Criminals and child abuse

Jun 15, 2016 Editorial, Features / Columnists

The current increase in crime, especially armed robberies and murders should be on top of the agenda of the Ministry of Public Security and by extension the government. It should also be occupying the top brass of the police and security forces. And there is where it should stay until the authorities find the will to reduce and control it.
The homicide rate may have reached a new high in the country but just as alarming is the utter viciousness of some of the criminals, who not only shoot or stab their victims, but also burn them to death or bind their hands and throw them into the high seas after robbing them.
The former outrage occurred almost two months ago, in mid-April, when criminals robbed and then burnt to death an elderly couple, 75-year-old Mohammed Munir and his 69-year-old wife Bibi Jamila Munir at their East Bank Essequibo home. The latter was the fate of five fishermen on the Corentyne whom pirates attacked two weeks ago.
The perpetrators are truly horrible and perhaps the worst human beings in our society. Their barbaric actions demonstrate a new low in humanity, especially in the psyche of criminals, some of whom have developed a terrible rage that is out of control. And many of them are youths.
According to psychologists, such rage, developed at a young age in most cases, could have an everlasting effect if counseling is not urgently provided. Most young criminals who are involved in gangs are either fatherless or feel worthless and need validation. Many have blamed society for their exclusion from mainstream life activities and for their choices which have brought them into contact with hardcore criminals. Studies have shown that there are several other reasons for youth violence. They include under-education, dysfunctional family settings and non-existent or poor parenting.
Although we live in a civilized society, yet some still indirectly consider child abuse to be normal. In fact, in equating politics with the welfare of children, a senior official surprisingly categorized an allegation of child abuse as a family affair.
Many adults genuinely believe that beating a child is the best form of discipline. Some men, the evil ones, still think that it is acceptable to eye up a nubile young girl they find attractive and ripe for sex. And some mothers even think, subliminally, that a male provider has a right to sexual favours from their daughters. Many in society also believe that children have no rights. However, most children have a highly developed sense of justice, but they suffer emotional damage from the injustices they often encounter but can do little about.
A majority of children are unable to deter an undeserved sexual advance, however, the hurt they feel because of their parents’ absence or lack of support or when told that they are no good by their parents, is devastating. This could be viewed as critical factors for the rage in some youths who join gangs and commit crime in order to be validated. They view the gross inequalities and widespread prejudices against them as a very tall order to overcome in society.
It is puzzling how youths are able to cope with the multiplicity of negativity and disadvantages they have to endure in society. It is true that no one is born a bad person or a criminal. Many youths have turned to violence and criminal activities to escape their poverty and to overcome the pain and suffering of child abuse and other ills.
Most of the nation’s child rights enshrined in law, hardly exist in practice. The government has a lot of work to do to address child abuse if it is to achieve fundamental change and systemic and cultural improvements in how adults treat children. The mantra of the government has been to provide a good life for all, protect the citizens, get tough on crime and corruption, and to create an equal society for all. But it has to deal with the issue of child abuse which is prevalent in society.

1 thoughts on “Criminals and child abuse”

Cotton_Candy June 15, 2016 at 12:44 pm

This is a very interesting article to read and it is nothing more than the truth. What the government needs to be paying attention to now they are not paying any attention to it. They are trying to pull up this, that and the other from John Doe, Mary Doe and all the others of which they cannot find the documents so that they can charge these people. They are trying to WAKE UP THE DEAD and the dead cannot be awoken.