<h2 class="p" style="margin: 0px 0px 10px; padding: 0px; font-weight: normal; font-size: 14px; line-height: 18px; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, sans-serif;">
	Teenage girls have been urged not to leave themselves isolated in unfamiliar groups following a worrying rise in gang rapes and sexual assaults.</h2>
<p style="margin: 0px 0px 10px; padding: 0px; font-size: 14px; line-height: 18px; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, sans-serif;">
	The attacks can happen at house parties and other locations where young people gather. And, because alcohol is sometimes involved, a young victim can be reluctant to tell their parents over fears they will get into trouble for drinking underage.</p>
<p style="margin: 0px 0px 10px; padding: 0px; font-size: 14px; line-height: 18px; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, sans-serif;">
	Children at Risk Ireland (CARI) urged parents to keep the lines of communication open with their teenagers so that they can discuss things that make them uncomfortable.</p>
<p style="margin: 0px 0px 10px; padding: 0px; font-size: 14px; line-height: 18px; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, sans-serif;">
	Majella Ryan, national clinical director with the charity, said there had been a marked increase in reports of gang rapes and sexual assaults which doubled to 41 last year.</p>
<p style="margin: 0px 0px 10px; padding: 0px; font-size: 14px; line-height: 18px; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, sans-serif;">
	&quot;It&#39;s happening in lots of different situations. It&#39;s happening at parties, it&#39;s happening where a young person arranges to meet a guy that she doesn&#39;t know terribly well and he turns up with some of his friends and she finds herself in a vulnerable position.</p>
<p style="margin: 0px 0px 10px; padding: 0px; font-size: 14px; line-height: 18px; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, sans-serif;">
	&quot;It can also happen when groups are hanging out and one girl becomes isolated, her friends go home and she&#39;s left behind,&quot; explained Ms Ryan.</p>
<p style="margin: 0px 0px 10px; padding: 0px; font-size: 14px; line-height: 18px; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, sans-serif;">
	She said when there were witnesses to sexual assaults, the abuse can continue as the victim is bullied on social media and made to feel shamed and humiliated. &quot;In my experience, we&#39;re hearing more about these types of cases in the last few years. This type of assault (involving a group of perpetrators) has increased and, in particular, it&#39;s down to the internet and easy access to pornography . . . Humiliation and degradation often feature heavily in pornography.</p>
<p style="margin: 0px 0px 10px; padding: 0px; font-size: 14px; line-height: 18px; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, sans-serif;">
	&quot;For many children and adolescents, they&#39;re accessing fairly hardcore pornography and this is how they&#39;re getting their sex education. If this is how you learn about sex, then it&#39;s giving you a very distorted view of sex,&quot; she added.</p>
<p style="margin: 0px 0px 10px; padding: 0px; font-size: 14px; line-height: 18px; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, sans-serif;">
	<strong style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px !important; margin-left: 0px; padding: 0px; font-size: 1em;">FREEDOM</strong></p>
<p style="margin: 0px 0px 10px; padding: 0px; font-size: 14px; line-height: 18px; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, sans-serif;">
	Ms Ryan said one of the challenges facing parents was to give their teenage children some freedom while also trying to keep them safe.</p>
<p style="margin: 0px 0px 10px; padding: 0px; font-size: 14px; line-height: 18px; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, sans-serif;">
	&quot;It&#39;s important to let them know its okay to talk about anything they witness or that happens to them that they&#39;re not comfortable with.</p>
<p style="margin: 0px 0px 10px; padding: 0px; font-size: 14px; line-height: 18px; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, sans-serif;">
	&quot;You can&#39;t lock your teenager up, that&#39;s not feasible or healthy, so a big thing is about the teenager feeling able to talk about things they&#39;re seeing, talking to them about certain measures they can take to keep themselves safe,&quot; she said.</p>
<p style="margin: 0px 0px 10px; padding: 0px; font-size: 14px; line-height: 18px; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, sans-serif;">
	<a href="http://www.independent.ie/irish-news/teen-girls-are-warned-over-rise-in-gang-rapes-29614316.html">http://www.independent.ie/irish-news/teen-girls-are-warned-over-rise-in-gang-rapes-29614316.html</a></p>
