Complex causes of abuse

Many of us can't understand why people hurt kids - we think abusers are just low-lives who must be punished. Certainly, the personalities of a small number of people may predispose them to do nasty things to children, though that's often because of what happened to them as kids.

These individuals need to be identified and, where possible, helped. But, above all, children need to be protected from abuse.

Harmful parenting, including raising children in violent homes, may increase the likelihood that children will grow up to abuse their children. Even very young children are affected by witnessing violence in their homes. In some cases, they repeat as adults the abusive behaviour they have seen and experienced.

But it's more complex than that: abuse and neglect of children and young people happens in wealthy families and communities, but it's more likely to happen where there is poverty, poor housing and unemployment.

One of the reasons that we have higher percentages of Maori and Pacific Island children in our child abuse statistics is that significant numbers of Maori and Pacific Island families are poor. As Child Youth and Family stated in its submission to the ministerial inquiry:

"Approximately 45 per cent of the children and young people we deal with are Maori. It is unlikely that this will change quickly. We are primarily a provider of statutory remedial services that are accessed by families at risk when they have fallen through the gaps in the universal services, such as education, health, housing and employment provided by other sectors."

But it is not just poverty.

There's a strong view that to change our childrearing practices we need to change the view that children are the property of their biological parents.

Human beings evolved not as individuals, but as communities. The smallest functional unit of humankind is not the individual but the clan. No individual, no single parent, no nuclear family could survive alone. We survived and evolved as clans - interdependent socially, emotionally and biologically. We need to recognise that children belong to the community; they are simply entrusted to parents.

The media promote violence as an effective way of dealing with conflict through television, films, videos and interactive video games.

At the same time, children are too frequently exposed to violence in their homes. They are frequently undervalued and seen as the property of their parents.

So poverty, exposure to violence and poor attitudes to children combine potently to lay negative foundations that sow the seeds of child abuse and neglect.

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Building Tomorrow - paths to prevent child abuse