Emanuel Foundation
against sexual exploitation -
for democracy and human dignity
Welcome to our website!
An important request in advance: What is discussed here can have a high triggering potential for some people and can generally be very upsetting or disturbing. If this applies to you, please do not engage with the content or only do so with helpful support. It is very important to us that you take good care of yourself.
We live in Germany and large parts of Europe in a society founded on the rule of law, democracy, plurality and human dignity, for which we are rightly grateful. And which must be preserved and defended against all threats without reservation, not least as a lesson from the most disastrous parts of our own history.
And yet, even in our supposedly safe middle, children, young people and adults - as the official figures suggest without taking into account the dark figure - are repeatedly sadistically humiliated, sexually exploited, mentally and physically tortured and sometimes even murdered. And this has not just happened since yesterday, nor since the invention of the Internet.
Sometimes the violence begins at a very early age with the involvement of close relatives: contrary to what it should be, the immediate family environment is the most dangerous place for many people. There they become victims of psychological, physical, sexual and spiritual violence.
Sometimes, however, they are "passed on" and "sold" to other perpetrators (via the Internet or directly) - and, as incomprehensible as this may sound, conditioned for these purposes from an early age. The more ideologically isolated a child grows up (e.g. in narrow religious or ideological groups or sects), the more skillfully the perpetrators are able to disguise their social double life and that of the child, the less chance they have of getting help. Some of the things that people who have left these violent structures report are shockingly similar to the tried and tested basic principle of totalitarian states and mafia organizations: complete dehumanization and isolation of the individual, education in "blind obedience" to a higher power (embodied by the respective master/boss/dictator/guru), combined with lifelong orders of silence and the most perfidious fight against the truth through "alternative facts".
And so sexual exploitation and torture can happen again and again without anyone believing the victims and providing decisive help. The extent of the violence is rarely apparent to outsiders, and if something is noticed, it is often not easy to take good steps against it.
The perpetrators come from all walks of life, as shown by crime statistics and reports from those affected. It is not uncommon for there to be family traditions, meaning that trauma is passed on to the next generation. Perpetrators use massive manipulation (including through attachment trauma), extreme psychological and physical violence and do everything in their power to ensure that their crimes remain invisible and unpunished.
"The children are actually conditioned and sexualized from an early age - they grow up like that."
"In this case, we would say: The girl knows what to expect. This is not the first time."
"I found it touching when we then questioned a victimized child together with a mother, where we had video of the father brutally abusing and raping the child, and the child then said to the interrogating officer: Where is daddy, where is daddy, I want to go to daddy!"
"They also try to get the children used to these sexual acts at a very early age, to sexualize them for themselves."
"They always call it 'educating'... they actually start from the day of birth and even before that with how you can 'educate' these children to put up with these sexual acts."
Quotes from investigating officers in the Bergisch-Gladbach abuse complex from the WDR documentary "This is how the police hunt pedophile perpetrators" (2022)
The Emanuel Foundation is committed to helping these people who are deeply injured physically and, above all, emotionally, but who have somehow managed to survive all the horror - and to break out of the destructive system. They urgently need human, legal, psychosocial and therapeutic support and, if they have not yet escaped the violent structures, protection and practical help that will enable them to make a new start in safety.
The name of our foundation is intended to commemorate a very special boy: Emanuel. He was a real, living child who was denied the chance to live. His name stands for many others to whom unimaginable things were done that should never have happened.
Almost all survivors of such crimes suffer massively in the long term from the violence they endured, which often determined a large part of their lives. Sleep disorders and nightmares, severe flashbacks, dissociation, panic attacks, unbearable pain, overwhelming grief, enormous (especially forced) feelings of guilt, self-hatred, hopelessness and a life on the brink of suicide are just some of the consequences that these people still have to deal with many years later.
We want to help ensure that they are not left alone, that hope becomes more tangible and suffering more surmountable. And that children like Emanuel are not forgotten. Fortunately, we are not alone in these concerns. There have been and are many courageous, determined people and also private and public institutions that have not remained idle. And in the interests of those whose rights we are fighting for, we are encouraged that the value of our work is now also being recognized at the highest political level.
"The Federal President is aware of how important your commitment to protecting survivors of extreme sexual violence is. He would like to thank you very much for this and would like to encourage you to continue fighting for this!"
Federal President
Frank-Walter Steinmeier
in a letter dated August 2021
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"Children and young people need advocates and people at their side who will fight to ensure that they receive the protection and help that our society and all of us owe them. Against this background, I would like to express my special thanks to you for your commitment to the Emanuel Foundation."
Minister of the Interior of North Rhine-Westphalia
Herbert Reul
in a letter dated September 2021
Nevertheless, given the enormity of what is happening "in our midst" every day, there is still far too little attention and help available. The Emanuel Foundation also wants to give a voice to those "professionals" and private individuals who have the courage and strength to help those affected with competence and empathy and support them in networking, training and the exchange of information.
On the following pages you will find more information about the background to this topic, as well as information about where you can get advice and how you can support us. We are also devoting ourselves to the discussion about the credibility of the statements of those affected and are positioning ourselves in their interests with a clear commitment to solid, verifiable information beyond exaggeration, political instrumentalization and trivialization or denial. We also consider this to be a fundamentally important contribution to a humane discourse, which is unfortunately often lacking.
Thank you for watching with us!
Dr. Eva Lauer-v. Lüpke is a lawyer and trauma consultant (DeGPT/BAG-PT). She has headed the Emanuel Foundation since its establishment in 2013 as managing director and chairwoman of the foundation board.
She personally feels it is a great privilege to work with severely traumatized people and to give them a greater voice and justice:
"I'm always told that this is a difficult topic. No question about it. But what is also true: in this work you keep meeting people for whom the word heroic should really have been invented. People who have failed far too many people and become brutally guilty. People who really were never told that love, respect or something like personal freedom could ever exist for them. And who still live exactly that. Those who no longer go along with it, who drop out, become creative, fight their way out, even if it takes many years, of a more than toxic system of violence and manipulation. What strength - what inspiration! For me personally and for all of us as a society that needs such courage and will for freedom more than anything else."
