Child Abuse Stigma

The stigma associated with child abuse has changed in our society, since around the mid to late 80’s, because of a change in views about child punishment. As a child, I remember being physically abused by my step-father, out in public and no one ever said anything. As a matter of fact, when I was in elementary school I got into a lot of trouble, probably because of abuse, so majority of my punishments were getting swatted by a wooden paddle. It never really bothered me when I got paddles, because I was so used to dealing with pain from my step-father. With regards to child abuse, many of these people who abuse others, were abused themselves, so to fix the problem we need an understanding of what causes it. In the story, A Child Called It: One …show more content…
Similarly, the mother from Dave Pelzer’s story, showed how evil she was, when she starved him for 10 days, and laughed when he begged for food, (Pelzer 2). She gave him a plate of food, “but the moment before the food touched my mouth, Mother snatched the plate away from me and emptied the food down the garbage,” (Pelzer 2). Those who hurt others are just passing on what was done to them, and they many feel bad after the fact, but they have no understanding. Equally, the boy faces some people who were positive figures, like his father and the new teacher, but they were not able to protect him from the evil mother. Their last bonding activity was washing dishes but his mother put an end to it, “Without a fight, Father gave up,” (Pelzer 1). His mother hated him for some reason and she treated the other kids well, but, if he survives he will learn how mentally strong he really is. Due to, current social stigma’s about child abuse, stories like this seem far-fetched, but evil still exists and it causes people to hurt others to include