Lullabies For Little Criminals Character Analysis

As we grow to a part of society we learn about the different situations that could be presented to us.We deal with these situations differently which distinguishes us from other people and allows us to grow. It is a loss of innocence, it is the extended amount of knowledge we gain from the experiences we gain.It is the moments where we are no longer in an imaginiative perfect world yet we are enlightened with all of the worlds attributes with being negative or positive. This is the main focus in Lullabies for Little Criminals written by Heather O’Neill, an author who grew up in an environment where kids had lost their innocence at extremely young ages on a day to day basis. It is completely normal for a child to hit the threshold where
She states after her first time having sex that “I always found sex painful mentally and physically” (O’Neill 255) due to the pressure she feels to please Alphonse, her pimp, by having sex with him even though she did not want to. Young people feel “forced into sex in relationships” due to the constant pressures they get from society (Richards). It is hard for Baby to say no to Alphonse when he tries to have sex with her. After a few times of having sex with Alphonse she says that “Even though he had given me a black eye I still had to stick by him” (O’Neill 152) because he was the only person at the time to not leave her, this adds to Baby’s loss of innocence by proving that Baby’s relationships in her life are not safe and add to the contradiction of morals and self-preservation. Little girls at this age shouldn't even be engaged in sexual activities because at this age “they don't understand that this first sex experience will always stick with them and they aren't emotionally mature” (Brown) enough to be having sex in the first place. Especially Baby who only uses her relationships as a means to find love that she never received from her parents. She thinks of Alphonse as a “mother-like figure” (O’Neill 242) which is the only reason she sticks around him. It is hard for a child to grow without a proper parental figure because “the most critical ingredients your child needs to develop and thrive on are security and stability” (Ebadi). Alphonse’s stability and security he provides for Baby has a negative effect on her childhood because he treats her as an adult and pressures her to do things adults usually do. Baby’s relationships traps her in the adult world and it is impossible for Baby to ever retrieve the experiences she has