Why Punish Children
Document Title: Why Punish Children
Document Ref No: R9102241
First Published: Reflections - Philippine Daily Inquirer
Publication Date: February 24th 1991
Author's Name: Father Shay Cullen SSC
If we all delve into the dark memories of our childhood more than likely
we will find some incident of child abuse in our own lives.
For me school was a very abusive experience. I remember being humiliated,
slapped by teachers who seemed to enjoy making children cry. Today teachers
still punish children and so retard them rather educate them.
If not for my loving parents I may have dropped out of school and become
one of the throwaways of society and you would not be reading this.
We must listen to our children everyday they come home from school and investigate
their complaints.
The throwaway children of this world have now reached more than an estimated
100 million and many of them are in the Philippines. In fact 1.5 million
children are living in subhuman condition in the streets and alleyways of
Philippine cities.
Most of them have been abused, degraded and punished in cruel and inhuman
ways by police, barangay tanods, pimps, paedophiles and perverts, but many
more are abused by their own parents and relatives as we have seen from
recent news reports.
Children are exploited, beaten, tortured, imprisoned and sexually abused.
Despite the ratification of the UN charter on the Rights Of Children by
the Philippine Government and the efforts of government and Non-government
agencies to implement it, thousands of children are still neglected and
intentionally hurt and pained in a society that has seen vast wealth concentrated
in the hands of few rich families while millions go hungry, unemployed and
malnourished.
But world wide estimates say that at least one in four children are either
physically or emotionally, abused and that at least 1 in 10 are sexually
abused in one way or the other.
Child abuse in society starts in the home. Experts say that 70% of parents
who have been abused themselves as children in their turn punish their children
in cruel and inhuman ways.
They call it discipline, tough love, or a learning experience. It is all
child abuse.
Mis-behavior in children is a symptom of the parents short-comings rather
than those of the child. Children are born innocent it is only by neglect,
harsh words and punishment that they become misbehaved and rebellious.
Child abuse can shape the character of the future policeman, military commander,
dictator or politician. This determines much of his behavior on the job
or at home.
Child abuse leaves an indelible mark on any victim. A husband or wife are
affected if either one has been abused and their children also. They have
to accept the reality and talk it out with a friend.
The personality and character of the community or society is also determined
by the childhood of the individuals who come to power and rule over others.
In a paternalistic society political leaders may act like abusive parents
with harsh and unrelenting discipline, uncaring neglect or with self-centered
selfishness.
The childhood of presidential candidates should be carefully researched
to learn if they are prone to become abusive rulers or compassionate and
determined to right the evils in society.
Society itself can be evaluated by the way it treats its children.
Those who have been abused react at times by being savage in punishing their
own children. They say it is discipline.
Daniel, a ten year old from Olongapo recounts how his mother put him in
a sack and beat him with a piece of wood. He ran away and became a street
child.
Another recounts how he was chained to a post by his father and beaten,
another little girl told social workers how she was tied to a banana tree
by her mother and ants thrown on her body.
While others tell of how their uncles, step-fathers or brother sexually
molested them and threatened to kill them if they told anybody.
That's why so little is known about the sexual abuse of children.
Individual cases sound horrific because they are escaped family secrets
but the abuse is all too common. Many run away to become street children
and child prostitutes because of abuse at home.
Child abuse is the best kept secret of society, simply because there is
so much of it. 33% of the children interviewed in one study, the majority
of them little girls, said that their stepfather, uncle, father or cousin
tried to rape them.
The abuse of children outside the home is equally harsh. 70% of the children
interviewed in one survey said that they were sexually abused outside the
family.
The most common form of sex abuse is committed by adults who pickup children
on the street or contact a pimp. More males want younger girls wrongly thinking
they will avoid AIDS.
In one reported case some years ago 2 corrupt policemen ordered young teenagers
to deliver them money and when they failed they were picked up and taught
a lesson by having their genitals systematically burned with cigarettes.
They were incapacitated for weeks.
Children report being beaten and verbally abused by police and military
and older street gangs.
Some drug abuse rehabilitation centers systematically violate the human
rights of the residents, many of them minors.
Some resort to physical brutality by punching and beating. Another notorious
center operated on harsh militaristic lines in Metro Manila is known to
physically beat the residents, impose harsh punishments and humiliations,
torture and chain the inmates.
Some clients of this center in Antipolo were hospitalized with severe infection
on their legs because they were leg-chained for months with steel ankle
clamps. They were warned to tell no-one of what happened but photos with
a government agency confirm the practice.
Another former resident told of being tortured with electric shocks in the
feet as punishment as for mis-behavior.
The Dangerous Drugs Board did all it could, it issued three closure orders
against the center after complaints were filed but high ranking politicians
intervened to keep it open.
Most parents of the residents defend the abuse, apparently to get rid of
their problem child and to punish his mis-behavior, a mis-behavior sometimes
caused by the abusive parents themselves.
