Cause And Effect Essay On Runaway Youth

Runaway youth is a serious problem that America faces today. Whether it’s just a youth’s way of trying to hurt their parent’s feelings, threating to run away is no laughing matter. Sometimes it’s not a threat to run away, sometimes they leave unannounced leaving the parent usually with grief, anger, and confusion. Between 1.6-2.8 million youth run away each year in the United States (The Truth About Runaway Teens, 2013). Those numbers are just the numbers of youth running away. Even when a youth runs away, they have to fend for themselves on the streets, which sometimes have some devastating results. In order to stay alive some of them have to resort to robbery, sexual acts, and sometimes those things can lead to death unfortunately. There are plenty of reasons why a child might run away; however, a common issue is their sexual orientation.
Most LGBTQ children don’t run away, but they are forced out of their home by their parents. Some parents can’t accept their child’s sexual orientation. Frustrated or confused parents often let their emotions take charge, and that leads to a homeless child. Twenty percent of the homeless youth are the GLBTQ community (LGBT Homeless, 2012). To prevent this type of run-away the parent needs to come to terms
It’s not a sure way to prevent a child from running away, but there are steps to take beforehand and afterwards. Whatever the reason may be for a child running away there are steps to take to not let it happen again. Parents should focus more on the parenting techniques to insure they’re doing a right by themselves and the child’s safety. Unfortunately, there are still homeless youth on our very streets, but we turn a blind eye on the issue. If we try to fund more outreach programs for this particular topic, then there might be hope for the LGBTQ youth community. If we take these steps outlined in this paper the runaway youth population could be immensly