Child Abuse

Child abuse is the intentional unexplainable suffering on a child. There have been many researches on child abuse, and trying to find out why people would do such a horrifying thing to a child. One of many reasons is that the person has psychological problems, or was themselves abused as a child. There are four kinds of child abuse. They can be physical abuse (such as getting beating and neglect), sexual abuse, incest, and exploitation (as child pornography).

Physical abuse can occur with a caretaker or by the parents. It is sad when both parents have to work and they have to find a caretaker for their children, not knowing that, that person might not be in their right mind, and can even hurt the child. Two examples of physical abuse is burning a child with a cigarette, or striking a child, and scalding with hot water. The other form of physical abuse that happens frequently is neglect. Besides the child going through physical abuse it is most likely they are going to go through neglect as well. Neglect occurs when parents or others who are responsible for a child's fail to provide for the child's basic needs in many number of ways. It can be when the parent fails to provide the proper food, clothing, or such as shelter. "Children with histories of maltreatment, such as physical and psychological neglect, physical abuse, and sexual abuse, are at risk of developing severe psychiatric problems." It is more likely that the child can develop reactive attachment disorder when they go through the trauma as a child, and there was not that much love.

Since the child has gone through so much trauma in their short time of life, they can most likely be unsecured of themselves, or having to much anxiety when it comes to a problem or to the extreme of stressing out, also being depress through out their whole life. There are many cases why it can happen. In some cases it happens without even the person knowing it is happening. Some parents do not believe in disciplining their child by talking to them after they have done something wrong, they think it does not really work that way. For many Hispanics they think it is better to spank them because that was provably the way they were brought up as a child and that was the way how they gained a lot of respect for their parent, and they want the same respect from their children. But what they do not see is that in the long run they could not confide in them because they were scared of the consequences. That is how slaps and spanking are viewed by parents as a part of raising a child, however the child will more likely view slapping and spanking normal, and good.

While I am doing this paper I take a moment to think how harsh life can sometimes be, especially for a young child that comes to this world without knowing anything of what is coming ahead. The saddest thing is that, that baby did not choose to come to this world and especially to a place where it is going to get the worst treatment. I know they say it happens to people with psychological problem, but how is it that they can not see they are hurting someone with life, so fragile, and so little. Some of the causes can be the circumstances the family is in. If the family is in poverty it can lead to a lot of stress and then leading to physical violence, or divorces that the parent is going through a hard time taking it hard on them or blaming the child. There is also emotional abuse; it can occur when parents fight or beat each other in front of a child, when they give a child permission to use drugs or alcohol or when the parents themselves are under the influence of drugs or alcohol. The child feels that no one cares for them and feels lonely in the world.

There are many organizations where people can go and seek for help if they are in need of it. As for: "Childhelp USA was founded in 1959 by Sara O'Meara and Yvonne Fedderson, Childhelp USA is one of the largest and oldest national nonprofit organizations dedicated to the prevention of child abuse, neglect as well as to the treatment of its victims in the United States. Childhelp's programs, which directly serve abuse children and their families, focus on meeting the children's physical, emotional, educational and spiritual needs. In 2005, Sara and Yvonne were both nominated for the Nobel Peace prize." There is always some organization that can help someone with any problem even a hotline and when you do not know who to turn to you can always go and tell a teacher, or a law enforcement officer. Another form of child abuse is sexual abuse, which is also known as molestation.

Sexual abuse involves forcing, tricking, bribing, threatening or pressuring a child into sexual awareness or activity. Sexual abuse is an abuse of power over a child and a violation of a child's right of normal, healthy, trusting relationship. Sexual abuse occurs when an older child or an adult uses a child for sexual pleasures. The sexual abuse can start very slowly but with time it can increase. The victims can start from infants to young people well into their teens, and it can happen in different way of forms. One of the ways it can occur is when a person exposes his or herself to a child, or when an adult forces a child to perform sexual act. "Child sexual abuse has been reported up to 80,000 times a year, but the number of unreported instances is far greater, because the children are afraid to tell anyone what has happened." Many times the child is afraid to speak up because they are fearful of telling; also sexual abuse is the least frequently reported type of child abuse. Many times they tell the child that it is ok what they are doing, and tricking the child into trusting that it is a love relationship. It is easy for an adult to convince a child to do what they want because children do not always know when they are being abused, and then when they do it is already too late.

The other form of child abuse is incest, they say it is common and is more likely to happen between family and close friends. "Most incest occurs between older male relatives and younger female children in families of every class and color. Other instances of sexual abuse of children are most often committed by friends who have access to children within the family setting and by people normally trusted by parents: doctors, dentists, teachers, and baby-sitters." One of the distressing things is that sexual abuse in childhood can have lifelong consequences. As survivors, they often blame themselves long after the abuse has ended--for not saying no, for not fighting back, for telling or not telling, for having been ``seductive,'' for having trusted the abuser.

Another form of abuse is child pornography. Child pornography by definition is the sexual exploitation of children. The concern is