Spare the Rod, and the Child

Child abuse is a serious issue today. Each year 3.6 million reports of child abuse are made, involving about 6 million kids. Four to seven children die each day, 1,460 to 2,555 each year. Do you see why this is an issue? Little kids are dying because someone decided to harm them, for what? Oh, sure; maybe they didn’t do what you asked them to do. Maybe they argued with you, but they’re innocent kids! They can’t possibly know that they are doing something wrong. They don’t get to grow up. They don’t get to follow their dreams, and those who do get to grow up don’t want to. They’re haunted with memories of their abuse and they have emotional damage with them forever. Also, victims of child abuse are 3 times more likely to engage in drug use, and 9 times more likely to be involved in criminal activity.Child abuse effects how those kids turn out in life, which is why it needs to end.

First of all, kids die too often from child abuse. In 2010, 1,537 children died from child abuse. Of that 79.4% were younger than the age of 4 and 47.7% were younger than the age of 1. That is way too high of a number. All of those kids don’t get to grow up and follow their dreams, even worse; they don’t even get to have dreams. They don’t get to experience life, and all the good things in it, or even get to have fun like a little kid should be able to. They lose their childhood. No kid should have to go through that. No kid should die before they live.

In addition, the kids that do make it out of their child abuse struggle with emotional scars for the rest of their lives. Every time they try having a relationship, they think about their sexual abuse, and that ruins it for them. Many of the victims have some sort of psychological disorder, including Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. This makes those victims stressed, or frightened, even if they aren’t in danger anymore, which causes those victims to be too scared to live their own life. Imagine, being too scared to live your own life, to try new things because of someone who abused you as a child in some type of way. This is another reason why child abuse needs to end.

Furthermore, victims of child abuse are 9 times more likely to be involved in criminal activity. 36% of women and 14% of men in prison in the U.S were victims of child abuse. They could be in there for the use of drugs, could be in there for domestic violence, and could be in there for plenty of other things. These kids resorted to drugs to forget their pain, resorted to violence because that’s all they know. They are becoming criminals. Overall, these kids are becoming something other people look down upon, because they never received the help they needed.

To conclude, child abuse effects how children turn out in life. It effects who they turn out to be. Child abuse can result in death, result in crimes, and result in a lot of different things. Do you want to help stop children dying so young? Do you want to help them have a life? Do you want to stop criminals? Report child abuse when you see it, and if you are a victim of child abuse, go tell someone! If you think someone is getting abused at home, talk to them about it, help them out, do whatever you can. You can help save a child’s life, you can help stop a good person from becoming a criminal, you can help a child live and you can help stop child abuse.