It was around those very first times I went up to my teacher to tell her what kind of things my classmates were putting me through on a daily basis that I remember her giving me the ultimate solution to every one of my problems.
"You need to stand up for yourself more."
It always struck me as an odd piece of advice, especially when it was coming from a trusted adult who was supposed to be there to help me do just that – to stand tall and fend for myself. Because the thing that gets overlooked so very often in this conversation is the fact that children should NEVER have to be the ones to keep themselves safe from abuse and violence.
"But kids need to learn the way the real world works–"
No. No, they don't. They will learn that well enough when they've grown up into adults. If you try to justify any sort of child abuse with this rhetoric – that the world is a cruel and unjust place and kids need to learn that sooner or later – I am begging you to stay away from children. Please. Because as much as you might think that experiencing traumatic events in your childhood prepares you for the real horrors of the world, you are so very wrong about that. A Kid's brain is not developed enough to "learn" anything from ABUSE – and a lot of the times, neither is an adult's brain either! And why might that be?
Because abuse is NOT a normal part of life.
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| resilience. |
Kids should not have to be resilient. Kids should not have to stand up for themselves. Every single Kid out there deserves to have a good, safe and protected childhood where they are taken care of, nurtured and loved, with no threats of violence or abuse – from no one. Parents, other family members, hobby coaches, teachers, peers... No one.
But I did just that, though; stand up for myself. I was as resilient as I could be as a little Kid. I did everything I could in order to protect myself, to make the abuse stop, and in the end, to withstand it and just be okay with it. Most of the time, I didn't even give them a reaction; I just stood there, listening, witnessing it all happen.
And none of that resilience stopped me from being traumatized.
With care,
ichigonya
You're absolutely right, no kid should ever have to fight for themselves like that. It's the adults job to fight for them, a kid shouldn't have to learn about the cruelty of the world until they're an adult, and it's disgusting that people justify abuse by saying that shit. Adults shouldn't be abused either, do how about no one accept or get used to abuse because it's never okay!
ReplyDeleteEXACTLY!! abuse is and will never be a normal part of the human experience, we desperately need to get rid of that mindset!
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