Child Abuse and Maltreatment: Inverted Priorities and Warped Values

We have our priorities all wrong, nationally and globally. The attack on entitlements for women and children, and the attempts to restore the institution of adult male "ownership" of, and dominion over these groups through a perverse and narrow definition of "family values," has resulted in a generalized devaluing of the rights of children. Groups of people who are denied basic individual rights have been transformed from human beings into objects, and children rank foremost among these groups. As our statist and corporatist masters gradually reduce us all to children with the erosion of our basic rights as adults (see Nanny State, by David Harsanyi), the plight of children becomes the plight of adults too. All too often, the loss of adult power and control through political and economic hardships and coercions, results in the attempts of parents to define their own power through psychological, emotional, and all too often physical abuse of their own children.

Even as a libertarian, I still disagree with cutting government spending on women and children; there are many other expenses such as war, and enforcement of useless and harmful laws where funding could be drastically reduced, or eliminated entirely, to the benefit of all (except for the profiteers whose livelihoods depend on these things). I'm all for cutting paperwork, and firing useless bureaucrats and incompetent and apathetic social workers; indeed, many of the more outrageous cases of child abuse resulting in injury or death can be directly attributed to social service agencies dropping the ball. But when budgets for food, housing and medical care for single mothers and working to middle-class families are cut, people get hurt, and people die. Too often these people are children.

The four major forms of child abuse/maltreatment are

1. Physical abuse: The intentional infliction of pain and injury on a child through physical violence.

2. Emotional abuse: The use of continuous verbal criticism and attacks and/or the withholding of affection.