Off-campus access
Using PhilPapers from home?
Click here to configure this browser for off-campus access.
- Daniel Howard-Snyder, Theodicy.Not long ago, an issue of my local paper reminded its readers of Susan Smith, the Carolinan mother who rolled her Mazda into a lake, drowning her two little sons strapped inside. It also reported the abduction and gang rape of an eleven-year old girl by eight teenage members of Angelitos Sur 13, and the indictment of the "Frito Man" on 68 counts of sexual abuse, a fortyfive year old man who handed out corn chips to neighborhood children in order to lure them to a secluded location. More recently, the headlines announced the untimely death of Ashley Jones, a twelve-year old girl from nearby Stanwood, Washington—she was raped and bludgeoned to death while babysitting her neighbor's kids. These are particularly disgusting, appalling cases of evil, all the more so because children are the victims. One might think that such cases occur only very rarely. I wish that were so. ABC News recently reported that in the United States a child dies from abuse by a parent or guardian every six hours. One is left with the disturbing thought: if that is how frequently a child dies from abuse in the US, how frequently are children merely abused? A sinister side-effect of familial abuse is that abused children are much more likely to abuse their own children; and so the attitudes and habits of abuse pass from generation to generation, a cycle of evil and suffering from which it can be enormously difficult to extricate oneself. Frequently, a child's suffering is unintentionally caused by those who love them most. Alvin Plantinga recalls a story about..Reading list | Discuss | Edit | Categorize |My bibliography
| Export citation | Other links: faculty.wwu.edu | Scholar 
Similar books and articles
Although touch frequently occurs in psychotherapy with children, there is little written on the ethical considerations of therapeutic touch. Because physical contact does occur, therapists must consider if, how, and when it is used, for both their clients' safety and their own. In this review, I further develop the issues suggested by Aquino and Lee (2000) in the use of nurturing touch in therapy by considering many types of touch that occur in psychotherapy with children; the possible positive role of touch; clients' perception of touch in therapy; considerations related to the therapist, the child's safety, and any history of abuse in the child's and family's background; and other practical considerations. I list guidelines.
Reading list
| Discuss | Edit | Categorize | My bibliography | Export citation | Scholar | At my library | More options ...
| | Scholar | At my library | More options ... I criticise the ‘liberal’view of the proper relationship between the family and State, namely that, although the interests of the child should be paramount, parents are entitled to rights of both privacy and autonomy which should be abrogated only when the child suffers a specifiable harm. I argue that the right to bear children is not absolute, and that it only grounds a right to rear upon an objectionable proprietarian picture of the child as owned by its producer. If natural parents have any rights to rear they derive from duties to bring their children into rational maturity where they can exercise rights for themselves. The presumption that natural parents are best suited to rear their own children should be discounted, as should the assumption that alternatives to natural parenting are unacceptably bad. I reject the suggestion that parents should be ‘licensed’but argue for a much closer monitoring of the family. Familial privacy, which such monitoring breaches, is shown to have a culturally specific and, given the facts of abuse, dubious value. In conclusion, I briefly specify the forms of monitoring I approve.
Reading list
| Discuss | Edit | Categorize | My bibliography | Export citation | Other links: eprints.lancs.ac.uk dx.doi.org | Scholar | At my library | More options ...
| | Other links: eprints.lancs.ac.uk dx.doi.org | Scholar | At my library | More options ... Psychologists who participate as forensic evaluators in custody and visitation cases involving allegations of child sexual abuse must possess advanced assessment skills and a thorough knowledge of child development, child sexual abuse, and child interviewing techniques. This case study illustrates the types of problems that are inevitable when psychologists violate the boundaries of their role as an independent evaluator and fail to uphold their ethical obligation to be knowledgeable and competent in the area in which they profess expertise.
No categories
Reading list
| Discuss | Edit | Categorize | My bibliography | Export citation | Other links: informaworld.com | Scholar | At my library | More options ...
| | Other links: informaworld.com | Scholar | At my library | More options ... Legal and ethical issues arise for clinicians working with female clients who are survivors of domestic violence and who have children. Statistics indicate that children of 30%-80% of such women are also abused. Disclosure by an abused woman of concurrent child abuse creates an ethical dilemma for the clinician involving adherence to mandatory reporting laws and the ethical duty to protect vs. ethical issues of confidentiality and respect for client autonomy. Potential resolution of this dilemma incorporates core tenets of feminist theory. A hypothetical scenario illustrating the ethical dilemma is provided, and some practical guidelines for its resolution, although not yet empirically tested, are outlined.
Reading list
| Discuss | Edit | Categorize | My bibliography | Export citation | Scholar | At my library | More options ...
| | Scholar | At my library | More options ... This paper addresses the criminalisation of fabricated images of child pornography. Focusing on the new offence of possessing 'non-photographic pornographic images of children' (NPPIC) under the Coroners and Justice Act 2009, it assesses whether harm- and morality-based arguments legitimate the extension of the criminal law to this activity. I contend that harm may be caused to children by NPPIC that are depictions of real child sexual abuse, and images that depict the fantasy sexual abuse of a real, recognisable child. However, it is extremely difficult to find a legitimate basis for prohibiting the possession of fantasy, completely fabricated NPPIC through a reasoned application of the harm principle and thus criminalisation of such images is not justified. Adopting a liberal perspective, I argue that moral harm-based arguments ultimately fail to convince, since legal moralism or moral paternalism should not be acceptable grounds for criminalisation. I conclude that a stronger case for criminalisation would have been made had the offence been limited to NPPIC depicting real child sexual abuse, or featuring real, recognisable children, or targeted at creators and distributors rather than possessors.
Reading list
| Discuss | Edit | Categorize | My bibliography | Export citation | Other links: interscience.wiley.com dx.doi.org | Scholar | More options ...
| | Other links: interscience.wiley.com dx.doi.org | Scholar | More options ... Recent advances in computer technology have been aiding sexual predators, stalkers, child pornographers, child traffickers, and others with the intent of exploiting children. Internet bulletin boards, chat rooms, private websites, and peer-to-peer networks are being used daily by paedophiles to meet unsuspecting children. Compounding the problem is the lack of direct governance by an international body, which will curb the illegal content and activity. Most countries already have laws protecting children, but what is needed is a concerted law enforcement and international legislation to combat child sex abuse. With the enactment of the Convention on the Protection of Children against Sexual Exploitation and Sexual Abuse, this may soon become a reality in Europe. This current article will discuss some of the recent legal developments concerning online child protection, including the new Convention.
No categories
Reading list
| Discuss | Edit | Categorize | My bibliography | Export citation | Scholar | More options ...
| | Scholar | More options ... In the United States, the implementation of a successful system of mandated reporting of suspected child abuse continues to be plagued by the absence of a clear standard for when one must report. All 50 states of the U.S. have laws requiring certain individuals to report suspected child abuse. However, at present, there are variable thresholds for mandated reporting and no clear consensus on how existing thresholds should be interpreted. Because “child abuse” is often present as a possible etiology for injuries and non-infectious conditions that beset children, it is problematic to suggest that “the mere possibility of child abuse” qualifies as cause to report. In an effort to move toward a more effective system of mandated reporting of child maltreatment, this paper discusses how the absence of a clear threshold affects mandated reporters, examines the relevant legal and conceptual issues, and suggests future directions for policy, practice, and research.
Reading list
| Discuss | Edit | Categorize | My bibliography | Export citation | Other links: dx.doi.org | Scholar | At my library | More options ...
| | Other links: dx.doi.org | Scholar | At my library | More options ... In this dissertation, I reconceptualize the concept of violence to consider its physical, sexual, psychological and economic dimension. I attempt to add to existing meanings of "violence" to include not only forms of abuse on the individual and group level but also abuse practiced by legal, political, ideological and economic institutions in a collective and systemic manner. Due to the significance of child maltreatment around the globe, I focus on the impact of law on this problem specifically through a study of domestic and international use of the best interests' doctrine; evidentiary issues relating to children; child abuse reporting mechanisms and protection schemes in Canada and elsewhere; and the international protection of children's rights. Lastly, I analyze the benefits of a reoriented rights-based approach to empower children within and without the legal arena.
Reading list
| Discuss | Edit | Categorize | My bibliography | Export citation | Scholar | More options ...
| | Scholar | More options ... One million cases of child maltreatment and twelve hundred child deaths due to abuse and neglect occur per year. But since many cases of abuse and neglect remain either unreported or unsubstantiated due to insufficient evidence, the number of children who are abused, neglected, and killed at the hands of family caregivers is probably higher. One approach to combat child abuse in the U.K. has been the employment of hospital-based covert video surveillance (CVS) to monitor parents suspected of Munchausen Syndrome by Proxy (MSBP). The use of CVS, however, raises concerns about voluntary informed consent, research on human subjects, privacy, and the appropriateness of healthcare providers to conduct CVS. More broadly, the use of CVS raises concerns about the ethical life of healthcare institutions and their moral obligations to the families and communities they serve. The U.K. protocol for CVS is examined in light of these concerns. Three alternative CVS protocols and two procedures for selecting a protocol are then proposed for use in the U.S. The paper concludes that any CVS protocol selected for use by hospitals ought to be selected by means of open and democratic processes that permit community input and, subsequently, the possibility of a consensus on the moral status and scope of CVS.
Reading list
| Discuss | Edit | Categorize | My bibliography | Export citation | Scholar | At my library | More options ...
| | Scholar | At my library | More options ... Not long ago, an issue of my local paper reminded its readers of Susan Smith, the Carolinan mother who rolled her Mazda into a lake, drowning her two little sons strapped inside. It also reported the abduction and gang rape of an eleven-year old girl by eight teenage members of Angelitos Sur 13, and the indictment of the "Frito Man" on 68 counts of sexual abuse, a fortyfive year old man who handed out corn chips to neighborhood children in order to lure them to a secluded location. More recently, the headlines announced the untimely death of Ashley Jones, a twelve-year old girl from nearby Stanwood, Washington--she was raped and bludgeoned to death while babysitting her neighbor's kids.
Reading list
| Discuss | Edit | Categorize | My bibliography | Export citation | Scholar | At my library | More options ...
| | Scholar | At my library | More options ... Discussion of Daniel Howard-Snyder, Theodicy
 Back
All discussions
Start a new thread
|
There are no threads in this forum |
Nothing in this forum yet.
