How safe are summer camps for young people?

How do summer camps protect children against sexual predators? The question arises after Anissa, a French influencer, testified on social media about how camp leaders would flirt with young girls and even sexually assault them during the camps. That is reported by La Croix. She said to have warned her supervisors, but "a lot of them did not believe" her, she says in a video.

At summer camps, the age difference between leaders and the young people attending is sometimes only very little. That increases the risk of slippage compared to other sectors. At the same time, drawing a strict line between gestures of comfort or inappropriate behaviour might be challenging.

In reaction to Anissa's video, about 400 people testified that they experienced sexual abuse while being on a summer camp. Sometimes, their stories were shocking, going as far as the rape of young children.

Criminal record check

Currently, the background supervisors of summer camps are already checked. They have to provide a criminal record if they sign up. Furthermore, the summer camp's organisation must send the staff list to the State Department "Youth and Sports". That department verifies the criminal record, checks the file of perpetrators of sexual or violent offences and looks at the list of people prohibited from exercising certain professions kept by the prefectures, La Croix writes.

"If a name appears on any of the lists, the department warns us, and we do not hire the person", Louise Fénelon, president of the vacation commission at the National Union of Tourism and Outdoor Associations, says.

Holes in the system

Yet, this system does not seem to be waterproof all the way. Volunteers from outside the organisation are not checked. This could, for example, be someone who gives a workshop during the summer camp. He or she would officially not be employed by the camp organiser and thus be exempt from the background checks.

Furthermore, the current way of checking someone's background does not filter out people who have not been convicted earlier for child abuse. Therefore, there is always the risk of an offender acting for the first time at a summer camp. David Cluzeau, general delegate of the sports organisation Hexopée, pleads for a referent for sexual violence during the camps.

Influencer Anissa has started a petition for better measures to prevent sexual abuse at summer camps. It has already been signed by more than 50,000 people in less than three months.