Why do parents abuse their children?

[thenamingofcats]

Trying to make sense of it. Of course I would prefer more thoughtful/philosophical answers but "BECAUSE THEY SUCK AZZ" is obviously totally acceptable as well.

 

[moshimoshi]

They may lack empathy and need an outlet for their anger, or they grew up being abused as well and never broke the cycle. Or maybe they abused their children once and felt really guilty afterwards, but then ended up doing it again and again and the guilt diminished eventually. Maybe they also think what they're doing isn't bad, and it will toughen their kid up or some bullshit like that. They also may not always realize what they're doing is abuse, depending on the situation, and can't see clearly how much they're hurting their child. Abusive parents make my stomach turn so much, they're disgusting. If only they could feel all of the insurmountable pain their children experience, both during the abuse and the after effects from it that last a lifetime

 

[Pluto]

The biggest impulse people have by far is to reproduce the environment of their own childhood.

Reasons for this may vary. One theory is that it's a survival instinct; if it is a known quantity and did not result in death previously, it must be safe. Alternatively, it could be so familiar that the brain has fully adapted to it, such that anything different feels uncomfortable.

There are other factors. Stress, of which parenthood delivers plenty, can reach breaking point. Factors that contribute to stress - finances, sleep deprivation, workplace challenges, domestic disagreements and community support - can accumulate.

Then there's mental illness. For example, people with bipolar can completely lose all control of their behaviour at times. Afterwards comes the guilt and attempted overcompensation. It is torturous for all concerned and is not really a choice. And in my experience, Dark Triad people will almost always be abusive, it's just a question of degree and type.

On top of that, the word 'abuse' can mean different things to different people. In the time of my grandparents, corporal punishment was the norm. Today, it is considered normal to sit children in front of iPads for 15 hours a day and let addictive content creators molest their minds. Likewise the normalisation of obesity. And many other issues that shift over time.

 

[EvisceratedJester]

Some things that are important to note is that:

1. Child abuse is very normalized in most parts of the world.

2. People tend to have a very black and white manner of thinking when it comes to people being good or bad.

3. A lot of abusive parents were also abused when they were younger and/or have had some sort of other past trauma/traumas that weren't sorted out.

And finally,

4. Children are a very dehumanized demographic .


Why parents abuse their children is a very complex topic and the answers may vary, but these four things do help us better get to the bottom of it.

Different forms of child abuse are very normalized in different parts of the world, with a lot of them being considered forms of "discipline" or just normal parts of being a parent. Corporal punishment and different forms of verbal and emotional abuse are the most normalized. This is can be a result of various reasons, such as religion (for example, many Christians misinterpret the "spare the rod" quote to mean corporal punishment when it actually refers to guiding one's child) and generational trauma (the whipping practices from back during slavery are part of why whipping is so normalized within a lot of African American households). To make matters worse, even children can grow to rationalize this behaviour against them due to it being everywhere. This can lead to children repressing their feelings and growing up to do the same thing to their own kids.

People also tend to categorize others as either good or bad, making it hard for people to recognize when they themselves are the one in the wrong and encouraging the rationalization of bad actions. If I think of myself as a good person then I'll have a harder time recognizing my wrongdoings or I may end up rationalizing them because otherwise I'll be the "bad guy". If I see myself as a bad person, then there is no point in trying to do better because this is all I'll ever be. This results in people having a harder time reflecting on their actions and leads to little growth overtime. This also leads to many abusive parents continuing on with their abusive behaviour due to them being unable to get to a place where they are able to recognize the horrors of their actions and work to better themselves. Instead, they just rationalize them.

A lot of abusive parents where also abused or traumatized in other ways when they were younger, leading to them inflicting said abuse onto their children. This can be observed in many different ways, from parents beating their kids because their parents beat them growing up and that's the only way they know how to discipline them to parents who lash out or act in a reckless manner towards their children due to poor emotional control. Abuse is usually a cycle and most abusive parents were victims themselves.

Children are also a very dehumanized demographic, being as property or things by most parents rather than as people. Children are an easy demographic to disrespect because of this. This is why you can't hit an adult without getting in trouble but you can hit a child and no one would care. Children are subjected to all sorts of maltreatment because they aren't recognized as individuals with their own feelings and opinions. They are seen as cute objects instead. This dehumanization makes children an easy target for abuse. Along with that, it keeps parents from looking into better parenting techniques or from being more empathetic toward their child. They are easy to abuse without feeling guilty about it because you aren't harming a small human being, you are just vandalizing property.

 

[Socrates Respecter]

Mostly out of their own ignorance. And sometimes out of both ignorance and malice.

 

[AdamOndiAhman]

my father beat me as a child and teenager. he made me stick out my hand and would hit it with either a bamboo stick or the hardest slipper we had that he kept specifically for beating me. if i didnt hold out my hand he would sit on top of me and beat my feet instead. he would beat them till he felt i received my punishment for not doing what he wanted me to do. (hes religious, muslim to be exact). i feel that he was only doing what was right in his mind. i never received anything from him to make up for those beatings. my mother couldnt do anything either (she died of brain cancer when i was 14). he would beat me when i didnt obey the religious commandments he expected me to fulfil. he even sent me away to some islamic schools where i got brainwashed and beat aswell. bear in mind that im an autistic dyspraxic. im just totally broken and ctb is my only way out of this hell that my life is. im so traumatised by nearly everything ive experienced so far that the thought ctb is the only relief i have to relieve me of this emotional hell im in. i cant be helped. im too far gone for help. i just want to not anymore be conscious in this body.
so in fine, using my own experience, i can understand that my father was only doing what he felt was right to him and for me.

 

[AprilsOrangeSpring]

At least where I live, it's widely considered acceptable and a "normal response" to any misbehaviour. Which is the stupidest thing I've ever heard.

I know multiple people who will say "They do it because they care about you/ anger is a normal response to disrespect/ It's just instinct" and in the same breath criticise children for being "unruly" and "angry" when they have a violent reaction to "disrespect".

In my opinion, it's just easier for them. They don't want to put in the effort to learn how to properly raise and discipline and care for a child. So they just abuse, gaslight, and then pretend everything is alright. Easy peasy for them. Then when their children grow up and they have to face the consequences of their abuse, they get to play victim, and all the other horrible parents will rush to comfort them.

 

[Meteora]

Because they have been abused, too, because the are narcissists, sociopaths or worse, because they can, because they re unreflected, not empathetic, because they don't give a damn... because they think their children are their possession, after all, they made them.... and stupidity is also high up on the list.
Plus a thousand more reasons.

Sorry, not very intellectual.

 

[1MiserableGuy]

All forms of trauma infliction are learned behaviors, they don't come out of a vacuum. Why it's critically important for victims to immediately seek help before they start repeating the same unacceptable behaviors.

That being said, our new definitions of "abuse" are so blurred and disingenuous it's unbelievable. If you spank a deliberately disobedient child that's now called abuse, but throwing them into a school where they're brainwashed into madness is somehow not considered abuse when both the clique wars and "education" in schools have negative impacts on children for the entire rest of their lives. I'll sooner go to jail than let my child be enrolled in a school.

Time out too. Time out is just jail for kids. No one learns shit from either one.

 

[Alltheywanted]

They are sadists who are scared to abuse anybody else than children.

 

[fleetingnight]

Stupidity. As a representative of the stupid community, it's not an excuse. Don't have a kid if you don't know how to raise one, or you're not mentally and emotionally ready to. (Maybe don't in general. This planet sucks.)

 

[Pluto]

It seems that a distinction needs to be drawn between cultural ideas, like corporal punishment, that more enlightened societies view as abuse, and the phenomena associated with Dark Triad parenting.

On the latter topic, I went down a morbid rabbit hole last night, starting with a case of a massive cancer scam orchestrated by a mother that occurred in Britain. That led to reading about the most heinous reported cases of Factitious Disorder imposed on another, a.k.a. Munchausen syndrome by proxy. The motivation for such parents harming their children tends to be the craving of attention and sympathy from the community.

Two extreme cases:
Marie Noe of Pennsylvania. Of her 10 children, all died by the age of 14 months. After her sixth child had died, she had a sympathetic article written about her tragic story in a magazine. Decades later, however, a reinvestigation occurred and she confessed to eight counts of second-degree murder (the other two died naturally) and was sentenced to 20 years of probation. Noe had suffocated the children, then claimed SIDS as the cause of death.

Marybeth Tinning of New York was sentenced to 20 years prison for killing her 9th child, also by smothering. The previous 8 'accidents' had been dismissed as genetic, despite one of the deceased being an adopted child. Several parole attempts failed due to her lack of genuine remorse, though she was finally released in 2018, having served 31 years.

My take on this: my parents did at one point make themselves the centre of attention while covering up their abuse with the false narrative that I was born with a psychological disability, hence my failure to function as an adult. The number 1 theme for this abuse is that the parent only cares about the parent and shamelessly acts on their dark impulses. Nfather gained sadistic pleasure from seeing me suffering, and enjoyed the challenge of covering up the abuse, knowing he had the perfect cover as the 'concerned father.' Decades later, I'm still battling to function, plus ageing, and he's still enjoying the drama, and will no doubt make himself the centre of attention when I die. I realised at last to just accept that he's won.

 

[EvisceratedJester]

Some things that are important to note is that:

1. Child abuse is very normalized in most parts of the world.

2. People tend to have a very black and white manner of thinking when it comes to people being good or bad.

3. A lot of abusive parents were also abused when they were younger and/or have had some sort of other past trauma/traumas that weren't sorted out.

And finally,

4. Children are a very dehumanized demographic .


Why parents abuse their children is a very complex topic and the answers may vary, but these four things do help us better get to the bottom of it.

Different forms of child abuse are very normalized in different parts of the world, with a lot of them being considered forms of "discipline" or just normal parts of being a parent. Corporal punishment and different forms of verbal and emotional abuse are the most normalized. This is can be a result of various reasons, such as religion (for example, many Christians misinterpret the "spare the rod" quote to mean corporal punishment when it actually refers to guiding one's child) and generational trauma (the whipping practices from back during slavery are part of why whipping is so normalized within a lot of African American households). To make matters worse, even children can grow to rationalize this behaviour against them due to it being everywhere. This can lead to children repressing their feelings and growing up to do the same thing to their own kids.

People also tend to categorize others as either good or bad, making it hard for people to recognize when they themselves are the one in the wrong and encouraging the rationalization of bad actions. If I think of myself as a good person then I'll have a harder time recognizing my wrongdoings or I may end up rationalizing them because otherwise I'll be the "bad guy". If I see myself as a bad person, then there is no point in trying to do better because this is all I'll ever be. This results in people having a harder time reflecting on their actions and leads to little growth overtime. This also leads to many abusive parents continuing on with their abusive behaviour due to them being unable to get to a place where they are able to recognize the horrors of their actions and work to better themselves. Instead, they just rationalize them.

A lot of abusive parents where also abused or traumatized in other ways when they were younger, leading to them inflicting said abuse onto their children. This can be observed in many different ways, from parents beating their kids because their parents beat them growing up and that's the only way they know how to discipline them to parents who lash out or act in a reckless manner towards their children due to poor emotional control. Abuse is usually a cycle and most abusive parents were victims themselves.

Children are also a very dehumanized demographic, being as property or things by most parents rather than as people. Children are an easy demographic to disrespect because of this. This is why you can't hit an adult without getting in trouble but you can hit a child and no one would care. Children are subjected to all sorts of maltreatment because they aren't recognized as individuals with their own feelings and opinions. They are seen as cute objects instead. This dehumanization makes children an easy target for abuse. Along with that, it keeps parents from looking into better parenting techniques or from being more empathetic toward their child. They are easy to abuse without feeling guilty about it because you aren't harming a small human being, you are just vandalizing property.

Something that I just realized that could be added to this is power and dominance. This doesn't even just impact parental abuse, but it goes into cases of abuse, mistreatment, rape and SA, and bullying.

Parents are treated as figures of authority, with fathers and sometimes mothers (depending on how the family is structured) being viewed as the ones on top of the hierarchy. This is then followed by the eldest sibling, the middle child, and then the youngest child. If you include grandparents or any other adult family memeber into the mix, then they would rank above the children. The parents generally hold the most power within the family dynamic, which can lead to issues since social hierarchical structures could be argued to encourage abuse. We already see this in school-age children, where pupils belonging to a school community with strong social hierarchical structures in place. Students who rank higher socially usually end up bullying those who rank lower as a way of establishing dominance and making sure that they keep their position.

We can see this in parents too, with many parents harming their children as a way to establish dominance over them and keep them in their place. That's part of why parents view forced compliance as a sign of respect, despite it being a sign of a child who doesn't feel safe and who feels like they aren't allowed to be heard. That's why parents take pride in their children fearing them, even though a child should never fear their parent. That's why parents argue that their rights should trump the rights of their children. That's part of why parents refer to any other type of parenting that demonstrates a more equal standing between parent and child as bad parenting. Parents are taught that they are the ultimate authority figures and are not to be questioned. Abuse, whether it be sexual, emotional, or physical, acts as a way of establishing dominance over one's child and putting them in their place.

That's why it's important that we, as a society, work towards both humanizing children, along with completely restructuring our views on parenting and the parent-child dynamic, and that we start prioritizing the rights of children over the rights of parents.

Going beyond that, we also need to start trying to move towards a society that is less hierarchical altogether.


(Also, I think that it's pretty interesting to talk about hierarchies and in-groups/out-groups and how they contributes to people harming others in ways that they would never think of if it weren't for them. This issue extends way beyond just parental abuse and bullying.)

 

[LoiteringClouds]

Students who rank higher socially usually end up bullying those who rank lower as a way of establishing dominance and making sure that they keep their position.

This is exactly what happened on me.

When I was 8 I was subjected to extreme bullying in school, where boys ganged up on me and kicked me dozens of times in front of a teacher, and she simply ignored it. The "boss" of bullies had a parent who worked for famous company and the most powerful figure among parents of all kids in school. So teachers couldn't discipline him. Instead they blamed me as "defiant." It was nothing but the case of "might is right."

Literally every adults blamed me, including teachers and my parents.

4. Children are a very dehumanized demographic .

And amid the bullying, my mom grabbed a kitchen knife, pointed it at me and said "I shall kill you."

Threatening a stranger with a kitchen knife is obviously a crime, but police don't care if parents do this to their kids.
I've been dehumanized to the point where I forgot what it's like to be treated as a human. But now I don't care, because I hardly remember the incident. And I even don't want to get back at that bullies - I'd say instead, "You treated me like a helpless chicken which is going to be slaughtered, but you couldn't kill me - I withstood, survived, pressed on and won."

Parents are taught that they are the ultimate authority figures and are not to be questioned. Abuse, whether it be sexual, emotional, or physical, acts as a way of establishing dominance over one's child and putting them in their place.

My parents threatened me a lot, but I think, I could get back at them on their deathbed if I really wanted to. I could say, "It's time to stop playing God and realize your life will soon be taken away by real God. This is the last lesson you'll learn - you're helpless before God. Repent, you sinner, before it's too late."
I rehearsed various version of my "revenge" in my head, and realized I have much more self-control than my parents, who couldn't stop fighting each other when I was young. So I no longer need to take revenge on them. I've vanquished inter-generational trauma.

I choose not to get back at my parents in any way, in order to show them off my sheer strength.