets en Zeitlinger, 1993; Fauwe, Loes de, Ritueel misbruik van kinderen voor satan, in: Het Parool, 12 June 1993; Nova (NOS/VARA), 28-29 June 1993.
10. Werkgroep Ritueel Misbruik, Rapport van de Werkgroep Ritueel Misbruik, Den Haag, Ministerie van Justitie, Directie Staats- en Strafrecht, April 1994, p. 65-66.
11. Werkgroep Ritueel Misbruik, Rapport van de Werkgroep Ritueel Misbruik, Den Haag, Ministerie van Justitie, Directie Staats- en Strafrecht, April 1994, p. 53-54.
12. Werkgroep Ritueel Misbruik, Rapport van de Werkgroep Ritueel Misbruik, Den Haag, Ministerie van Justitie, Directie Staats- en Strafrecht, April 1994, p. 32-36.
13. Crombag, Hans F.M. and Harald L.G.J. Merckelbach, Hervonden herinneringen en andere misverstanden, Amsterdam/Antwerpen, Contact, 1996, p. 153-194.
14. Cohen, Stanley, Folk Devils and Moral Panics: The Creation of the Mods and Rockers (1972), London, Routledge, 2002, p. XV; Goode, Erich and Nachman Ben-Yehuda, Moral Panics: The Social Construction of Deviance, Cambridge, Mass., Blackwell, 1994, p. 57-63; Nathan, Debbie and Michael Snedeker, Satan's Silence: Ritual Abuse and the Making of a Modern American Witch Hunt, New York, NY, Basic Books, 1995; Victor, Jeffrey S., Satanic Panic: The Creation of a Contemporary Legend, Chicago/La Salle, IL, Open Court, 1993.
15. Beetstra, Tjalling A., Massahysterie in de Verenigde Staten en Nederland: De affaire rond de McMartin Pre-School en het ontuchtschandaal in Oude Pekela, in: Peter Burger and Willem Koetsenruijter (Eds.), Mediahypes en moderne sagen: Sterke verhalen in het nieuws, Leiden, Stichting Neerlandistiek Leiden, 2004, p. 53-69.