Have a look at this story – http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/education-12449643 Headline: “Million children ‘severely maltreated’, says NSPCC”.

Holy shit! “One in four people in the UK, aged between 18 and 24, claims to have experienced severe violence, sexual abuse or neglect as a child, says the children’s charity the NSPCC.”

Then you read the article and find out that the study which was about rape, attempted rape and physical abuse “also included ‘serious emotional neglect or lack of physical care or supervision’, which it defined as including ‘parents never or hardly ever asking their child who they were going out with or where or what they were doing’.”

Ah. That’s bad, but it’s not in the same league as rape or physical assault.

“This category also included children reporting that ‘the child’s family never let the child know they cared about them’.”

Again, not good but putting it in the same category as rape and physical assault? But maybe I’m cynical and it’s not the case that the vast majority of abuse was in this far lower category that just happened to be lumped into the ones that grab headlines? Let’s take a look at the report and see the actual numbers. Ah. The “report” seems to be mainly pictures of sad looking children, quotes of horrendous abuse and NSPCC logos. Not many numbers to work with.

This is why I don’t give money to the NSPCC – they use dodgy data to lobby and further their own cause. They use tabloid tactics to mislead people into a think-of-the-children panic based on scary headlines.

Every time I see bullshit like this it reminds me why I donate to Barnardos instead.