Domestic Violence/Abuse Resources

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A Personal History of Violence

Canada, Geoffrey. Fist Stick Knife Gun: A Personal History of Violence in America. Boston: Beacon Press, 1995.

OVERVIEW

Geoffrey Canada is the Executive Director and President of the Harlem Children’s Zone in New York. He is a native of the South Bronx, and a graduate of Bowdoin College and Harvard University. He took over the Rheedlen Foundation in 1983. This book describes how his personal history with violence informed his work with youth and the programs that he has started to support youth. Canada actually learned the code of the streets because he grew up in the streets and had to fight to protect himself and his friends.

He remembers his brothers being sent out of their apartment by his mother to retrieve a stolen jacket: “You let somebody take your brother’s jacket and you did nothing?” she explodes at the older brother. “You go out there and get your brother’s jacket or when you get back I’m going to give you a beating that will be ten times as bad as what that little thief could do to you.”

I waited a long ten minutes and then, to my surprise, John and Dan triumphantly strolled into the apartment. Dan had John’s jacket in hand. My mother gathered us all together and told us we had to stick together. That we couldn’t let people think we were afraid. (pp. 4-5)

Geoffrey Canada describes the evolution of violence over the course of his lifetime. As a child, he and his peers used fists to solve conflicts and command respect in the streets. On occasion a weapon such as a knife or car antenna would be used, but in the eighties, the drug trade and influx of guns changed the face of violence forever. The Rockefeller drug laws increased mandatory sentencing for drug-selling, and led to the growth of young people selling drugs because of the lighter sentences in the juvenile justice system. When territory and property were at risk, possession of a gun was the solution for poor inner-city kids. It guaranteed some semblance of security, and provided power without the natural checks of violence of size and skill that were previously in place.

Canada describes how relationships with adults, poverty, and safety (or lack thereof) lead kids to use violence to solve problems. In schools, adults who set safety principles do not always understand the justice laws of the street, and cannot support them while protecting students. Often adults create, unknowingly, larger opportunities for conflict than what naturally occur between youth.

Trust is a major concern for young people. This is why young people do not bring problems to adults but try to solve them the best way they know how. There is a fine line between asking for help and being labeled a snitch. Access to the things they need cause kids to rob or fight for shoes, jackets, and toys. When they do not have something and they see someone else has it, their solution could be to fight and take it. Sometimes, kids have to fight a few times to avoid being bullied or “punked” repeatedly. In other situations, kids fall into a pecking order in the neighborhood, and must create alliances for safety within their neighborhood and throughout the areas in cities where they must travel. Canada uses multiple stories to illustrate his points about the understanding of the streets and wins and losses in his work. He draws conclusions about the impact of the justice system, police, education, and economy on violence.

Canada concludes with suggestions for government initiatives to reduce violence in the streets. They include:

Creating a peace officer corps
Reducing the demand for drugs
Reduce the prevalence of domestic violence and child abuse and neglect
Reduce the amount of violence on television and in the movies
Reduce and regulate the possession of handguns

QUOTATIONS

“America has long had a love affair with violence and guns. It’s our history, we teach it to all of our young.” (x)

“But the truth is, the finger keeps the urgency of the work my colleagues and I do with children at the forefront of my mind. The slight deformity is such a small price to have paid for growing up in the South Bronx.” (69)

“We will never convince them [children] to give up their weapons with fancy television jingles or with marches alone. What these children need is a sense of safety, a certainty of surviving as they go to school or to the store.” (75)

“Before Robert left we went over the drill for what you should do when someone might be trying to kill you. The drill was a collection of do’s and don’ts learned over the years by the mistakes others had made, often costing them their lives:…I’ve gone over this drill too many times with too many kids.” (94)

“Kids with guns often see no limits on their power.” (100)

“Here I was dealing with children dying every day and trying to solve the problem on the streets, and other Americans were sitting in offices designing new and more effective ways to entice children to use handguns.” (124)

“I couldn’t help think that this is what we are trying to do at our Beacon school – believe in our children, support them, be patient with them, knowing that eventually they will succeed. And then cheering with all our heart when they do.” (146)

“This incident confirmed what I had long suspected: when it came to violence teachers and principals just didn’t understand – we were on our own to survive the best way we knew how.” (157)

“I try to remember what I once knew, that children are the real experts in violence prevention, that they are the first ones to ask if you really want to know what works and what doesn’t.” (157)

“Any child living under siege knows that he boy down the block will kill him or her instantly – no trial, no defense attorney, no copping a plea, just one second alive, the next second dead. The government can never compete with that reality.” (160)

QUESTIONS FOR REFLECTION AND DISCUSSION

Are you willing to take the types of personal and physical risks necessary to ensure safety of kids that the workers in these programs did?
What alternatives to loitering, gang involvement, and violence response does your program/ministry provide?
Are you trained in conflict resolution?
What changes need to be made in the laws relating to youth and violence?
How can you balance the tension between making yourself available to young people for counsel and the impression/consequence of being a snitch? What can adults do to change this isolation and communication gap?
How do you reward youth who do not resort to violence?

IMPLICATIONS

Canada implies that the violence committed by and against children is the solution that children have devised to problems that adults created or do not prevent. The government, social, and economic factors involved in youth violence must be considered as we try to reduce violence with single campaigns and narrowly focused programming. We need comprehensive programming that addresses not only needs of children but also needs of parents and families. If we do not approach the problem with input of families and children, we will be unsuccessful at meeting the needs of children and supporting them so that they can be successful.

Tamecia Jones c. CYS

Cognitive-behavioral interventions aimed at anger of parents at risk of child abuse

Whiteman, M., Fanshel, D., & Grundy, J.F. (1988, November/December). Cognitive-behavioral interventions aimed at anger of parents at risk of child abuse. Social Work.

OVERVIEW

WHY DOES CHILD ABUSE OCCUR?

Despite the varying conditions affecting abusive parents, including variation in personality or in severity of experienced stress, one feature is common to the act of physical abuse: the underlying emotion of anger...If, as some researchers have estimated, about one million children are abused in one year, then every 38 seconds a flare of anger leads to child abuse.

OTHER CAUSES

Complex attitudes toward violence.
Norms defining parental rights.
Negative stress factors: economic, individual, or family-induced.
Parental hostilities and rigidities toward the child engendered by: broad personality traits, lack of parenting skills, or maltreatment by the parent’s own parents.
Child/parent relationship characterized by abusive behaviors.

All these causes involve an act of abuse finally motivated by anger. The article asserts, "If this anger could be controlled and redirected, the abusive behavior that it supports should be prevented or ameliorated."

This article describes experiments and research conducted in two social agencies. These experiments suggest a significant reduction in anger when three methods are used cooperatively, based on cognitive-behavioral therapy:

Relaxation training.
Problem-solving training.
Cognitive restructuring of the parental perception of the child’s behavior.

Of these three, problem-solving training is most effective and relaxation training least effective. But a composite of all three methods appears to be best. The findings are particularly promising because the effects were obtained in only six sessions. This training was equally successful with parents at risk as well as with those identified as child abusers; it is recommended for general educational use.

IMPLICATIONS

Three levels of dysfunction are suggested in any consideration of child abuse. Certain aspects of our society drive people to anger; our culture models violence. The anger of individuals and the dysfunction of the family also demand consideration. Dysfunction must be rectified on a social, family, and individual level.
With a knowledge of causes and treatments, society can begin not only to reduce child abuse, but to strengthen families as well.
Teachers and youth workers must teach in a way that supports victims and families while suggesting possible options.

Dean Borgman cCYS

Virtual Sexual Predators

Lewis, Raphael and Tara Yaekel (31 May, 2000). “Virtual Dare, Real Scare: Girl’s Action Highlights Perils of Net” The Boston Globe.

Belkin, Doug and Mac Daniel (14 August, 2001). “Runaway Teenager Lost Way on the Web” The Boston Globe.

Thomas, Karen (9 June, 2000). “Kids Run a 20% risk of ‘Cybersex’ Advances” USA Today.
(Download this review as a PDF)

Overview:

Danielle Carrien, a 13 year-old seventh grader in Massachusetts, was lucky to make it home some 18 hours after vanishing from the yard. In New York, a 15 year-old girl from Massachusetts spent two days held in a closet undergoing an ordeal of rape before she was able to contact police.

What is the relationship between such awful incidents and teen internet use? According to recent (2000) survey data, one in five adolescents and teens who regularly socialize on the Net have encountered strangers soliciting ‘cybersex’. Though in 75% of cases the solicitation is ignored by youths, the risk that comes with such open-ended communication is palpable.

Carrien met up with an older teenage boy she met while chatting on America Online, promptly joining him for a sleepover. Though her situation evidenced obvious risks, in many cases, notes Lewis and Yaekel, youths are baited by adult ‘cyber-stalkers.’ John Grossman, chief of the High Technology and Computer Crime Division of the Massachusetts Attorney General’s Office, reports “we are seeing an increasing number of cases of young people meeting older acquaintances they made on the Internet.”

Understandably, parents are concerned. “They parents have to know what the kids are doing on the Internet,” says Edith Flynn, a criminal justice professor at NortheasternUniversity. But this is no easy matter. In Carrien’s case, her parent’s had limited her to one hour a day on the Net, and the computer was located in a central, viewable room in the house. Even still, she had generated a 30 person “Buddy” list in America Online chat rooms.

In the New York

case, the 15 year-old willingly met with a man and woman in their forties, who then kidnapped and sodomized her. According to Belkin and Daniel’s report, the girl involved was under considerable stress at home, even though she was a responsible honor-roll student.

The Cyberangels, a volunteer Internet safety organization, has launched school-based efforts to help teenagers train one another in the risks of Internet use. Their executive director, Parry Aftab, admits that kids and parents are holding a two-edged sword: “It’s a serious, serious problem. Yet the Internet is absolutely essential to all our kids.”

One obvious lesson is that kids must not let the ease of Internet interaction translate into a ready trust of those they meet online. The prevalence of cybersex advances alone indicates the exposure that happens when youths open themselves up to online chat forums.

Consider these numbers from a 2000 study conducted by the University of New Hampshire and the NationalCenter for Missing and Exploited Children:

· 66% of those reporting a sexual advance while online were female.

· 70% of incidents happened wile the youth was on a home computer.

· 65% occurred wile in a chat room; 24% by instant message.

· 29% told a friend or sibling; 24% told a parent.

· 77% of kids propositioned were 14 or older.

One challenge, according to Thomas, is that kids see online friendships as a great gift of the Internet. But when it comes to meeting up with such ‘friends’ in person, no amount of safeguards and family involvement is too much.

Questions for Reflection and Discussion:

1. Does your child/teenagers you work with participate in online chat forums?

2. Do you have rules in your home about Internet surfing?

3. Is your computer in an open, viewable area?

4. What stresses are currently affecting your child/teens you work with that might encourage them to seek solace in a virtual community?

5. How can parents/counselors have frank conversations with young people about the problem of online sexual solicitation?

Implications:

Its’ virtues notwithstanding, the Internet poses great risks. It tends to give one the illusion of privacy, security, and community, at times inviting unwanted attention and contact. Though it may be an awkward and difficult task for parents, communicating with your child about Internet use and setting reasonable boundaries is vital. Obviously we should not be alarmist and assume all children are being ‘stalked’ by online predators, but even something as simple as turning to the Internet to relieve stress can quickly catalyze unhealthy habits and risks.

Christopher S. Yates cCYS

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The Concept of Abused Children now a Reality

Ciira, W. (1988, October 2). The Concept of Abused Children now a Reality. The Nation

(Nairobi, Kenya).

OVERVIEW

(Download the Concept of Abused Children overview as a PDF)

Not so long ago, many Kenyans did not believe there were battered children in the country, or even in Africa. People retorted that even the word ‘battered’ was coined in some Western country.

Now, however, people know differently. They realize that battered children are not a foreign concept. ‘These doubting Thomases have now been re-educated.

These poignant words are shared from Professor N.O. Bwibo, professor of pediatrics and principal of the College of Health Sciences at the University of Nairobi

. Newspaper headlines covering a three-month time span bear evidence to his remarks:

"Lost Kakamega pupil found dead in forest,"	Nation, 20 July, 1988.
"Urgent solution needed to combat child abuse,"	Standard, 5 August, 1988.
"Girl sacrificed to redeem parent,"	Nation, 12 August, 1988.
"25-yr. old abductor of 13-yr. old girl caught,"	Nation, 12 August, 1988.
"Worst child sex scandal exposed in S. Africa,"	Nation, 16 August, 1988.
"Forgotten and lonely orphans,"	Nation, 18 September, 1988.
"Of children who disappear without a trace,"	Standard, 18 September, 1988.
"Forgotten and lonely orphans of AIDS,"	Standard, 18 September, 1988.
"Destitute abandoned children on the rise,"	Nation, 27 September 1988.
"Police hunt for baby-snatcher,"

Standard, 5 October, 1988.

A Sunday morning service at Nairobi Baptist Church highlighted the problem as Pastor Oscar Muriu called "for a lasting solution to the problems of incest and child abuse" (according to the Standard

, 17 October 1988). Pointing out some terrible results from incest, rape, and child abuse—poor school work and life traumas—Pastor Muriu said he wondered why women fear to report their spouses. He shared a story of "a 3 1/2 year-old child who was locked in a house and raped repeatedly for two months by her uncle."

Considering the presence of such startling revelations, Professor Bwibo’s two-day workshop on "The Rights of the Kenyan child" was timely. He "is credited with being the first Kenyan to carry out research on child abuse." Attendance at his workshop demonstrates that his concern is shared by many others.

The author of the article adds, "The workshop was organized by the African Network for the Prevention and Protection Against Child Abuse and Neglect (ANPPCAN) with funding by the United Nations Children’s Fund

(UNICEF) Kenya country office. It is part of an on-going...in-depth study of the status of the child in Africa."

The goals of this project are

To identify areas needing further examination.
To initiate detailed research.
To establish dialogue with government and other agencies.
To publicize and distribute the project report.

To translate information into local languages.

Concluding the article, Ciira states, "Throughout the workshop, it repeatedly came to light that Kenyan’s changing lifestyles have brought in their wake new psychological, social and emotional problems which especially effect children adversely. According to Professor Bwibo, the times we live in are ‘good times’ in as far as material things go, but ‘bad times’ in that parents may have to lock their children up at home when they go out to work or to attend to other matters, thus exposing them to many dangers."

IMPLICATIONS

A modern society can take proper action only when it knows the facts and statistics of a problem. The workshop and project described offer hope for a constructive, societal response.
Along with the sociological explanations of the rise in child abuse, there are psychological explanations for the pastor’s question. Women are often afraid to report crimes against their children because they themselves are victims of such childhood abuse—a situation that produces a paralyzing fear.
Schools, social welfare and medical institutions, churches, and parents are all called upon to respond to this rising problem.

Youth workers must not retreat from such problems—but they must be approached with extreme sensitivity and skill.

Dean Borgman cCYS

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Adolescent prostitution

Schaffer, B. & DeBlassie, R.R. (1984, Fall). "Adolescent prostitution." Adolescence, 19.

OVERVIEW

Reviewing previous research, this study explored the conditions that lead teenagers to prostitution and how American institutions and the legal system deal with them.

FINDINGS

Contributing conditions. Conditions facilitating prostitution include alienation from the family, leading to dependency on peers; parental abuse (physical or sexual) and neglect; failure in the classroom and limited employment prospects; and crumbling structure of the home life.

Motives for prostitution. The incentives for prostitution are many: economic rewards; support for the basic needs of runaways; lack of parental attention and self-worth; adventure; institutions (exposure and labeling); hostility; and drug abuse.

Female and male prostitutes. Males engage primarily in homosexual contacts, although most perceive themselves as heterosexual. There are few supports for males, whereas females form an elaborate social network.

Justice system and institutions. Among the findings: females are punished with disproportionate severity compared to males; deviant behavior is often learned in detention facilities; homosexuality touches nearly all incarcerated individuals; and security is a primary concern, while rehabilitation is secondary.

CONCLUSIONS

Youth who fail in a traditional setting find reinforcement and support on the streets among peers.
The judicial systems are inadequate for the task of rehabilitation.

IMPLICATIONS

Develop supportive relationships that break the dependency of destructive relationships. Build self-esteem and self-worth through consistent love and caring to counter alienation and rejection in primary relationships. Provide strong, positive role models to aid the development of a positive value system:

Offer outreach in a preventative mode to youth of broken and troubled families.
Offer outreach to juvenile facilities.
Offer outreach in conjunction with parole and probation programs.

Consider reaching to runaways at transportation depots, providing them support before their needs become desperate, and before they are approached by pimps.
Offer individualized tutoring programs to increase the chances for success in school and the working world while building loving, caring relationships.
Provide counseling services to abused youth.

Cora Lombardi and Anne Montague cCYS

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Child abuse and neglect decline in USA

Wasson, H. & Mullins, M.E. (2000, June 16-18). Child abuse and neglect decline in USA. USA Today (Snapshots), p. 1A.

OVERVIEW

Going into the 1990s, it looked as if child abuse and neglect might reach a rate of 20 per 1,000. The good news is that 1998 (the latest figures available half way through the year 2000) showed the lowest rate in the past 10 years-at 13 per 1,000. The bad news is that rates are still too high and represent terrible tragedy in the lives of infants and children.

Highest rates in the nation are found in the following:

Washington, DC	48 per 1,000.
Alaska	37
Florida	23
Kentucky	23
Idaho	23
Connecticut

(The source of this information is the U.S. Health and Human Services Department.)

QUESTIONS FOR REFLECTION AND DISCUSSION

What constitutes criminal child abuse? What is criminal child neglect?
What are possible effects of neglect and abuse on children?
How do you weigh the relative damage of separation from parents and the dangers of continued neglect and/or abuse to the life of the child?
At what point should social services intervene in the life of a family?
Considering that most abusive and neglectful parents are alcoholics or drug abusers, what should to be done to these parents?
What review or check on social service policies and practices would you favor?

IMPLICATION

A major function of a culture is the rearing and socialization of children. There are many societal challenges to rearing children whose parents are abusive and neglectful. More must be done to protect children, and to halt the cycle of abuse and neglect.

Dean Borgman cCYS

The truth about domestic violence

McNeely, R. L. & Robinson-Simpson, G. (1988, November/December). "The truth about domestic violence: A falsely framed issue". Social Work.
(Download this review as a PDF)

OVERVIEW

A POPULAR MISCONCEPTION

Read more

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Abuse rate highest for ethnic boys

Lewin, T. (1998, June 27). Abuse rate highest for ethnic boys. The Arizona Republic, p. A18.

OVERVIEW

According to the article,

A new study of adolescent boys’ health has found that more than one in eight high-school-age boys said they had been physically or sexually abused, with Hispanic and Asian-American boys reporting the highest rates of both kinds of abuse.

The study found that physical abuse of boys is much more prevalent than sexual abuse. About 2/3 of the physical abuse occurred at the hand of a family member and in the home. Approximately 1/3 of sexual abuse situations occurred in the home; 45% of those sexually abused were abused by a family member. Most of the physical and sexual abuses were recurring.

The study, managed by Louis Harris and Associates, Inc. for the Commonwealth Fund, was based on questionnaires completed by over 3,000 boys, grades 5-12, in nearly 300 schools across America; it was conducted from December 1996 through June 1997. The boys’ responses were compared with a similar sample of girls researched several months earlier. The authors of the study were shocked about the differences between ethnic groups. Notes Cathy Scheon, one author, " ‘We didn’t find those ethnic differences when we looked at abuse among girls, and most of the studies of abuse look at girls, because they have a much higher rate of sexual abuse. But boys and girls have similar rates of physical abuse, and it does look like boys within some ethnic families are more at risk.’ "

Response to abuse varies: nearly half of abused boys had not talked to anyone about their abuse, while 29% of abused girls had not shared their stories of abuse. Additionally, 15% of abused boys had considered suicide; only half as many abused girls had contemplated it. Authors of the study were surprised that boys had no one that they felt comfortable talking to about the abuse. Also, notes Schoen, " ‘Another thing that struck me about boys who said they had been abused is their much higher rate of bulimia, which is so rare among boys generally that doctors could almost look at it as an early warning sign.’ "

In general, boys reported being less likely than girls to talk to anyone when they were "stressed, overwhelmed, or depressed." Boys showing signs of poor mental health were most likely "to lack a support person."

The questionnaires did not define the term "abuse," but it did ask whether the study participant had ever experienced sexual or physical abuse. The following table outlines abuse by ethnicity:

Boys (by ethnicity)	Sexually Abused	Physically Abused
Asian American	9%	17%
Hispanic	7%	13%
Black	3%	10%
White	3%	8%

¾ of both boys and girls reported watching television when they were stressed. Yet, girls were much more likely to call a friend, while boys favored spending time on the computer or exercising.

Concerning boys’ health, the study found the following:

8 Of 10 boys worked out at least 3 times a week. Hispanic and Asian-American boys were less likely than black or white boys to participate in organized sports.
Although boys were much less likely than girls to report eating disorders (8% boys to 16% girls), abused boys were four times as likely "to have binged and purged than those who had not been abused." These boys were also 8 times as likely to do so frequently.
High school boys and girls had similar drinking, smoking, and drug practices, but 5^th-8^th graders were more likely to drink, smoke, and do drugs than girls.

QUESTIONS FOR REFLECTION AND DISCUSSION

Do these findings surprise you? Why or why not?
Are girls better at hiding abuse than boys? Are boys abused more often?
Do girls have better support during difficult times than boys?
What can you do when you think that a young person is being abused? What should you do?

IMPLICATIONS

It is always important for youth workers to be aware that adolescents are abused. Watch for any signals.
Kids will try to hide the abuse. It is shameful and humiliating. Help kids understand that abuse is not their fault.
Build relationships with young people who may be abused. Earn the right to be trusted by them.
Encourage young people to support and care for each other.

Kathryn Q. Powers cCYS

MISSING CHILDREN RESOURCES

MISSING CHILDREN RESOURCES

ORGANIZATIONS

Child Quest International, Inc.
Child Quest International is a non-profit corporation dedicated to the protection and recovery of missing, abused and exploited children and at-risk adults.

National Center for Missing and Exploited Children 24-hour Hotline: 1-800-THE-LOST
The organization's mission is "to help prevent child abduction and sexual exploitation; help find missing children; and assist victims of child abduction and sexual exploitation, their families, and the professionals who serve them."

The Nation's Missing Children Organization (NMCO)
The NMCO is a nonprofit agency providing nationwide assistance to law enforcement and families of missing persons.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Hyde, Margaret O. (1998). Missing and Murdered Children. Franklin Watts.
An informative book presents information about children who have been kidnapped, runaways, thrownaways, and those who have died from abuse and neglect and at the hands of strangers and peers. The effects of abductions and runaways on a family, shelters that aim to get children off the streets, and programs designed to get the missing youngsters home are explored.

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Injuries to children younger than one year of age

Rivara, F.P., Kamitsuka, M.D., & Quan, L. (1988, January). Injuries to children younger than one year of age. Pediatrics, 81, 93-97.

OVERVIEW

Child abuse has been coined "the crime of the 1980s." In most states, professionals are legally bound to report evidences of such a crime. Even beyond the greater attention given it, there seems to be an increase in its incidence. False incrimination of parents is a possibility—a very painful one. Clinicians face the difficult task of distinguishing children’s injuries due to abuse from those acquired accidentally and unintentionally.

DESIGN

Researchers investigated the circumstances and characteristics of injuries to 191 infants under one year of age brought to an emergency room for treatment. A comparison was made between two carefully determined groups: 146 infants unintentionally injured and 45 infants abused.

FINDINGS

Within the unintentionally injured group, the majority of injuries were minor, with exception of eight skull fractures and seven fractures of the clavicle.
Within the abused group, injuries were most often multiple and severe and more likely to lead to long-term disability. Also, fractures of the ribs and lower extremities and retinal hemorrhages were seen only in the abused group.
There were no differences in groups as to the time of day of reported injury.

CONCLUSIONS

The researchers suggest that serious injuries in infants are rarely due to unintentional injuries and that certain kinds of injuries should be viewed as potential signs of abuse.

IMPLICATIONS

When families cannot protect the life and welfare of innocents, other institutions must step in. Friends and the church can sometimes save injury and public cost. Public professionals need guidelines established by studies such as this.
Care must be taken not to incriminate innocent parties—such parents need advocates and due process.
The disciplines of psychology, sociology, and education all have an interest in a careful investigation of this current issue.
Youth workers have a significant responsibility to affirm families and community and to offer alternative ways for responding to stress-filled situations.

Dean Borgman cCYS

Cradle-to-grave intimacy: Some researchers openly argue that ‘everything goes’ for children

Leo, J. & Galvin, R.M. (1981, September 7). Cradle-to-grave intimacy: Some researchers openly argue that ‘everything goes’ for children. Time. Study sheds light on child sex rings. (1984, May 11). The Patriot Ledger. (from the New York Times News Service).

OVERVIEW

The cover of what is called a national bestseller, Show Me! features two tiny tots, both nude, one smiling suggestively, the other gazing pensively. The book is subtitled, "A Picture Book of Sex for Children and Parents, Photography and Captions by Will McBride, Explanatory Text by Dr. Helga Fleishcauer-Handt."

The authors of this Time article are disturbed by what they have found tucked away in other research or indirectly stated by feminists and children’s rights advocates. It is the idea that very young children should at least be allowed, if not encouraged, to practice a full sex life. Briefly stated, the argument is that children are sexual beings and have the need and the right to develop their skills early in life. Those who hold this position contradict the Freudian notion of a latency period (from about four years of age to puberty) as a prudish doctrine of a repressive society. The idea comes out differently from several specialists quoted.

Mary S. Calderone, head of the influential Sex Information and Education Council of the United States stated that children have a fundamental right "to know about sexuality and to be sexual."

John Money of Johns Hopkins University points out with others that even as infants, boys can have erections and girls may evidence lubricated vaginas. "It is almost certain that human beings, like the other primates, require a period of early sexual rehearsal play," he wrote in The Sciences magazine. Such "rehearsal play with adults affects them beneficially."

Anthropologist Richard Currier furthers the argument (in Human Behavior), "Western society has undergone a revolution in sexual values but has tried to apply it exclusively to adults, and this arbitrary restriction is not working."

A family therapist from Acton, Massachusetts, Larry Constantine carries the argument to a further extreme: "Children really are a disenfranchised minority. They should have the right to express themselves sexually, which means that they may or not have contact with people older than themselves." Apparently, for him, protection from child molesters would come from the ability liberated and educated children to say no.

Though forced to oppose adult-child sex publicly, some researchers are admitting they believe adult-child sex does not hurt a child. Norwegian psychologist, Thore Langfeldt, points to early sexual stimulation and infant masturbation by adults in some primitive cultures and says it "definitely does not seem to harm the child."

Wardell Pomeroy, who co-authored the Kinsey reports, claims that incest "can sometimes be beneficial" to children.

Frits Bernard, a Dutch psychologist who has written many articles and books on pedophilia claims that adult-child sex is innocent—that it is the fuss adults make over it and not the sex itself that harms children. He finds adult-child sex basically innocent; children involved in such activity he has studied "are no more neurotic than the average Dutchman."

Commentators on this subject like Floyd Martison, sociologist at Minnesota’s Gustavus Adolphus College, emphasize the quality of the adult-child relationship. "Intimate human relations are important and precious. I’d like to see as few restrictions placed on them as possible. Harvard Health Service psychologist, Douglas Powell adds, "I have not seen anyone harmed by this so long as it occurs in a relationship with somebody who really cares about the child."

Obviously, such opinions give comfort and encouragement to pedophiles. The Goleman article above refers to a study published in the official journal of the American Psychiatric Association. This study by a group led by Ann Wolbert Burgess of the University of Pennsylvania School of Nursing focused on the children’s point of view. It is based on two years of interviews with 62 children (49 boys, 17 girls) averaging 11 years of age and involved in eleven sex rings in the Northeast and Middle West from 1978 to 1981. Their length of involvement in the rings were from a few months to four years.

The fourteen adult leaders of these groups used the children sexually and sold pictures for profit.

The adult ring leaders, all of whom had legitimate roles in the children’s lives, included neighbors, a school bus driver, a coach, a scout leader, a grandfather, a teacher, and an apartment manager. In a typical sex ring, a 54-year-old man who had received a community award for "devoting 25 years to the youth of the community" as a baseball coach, was arrested by the federal agents for distributing child pornography.

Two years after the rings were discovered, the study found, about one in four of the children had made what appeared to be a healthy psychological adjustment.

Going back to the Time article, we read how pedophiles have welcomed opinions regarding the benefit of childhood sex. A leader of an organization of pedophiles, the Childhood Sensuality Circle, out of San Diego, Valida Davila says:

We believe children should begin sex at birth. It causes a lot of problems not to practice incest.

Militant homosexual, David Thorstad, claims to be fighting for "the rights of children to control their own bodies."

Only a few voices have been raised against what many would call assaults against childhood innocence. One of them is that of lesbian columnist, Nancy Walker:

Let Thorstad and his confreres at least say what the real issue is: that they want to [copulate with] children. Prepubescent children are not taboo because this is a sex-negative society, but because they can be physically hurt and may be psychologically injured as well by sexual intimacy with adults.

Child psychologist Leon Eisenberg (Children’s Hospital Medical Center, Boston) is one of the few responsible child experts to respond boldly and bluntly against ideas of child-adult sex:

Premature sexual behavior among children in this society almost always leads to psychological difficulties because you have a child acting out behavior for which he is not cognitively or emotionally ready. People who think small children are capable of making free decisions about sex with adults are full of crap.

Psychotherapist Sam Janus describes in The Death of Innocence how people who were seduced early in life "go through the motions of living and may seem all right, but they are damaged. I see these people year after year in therapy." UCLA psychiatrist Edward Ritvo, who has worked with children from difficult sex encounters agrees: "Childhood sexuality is like playing with a loaded gun."

QUESTIONS FOR REFLECTION AND DISCUSSION

What are your feelings in reading this, and what troubles you most from the article?
How is a pluralistic, secular society to set its sexual standards? Is there any common ground for a public sexual philosophy?
How must family, schools, health agencies, and churches cooperate in protecting those who may be sexually abused?
Is sexual abuse of children a public health issue in this society? What does that mean? What would be its implications for families, the media, health agencies, and churches?
When and how can youth leaders deal with these issues?

IMPLICATIONS

It would seem that we have come to a place where "private" adult freedoms must be legally and constitutionally limited to protect vulnerable children. Society has no greater responsibility than the protection of infants and children.
Secular, pluralistic societies must return to a concept of the common good and to a common moral foundation. One of the principles of such a moral base should be that all the promotes full and whole maturity to manhood and womanhood is good, and anything that injures or hinder growth to adulthood is wrong.
We have reached a point in our society where families, schools, businesses, churches and public agencies must cooperate for the good and welfare of young people. No single social system, nor alliance of two or three systems, can deal adequately with the crises among children and youth today.
As Deborah Prothrow-Stith has asked our society to deal with violence as a public health issue, we would suggest that the sexual abuse of children is a public health issue. This means that parents and other adults, schools and churches, and especially the media, must be held accountable for the welfare of children.
It must be admitted that there is no clear consensus regarding a public sexual philosophy and implied standards. It may be the welfare of children that will explode our extreme indulgences and help us find practical principles that work for the common good.

Dean Borgman cCYS

Warnings can point to abuse

Lankard, C. (1999, November 1). Warnings can point to abuse. The Daily Oklahoman, p. 1B, 4B.

OVERVIEW

It is important for youth workers to understand the families of the children that they work with. According to this article, over half of men who beat their female partners also beat their children. So, if a youth worker senses that a spouse or partner is being abused, it would not be surprising that the children in the family are also being abused.

Additionally, young people who view domestic violence frequently have emotional and behavioral problems of their own. Notes Lankard, "Of boys ages 11 to 20 who commit homicide, 60 percent kill the man abusing their mother. Of the children exposed to violence, 30 percent become violent adults." It is essential to a child’s well-being to address domestic abuse as quickly as possible.

Abuse comes in many forms. Physical, verbal, emotional, sexual, economic abuses are typical, as is the destruction of property or pets. These acts are not only physically harmful, but they destroy a person’s trust, safety, and control. While domestic violence is widespread, only one in ten incidences is ever reported. Unless an effective, appropriate intervention occurs within the violent situation, the abuse always intensifies. Violence occurs within all socioeconomic, ethnic, religious, racial, and age groups. While women are usually the abused, men are victims, too. Men are more likely to be emotionally and verbally abused, and are highly unlikely to report it. Most abusers were young victims of abuse, or witnessed their mother’s abuse. The "battered wife" usually grew up in a similar household.

There are a few warning signals of a potential abuser:

Playful use of force in sex.
Verbal abuse.
Rigid sex roles.
Dr. Jekyll/Mr. Hyde personality.
A past battering history.
Threats of violence.
Breaking or striking objects.
Use of force during any argument.

The abuser generally explains his or her behavior as a gesture of love and concern. Eventually, the actions increase in severity and begin to dominate the victim. There are several warning signs indicating that a person may become abusive.

Jealousy.
Controlling behavior.
Quick involvement.
Unrealistic expectations.
Isolation.
Blames others for his or her problems.
Blames others for his or her feelings.
Hypersensitivity.
Cruelty to animals or children.

QUESTIONS FOR REFLECTION AND DISCUSSION

Have you been in an abusive home? What was it like?
How would you respond if a young person told you that he or she was being abused? If their parent was being abused? If their sibling was being abused?
Have you worked with children from abusive homes? Does this article substantiate your experience with the abuse?
What are the special needs of children who witness or receive abuse?
What long-term problems have you seen in these children?
How can you help these children?

IMPLICATIONS

Many and perhaps all states require citizens to report suspected abuse. Be familiar with the laws in your area.
Children who are abused or who witness abuse are destroyed in many ways. Their hearts and perhaps bodies must be rebuilt.
Some children will lash out in anger. Others will focus within. Still others will attempt to cover it up. Learn the different ways that children react to abuse. Learn how to respond to each of those types of children.
Additional resources are available through local and national hotlines and programs. Seek one near you to help the victim, the abuser, and any witnesses to the violence.

Kathryn Q. Powers cCYS

Counseling adult women who experienced incest in childhood or adolescence

Courtois, C. & Watts, D. (1982, January). Counseling adult women who experienced incest in childhood or adolescence. The Personnel and Guidance Journal.

OVERVIEW

Although this article deals with issues in the adult counselee, it provides important background information and principles helpful with younger females. The changing social climate for discussion of this sensitive issue and definitions of incest, legal and psychiatric, is noted.

Fear is the main reason most women wait to adulthood to disclose sexual molestation. The presenting issues of these counselees involve symptoms around the category of self (identity and self-esteem), physical complaints, sexual functioning, and relationships with others. Clients who present issues associated with early incest or molestation may be asked the question in a "calm, straightforward, matter-of-fact manner, but the timing and approach should vary by client."

The author lists the most prominent features of the incest experience which "influence the severity of effect."

Duration. Short- or long-term.

Age at onset. Pre- or post-puberty.

Frequency.

Covert versus overt. Disclosed, assumed, or hidden to the family.

Kinship or relationship of perpetrator. Close or distant relative, step-parent or parent’s lover, brother’s friend, etc.

Consent or nonconsent. Many authors and professionals argue that a child is never really free to choose against authority, but the attitude of the victim is important.

Use of force. Further dimension of variable of consent.

The article continues with treatment issues and approaches. It discusses the pain associated with incest and the importance of the client-counselor relationship, because the client’s trust is destroyed. "Many clients are caught in significant conflict and trust no one because no one was trustworthy in their family."

IMPLICATIONS

The counselor must be patient, understanding, and sensitive.
A working alliance may be difficult to form due to the client’s mistrust.
Group counseling, alone or in conjunction with individual counseling, can be very effective.

cCYS

When can a child be left home alone?

Lehman, B.A. When can a child be left home alone? (1993, January 11). The Boston Globe.

OVERVIEW

America woke up to the issue of neglected children, as it often does, only when the actions of David and Sharon Schoo became local and national news. Millions watched a white, upper-middle class couple being handcuffed and led through Chicago’s O’Hare International Airport. The story was even more dramatic and puzzling. This educated and successful mother and father had left their two daughters (ages nine and four) at home for nine days during Christmas 1993 with written instructions—while they vacationed in Mexico!

2,700,000 Cases of child neglect were reported in the United States in 1991. Four children die every day, on average, from child neglect or child abuse. And the court protection and adjudication of many such cases are nothing short of scandalous in terms of protecting the welfare of our nation’s children.

All parents, and particularly single moms and dads, are under tremendous pressure these days as they try to balance work, personal and domestic business, and possibly some social life of their own with child care. Parenting sometimes seems too much to bear, and the temptation to leave kids for a few minutes in the car while running into a store, at home while making a quick trip to the grocers, library, or video store often seems justified.

When and how are children ready to be left alone? Studies indicate and experts affirm that children younger than twelve or puberty are not ready intellectually to handle emergencies. Children twelve and below are typically not mentally prepared for formal operational thinking. Their minds operate in terms of isolated concrete facts and procedures. They may, therefore, be quite able to handle the video, the microwave, home chores or personal duties. They may even seem to understand simple instructions.

But if, suddenly, there is a fire, an electrical short circuit, or an intruder at the door, or if they have seriously injured themselves or a sibling, they may panic emotionally and do something logical regarding some isolated aspect of the problem, but tragically inappropriate for the entire emergency. It might make sense for a youngster to hide in a closet when he or she should be exiting the building. Taking time to deliver necessary information by dialing 911 may in some cases be a fatal mistake.

The rule then, is that children under 12, elementary school children, should not be left alone. Some junior high-age children may not be ready to be in charge on their own. And the experts note considerations additional to the maturity and temperament of the child:

Presence of younger siblings who may need care.
Proximity of familiar and responsible adults.
Safety and concern of the neighborhood.
Training of the child in question.

Dr. Michael S. Jellinek, chief of child psychiatry at Massachusetts General Hospital comments, "There are a half-dozen factors that would make one 8 year-old perfectly fine to leave at home for 15-20 minutes, but would make another 8 year-old very dangerous to leave at home for that time." Pediatrician Dr. Eli H. Newberger adds, "I don’t feel that children should be left alone who are younger than 12 or 13. At all."

Kids left alone are often terrified. They often feel isolated; they may become depressed. They may do angry, self-destructive things, like setting a fire or going into the liquor cabinet. Or harming their siblings.

Kenneth D. Herman is a lawyer and psychologist and director of a Children and Law program at Massachusetts General Hospital. He believes that, due to changes in society, parents who may have themselves been left alone at a young age should not continue the practice:

It was fun to be left alone when I was 8 or 9 years old growing up in Denver. I enjoyed the being in charge, searching my parents’ drawers and desk and getting into mild mischief.

These days, I think, an 8- or 9 year-old might be a great deal more worried. I think children are being bombarded with concerns about the dangerousness of the environment, and sad to say, many of them are well-founded concerns.

In Herman’s opinion, kids probably should not be left alone until junior high.

The experts consulted in this inquiry expressed sympathy for low-income and single parents who "may find it almost impossible to secure good after-school care and thus may find it necessary to leave children unattended too soon." Still, they emphasize the importance of supervised after-school care as well as good day care.

Michelle Seligson, director of the School Age Child Care Project at Wellesley College concludes:

What I’m trying to say is children are vulnerable in our culture. That’s where you start from. You don’t start from, ‘How much can I lay on this kid? How much can I ask this child to endure?’ You start from, ‘How much can I do to protect my child?’

QUESTIONS FOR REFLECTION AND DISCUSSION

How should a youth worker today respond to abused or neglect children? How should one talk with parent believed to be negligent? In what ways are most parents negligent?
Do you agree with the principles and suggestions provided in this article? Are there analyses or advice here with which you disagree? What else needs to be said to parents?
How can children best be prepared for what they must do on their own?
What is causing child negligence and abuse to proliferate?
Who should be responsible for abused or neglected children? How should this be accomplished? How can one work to ensure that the current system does not further abuse or neglect children?

IMPLICATIONS

Children, even before women, poor immigrants, and minorities, are the most vulnerable constituency of our society. They must be protected.
The family, too, must be protected and supported. A difficult tension exists between rights of privacy and protection in cases of child abuse and neglect. In some instances, parents have been terribly misunderstood and abused. Young victims need their parents, but their safety is paramount.
Families, community, schools, social agencies, and churches interlock in American society. These systems are interdependent, and must work together, support one another, and challenge weaknesses in a particular system.

Dean Borgman cCYS

The Virtual Child Porn Debate

Borgman, Dean “The Virtual Child Porn Debate,” CYS.

The 1996 Child Pornography Prevention Act made it a crime to distribute, receive or possess an image that “appears to be of a minor engaging in sexually explicit conduct.”

Since that time the digital age has made it possible to create images that are life-like. The possibilities of sexual child predators creating, storing, sharing and using animated images to seduce children led Congress to pass a new federal law in 2002 banning “virtual” child pornography, including computer-generated images of minors in sexual situations.

On 20 May 2002 the Supreme Court declared that law unconstitutional as a violation of the First Amendment arguing that the First Amendment, in their majority opinion, should be presumed to protect pornography that “records no crime and creates no victims by its production.”

Writing for himself and Justices John Paul Stevens, David H. Souter, Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Stephen G. Bryer, Justice Anthony M. Kennedy declared not only the new act, but the original act to be in part unconstitutional. Its language was unconstitutionally vague and far-reaching. “The First Amendment requires a more precise restriction. Writing separately, Justice Clarence Thomas agreed with the decision.

Justice Sandra Day O’Connor only partially agreed with the Court’s majority decision. Dissenting were Chief Justice William H. Rehnquist and Justice Antonin Scalia. “The aim of ensuring the enforceability of our nation’s child pornography laws is a compelling one. The (law) targeted to this aim by extending the definition of child pornography to reach computer-generated images that are virtually indistinguishable from real children engaged in sexually explicit conduct.”

The Free Speech Coalition (FSC) had filed suit against the law, claiming it was too broad and violated free speech. Both the FSC, and the pornographers’ trade group, say they are against child pornography, but that they are afraid the law could make legitimate, though distasteful, films and photos produced by pornographers, illegal. FSC Executive Director Bill Lyons claims digitally generated, "virtual" child pornography is—somehow—different than regular photographs of child sex. "There is no child used in the creation of the image; therefore there cannot be child pornography based on the abuse of a child.”

Miriam Moore, of the Family Research Council, strongly disagrees with Lyons' position and argument.

"Even though this may not be pictures of actual children, it's being passed off to pedophiles as pictures and it's used in the cycle of abuse," Moore said. "It becomes integral to drawing more children into this."

Benjamin Bull, an attorney with the religious-liberties legal group Alliance Defense Fund, further argues:

It'll be the downfall of the enforcement of existing child pornography laws (Bull said, pointing out that computer-generated images can be nearly impossible to distinguish from actual photos). A pornographer could always assert in court that the material that he's being prosecuting for distributing isn't actual child pornography, but simply morphed virtual child pornography and there'd be no way for the government to disprove that.

On the other side, Danielle Cisneros, writing in the Duke Law and Technology Review (2002 Duke L & Tech. Rev. 0019, 9/23/2002) concludes her article:

The proposed amendment is so broad that it would encompass much of the entertainment industry. Imagine if all the movies depicting minors in sexually explicit situations were removed from the store shelves. Some very popular movies and works of art would suddenly become illegal contraband. It could happen if Congress passes this proposed amendment. Congress has again failed to narrowly tailor the law but hopefully, for the sake of our freedom of speech, the proposed amendment shall fail as well. The Supreme Court’s decision in Ashcroft v. The Free Speech Coalition indicates that there is a way to tailor the revision of the CPPA without violating the First Amendment. If the government believes that "virtual child" pornography will be used by child abusers to convince their victims to participate in sexual activities, Congress could narrowly tailor a criminal statute to punish such uses of the materials severely without banning the creation and possession of the work. Banning "virtual child" pornography will not effectively protect the nation’s children from perpetrators. It will simply eliminate a victimless alternative that is substantially less repugnant than the abuse of actual children. The proposed constitutional amendment and congressional bills are plagued with the same problem of being overbroad as the CPPA and violate the First Amendment’s protection of the freedom of speech.

Disagreeing with such a position and the Supreme Court’s decision, the conservative National Review Online (www.nationalreview.com) had this to say:

The Court… construed the purpose of the pornography laws too narrowly. The Court comes close to suggesting, that virtual child pornography is a good thing, since it reduces the demand for pornography involving actual children: “Few pornographers would risk prosecution for abusing real children if fictional, computerized images would suffice.” But the harm done by child pornography is not limited to the harm done to children exploited in the course of its production.

There is also the harm done to public morality, and to the many children who will suffer if that morality declines—if people who are attracted to sex with children, and the sexualization of children, are told that the law does not frown on this desire and behavior and that it even tolerates a subculture oriented around this desire. The making of “virtual” pornography inflicts that harm just as much as pornography involving actual children does.

For most of American history, nobody thought that the Constitution enjoined legislatures from enacting laws to protect public morals. Nobody doubted that such laws were legitimate even if they impinged on “free expression” (sex with a prostitute is an expression of lust, but it can be legally proscribed). Today’s Court has a routinized distrust for democratic processes. In this case, it argued that prosecutors and juries would be unable to distinguish between obscenity and Romeo and Juliet. Our own view is that the general public can be trusted to draw the appropriate lines—especially when the alternative is to hope that sexual deviants will themselves respect the line between enjoying depictions of sex against children and actually forcing them on children.

QUESTIONS FOR REFLECTION AND DISCUSSION

1. On which side of the debate are you? Do you think freedom of speech should be protected even when it does social harm? Or, do you believe our laws should protect public health—that the issue of child pornography is a moral public health issue?

2. Are you with the Congress who passed these laws to criminalize the use of child pornography digitally produced, or are you with the Supreme Court in striking down or limiting these laws?

3. What do you think of the arguments above? Do they summarize the debate?

4. Can things a person does alone or with another in secret damage others?

5. Do you think pornography generally damages the health of society, the common good, and the welfare of family, children and young people?

6. Is there a place for this discussion in the family, in schools, in churches and youth groups? How can such discussions best be handled?

IMPLICATIONS

1. The abduction and slaying of children by child rapists is increasing. Sexual addictions can lead to infantilizing of sexual desires. Child sexual abuse in the home is a huge problem. A local truck driver and his girl friend have just been arrested for sending posed pictures of her nude child by picture mobile, so the boyfriend, who has had sexual relations with the child, could masturbate while traveling cross-country.

2. The pornography business is a multi-billion dollar industry world-wide. A good part of that includes child pornography. Children are being seduced with alcohol and pornography; they in turn being exploited by cameras and the Internet.

3. We must discuss and decide whether this is a public health issue or not.

c. CYS

Virtual Sexual Predators

Lewis, Raphael and Tara Yaekel (31 May, 2000). “Virtual Dare, Real Scare: Girl’s Action Highlights Perils of Net” The Boston Globe.

Belkin, Doug and Mac Daniel (14 August, 2001). “Runaway Teenager Lost Way on the Web” The Boston Globe.

Thomas, Karen (9 June, 2000). “Kids Run a 20% risk of ‘Cybersex’ Advances” USA Today.
(Download this review as a PDF)

Overview:

In the New York

Consider these numbers from a 2000 study conducted by the University of New Hampshire and the NationalCenter for Missing and Exploited Children:

· 66% of those reporting a sexual advance while online were female.

· 70% of incidents happened wile the youth was on a home computer.

· 65% occurred wile in a chat room; 24% by instant message.

· 29% told a friend or sibling; 24% told a parent.

· 77% of kids propositioned were 14 or older.

Questions for Reflection and Discussion:

1. Does your child/teenagers you work with participate in online chat forums?

2. Do you have rules in your home about Internet surfing?

3. Is your computer in an open, viewable area?

4. What stresses are currently affecting your child/teens you work with that might encourage them to seek solace in a virtual community?

5. How can parents/counselors have frank conversations with young people about the problem of online sexual solicitation?

Implications:

Christopher S. Yates cCYS

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Healing the incest wound

Courtois, C. (1988). Healing the incest wound. New York: W.W. Norton and Company.

OVERVIEW

This book developed out of the author’s frustration at not finding adequate information to help the many young women who sought help in coping with the after effects of sexual abuse. The author began her professional career working with victims of "stranger" rape. Her experience was that a significant number of the women coming to the rape center where she practiced were not victims of "stranger" rape, but incest at the hands of a family member.

Based on this information, she began a literature search, which uncovered little helpful information. During this same period of time, research was being done on domestic violence and traumatic stress. In cooperation with some of these other researchers, Courtois proposed that the most accurate diagnostic category for incest survivors was "post traumatic stress disorder," the label given to many Vietnam veterans experiencing extreme stress reactions upon returning home.

This book provides readers the information necessary to identify a potential problem and provide assistance when possible. The book is divided into three sections:

Incest characteristics and dynamics. A description of the family systems in which sexual abuse occurs and its development.

Symptoms, aftereffects, and diagnosis. A description of the symptoms and signs that a young woman may have been or is being sexually abused.

Incest therapy. Describes techniques that have been developed for working with survivors and helping them heal.

IMPLICATIONS

The first two sections of this book would be helpful to anyone who is involved in the lives of young women. The information is presented in a readable style that will appeal to the professional psychologist as well as to parents and youth workers. It is imperative that anyone working with youth and their families understand how dysfunction develops within the family system. In addition, youth workers must be able to recognize signs of abuse.
Section three of this book is intended for a professional counselor working with incest victims. Counseling—in any depth—with a survivor of sexual abuse should only be done by professionals.

Sandra Bisson cCYS

Español

Adolescent prostitution

Schaffer, B. & DeBlassie, R.R. (1984, Fall). "Adolescent prostitution." Adolescence, 19.

OVERVIEW

Reviewing previous research, this study explored the conditions that lead teenagers to prostitution and how American institutions and the legal system deal with them.

FINDINGS

CONCLUSIONS

Youth who fail in a traditional setting find reinforcement and support on the streets among peers.
The judicial systems are inadequate for the task of rehabilitation.

IMPLICATIONS

Develop supportive relationships that break the dependency of destructive relationships. Build self-esteem and self-worth through consistent love and caring to counter alienation and rejection in primary relationships. Provide strong, positive role models to aid the development of a positive value system:

Offer outreach in a preventative mode to youth of broken and troubled families.
Offer outreach to juvenile facilities.
Offer outreach in conjunction with parole and probation programs.

Consider reaching to runaways at transportation depots, providing them support before their needs become desperate, and before they are approached by pimps.
Offer individualized tutoring programs to increase the chances for success in school and the working world while building loving, caring relationships.
Provide counseling services to abused youth.

Cora Lombardi and Anne Montague cCYS

Español

Community explores violence from a teenager’s point of view

Smith, T.G. (1994, August). Community explores violence from a teenager’s point of view. Nation’s Cities Weekly, 17(31), 1.

OVERVIEW

Community organizations are taking more of a responsibility to "patch the holes in the support fabric that wraps our children in a safe, healthy environment." The strategy is to provide developmental rings of support for youth through partnership and collaborations with multiethnic service agencies. Through outreach and activities, ties between teen communities of color bring different ethnic groups together. Forums and peace walks have proven to be community activities which attract large numbers of participants. As young people share experiences and mingle with different kids, stereotypes of certain groups are often shattered. Community activities provide young people opportunities to make new friends and learn about different cultures. One young person who had participated in a culturally-rich forum shared, " ‘Wow! This forum is really cool, I wish some of the guys were my sisters and brothers. It’s great how well we get along!…Never before have I seen boundaries within cultural diversity so clurred…’ " During these community events, youth identify key community issues and problems and brainstorm solutions to these concerns. As they unite to solve community problems, their relationships and understandings of each other continue to strengthen.

QUESTIONS FOR REFLECTION AND DISCUSSION

How often does your community attempt to bring diversity into large group events?
What do you think are some of the key issues adolescents in your community face today? How does multiculturalism affect these issues? Are any of these issues related to racial or ethnic tensions? Can any of them be solved through uniting young people from different ethnic groups?
To solve problems, why do teens often turn to their peers before turning to adults?

IMPLICATION

Racism is real. Schools and community organizations need to accept more responsibility to ease the tension of discrimination. Forums, workshops, and other programs can generate more discussion about racism. Creating situations where youth can personally meet friends of different color helps erase damaging stereotypes.

Yvonne Lam cCYS

Español

The truth about domestic violence

McNeely, R. L. & Robinson-Simpson, G. (1988, November/December). "The truth about domestic violence: A falsely framed issue". Social Work.
(Download this review as a PDF)

OVERVIEW

A POPULAR MISCONCEPTION

Read more

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Domestic Violence/Abuse Courses

mehr

Volunteer Opportunities: Domestic Violence/Abuse

Titel	Organization Name	City, State/Country
medical interns	friends of orphans	Malaba Kenia
Pastor-Teacher for Church Planting & ESL	All Nations Christian Academy	Yangpyeong-Eup, Yangpyeong-Gun Südkorea
1-week mission trips		Cincinnati, OH USA
school teacher, community development, nurse	Lifewater community church	AHERO Kenia
teacher assistants	Ashish Centre	Indien
Abortion Recovery Facilitator	Oil of Joy For Mourning	Houston, TX USA
TRAINER/CURRICULUM DEVELOPER	CHAMEG	bolifamba Kamerun
Summer Missionary Team Internship	The City Mission	Cleveland, OH USA
Jesuit Volunteer- Northwest Region	JVC Northwest	Portland, OR USA
COMMUNITY DEVELOPMENT VOLUNTEER	saveorphansug@yahoo.com	kampala Uganda

Titel	Organization Name
Orphan Sponsor Recruters	Project Christ International, Inc.
Fundraiser Chief	ACTS 1:8 MINISTRY - KENYA
Widow Sponsor Recruters	Project Christ International, Inc.
Non-Profit Board Member	Wandering Souls
Train as a Christian Life Coach	New Life Coach Inc
Her Journey Leadership	Abuse Recovery Ministry & Services
Prayer Partner	Health Resources LifeCare Center
Artis ,decorators(chicago residents needed)	New Life Coach Inc
IT Consultant	QIQ Technologies Corp
Ministry Administrative Assistant	DDH Ministries

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Faith Content

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Videos: Domestic Violence/Abuse


	child abuse
	Stop Child Abuse
	PROTECTING CHILDHOOD: Children's campaigner speaks out.
	PMM on Institutional Child Abuse Bill 2009
	Family Violence 'It's not OK!' First TV Ad


	Troy Shaw: Interview with "Why Husbands Kill Their Wives" Author: Focus on Diversity 2007 Video
	Family Violence 'It's not OK!' First TV Ad
	child abuse
	PROTECTING CHILDHOOD: Children's campaigner speaks out.
	PMM on Institutional Child Abuse Bill 2009

Domestic Violence/Abuse Resources

Articles, Blogs, and News

A Personal History of Violence

Cognitive-behavioral interventions aimed at anger of parents at risk of child abuse

Virtual Sexual Predators

The Concept of Abused Children now a Reality

Adolescent prostitution

Child abuse and neglect decline in USA

The truth about domestic violence

McNeely, R. L. & Robinson-Simpson, G. (1988, November/December). "The truth about domestic violence: A falsely framed issue". Social Work.
(Download this review as a PDF)

OVERVIEW

Abuse rate highest for ethnic boys

MISSING CHILDREN RESOURCES

Injuries to children younger than one year of age

Cradle-to-grave intimacy: Some researchers openly argue that ‘everything goes’ for children

Warnings can point to abuse

Counseling adult women who experienced incest in childhood or adolescence

When can a child be left home alone?

The Virtual Child Porn Debate

Virtual Sexual Predators

Healing the incest wound

Adolescent prostitution

Community explores violence from a teenager’s point of view

The truth about domestic violence

McNeely, R. L. & Robinson-Simpson, G. (1988, November/December). "The truth about domestic violence: A falsely framed issue". Social Work.
(Download this review as a PDF)

OVERVIEW

Domestic Violence/Abuse Courses

Volunteer Opportunities: Domestic Violence/Abuse

Videos: Domestic Violence/Abuse

Audio: Domestic Violence/Abuse

Books: Domestic Violence/Abuse


Postal Code

Domestic Violence/Abuse Resources

Articles, Blogs, and News

McNeely, R. L. & Robinson-Simpson, G. (1988, November/December). "The truth about domestic violence: A falsely framed issue". Social Work.(Download this review as a PDF)

OVERVIEW

McNeely, R. L. & Robinson-Simpson, G. (1988, November/December). "The truth about domestic violence: A falsely framed issue". Social Work.(Download this review as a PDF)

OVERVIEW

Domestic Violence/Abuse Courses

Volunteer Opportunities: Domestic Violence/Abuse

Videos: Domestic Violence/Abuse

Audio: Domestic Violence/Abuse

Books: Domestic Violence/Abuse

McNeely, R. L. & Robinson-Simpson, G. (1988, November/December). "The truth about domestic violence: A falsely framed issue". Social Work.
(Download this review as a PDF)

McNeely, R. L. & Robinson-Simpson, G. (1988, November/December). "The truth about domestic violence: A falsely framed issue". Social Work.
(Download this review as a PDF)