Violence of any kind is hard for us to understand, but crimes against children are perhaps the hardest to comprehend. In my book, "A Violent Heart," I addressed a number of crimes against children that stagger the imagination. Richard Allen Davis broke into a home in California and kidnapped twelve-year-old Polly Klaas while her mother slept in another room. He later killed her. For no clear reason, a man broke into a home in California where five children were home alone. He killed two them with a pitchfork. In England, Jon Venables and Robert Thompson, just children themselves, kidnapped two-year-old James Bulger from a shopping mall, tortured him and then beat him to death. It is heartbreaking to read stories like these, but every day children are sexually abused, physically abused and tortured, and even killed, not by strangers who break into their homes, but by family members and trusted family friends. Far more children suffer at the hands of their caregivers than strangers. In nearly two decades of work with children, I've seen such a wide variety of abuse against children that almost nothing surprises me anymore. The problem of child maltreatment is pervasive.
Abusers can be any person with access to the child - a parent, guardian, stepparent, boyfriend, babysitter, nanny or child-care worker, minister, teacher, sibling or other relative. For the sake of simplicity I refer to abusers as parents or caregivers, but it easily could be someone other than the parent. About half of the children I see in my practice are abused or neglected and most of the cases where I am asked to consult involve abuse of some kind. According to the United States Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), there were approximately 900,000 reported cases of abuse in 2000. Of those 900,000 cases, 54% involved neglect, 23% involved physical abuse, and 12% involved sexual abuse. These percentages have changed little over the last several years.
Regardless of the number of cases of abuse, even one case is too many. Sadly, over 1000 children die each year as a result of abuse or neglect. Most children who are abused are younger than eight years of age and the younger the child, the more likely the child is to suffer fatal injury.
Animals will neglect or even kill their own young. For example, runts in many species are tormented by parents, especially fathers, and are ignored by mothers as she tends to healthier cubs and kits. In some species, mothers even kill some of their young, thus providing more nourishment and attention for the ones that remain. Yet this provides an evolutionary purpose that ensures the survival of the species. Maltreatment by humans against their young, however, has nothing to do with survival of the species. Rather than survival of the species, abuse against children stems from two major sources - ignorance and cruelty. Some parents abuse their children because they don't know any better. They are doing the best they can with their limited experience, education, and/or mental abilities. Others, however, abuse because they are cruel, selfish people who elect not to control their anger or sexual urges. They prey on children giving little thought to the ramifications of their behavior.
We cannot expect children to seek help on their own. They are defenseless and they have limited resources. They know the backlash of crossing their abusers. Therefore, they often keep their circumstances to themselves. It is up to adults to recognize abuse and to have the courage to intervene. If you work regularly with children (e.g. teachers, ministers, day care workers) and you have good reason to suspect child maltreatment, you are required by law to report your suspicions to DFACS. Your report can be anonymous. If one phone call from a caring adult can save even one child from one more beating or one more sexual violation, it is worth the ten minutes it takes to report it. If you want to make a difference in the future, rescue a child from the hands of an abuser.
(To learn more about child abuse and what you can do to prevent it, see my book entitled, "Wounded Innocents and Fallen Angels," Praeger Publishing, 2003. Available at Amazon.com, bookstores, and many other book dealers.)
