To order original high quality academic papers, fill the form below:
Trauma Essay: Case Study of Child Abuse and Abusive Environments
Child abuse is on the rise in the United States and other countries around the world. Most of the violence in the family is caused by drugs, alcohol and physical assault from emotionally unstable people in the community. One of the reasons for emotional instability is the use of drugs and alcohol. Researchers have found that alcohol and other most commonly abused drugs like marijuana and tobacco cause mental impairment (Chemtob & Carlson, 2004). People who use the drugs think that they will be stress-free and happy. However, the drugs and alcohol make them slaves. With impaired judgement, they cause trouble in the society. One of the effects of drinking alcohol or consuming other drugs is violence. Domestic violence breaks families leading to trauma, separation and death.
Parents who abuse alcohol and other drugs pass it over to their children. First they abuse their children through violence and then model them to take after them. The children grow up hardened in drugs. Kaplan Pelcovitz and Labruna (1999) found that the surrounding and upbringing play an important role in the behavior of the child. As the children grow up with the drug abuse and alcoholism and violence mentality, they influence their peers to do likewise when they interact at school. Many young youths and adolescents spend most of their time in school where they are influenced by their drug-abusing and alcoholic counterparts. The problem becomes bigger as the snowball effect takes shape. The end result is a society full of violent alcohol and drug abusers (Bernstein et al., 1994).
Drug abusers tend to be domineering and physically abusive. Since their brains do not judge between right and wrong, they are highly vulnerable to immoral sex behaviors like rape, incest, adultery and fornication. When they cannot achieve what they want, they resort to violence. Sexual abuse gives rise to emotional abuse. The combination of drug abuse, physical abuse, sexual abuse and emotional abuse cause degenerate the society. When allowed to progress, the vices combine to reduce prosperous societies to poor violent neighborhoods.
Education and good governance are the keys to reducing social evils. Education starts at home. Parents should be taught their crucial roles of bringing up children morally. If parents train children properly, the children will impart positive influence to their peers at school. If teachers do their work well, the children will spread the knowledge disseminated to them throughout the whole family and society. The end result will be a reduction in moral decadence and crime in society. Unfortunately, this has failed because of proper structures of enforcing law and inculcating values. The government and the society are too permissive to vices which end up undermining peaceful co-existence of people. Human beings end up becoming their own enemies.
Many instances of drug, sexual, physical and emotional abuse are documented in the American soil. For instance, the sporadic mass shootings that occur in America are constant reminders of the evil within. One shooter or a group of shooters motivated by the struggles of life or by revenge, open fire to hundreds of unsuspecting peaceful people every year. The government knows that such incidents are motivated by drug abuse, abusive parents, bad neighborhoods, mental instability, gun policy and other reasons but it does nothing to stop the violence (MacMillan et al., 2001).
Many attempts to stop crimes have failed. Law enforcers often attempt to respond to incidents but it is normally too late. Furthermore, policemen cannot be placed everywhere to guard everybody. Even police officers turn wild and wreak havoc. The fundamental place to train up the future generation in the best ways possible is the home and parents have failed. If I were in a powerful position, I would ban the production, supply and consumption of alcohol and psychoactive drugs. Then I would make it mandatory for children to receive moral guidance from their parents and teachers.
References
Bernstein, D. P., Fink, L., Handelsman, L., Foote, J., Lovejoy, M., Wenzel, K., … & Ruggiero, J. (1994). Initial reliability and validity of a new retrospective measure of child abuse and neglect. The American journal of psychiatry, 151(8), 1132.
Chemtob, C. M., & Carlson, J. G. (2004). Psychological Effects of Domestic Violence on Children and Their Mothers. International Journal of Stress Management, 11(3), 209.
Kaplan, S. J., Pelcovitz, D., & Labruna, V. (1999). Child and adolescent abuse and neglect research: A review of the past 10 years. Part I: Physical and emotional abuse and neglect. Journal of the American Academy of Child & Adolescent Psychiatry, 38(10), 1214-1222.
MacMillan, H. L., Fleming, J. E., Streiner, D. L., Lin, E., Boyle, M. H., Jamieson, E., … & Beardslee, W. R. (2001). Childhood abuse and lifetime psychopathology in a community sample. American Journal of Psychiatry, 158(11), 1878-1883.
