MARKING THE UNITED NATIONS CHILDREN’S DAY 27/05/2024

One of my old university course mates threw up a story on our WhatsApp platform this morning stating that a child took a piece of meat from the mom’s pot of soup and was caught and punished. When the dad returned, the mom told him what the boy did and the dad punished him again for the misdeed. Being not satisfied, the mom refused giving the boy food that night to further punished. In the morning, the boy was given food, his school bag packed as usual and he was happy to go to school. Unfortunately, the mom narrated the behavior to the class teacher who further punished him in front of the class leading to much stigma from the child’s classmates.

After reading the piece as summarized above, I threw up a challenge to my course mates stating the following;

“Truthfully, this child will develop a warped personality, and may not be open due to fear of exposure and possible backlash. This, of course, will lead to myriads of physical and psychological health problems both at the present and in the future. Please tell us the limits of punishment and what could be done to help this child given the stigma he currently faces at school”. Make your responses to help children all over the world and to mark the UN Children’s Day. Below is the summary from the inputs from some of my course mates.

“The child will require urgent counselling therapy by a professional therapist. Both parents have inflicted unspoken wounds to his inner person. Agreed he took a piece of meat without authorization for which he was punished at home and which he also accepted as appropriate but the public exposure and shaming in front of the class is what the young mind cannot understand or explain. Yes, the father tried to be nice to him when he returned home but did not know that his wife escalated the issue in school when she told the child’s teacher. So, whatever the father did at home did not take away the stigma, the shame and the depression at the thought of going to school.

WHAT SHOULD BE DONE?

1. Parents should discuss limits of punishment and respect it when a spouse gives it out and never duplicate it, no matter how mild.
2. A child should be well informed why he is punished so he does not misunderstand it to mean that the parents wicked and mean to him.
3. Parents must NEVER use starvation as a means of punishing a child.
4. A professional therapist should be provided for needful therapy and to help reframe the child’s mind. He must be helped to get out of anger, bitterness and depression which could affect his education. Following the therapist’s diagnosis, the therapist should adopt the following counselling techniques among others (a) Reframing, (b) Cognitive therapy and (c) Forgiveness techniques among others.
5. The child must be put into a new school immediately to remove him from the traumatic/retraumatizing environment. This will also help restore his personal dignity.
6. He must be introduced to a Social Group that is accepting and whose activities helps to reframe the child’s mind for needful healing.
7. Intentional effort must be made to help the child form new set of friends with positive attitude.
8. Furthermore, intentional effort should be made to introduce him to the love of God. Using appropriate Biblical scriptures will help build his faith and restore his confidence in God and ultimately to trusting his parents and teachers again.
9. For the parents, they must (a) own up that they have hurt their child, (b) tell their child so, (c) they must apologize to their child that they are sorry for putting him through shame, (d) ask their child for forgiveness.
10. The class teacher should also apologize and ask for forgiveness from the child for abuse and for unprofessional treatment – public shaming.

In many climes, a Childs Rights Organization could institution a law suit against the parents and the teacher. Remember that the law provides and affirms the rights of all citizens to the dignity of their person hence, if the parents or the teacher feels otherwise, not to apologize and remediate for their dehumanizing actions against the child, a Childs Rights Organization could take them up to face the law. The “Childs Rights Act” or “Domestic Violence Act” if one is in Lagos State can be activated in this regard. Let’s protect the Rights, Health and Dignity of all children around the world.

HAPPY CHILDREN’S DAY TO ALL OUR CHILDREN.