Child Abuse Essay Research Paper Imagine yourself

Child Abuse Essay, Research Paper

Imagine yourself a little girl, your mom just got remarried, and you’re trying to adjust to a new stepfather, house, and sharing your mom. Your mom leaves to go to the store and leaves you home alone for the first time with HIM. You accidentally break a glass and he goes off the wall yelling at you, calling you worthless. Then, he starts to hit you. While your trying to shield yourself, your mom comes in. Later you tell her what happened and she just tells you that you need to learn to respect your stepfather more. This is the first of the many incidents that happened to my friend Jessi. Growing up I saw Jessi being abused and was always too afraid and confused to do something about it. I didn’t even know what abuse technically was. In my research I learned that child abuse is the physical, sexual, and emotional abuse of a child by an adult. Jessi isn’t alone; “since 1988 the child abuse victims have steadily increased to about 1,000,000 reported abused victims a year. ” I’ve always thought that an abused child is just a kid whose parents hit them but, while researching I learned that there are 3 different types of abuse: physical, sexual, and emotional. Physical Abuse is the most know form of abuse it’s basically involves hitting, kicking of the child with fist or feet or other objects such as belts, baseball bats, and other assorted objects. Another form of abuse is holding a child’s head under scalding water or sticking the child in a washing machine. A child psychiatrist told me that nobody knows precisely how many children are abused a year because for every child abuse incident that is reported 100 go unreported. The National Committee for the Prevention of Child Abuse states in its Annual survey of all 50 states estimates that “1,125 children died from physical abuse in 1988, and this is the lowest estimate possible.” Usually if a child is seriously hurt because of physical abuse, he is not taken too the hospital by the person who injured him. 90 percent of the time another person who knows of the abuse but, does not do anything to stop it. This person is called a facilitator. Personally I was a facilitator I knew about the abuse my friend was going through and did nothing about it. I still have really guilty feelings about it. In many cases a child will look physically abused but, they will actually be victims of sexual abuse. Sexual Abuse is the touching of genitalia or anything, which is uncomfortable for normal person to person contact. It can also be described as being forced to do sexual acts with an adult. There are many categories of sexual abuse such as; pedophilia, incest, molestation, statutory rape, and child pornography. In one of my interviews I was told that “approximately 3 hundred thousand children are involved in child prostitution and child pornography.” In many cases of sexual abuse is used to full fill a sexual fantasy. Again, like physical abuse sexual abuse is increasing steadily, most likely because the sex drive of society has raised. I remember when I would be at Jessi’s house when I was little. Her stepdad would tell us we were ugly or stupid. I always thought he was just kidding but, it always hurt Jessi. I didn’t think stuff like that was actually abuse. During my research I learned that it was the most common form of abuse, mental abuse. Most people don’t even realize they are doing harm to their child by it, but anything a parents constantly says that puts a child’s self-esteem down is mental abuse. “Physical and sexual abuse are like road blocks of life. They are here for a while but eventually you can get over it, mental abuse on the other hand makes you think things that aren’t necessarily true. ” Take my friend Jessi for example, her stepfather used to always call her ugly, now at 15 she believes it. There is another form of abuse that is categorized in the mental section. It is called neglect. Personally I think this is the saddest form of abuse. Neglect is when a parent unlawfully holds back the basic needs of a child when they can afford it. Basic need of a child include food shelter and clothing. “In 1966 the American Humane Association stated that 63 percent of 2,000,000 child abuse cases that were reported because of neglect. ” I ‘ve always wondered why a parent would just go off and abuse their child. Your child is supposed to be your life, you’re supposed to love them. I always knew a reason for abuse was alcoholism but, I never knew that it could be a psychological problem. “43 percent of people who were abused when they were children ” It’s the way the were brought up it’s the way they know to react to things like that. It’s like when I’m baby- sitting and the kids are doing something that they know is wrong like drawing on the walls and I say “how many times have I told you not to draw on the walls.” And I stop and think whoa I just sounded just like my mom. It’s scary. People always repeat things that their parents said like 20 years ago. Child abuse is the same way. They don’t know any other way to react. Alcoholism causes abuse because some people get violent or disoriented and don’t realize what’s happening. Another reason for abuse is problems at home. Whether it’s family problems, stress, or if the child has mental problems or other problems that make it difficult to raise a child. Raising a child can be hard

enough but, when your child has difficult problems it can raise the stress