Physical abuse

“ Instead, hundreds of thousands of children each year suffer abuse and neglect, most often at the hands of their own parents or other family members. The horrors of physical or emotional trauma deny these young people their childhood, and our abused children carry the psychological scars of their mistreatment throughout their lives. ”

“ The bloodless lips, the dull, heavy eye surrounded with dark rings, the nerveless hand, the blanched cheek, the short breath, the old, faded look, the weakened memory and silly irritability tell the story all too plainly. The same evil result follows, ending perhaps in death, or worse, in insanity. Aside from the injury the girl does herself by yielding to this habit, there is one other reason which appeals to the conscience, and that is, self-abuse is an offence against moral law—it is putting to a vile, selfish use the organs which were given for a high, sacred purpose. ”

“ Teach him that when he handles or excites the [393] sexual organs all parts of the body suffer, because they are connected by nerves that run throughout the system; this is why it is called 'self-abuse.' The whole body is abused when this part of the body is handled or excited in any manner whatever. Teach them to shun all children who indulge in this loathsome habit, or all children who talk about these things. The sin is terrible, and is, in fact, worse than lying or stealing. For, although these are wicked and will ruin their souls, yet this habit of self-abuse will ruin both soul and body. ”

“ Then, rubbing my forehead for a long time, “Why have I committed an indiscretion in relieving my resentment by natural abuse,” I mused, “what does it amount to? Are we not accustomed to swear at every member of the human body, the belly, throat, or even the head when it aches, as it often does? Did not Ulysses wrangle with his own heart? Do not the tragedians ‘Damn their eyes’ just as if they could hear? Gouty patients swear at their feet, rheumatics at their hands, blear-eyed people at their eyes, and do not those who often stub their toes blame their feet for all their pain? ”

“ It is not the idea of pain that makes me abhor bodily punishment, but the deep humiliation that the victim must feel. And also the harm it does to the one who punishes. Physical punishment embitters, but never cures. ”

“ I know that men's lives have been shortened by these brutal assaults. And that is only a polite way of saying that murder has been committed here." Turning next to the matter of the women's wards, I said: "A patient in this ward—a man in his right mind, who leaves here on Tuesday next—told me that a woman patient told him that she had seen many a helpless woman dragged along the floor by her hair, and had also seen them choked by attendants who used a wet towel as a sort of garrote. I have been through the mill and believe every word of the abuse. ”

“ I call that an abuse which squanders the precious and unreturning hours over long chronicles of depravity. The murders, the suicides, the executions, the divorces, the criminal trials, are each and all so like one another that it is only a wanton waste of time to read them. ”

“ Disorder entailed by disobedience to nature's dictates they regard as grievances, not as the effects of a conduct more or less flagitious. Though the evil consequences inflicted on their descendents and on future generations are often as great as those caused by crime, they do not think themselves in any degree criminal.
It is true that in the case of drunkenness the viciousness of a bodily transgression is recognized; but none appear to infer that if this bodily transgression is vicious, so too is every bodily transgression. The fact is, all breaches of the law of health are physical sins. ”

“ The mental derangement is not always accompanied or preceded by spermatorrhea or frequent seminal emissions, the injury done to the nervous system by the practice of self-abuse, or sexual excesses, being first noticeable in various phantasms or imaginings on the part of the patient. These are, in different cases, so various, both in character and degree, as not to admit of any classification, each case presenting phases peculiar to itself. In many cases, the patient imagines that his best friends are conspiring to injure him, or that some great calamity is about to befall him. ”

“ Lacking moral development and ignorant of the more subtle means of accomplishing his purpose, he may resort to violence in some one of the many possible ways. Often he is not conscious of what it is that is driving him and hence does not know where satisfaction lies. Under these conditions his violence may show no outward signs of being sexual. It may show every degree from rough horseplay with girls, such as pushing, pulling, grabbing hat, cloak, or other articles of dress, bantering, teasing, and other forms of personal contact, up to physical injury, torture, and even murder. ”

“ Bodily pain, if severe, is generally brutalizing, at least for most people, and the moral insight is in it only in so far as the past experience of bodily pain helps us to know the significance of the suffering of others, not by giving us that blind emotion of sympathy before criticised, but by giving us the means to form a cool abstract estimate of the value of this evil of physical pain. ”

“ Such an illegal examination, brutally conducted, covers the helpless and innocent with the awful shadow of fear fathered by the suspicion of cruel abuse, and the victims of such gross assault, in their loneliness, beyond all help, are forced to appear guilty of something when they are not. ”

“ If it be true, that the number of those, who from fear or virtue, respect the laws, is greater than of those by whom they are violated, the risk of torturing an innocent person is greater, as there is a greater probability that, cæteris paribus, an individual hath observed, than that he hath infringed the laws. There is another ridiculous motive for torture, namely, to purge a man from infamy. Ought such an abuse to be tolerated in the eighteenth century? Can pain, which is a sensation, have any connection with a moral sentiment, a matter of opinion? ”

“ The imagination of debauchees, in actively or passively picturing the immoral acts, is exceedingly lively; and that the following enumeration of the sexual acts of this kind known to law exhausts all the possibilities is questionable. Most frequently the abuse consists of sexual handling (under some circumstances, flagellation [11] ) , active manustupration, or seducing children by inducing them to perform onanism, or lustful handling, on the seducer. Less frequent acts are cunnilingus, irrumare on boys or girls, pædicatio puellarum, coitus inter femora, and exhibition. ”

“ He is beaten, and it is thought that the whole effect of the blow stops at the moment when the child is prevented from being bad. He has, it is thought, a powerful reminder against future bad behaviour. People do not suspect that this violent interference in the physical and psychical life of the child may have lifelong effects. As far back as forty years ago, a writer showed that corporal punishment had the most powerful somatic stimulative effects. ”

“ The moment the solemn hereditary mask covering up an abuse is brusquely and adroitly torn aside, we feel a curious spasm, the corners of our mouth stretching apart and our breast heaving violently, as at a kind of sudden relief, an unexpected deliverance, experiencing a sense of our recovered superiority, of our revenge being gratified and of an act of justice having been performed. ”

“ If girls knew their delicate nature and their sacred mission, I am sure they would never abuse these organs. The more delicate and sacred an organ is, the more serious will be the penalty following its abuse. The abuse of these most delicate organs of the body results in poor health, poor development, much suffering, and should the victims marry, their children would be puny, sickly and short-lived. ”

“ A scolding and a whipping are both painful—one in mind, the other in body. It is natural for one to seek to avoid pain and suffering. It is equally certain that punishment must inevitably follow the violation of law—whether parental law, physical law, or the law of the land. Loading the stomach with indigestible food brings its own punishment in the disturbance of the bodily functions. ”

“ Probably, however, not a few will contend that already most parents do this—that the punishments they inflict are, in the majority of cases, the true consequences of ill-conduct—that parental anger, venting itself in harsh words and deeds, is the result of a child's transgression—and that, in the suffering, physical or moral, which the child is subject to, it experiences the natural reaction of its misbehaviour. ”

“ The term military sexual trauma means, with respect to a veteran, psychological trauma, which in the judgment of a mental health professional, resulted from a physical assault of a sexual nature, battery of a sexual nature, or sexual harassment which occurred during active military, naval, or air service.. ”

“ Sexual assault can lead to long-term health problems including chronic pain, stomach problems, and sexually transmitted diseases. It can also cause severe emotional harm that may be even more painful than the assault itself and resulting physical injuries. ”

“ The argument on both sides has proceeded on the basis of earlier authorities that bodily harm means any hurt or injury that is calculated to or does interfere with the health or comfort of the subject but must be more than transient or trifling, that grievous bodily harm means really serious bodily harm and that wounding involves the breaking of the whole skin. Common assault would include any physical touching which did not fall within these categories. ”

“ The court then reviewed the trial court's finding that respondent "committed the offense in an especially heinous, cruel or depraved manner," § 13-703 (F) (6) . The court noted that it had interpreted and applied this provision in light of the dictionary definitions of the words used:
"The element of cruelty involves the pain and the mental and physical distress visited upon the victims. Heinous and depraved involve the mental state and attitude of the perpetrator as reflected in his words and actions. 'Heinous' means 'hatefully or shockingly evil; grossly bad' ”

“ There is first the danger of disturbing the spirit of the head, which may be injured in the process and may revenge itself upon the person who molests him. Secondly, there is the difficulty of disposing of the shorn locks. For the savage believes that the sympathetic connexion which exists between himself and every part of his body continues to exist even after the physical connexion has been broken, and that therefore he will suffer from any harm that may befall the several parts of his body, such as the clippings of his hair his hair or the parings of his nails. ”

“ First, there are certain punishments that inherently involve so much physical pain and suffering that civilized people cannot tolerate them - e. g., use of the rack, the thumbscrew, or other modes of torture. ”

“ If you have become mentally strong [Pg 60] enough to restrain your impulses to strike your child, do not substitute other means to "punish" him. Changing the method of brutally inflicting physical pain upon your child to some other means, though less repulsive, is still obnoxious and harmful. ”

“ What form does this retribution that nature metes out to the vice of illicit intercourse take? Besides the various psychic punishments, the principal of which are remorse, and impure thoughts, there are physical punishments in the form of venereal diseases. ”

“ AS IN THE BOY, SO IN THE GIRL, self-abuse causes an undue amount of blood to flow to those organs, thus depriving other parts of the body of its nourishment, the weakest part first showing the effect of want of sustenance. ”

“ A weary and harassing thing it is even where the body is the aggressor—when the fevered blood, darting like liquid fire through the veins, mounts to the throbbing brow, and, pressing like molten lead upon the brain, crushes out thought and feeling, leaving but a dull consciousness of the racking agony which renders each limb a separate instrument of torture. ”

“ As there exists a certain abuse, which is characterized by the most abominable savagery, but which nevertheless some of the faithful have stupidly adopted. We, prompted by motives of humanity, have decreed that all further mangling of the human body, the very mention of which fills the soul with horror, should be henceforth abolished. ”

“ To him, all traumas are of equal standing, though their severity may differ together with the permanence of their emotional outcomes. Moreover, such abuse and neglect could well be the result of circumstances beyond the abusive or negligent parent's control. A parent can be physically or mentally handicapped, for instance. ”

“ In that event I should have a witness and the detection and punishment of the offenders would exonerate all those who in case of my removal would have part of the criminal credit of molesting the private residence of a professor and a [Pg 29] scholar. 2d, The fear of personal injury from the hands of one, who for many years past has been known to be a man of peaceable and unexceptionable behavior and who never attacked or struck any man in his life, appears to have its origin in a consciousness of guilt and to be a virtual admission of it. ”

“ Corporal punishment affects the nervous systems of children injuriously, and when applied to certain parts of the body it stimulates prematurely the action of the sexual nature, and leads to one of the worst forms of depravity. ”

“ Except the momentary bodily pain, however, these appear in most cases to make little impression on a people who have been accustomed to corporal punishment from their youth upwards. Their acquaintances stand round the sufferers, while the blows are being inflicted, and mockingly ask them how it tastes. ”