Abuse and Violence should be severely punished

 No one is a fan of abuse or violence. Abuse and violence hurt and thrashes out at everyone in their path. Abuse and violence spread faster than the common cold, infecting almost everyone they come into contact with. And like a cold, abuse and violence are hard to get rid of. Abuse and violence should be punished in order to start cleaning up America.

 There is a difference between punishment and abuse. There are other ways to  express anger or punish a child without causing physical, psychological, or other emotional distress. Noticing and acknowledging the warning signs and symptoms of domestic violence and abuse is the first step to ending it.

 Signs of physical violence are bruises, cuts, broken bones, and handprints anywhere on one’s person. The person may feel secluded from friends and family. People that have suffered from physical violence and abuse usually try to hide it. "Physical abuse of children is a severe social problem and is usually identified by the presence of bruises of various ages. The visual appearance of bruises is widely used to identify victims of abuse," scientists in Akita, Japan report (see also Life Sciences).

 Psychological abuse is defined as a form of abuse characterized by a person subjecting or exposing another to behavior that is psychologically harmful, also known as emotional abuse. Abusers will make their victim believe he/she is stupid, ugly, insignificant, and worthless. Since the abuser is usually someone the victim believes he/she can trust, the victim believes the abuser of his accusations and has a very low self esteem. The abuser makes the victim think everything the abuser does is the victim’s fault. This results in the victim being in distress.

 Sexual abuse is a very heinous crime. Abusers force their victims to endure or participate in sexual activities. Age, race, and gender all vary in sexual abuse. Sexual abusers are twisted, sick psychopaths, as shown by their actions of rape and other forms of sexual abuse.  Victims often die at the hand of their abusers.

 
 “Domestic violence is a national health problem and involves virtually every sector of society, regardless of ethnicity, social status, religion, sexual orientation, or gender (Caetano, Field, Ramisetty-Mikler, & McGrath, 2005; Durose, Harlow, & Lagen, 2005; Shaver, Lavendosky, Dubay, Basu, & Jenei, 2005). It may include physical, emotional, psychological, and sexual aspects (Carlson, 2005; Dutton, Kaltman, Goodman, Weinfurt, & Vankos, 2005; Sackett & Saunders, 1999),” as copyrighted by Michigan Counseling Association. Domestic abuse varies in all aspects of abuse. I witnessed my mother being abused for the majority of my life. She did not deserve to be drug across the room by her hair or the many bruises that were left behind. No one should tolerate domestic abuse.

 Abuse and violence has a tendency to spread from person to person like a virus. Once a person was infected by another, that person goes and infects more and more people, usually starting with the people closest to him or her. This means husband, wife, children, pets, and friends are the people most likely to be abused or assaulted. Then, when the loved one has been hurt, the loved one will then keep the chain going on and on and on, from one innocent person to the next.  It is a never ending chain that needs to be broken.

 No one would oppose that abuse and violence need to be done away with. “Many of the novels published in the first half of this year have several things in common: death. violence and murder. Although they all present diverse perspectives, the authors all appear to be offering the young adult a way of making sense of today's violent world. Violence is pervasive on television, in song lyrics, in multimedia computer games and in the vernacular, and teenagers are constantly bombarded with images of death, destruction and loss,” says Claudia Mody, Ottakar's children's intranet manager, previews the pick of the forthcoming titles for teens.(Young Adult Review)(Book Review). We are surrounded by violence more than trash is surrounded by flies.

 Many of our schools are infected with violence. Teachers and teenagers are pulling out guns on innocent students and having a part in sexual activities. Girls fighting and hair-pulling in the hallways while others record and cheer is not acceptable, nor is guys and girls bullying others. “School violence is widely held to have become a serious problem in recent decades in many countries, especially where weapons such as guns or knives are involved. It includes violence between school students as well as physical attacks by students on school staff,” as stated on Wikipedia. We need to clean up the filth of violence from our schools.

 Society desperately needs to take away everything that spawns violence and abuse such as anger, hatred, and racism. As a victim of physical and psychological abuse, I propose that violence and abuse should have a harsher punishment. In order to have peace and security, we need to put the fear of God into these abusers so as to never have another man, woman or child harmed in the United States. These abusers need to be more than fined or only put in jail for a few years just to be let out to do as they wish. These abusers need to serve life sentences. They ruin peoples’ lives. Abusers need to be kept off of our streets.