Immaturity, and fear of humiliation.
Children and youth who are molested and/or abused understand the events are taking place but develop a distorted appraisal of them. For instance, they are molested so they assume everyone is molested. It’s “normal”.
This is partially why adults who were molested as children have a very high rate of personality disorders: there develops a strong connotative dissonance where you assume everyone has sex with children even though you have the life experience to know it’s not true. But, because you’ve learned it as a child it becomes engrained in your psyche.
Getting rid of that perspective is literally like trying to unlearn how to tie your shoes.
It’s all nasty stuff.
Thanks for the insight, Psycho B.
I know it’s common for abused children not to come forward but you would think there would be ONE at the time.
But sometimes kids also don’t feel safe telling a critical or emotionally detached parent too.
When my daughter was about 12, the whole cheerleading squad wrote her nasty notes and told her they hated her(due to one jealous perp). She didn’t tell me about it then and suffered in silence. I must have given her the impression that I wasn’t available. I don’t feel good about that memory.