a few things:

i’m slacking more than i should.. it derives from suddenly being allowed all this free time and having no difficult or serious HY projects or essays to plow through.. ok i’ve got an Archi essay due this friday, but my brain just can’t place Architecture under the same importance as History.. speaking of which i’ve got a History test on Tuesday which I’ve not started studying for.. talk about priorities..

one would think that Hari Raya is over, but apparently not for my nenek’s neighbours.. i just attended a Hari Raya gathering yesterday at the common hall near my nenek’s house.. it was pretty awkward, cos umm, i didn’t know anybody there other than my nenek (the rest of my aunts and sis pangsehed on me) and well, all we did was makan.. i left shortly after, wanting to escape the games round..

there was this really interesting article on Berita Harian, pertaining to the recent apparent ’trend’ of child abuse inflicted by their fathers.. apparently, fathers who beat up their kids stemming from uncontrollable anger and leading to the child’s death, were usually brought up in such a way themselves; as in, they had an upbringing where punishment usually constitutes being beaten up.. you know how parents last time caned their children a lot to discipline them? yeah so it passed down to their children, who then grew up with this mentality of “i beat up my children not because i dont love them. if i don’t love them, i wouldn’t care if they turn out good or bad.” i don’t dispute their conviction.. i’m sure for the cases that involve the biological parents, they DID love their children.. however, they were, as the article mentioned, less exposed to other softer alternatives to disciplining their children..

at the end of the day, according to the article, it comes down to the following factors that crossed the line from beating up your children as a disciplinary action, to beating up your children to death..

1) as mentioned, it perpetuates from the parents’ upbringing, where the common mentality was that it was ok, even necessary, to beat up their children.. it was the common disciplinary action even till our generation.. all i can say however, is that caning worked last time, it works less now.. for me and my sis, at least, it freaking worked.. hence with regards to the first factor, i would say that its a bit ambiguous and less clear-cut as to whether beating up children would DIRECTLY lead to child abuse.. this is where the next 2 factors come in..

2) unfulfilled dreams and dissatisfaction with life.. for these parents, they probably had a rough childhood, strict parents, generation gap, miserable education just to name a few.. these are just generalisations, but if we look at the several cases of child abuse leading to death that have happened in Singapore over the past few years (take your pick), the parents are from less-educated background, and probably have a tough life socially and economically which adds to their emotional volatility..

3) social illnesses such as being addicted to alcohol and drugs.. the psychiatrist interviewed in the article mentioned that these make them less able to control their anger..

i would love to have a conclusion for this, but this is where conclusion escapes me.. because in order to come to a conclusion about something you need to have understood what you’ve written so far and well, i don’t.. i’ve just been regurgitating from an article, but i’m still struggling to understand the concept of inflicting insurmountable and unchecked anger on little children.. i fucking don’t get it..