Social Issue Reading Response

     For this homework assignment, I read two articles on child abuse. I didn't know how big of an issue child abuse was until I read these two articles. I mean I knew that child issue was a big problem, but I didn't seem to grasp how horrible child abuse was until I read these two articles. Reading these two articles makes me feel  sick to my stomach that there are such parents out there. It's appalling and abhorrent to know that some parents think that abuse is the solution to a problem. When in reality, abuse makes children anti-social, afraid, and neglected.
     Both articles I read were very informative on the topic of child abuse. How Best to Protect Children? by Ilana Sherer was about a 17 soon to be 18 year old teenage who had been badly abused by her father. All pediatricians are mandated by law to report any concern or child abuse. This teenage had been seeing this Sherer for awhile and Sherer finally noticed that the teenage had been abused at home so she filed a child abuse report to the Child Protective Services. Now, for me, what I found most interesting is that this teenage begged Sherer to write a report on the abuse that she had been going through at home. She was ready to go to college, but when she, the teenager, found out that it would affect her college education, she quickly told Sherer that she lied about everything. For me, if I was put in this situation, I could see how it would be hard for her (the teenager) to go through this. Even though Sherer had already filed the case, she still begged her to tell them that she lied because she wanted to go to college. I'm not sure whether or not she did this to protect her father as well, but either way, she made this decision so that she could go to college.
     The second article I read was Sanctuary for Abused Kids by John M, Gilonna. This article was also about child abuse except the statics and article was mainly based in South Korea. It was about a 7 year old who arrived at a group called the Open Center Youth Foundation. She had been all battered up from the daily beatings that she got from her parents. In the article, it explained how this abuse effected her and her actions. Although people know that South Korea has a high rate of physical abuse of children, not many people care to pay attention to this problem. It is a shame that people don't do anything about it even though they know its a big problem.
     Ever since I read the memoir, A Child Called It  by Dave Pelzer, it has made me wonder more and more about the causes of child abuse. I can now see on some levels why child abuse gets so bad and extreme. It honestly breaks my heart to know that someone my age, younger or older, has to go through all this constant pain. Why must some grown ups do this to their children? Why isn't there an even stricter law for these beatings? Why isn't this paid as much attention to? I feel beyond grateful that I have parents who believe in giving lectures over abuse. I can't imagine how much pain abused children go through.


The two articles I read were about child abuse. They can be found here:

• http://sks.sirs.com/cgi-bin/hst-article-display?id=S44-4241-0-4830&artno=0000317641&type=ART&shfilter=U&key=Child%20abuse%2C%20Law%20and%20legislation&title=How%20Best%20to%20Protect%20Children%3F&res=Y&ren=N&gov=N&lnk=N&ic=N
• http://sks.sirs.com/cgi-bin/hst-article-display?id=S44-4241-0-8565&artno=0000318500&type=ART&shfilter=U&key=Sanctuary%20for%20abused%20kids&title=Sanctuary%20for%20Abused%20Kids&res=Y&ren=N&gov=N&lnk=N&ic=N