Part one of a research paper.
Child abuse has been a problem since there first existed children to abuse. More than any other group in society, children are time and time again abused in a variety of ways: physical, sexual, and emotional. Over and over throughout history, children are commonly neglected to the point of death for being physically or mentally inadequate, brutally beaten in the name of discipline, raped and then blamed for it, constantly told they are worthless burdens, and much more.
Children are the natural target for abuse, whether the abuse is for the gratification of the adult or an outburst of his anger. They are small, fragile, easy to terrorize, use, and keep silent. A child can't fight back - more importantly, a child can be taught he shouldn't fight back, that the abuse he suffers is justified by his own "bad" behavior. Often children are seen as objects - both metaphorically and legally - not truly with feeling or of worth, not really human until they are considered adult, and frequently by then, it's too late to change what they were taught all their childhood, and they go on to be abused again and again during their lifetime, and/or to abuse others.
However, not only abusers have existed for eons - protectors have, too. For instance, over six thousand years ago there was already a patron goddess specifically for orphaned children, who frequently suffered from serious neglect and abuse as they struggled to survive without their parents. Records of homes for orphaned and abandoned children date back thousands of years as well.
Unfortunately though, government authorities have only begun taking a serious look at the issue of child abuse in the past few decades. In virtually every society, child abuse was considered normal and routine, children had few or no rights, and only the parents were seen as having the right to choose how to raise and discipline their child. Even if a case of serious abuse surfaced, authorities would often turn a blind eye, not wanting to intervene in what they saw as a "private family affair." Even now, when people are finally beginning to realize how incredibly harmful and dehabilitating child abuse is, many forms of abuse are still commonly accepted and inflicted.
Another important aspect of child abuse that has also been realized, at least partially, in the last few decades, is the link between child abuse and the later crime life of the victim. In the past this was evidently unclear to the authorities - children who committed crimes were typically treated just as harshly as adults. The motive behind the crime and the situation of the criminal him/herself, were factors rarely considered. A child could be maimed or even executed for a crime like stealing bread to keep herself from starving. A child who committed crime was simply seen as "bad" - it didn't matter what in her life had led her to that point or even if she was old enough to comprehend her crime.
This did not begin to change until the sixteenth century. In England, the use of chancery courts led to the concept of the King or the court itself acting in parens patriae - acting as the "father" of the child involved, and thus ruling according to what would be the child's best interest. Although this system was originally used for orphaned, abandoned, and neglected/abused children, not child criminals, it later expanded into what would become the juvenile delinquency system - but this system was not truly realized until the late nineteenth century.
Despite this, the link between child abuse and the victims' crime life is clearly visible in history. Children who were orphaned, abandoned, and neglected were frequently also those who engaged in petty crime in their struggle to survive on their own, and more serious crime if they survived into adulthood. Parents who beat their children had usually suffered such beatings themselves when they were young. Others remain victims all their life and are swept into crime by others.
I believe that child abuse is the single most important cause of juvenile delinquency and adult crime. Trauma in childhood can actually change the way the victim's brain functions, the connections the neurons make - the brain of an abused person simply does not work the same way as that of a non-abused person. In my research, I've discovered that child abuse is extraordinarily common - studies show that even in "civilized", modern cultures, the majority of people have experienced some type of abuse in their childhood, and when I looked at studies specifically of juvenile delinquents, the percentage was even higher.
Unfortunately, because it is such a controversial subject, because adults are those in power, and because their victims so often stay silent, this link has not been adequately explored, and many people remain blind to the abuse going on around them, and ignorant to its traumatizing effects.
In this study, I will be exploring the subject of child abuse and juvenile delinquency in two different countries, one from the West and one from the East - the USA and Japan. I decided to look at, and compare, two drastically different countries in order to understand how different cultures perceive different types of child abuse and youth crime, and further explain this link. In my study of Japan, I will be concentrating on societal views towards child abuse, while in the study of the USA, I will be concentrating on the psychological effects of abuse and on juvenile delinquency.
Part two will be coming soon. If you liked this post, please give it a high rating and check out the rest of my blog!
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