Bad Parenting & Child Abuse: Let's Make a Deal

Between our gubernatorial scandal, the crane collapse, the Sean Bell shooting, and the demise of Bear Stearns, there is a lot of bad news filling the local headlines here in New York.

However, for some reason, I find myself obsessed with the tragic story of young Nixzmary Brown, the 7-year-old Brooklyn girl who was systematically starved, abused, tortured, and beaten to death at the hands of her own parents. Every article I read about her has me in tears.

According to her own father's confession, both parents hit Nixzmary repeatedly with a belt, dunked her head in cold water, and used duct tape and bungee cords to tie her to a chair. A litter box was her toilet. The young girl was completely emaciated and, at her death, weighed 37 pounds (roughly the weight of a child half her age.)

The fact that a parent can inflict such pain on their own child is beyond my realm of understanding.

The scary thing is that one need only watch the local news anywhere in the world to hear these horrible tales of abuse. Nationwide, the trend has gotten so bad that there are websites solely devoted to documenting cases of child abuse.

I don't know about you guys but there seems to be a shocking rise in the incidence of child abuse on this planet and I think it augers for the end of the world.  

Look, to a certain extent, I understand man's inhumanity against their fellow man. I don't believe we'll ever see a world without war or conflict. At a purely macro level, human beings are violent creatures intent on seeking conflict with others.

At the individual level, I also get the fact that occasionally people are going to brush up against another individual and hey, their life must end. That doesn't make it acceptable but, at some level, I think we all understand that transaction. As Dennis Miller once said, we're all big boys and girls and we dig our own graves.

But when did we start taking it out on innocent children?

How about we all join in making a little pact with one another?

You've got to promise me that if you ever get to the point in your life where you are so puzzled, confused, and frightened that you feel that the only way out is to abuse or molest a little kid, well then, you have got to fucking kill yourself. You've got to bite the bullet and take one for the team.

Do we have a deal?

Because honestly I can't think of anything worse in the world. What compels a person to take out their anger on a mere child? And how can people do that to their own children?

I get the fact that raising a kid is damn hard work and can often be an exercise in futility. I've frequently thought that parenting is the greatest test of man's patience since Job.

There are times when I've spent an hour cooking my daughter her favorite dinner and she's tossed it onto the floor in a rage of fury. I've walked into her room to see that she's painted the walls with poop. We've gotten into more fights about bedtime than I thought were even possible. She seems to have her most extreme meltdowns at the most inopportune times imaginable. And don't even get me started on how many books of mine have been destroyed because the Peanut ripped out the pages, stuck them in her mouth, and said to me, "Look, Daddy! I'm chewing gum!"

But see, that's where the true test of parenting begins.

When you can stand on the brink of chaos, teeter on the verge of insanity, want to throw yourself off a building and still look at your kid and say, "God damn, I'd do anything in the world for that little munchkin"...then you're ready to be a parent.

Almost.

Run out and get yourself a copy of "Finding Nemo." Watch it 50 times. Pour some milk on your favorite shirt. Now deprive yourself of sleep for about a year.

Ok, now maybe you're ready.

Comments

[Jo]

Oh, god, don't kid yourself this hasn't always happened. Seriously, it just didn't used to be news. Ireland has a horrible history of Industrials Schools getting away with beatings, abuse and murder, you've read about the priests and nuns... and that's recent history. It's only lately we've started understanding psychology, self esteem.... there's nothing new about taking it out on thhose who can't fight back, who remind us unconsciously of our inner selves, we repeat the patterns we experienced.

You might be right about the suicide pact. But that would leave its own scars too.

I have to fight not to think about the children who are being abused this second, right now, the dark rooms all over the world - it feels like a madness of desperate grief and fear would overtake me if I did - I don't know how you read the stuff, I had to close my eyes and skip the paragraph with your description. I'm a wimp.

I wish I had some answers - people are badly designed, too much capacity for damage.

[Whit]

I hadn't heard that story. Sadly, it's come to that. It is so common that it doesn't even make the news in another state.

Sad stuff.

[Mitch McDad]

I hadn't heard that story either. it's fucking repulsive.

Great post.

And I'd take milk on my favorite shirt vs. the puke it took a few months ago.

[creative-type dad]

I seriously feel like throwing up.
How can somebody do that to a child...

[Navi]

It's not actually 'so common it doesn't make the news in another state.' The media decides what news to show based on what will make it more money... That's why you can find two almost identical cases but for one or two differences, one won't be news, but the other will. My sister's been telling me horrors she's heard out of Chicago for the last 10 years. None of it makes the news here in MI.

I agree it's been happening all along. However, there was a time when people weren't prosecuted for abusing their children. because children were seen as property. There was and in places still is a time/place where people were punished more severely for abusing an animal than their own child.

That said, for those that say that mental illness/substance abuse isn't an explanation (it's never an excuse), they obviously either haven't dealt with it, and if they're in a profession that deals with it they really should get out of it, because they aren't helping. I've seen mental health issues in those I love. It's pretty damn scary untreated. A 'chemical imbalance' can turn the most loving person into a monster. So, if you know someone with even the slightest signs of depression or mental illness, don't tell them to get over it. Encourage them to get help. Be their friend. Don't look down on them for it. If the stigma is removed, that's one less reason for someone who needs help to get help.

For the people who don't understand how the jury could rule manslaughter? the jury did its job. You're not supposed to put emotions into our justice system. If you do, it fails. Yes, I'd prefer they were convicted of murder, but I'm not going to put down the jurors because they weren't.

And I'm glad of the people that posted details of the story, that the family's been investigated multiple times. It's not just the parents that failed this child, it's the system. The parents apparently should have been prosecuted long before this child died. They should have been in bars, or in an institution earlier. Because, unfortunately, there will always be monsters like these parents. Our system needs to be fixed. I've no idea how to fix it, but it needs repair. It's under funded, and under staffed.

er, I ment "if the stigma is removed that's one less reason for someone who needs help not to get help..."

[whoorl]

"When you can stand on the brink of chaos, teeter on the verge of insanity, want to throw yourself off a building and still look at your kid and say, "God damn, I'd do anything in the world for that little munchkin"...then you're ready to be a parent."

True that, true that. Great post.

[Ka_Jun]

I don't know why this happens...it's horrible and there are no words to describe the unspeakable.

[Waya]

We watched "Super Nanny" last week and man, there are bad parents out there. I mean, we're not exactly the best parents sometimes, but boy...there are families out there who should not have kids.

I commented to the hubbie that some religions require the couple to go through classes before getting hitched. Well, they should have a class for parents-to-be, go through extreme "what ifs" before having kids.

It sickens me to hear of nanny holding babies by the collar like a pet and throwing him/her around. Or a boyfriend biting an ear off of a child while the stupid mother is "afraid of her life and what he might do if she intervenes!". Or another boyfriend burning a little boy's private part with a cigarette. I hope these monsters get the same treatments in jail!! It reminds me of the line from "Pulp Fiction": ""What now? Let me tell you what now. I'ma call a coupla hard, pipe-hittin' niggers, who'll go to work on the homes here with a pair of pliers and a blow torch. You hear me talkin', hillbilly boy? I ain't through with you by a damn sight. I'ma get medieval on your ass."

[Holmes]

Christ, I hadn't heard about this. Of course, we have plenty of these stories pop around my neck of the woods as well. The best that can be attributed to such grisly cases is mental illness on the part of the parents. The one bit of hope I hold onto in the face of shit like this is that at least we've come to the point where we recognize things like this as an atrocity. Time was, decades and centuries ago, that children were regularly treated as subhumans, free to be abused, enslaved, and killed. Still, that's cold comfort for those like this little girl. Goddamn.

[Dootz]

One of the oddest sensations is when you have had a horrendous day with the kids - the kind of day when your 4-year-old throws a rolling-on-the-ground tantrum in Zabar's bakery and has all 40 customer heads turned your way and tsk-ing at you - and that night you look down at your three sons' cherubic faces as they sleep and you can't remember the bad parts of the day at all. It's like it all gets wiped away each night. A daily tabula rasa.

[Jeremy Neal]

Just wanted to let you know that I thought this was one of the best posts I read in March. Gave you a plug on my monthly round-up at Discovering Dad. -Jeremy

[Chuck]

I'm in.

This topic comes up more than I care for it to just within our own household as we watch the evening news, or rather listen to it while tending to the kids. The heartbroken feeling for these kids and the hate for the abuser comes fast and furious. I don't understand it. Never will. Never, never will.

[Mike]

Great post! Great site! I'll be back!

My friends Smith & Wesson and I are more willing to help any child molester or abuser out if they have problems planning their own demise.

I wrote a similar post a little while back

[ka_jun]

http://www.cnn.com/2008/HEALTH/04/03/infant.neglect.ap/index.html

http://www.cnn.com/2008/CRIME/04/03/sunny.nannycam/index.html?iref=mpstoryview

1 in 50...man...

[CJsmamaLeah]

The Nixzmary case really has me thinking lately too. In one picture of Nixzmary, she's dressed up for Halloween in a Power Ranger costume. My son was the same Power Ranger this year. When I see that picture, I can't help but cry. When my son is at his most obnoxious, I still couldn't imagine causing him any pain, physical OR emotional. I don't know what comes over these "parents" who hurt their children. Children should never live in fear of the people who should be their protectors.