Can Someone Abuse A Defenseless Child?

Ghida al Messelmani

Child Abuse

How can someone abuse a defenseless child? That question is usually asked every time we hear about such thing. Child abuse is one of the most terrible, saddest and most tragic problems that each society suffers from. It occurs in all income, racial, religious, and ethnic groups and in urban and rural communities. It is, however, more common in some groups, especially those below the poverty line. It is a serious problem that plagues youth all around the world. Each year an estimated percentage of children around the world are being beaten, neglected, or sexually and emotionally abused by their parents or guardian.

Every child has the right to be in a safe home, instead of having to fear for their lives
daily. According to social agencies, beatings of children have multiplied over the past twenty years and are still increasing to the moment. Most people, who abuse their children, think that they are not doing anything wrong because they see it as a form of discipline. They might break their child’s arm, leg or even cause those severe injuries and all of that because they fail to realize the difference between spanking a child and trying to kill him/her. Any physical abuse, whether by hand or life-threatening weapon like a knife or gun, could cause mental and physical impairment, disfigurement and chronic scars. Physical abusive parents act out of anger and the desire of assert control to teach their children to respect and fear them. But all what those parents are teaching their children is how to be aggressive.

Child neglect is sometimes included in legal definitions of child abuse to cover instances of malnutrition, desertion, and inadequate care of a child's safety.
This failure of providing the necessities that every child needs, like food, clothes, water, supervision and a shelter, endangers the child’s physical health, well-being, psychological growth and development. Moreover, physical neglect can severely impact a child’s development by causing failure to thrive; malnutrition; serious illness; physical harm in the form of cuts, bruises, burns or other injuries due to the lack of supervision; and a lifetime of low self-esteem. Child neglect is not always easy to spot, in some cases; the parent might become physically or mentally unable to care for the child, such as with serious injury, untreated depression or anxiety. And in other cases, if the parents are addicted or alcoholics, they might seriously impair judgment and the ability to keep the child
safe.

Child sexual abuse is an especially complicated form of abuse because of the layers of shame and guilt.
It is very important to recognize that sexual abuse doesn’t always involve body contact. Exposing a child to sexual situations or material is sexually abusive, if there was touching or not. Sexual abuse normally occurs by someone that the child knows and should be able to trust, most often close relatives. Besides, it is not just girls that can be sexually abused, both boys and girls suffer from this problem. Sexually abused children are tormented by shame and guilt; some might feel that they are responsible for the abuse or somehow brought it upon themselves. This can also lead to self-loathing and sexual problems as they grow older, often excessive promiscuity or inability to have intimate relations. The shame that the children face makes it hard for them to come forward. They may worry that others won’t believe them, will be angry with them, or that it will split their family apart. So because of these difficulties false accusations of sexual abuse is not common to hear about. So if a child ever confides into you, take him/her seriously, don’t turn a blind
eye.

Emotional child abuse can severely damage a child’s mental health or social development, leaving lifelong emotional scars. Emotional abuse can occur by humiliating a child or calling him/her names and making negative comments, telling a child that he or she is no good, worthless, bad, or a mistake. And also, troubled parents might threaten or talk a very bad language with their own children. Which leads the children to not respect anyone and misbehave with everyone, or it may lead to the opposite, on which the child become weak, shameful and seek to sit alone away from people so that no one can talk to him/her.

An average of four children dies everyday due to child abuse in USA, knowing that the estimated cost of child abuse and neglect in USA runs about $104 billion, in 2007 at least so more than likely that number has went up. But, simply troubled parents just don’t care about anything; they disobey the law, beat up their children and abuse them in many ways. Just in USA, there are 906,000 children who are victims of abuse and suffer everyday, waiting for the future and what will it bring up for them. Everyday the number of child abuse increases more and more in USA, Lebanon, Egypt, and the list never ends....