Dear Next President,

My name is Jennifer Valentin and I am a junior in Olney Charter High School. I currently live in Philadelphia. The problem that has been bothering me here in Philly and anywhere else in the world is child abuse. Something needs to be done about it. Sometimes if the mother is being abusive and the father is taking the mother to court, the kids need to ride with the mother and that’s not fair. New laws need to be made.

Let me tell you about the time when i was fourteen years old and was dramatized from then on. I remember watching the news and then the news reporter said ‘Newborn baby thrown around by his own mother’. At first I couldn’t believe it until a clip was shown of a twenty days year old baby was being pushed, kicked and thrown around the floor by his own mother. I was just mortified when I saw that. The baby was just crying while the mother was just throwing him around like he was a paper ball. The big sister, which she was seven or eight years old, was just trying to help her little baby brother while the father was just watching and recording. It was the most saddest moment in history. Ever since I saw that I was in shock. Newborns, kids and teens go through this and it’s not fair.

Newborn babies are not only one experiencing child abuse. Do you know how many children in general are being abused every year? More than 6.6 million children are being abused every year. More than 3.6 million referrals are made to child protection agencies (childhelp.org). Any little kid can be living in an abusive home. It can happen anywhere at anytime, especially in the US. The US has one of the worst records among industrialized nations (childhelp.org). The US is losing an average between four to seven children everyday to child abuse and neglect. We’re losing children due to abuse and nothing is really being done about it. More than 70% of the children who has died from abuse or neglect were two years old or younger and 80% weren’t even old enough to be in kindergarten (childhelp.org). All those little innocent babies are being abused and nothing is changing. This issue is just getting worse and worse everyday.

The statistics surrounding child abuse represent the real children that suffer because these children are so young and innocent and they’re going through something really difficult. They’re being physically and emotionally abused by their own family members. A little baby that just got out the womb twenty days ago, was being abused by his own mother. He couldn’t even stand or walk, not even move his hands and he was being abused and neglected. That’s just one out of the millions of children being hurt like he was. Children don’t deserve to go through this, they’re just kids. Babies and kids are very fragile, they haven’t physically grown yet so they can’t be tossed around like older adults. They need to be taken away from the abusive home as soon as possible because since they are little they can’t stand pain like adults do.

If you haven’t seen or been in an abusive childhood you can’t imagine how it’s like to be neglected and hurt by your own family members. But try doing this. Imagine being a baby you were just born and you have no idea what’s going on. You don’t know how to stand up, roll over or sit up. You’re so delicate, small and hopeless. You’re being hit over and over again. You’re crying your eyes out because it hurts so much and there’s nothing you can do. You eventually just start coughing and whimpering because this abuse has been happening for so long you don’t even have anymore tears to cry. Child abuse is not to be taken lightly.