The Urgent Issue Of Child Soldiers
In America many children under the age of 17 get to have fun and make money. However in other parts of the world children are being bought, sold, and forced into the army, where their fates and evenings are left at stake. Today there over 100, 000 children as young as 10 around the world are being forced into armed conflict. These children are living under fears of being killed, trapped in an ambush and also gunfire.
Background
Child soldiers can be under the age of 10, they are used for military purposes and are forced to serve no matter the condition. Many children are born into war zones and end up fighting at a very young age. According to article, Child Soldiers international “Who are Child soldiers?”, child soldiers are children who are used for any military purpose. Some are in their late teens, while others may be as young as four. Some child soldiers are used for fighting – to kill and commit other acts of violence. Others are used as cooks, porters, messengers, informers or spies, or in any other way their commanders want. Child soldiers are also used for sexual purposes. This reference states that they use both genders to fight adult battles, girls are most vulnerable for sexual violence because they are weak, also both genders are forced to kill, fight and take part in other violent actions that not only hurt themselves but others. In the last 15 years the use of child soldiers has spread to mostly every region of the world and every armed conflict. They manipulate children who are poor and displaced from their families. They have limited access to education, or live in a combat zone are more likely to be forcibly recruited.
Analysis
Child soldiers affect themselves and the world because they become mentally damaged. They were experienced violence that they will never forget and that has a side effect; so they start remember it and take into actions again this is not only affecting them but affecting the people around them because someone might get hurt. Based on the information in the text Society for Research in Child Development, all of the former child soldiers were exposed to high levels of violence, such as massacres or village raids. More than a third of the girls reported having been raped, and almost a quarter of both girls and boys reported having injured or killed someone. ” According to this they were demonstrated to higher levels of hostility and anxiety and were compared to those who didn't experience these types of traumas. This affects the society because we don't know if there mentally ill and we also don't know what they are compatible of doing to the society. These people are mind damaged and will never get over what they had to experience.
They need help! It can take as long as 3 years for society to reintegrate child soldiers. Child soldiers have to be placed in a rehab facility in order to go back with family and friends. This why they lose their minds they need to be free not right back under someone's commands. Society doesn’t take them back that quick, they treat child soldiers as animals not human. They lock child soldiers up as soon they come home, they act like the children wanted to kill it’s not their choice. It’s life or death situation. They government has been saying for a long time that they will stop the act of child soldiers but for the last few years nothing has happened. Someone in society has to step up for what’s right. “Compelled to become instruments of war, to kill and be killed, child soldiers are forced to give violent expression to the hatreds of adults”. This quotation by Olara Otunnu explains that children are forced into becoming weapons of war, so if they do something bad it’s not their fault society should still take them back. They are taking away the life a child, they are taking them away from family, the children are living a horrific life.
Conclusion
In conclusion, child soldiers should not be held responsible for their crimes. These children are placed under horrific circumstances which are preposterous. If they received help from someone that understood what they went through and did not judge them, they will understand the actions they committed and know it’s the wrong thing to do and everyone deserves a chance. These children did not wake up one day and say hey I’m going to make a bad impact on the world they were taken from their parents, beaten, they suffered just to kill someone that probably didn't do anything. They kill to stay alive, they kill to tell their story, they kill because they are forced to, they are human just like us and they deserve a chance to be helped, they should not be convicted for the crimes they are forced to do, they are scared and don’t know what to do.
