The Reasons and Consequences of Child Abuse

The abuse and mistreatment of children has flooded throughout our society for a while. Its sad but things like this happen everyday. The people who abuse their kids usually come from a past where they themselves were abused which is heartbreaking because they just keep repeating the cycle. Child abuse is huge problem in many countries including the United States. It is not only a problem because child abuse is wrong but also because the amount of abuse that goes on in the world. 2. 9 million cases of child abuse are reported every year in the United States. This is a big number but I don't think that this is all of the numbers because there is probably another million cases that go unreported. This is too many kids having their childhood taken away because they are afraid of the people who should be there to love support and nurture them during these crucial years of their life. Child abuse can be a sensitive subject for some people but the only way that we can reduce the accounts of child abuse is if create more public awareness of it.

I chose to write my paper on child abuse because it hurts me whenever I see kids being abused. I hate it because kids don't know alot and can be easily taken advantage of. I hate when kids get beaten because they are helpless and can’t defend themselves. Children should have fun and love life instead of worrying about when their parent or guardian is going to neglect or abuse them next. Child abuse can be placed into four categories: physical, emotional, neglectful, and sexual abuse. These categories are all very bad even if you think some are worse than others. Physical child abuse is defined as the “physical injury inflicted upon the child with cruel and/or malicious intent”. This can be anything from punching, kicking, burning, shaking, throwing objects at, etc. There is sometimes of a grey line between abusing your child and disciplining your child. Some parents think that they are disciplining their kids but they go to far where it turns into abuse.

I think the thing that should differentiate abuse and discipline is the force of the incident. I feel that you can discipline your child but it should be with an open hand because if you spank your kid with an open hand it shouldn't be enough to bruise the child. When a child gets a bruise is when it becomes a problem because for someone to get a bruise there would have to be a lot of pressure to cause it. This is why it is easy to spot physical abuse because not all the time but a lot of times if there is a child with some bruises it can be a sign of abuse. This can be from a guard. ian slapping, punching, or kicking the child. Children can get physically abused because of something either they did or that happened to the assaulter. Children usually get assaulted when they do something bad and the parents or caregiver become so mad that they feel they need to hurt the child in order for them to understand what they did. This can make someone purposely or accidentally hurt their child physically.

Another reason someone might physically assault their child is if something happens to themselves. There are cases where parents take out their aggression on their kids and use the as a “punching bag”. This makes me mad because in these cases it's not the child's fault at all but they have to experience the brute force of their parent or caregivers aggression. The next kind of abuse I want to discuss is emotional child abuse as it is probably the most damaging to a child. Emotional abuse is the mental trauma one receives from neglect or abuse. Examples of this abuse can be terror, rejection, humiliation and so on. When something like this happens to a child it can scare there developing brain and if repetitive, can mess the child up psychologically. Situations that relate to this abuse is when a parent constantly yells at their kid, a parent makes fun of their kid, or a parent who does not pay attention to their kid. I feel that these things can really break a child because they look up to their parents. Parents are supposed to be there for their kid, giving them love and support. When the opposite of this happens a child might feel that if theyre idol doesn't care about them or love them who else would. A parent and child are supposed to have a strong emotional connection with each other as they have been there for eachother since birth. When kids are being humiliated and terrorixed while their brain is developing, they remember situations for a long time, which can sway their perception on the parents and/or life. The brain actually gets damaged because of this kind of abuse.

The result of emotional abuse to a child can cause long lasting effects like “depression, estrangement, anxiety, low self-esteem, inappropriate or troubled relationships, or a lack of empathy”. As abuse continues so will emotional trauma. You can tell a child is suffering from this if they are becoming antisocial, having low self-esteem, seeking attention from other mentors and so on. Because of this these kids are more likely to have a mental disorder, have the urge to hurt themselves and ultimately have more of a desire to commit suicide than others who did not go through emotional abuse.