Ibrahim Muhammad Badawood

Al Madina

 

Children are a blessing. Some families, however, do not appreciate this blessing. Instead of treating their children with kindness and attending to their needs, they subject them to all forms of harm and abuse. Last year, 340 domestic violence cases against children were registered.



Child protection regulations list 14 forms of abuse that children are subjected to at the hands of none other than their own families.



Among the list is the failure of a family to register their children with the relevant authorities and to get proper ID documents for them.



Some families destroy their children’s IDs and other important documents or simply lose them and never care about getting duplicates.



Some parents never follow their children’s vaccination schedules, something that leaves youngsters open to the risk of catching various diseases.



Some children are never enrolled in school and some grow up in bad environments where they end up as victims of sexual abuse or as beggars or even criminals.



Violence against children includes verbal abuse, humiliation or exposing them to sexually explicit or violent content. Any form of discrimination against children based on their social or economic status or color is considered a form of racism.



Letting your underage son drive a car and jeopardizing his safety and that of others is a form of abuse. Unfortunately, all forms of abuse mentioned above can be found in our society.



Families seem to care about having children but not about raising them and protecting them from social evils.



The authorities should deal sternly with these families because boys and girls raised in this way will end up becoming criminals or terrorists.