Who is a child ?
The United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child defines a child as "a human being below the age of 18 years unless under the law applicable to the child, majority is attained earlier." .
Biologically, a child is anyone in the developmental stage of childhood, between infancy and adulthood.
What are children's rights ?
Children's rights are defined in numerous ways, including a wide spectrum of civil, cultural, economic, social and political rights.
Rights tend to be of two general types: those advocating for children as autonomous persons under the law and those placing a claim on society for protection from harms perpetrated on children because of their dependency.
These have been labeled as the right of empowerment and as the right to protection.
One Canadian organization categorizes children's rights into three categories:
- Provision: Children have the right to an adequate standard of living, health care, education and services, and to play. These include a balanced diet, a warm bed to sleep in, and access to schooling.
- Protection: Children have the right to protection from abuse, neglect, exploitation and discrimination. This includes the right to safe places for children to play; constructive child rearing behavior, and acknowledgment of the evolving capacities of children.
- Participation: Children have the right to participate in communities and have programs and services for themselves. This includes children's involvement in libraries and community programs, youth voice activities, and involving children as decision-makers.
In a similar fashion, the Child Rights Information Network, categorizes rights into two groups:
- Economic, social and cultural rights, related to the conditions necessary to meet basic human needs such as food, shelter, education, health care, and gainful employment. Included are rights to education, adequate housing, food, water, the highest attainable standard of health, the right to work and rights at work, as well as the cultural rights of minorities and indigenous peoples.
- Environmental, cultural and developmental rights, which are sometimes called "third generation rights," and including the right to live in safe and healthy environments and that groups of people have the right to cultural, political, and economic development.
Amnesty International openly advocates four particular children's rights, including the end to juvenile incarceration without parole, an end to the recruitment of military use of children, ending the death penalty for people under 21, and raising awareness of human rights in the classroom.
Human Rights Watch, an international advocacy organization, includes child labor, juvenile justice, orphans and abandoned children, refugees, street children and corporal punishment.
Scholarly study generally focuses children's rights by identifying individual rights. The following rights "allow children to grow up healthy and free":
- Freedom of speech
- Freedom of thought
- Freedom from fear
- Freedom of choice and the right to make decisions
- Ownership over one's body
Other issues affecting children's rights include the sale of children, child prostitution and child pornography.
Where are we now in protecting children ?
Indian children work next to their parents at a construction project in front of the Jawaharlal Nehru Stadium in New Delhi. The Commonwealth Games are due to be held in the Indian capital in October 2010 but concerns remain over construction of its sporting and transport infrastructure. The sheer scale of the project has drawn an enormous population of migrant workers from all over India.
( if this picture doesn't break your heart then i don't know what will )
There are thousands of child soldiers in the world.
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A driver performs dangerous Saudi drift:
unfortunately , the video has been removed from You Tube.
But.... keep reading
(This driver is a child who is only 7 years old, yes seven.)
A seven-year old child has been recorded performing one of the most dangerous automotive stunts in the world! Saudi drift is the most insane, crazy, and dangerous form of drifting known to man. Starting the drift at speeds well above 60 miles per hour, the point of Saudi drift is to spin as many times as possible but yet still maintain control and keep the car moving. The stunt performed by even the most advanced driver is still very dangerous. There's a reason behind the age requirement to drive on the road, but you don't need a license to drift!
I'm sure some of you are completely shocked at the fact a seven year old boy was captured behind the wheel performing a very dangerous stunt. Indeed, this is totally wrong in every way and should not be attempted, but let's not focus on the typical "dark side" of the story. Of course I could go on a rant how this is child endangerment, wrong, etc.
So what could possibly be positive about this? First of all, he's driving the car on what appears to be a safe road. There is traffic in the background, but no immediate vehicles on the road he's currently drifting. Even though it's scary to watch, this young chap does an amazing job! Imagine with years of practice how good he'll be at Saudi drift! Hold on to your keyboards as this Saudi youngster drifts his Pop's car with the greatest of ease. Would you let your child Saudi drift? Comment below!
you can read the rest of the article here... but can you see how the writer indicate that there are positive sides to the whole story. how crazy can we be to even think positively with this story ??
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Have you heard of the seven year old Afghan child who the Afghani government said Taliban hang for spying while the Taliban denying??
Both cases are wrong. If that's true it's brutality and if it's not then shame on the Afghani government for using children against their enemies.
Taliban hang 7-year-old boy to punish family
A seven-year-old boy was murdered by the Taleban in an apparent act of retribution this week. Afghan officials said that the child was accused of spying for US and Nato forces and hanged from a tree in southern Afghanistan.
Daoud Ahmadi, the spokesman for the provincial governor of Helmand, said that the killing happened days after the boy’s grandfather, Abdul Woodod Alokozai, spoke out against militants in their home village.
Mr Ahmadi said: “His grandfather is a tribal elder in the village and the village is under the control of the Taleban. His grandfather said some good things about the Government and he formed a small group of people to stand against the Taleban. That’s why the Taleban killed his grandson in revenge.”
The attack happened in Heratiyan, in Sangin, near where insurgents shot down an American Pave Hawk helicopter on Wednesday, killing all four crew. The helicopter was swooping over the town to suppress attacks on a grounded air ambulance, which was picking up British casualties.
Shamsuddin Khan Faryie, an elder in Heratiyan, said that the boy, identified as the son of Abul Qudooz, was seized as he played in his garden. He was found hanged from a nearby tree.
Mr Faryie said that there were conflicting reports within the village over who was responsible. “Some people said that it was Taleban,” he said. “Some people said they were private enemies. Some Taleban I spoke to said that he was a spy. Some said that it wasn’t them.”
The killing of children to punish their families has echoes of Western mafia-style violence. Under Pashtunwali, the ancient honour code of the Pashtuns, it is likely to provoke more vendettas and blood-letting.
Qari Yousef Ahmaid, the Taleban spokesman, denied that any of his militants were involved. “The Taleban’s enemies are the Afghan Government and the foreign forces,” he said. “We never kill children. Everyone knows a seven-year-old can’t be a spy.”
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Taliban Hangs 7-Year-Old Boy in Grisly Warning
and insurgents publicly hanged someone who they labeled a spy for local troops.
The Afghan accused of spying was a 7-year-old boy. He was hanged from a tree in front of a crowd in Helmand's Sangin district, where more than a thousand British troops are based. He was the son and grandson of prominent tribal leaders, one of whom had recently spoken out against the Taliban, according to local journalists.
"A 7-year-old boy cannot be a spy," President Hamid Karzai said in a press conference in Kabul. "A 7-year-old boy cannot be anything but a 7-year-old boy, and therefore hanging or shooting to kill a 7-year-old boy ... is a crime against humanity." The hanging occurred hours before a man walked into the main section of a wedding just north of Kandahar City and pulled the trigger on a suicide vest, killing more than 40 and injuring more than 70, including the groom. The groom's family had opposed the Taliban, and his uncle, the local tribal leader, had successfully organized a militia against insurgents , according to Ahmed Wali Karzai, the head of the provincial council and the president's brother.
Taken together, the grisly incidents will serve as a warning that American soldiers and Marines have not yet guaranteed security for those Afghans willing to help them. And that will make the surge into southern Afghanistan more difficult. American commanders admit they need local help in order to defeat an insurgency deeply embedded into the ethnic and tribal population of Helmand and Kandahar.
The rest of the article here.
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This story i can relate to, because we tend to do the same in here
Raised to Hate: Kids of Westboro Baptist Church
Boaz Drain, a seven-year-old from Topeka, Kan., and his six-year-old sister Faith are the picture of typical American children, chock full of energy, fun and imagination. They watch movies like "Shrek" and enjoy playing with the standards like "Star Wars" light sabers and ray guns.
Yet ABC News' Chris Cuomo was shocked to hear some of the things Bo told him when he visited the Drain family recently.
"I don't think you'll go to heaven, I think you'll go to hell," Bo told Cuomo, adding those who were destined for eternal damnation included "gays, fags, hundreds and hundreds of Jews," among a wide swath of other people that Bo has been taught since birth were hated by God and bound for Hell.
Bo's family belongs to the infamous Westboro Baptist Church, led by Pastor Fred Phelps. Members believe the Bible is the literal law of God, and the penalty for violating the rules and lessons put forth in the scriptures is eternal damnation.
Westboro, based out of Topeka, Kan., spreads the message that because the United States condones homosexuality, abortion and divorce, all Americans are going to hell. It's a message they hammer home to their children from birth.
"He [God] only loves his elect that obey and he doesn't love the people that don't obey," Bo told Cuomo.
While his father, Steve Drain, stood nearby and occasionally coached his son on the beliefs of the church, Bo went into the ideology he said he firmly believes in.
"You get destroyed and you get put in hell. Hell is like a burning place where it can never be stopped, burning, and it can burn millions of people every day," Bo said about homosexuals.
Bo also considers "enablers" of homosexuality, including all citizens of the United States, to be destined for hell.
Steve and Luci Drain have four children -- Bo, Faith, 19-year-old Taylor Drain and 24-year-old Lauren Drain. Steve Drain was filming a documentary on Fred Phelps and the church in 2000 and came to accept the church's beliefs, uprooting his family from Florida and moving them across the street from Westboro's compound in Topeka.
Complete the sad article here .
and this is the video ( so shocking)
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11 Year Old Matador . This sport ( which has nothing to do with sports at all is the most violent and brutal to human and mostly animals)
Matador Rafita Mirabal: Too Young to Risk Death?
He entered the ring for his moment of truth -- prancing, posing, even walking like a grown man. But appearances can be deceiving.
Rafita Mirabal may have looked like a toreador, but he was, in fact, a little boy in a bullfighter's costume. Only it wasn't Halloween. He faced a real bull with real horns.
When asked if he was scared of bulls, then-11-year-old Rafita quickly answered, "Well, maybe a normal kid, but not me!"
Rafita isn't the only little boy facing danger in the bull ring: Jairo Miguel of Caceres, Spain has been fighting since he was eight; Michelito Lagravere of Merida, Mexico has tempted the fates since he first faced 500 pounds of fury at the age of six.
But are these little bull fighters too young to be risking death in this extreme sport that they love? Not if you ask Rafita, who said he doesn't think about danger in the ring.
"For bullfighting there is no age," Rafita, now 14, told "20/20." "The only thing that counts is the decision to be there in front of the bull and enjoy being there. That gives me satisfaction!"
For Rafita, who lives south of the border in the small town of Aguascalientes, Mexico, it's not the danger, but the cheers from the crowd that give him the courage way beyond his years.
In Mexico City, Rafita performs at the biggest bullfighting ring in the world. He does well and though he's not strong enough yet to actually kill the bull, the crowd is not disappointed
"These are experiences that can never be compared to anything else," Rafita said, "to be carried out on people's shoulders, hearing the people shout, 'Torero, torero.'"
Rafita's parents -- who first dressed him in a bullfighting suit when he was only three years old, sent him to a special toreador school, and then arranged for a private coach to practice with him -- are well aware of the risks. In fact, they agonize over them. His father, who nervously stands watch at the edge of the ring during each contest, worries that if something terrible happens he will be blamed.
"Many times I have asked God if I am making a mistake," said Rafita's father, Rafael Mirabal. "Should I cut off Rafa's career right there and say, 'That's it, it's over?' I've lost sleep over it and the one who is responsible in this case would be me."
Rafita is in serious training to turn professional. He is still among the youngest bullfighters in the world, and arguably the best for his age. But despite his skills and the quickness of youth, he has often been hurt.
Rafita hit one the lowest points of his career nearly four years ago in Texcoco. Then just 10, he was knocked unconscious when a bull hit him in the face during a pass. He was sent out of the ring in an ambulance.
Rafita tried to downplay the injury when asked what it feels like to be hit by a bull six times his size.
"It feels like I made a mistake, like I messed up," he said.
When "20/20" first visited Rafita in October 2007, he was charged again by a 500-pound bull. He was knocked off his feet, and although he tried bravely to challenge the bull again, he was pummeled to the ground for a second time. Rafita's eye was cut and with tears in them he looked every bit the 11-year-old boy he was.
"Yes, I know about the blows, about the risks and that one day a bull could gore me to death," said Rafita, who wouldn't let it stop him from doing what he loves.
Should Parents Encourage Kids to Pursue a Dangerous Dream?
Suffering only minor injuries so far in his career, Rafita has been luckier than other kid bullfighters. Michelito Lagravere was once seriously injured when he was repeatedly stomped and thrown about the ring by an out-of-control bull, and Jairo Miguel nearly died when he was gored over and over again in front of thousands of fans.So, should parents intervene before their kid matadors are seriously injured, or even killed? The elder Mirabal recognizes his son's happiness and determination and has decided all of the anguish is worth it.
"When he has a good bullfight and I see him smiling in front of the bull, I think he is really enjoying life," he said. "I suffer at night, think of the possibility [of something bad happening], but while he keeps demonstrating that he wants to do this ... not just facing the bull, but his studies, his commitments ... I will continue to support him." But Columbia University's Dr. Elisabeth Guthrie, a pediatrician and psychiatrist, said there are actual physiological reasons for parental caution. Recent studies show that the brain does not fully develop until a child is past the teens, and one of the last parts to develop is the frontal lobe where judgment is formed.
"I think parents have to be their kids' frontal lobes for the first 10 or 15 years of their lives," Guthrie said. "And that's really our task."How young is too young for a child to face the extreme dangers of fighting in a bull ring? For the parents of a child with a special skill like Rafita, it may be the toughest question of all, and a risk that can end in huge personal rewards or cost a family its most precious gift.
"I don't feel like a bad parent, nor a very good parent," his father said. "I've tried to find the best in me and give it to him. [And] ... I think it would do him a lot of damage to just stop him from doing this."
end of the article .
The video
No parents would convince me that letting their children doing this dangerous thing and claim that it's for the best of their kids . They should be arrested.
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And to more dangerous things children allowed to do !!!!
Should a teen climbed Mount Everest !!!
well, it happened .
Teen Climber: Too Young to Scale Mt. Everest?
At 13, Jordan Romero has already scaled the world's highest peaks on six different continents. Last week, he became the youngest climber ever to make it to the top of Mount Everest. It's an astounding feat that has killed 220 climbers before him.
"I try not to let it get to my head. That was the key," he told "20/20 's" Elizabeth Vargas about blocking out the possibility of death while summiting Everest. Jordan's father, Paul Romero, who accompanied him on the record-breaking summit, said he talked to his son beforehand about the dangers of Everest -- a mountain that, in recent years, has claimed the life of one climber for every 80 who summit. "It's a well-known fact. If you die up on Mount Everest you stay there. That's your grave."
"I try not to let it get to my head. That was the key," he told "20/20 's" Elizabeth Vargas about blocking out the possibility of death while summiting Everest. Jordan's father, Paul Romero, who accompanied him on the record-breaking summit, said he talked to his son beforehand about the dangers of Everest -- a mountain that, in recent years, has claimed the life of one climber for every 80 who summit. "It's a well-known fact. If you die up on Mount Everest you stay there. That's your grave."
While many hailed Jordan's accomplishment, some asked who would send a 13-year-old up the world's highest peak, which is also among the most dangerous.
"I trust him completely. And I have from a young age. He's never been an adrenalin junkie that seems to take unnecessary risks," said his mother, Leigh Anne Drake. "He's very comfortable with what he can do and ...what is beyond his range of ability."
But where does the line end between fulfilling a child's dream and reckless parenting? Ken Kamler, who has climbed on Mt. Everest six times and penned "Surviving the Extremes" -- containing his account of the 1996 Everest storm in which eight climbers died -- said Jordan's climb was overly risky.
"I would not send my son up there at the age of 13," said Kamler. "I think the other doctor climbers that I know are in agreement...I don't think it needs to be done -- I think he can wait until he is older."
Jordan, from the ski town of Big Bear Lake, California , in the San Bernardino Mountains, set his sights on climbing the seven summits at age nine.
While his mother may have initially expressed passive concern at her son's dream to climb the seven summits, Jordan's father, an air rescue paramedic and adventurer, trained him, and encouraged him to become the youngest American at the time to scale Mt. Kilimanjaro at age 10. Then, they moved on to the tallest peaks in Australia, Russia, Argentina and Mt. McKinley -- also known as Denali -- all before he turned 12. Next on the list was Everest.
Everest has been the ultimate challenge for climbers for a reason. Kamler said brutally cold temperatures and strong winds create a wind chill factor worse than on Mars.
"Climbers up there are really at their limit," he said. "Breathing at sea level requires only 5 percent of your energy, whereas... the summit of Everest, it would require 70 percent of your energy."
To prepare, Jordan had a vigorous training regimen. He pulled weighted tires up the hills near his home and spent nights in a reduced oxygen tent to prepare his lungs for the thin air at altitudes above 20,000 feet.
With six peaks already conquered, Team Jordan -- Jordan, his father and his father's girlfriend Karen Lundgren -- set out for Everest. At the base of the mountain, Jordan said as he stared up, he was not intimidated.
"The summit really looks so close like, you know, you think you could just pack a couple of water bottles and a fleece and just go," he said.
But the journey was arduous, and despite his training, Jordan said he had difficulty breathing.
feels like you have cinder blocks on your legs," Jordan said. "But we weren't gasping for air up there. You know we were not suffocating, but we were breathing heavy..taking five-minute breaks every twenty seconds."
Climbers Question Team Jordan's Decisions
As Team Jordan ascended Everest, some climbers questioned two critical and potentially dangerous decisions they made: first, climbing without a professional Western guide. At more than $25,000, guides are an insurance policy if trouble occurs, often making life-saving choices on whether to go on or turn back. Jordan's dad said the group's members were "not rookies."
"We've been widely scrutinized for not having a guide -- with us," said Paul Romero. "The fact of the matter is that we didn't hire a Western guide. We did, in fact, hire three -- extremely experienced, professional Sherpa guides from Nepal that combined had nine summits."
The second line of criticism has been on their route. Most groups ascend from the South Side in Nepal, but Team Jordan traversed up the more perilous north face on the Tibetan side since the Nepal government says they don't issue permits to anyone under age 16.
"North Side is more technical. It has about twice more fatalities than the South Side. It is a whole lot colder and a whole lot windier," Paul Romero said. "But there's less objective dangers... that you can't predict and have no control over."
Approaching Camp One, Team Jordan encountered a towering wall of ice -- which suddenly collapsed. "I remember the first thing my father had said was, 'Jordan, those things can fall any minute,'' he said.
Jordan and his father were dragged down the mountain, buried under ice, but able to get out. They might have died had they not been attached to a rope. Less than 100 feet away, a Hungarian climber was killed, buried under a sheet of ice.
"Me and Jordan stood right there and watched a man die right next to us," said Paul Romero, whose head and legs were punctured by the spikes on Jordan's boots during the ice fall. "It was a real punch in the chest, reminding you that you're at Mt. Everest. There's no screwing around here."
"We said 'hi' to that guy right before it all had happened," Jordan said.
After the ice fall, Team Jordan waited for their weather window. At 25,000 feet, they hit hurricane-force winds, which blew away their Sherpa's tents and forced the six members of Team Jordan to squeeze into a three-man tent. Battered by 100-mile-an-hour winds, they barely clung to the side of the great mountain.
"We had wind pounding on us...a whole day it was storming. Other tents were literally being blown off the mountain and down off one side and going 100 feet up in the air just twirling," Jordan said. "That was a little bit scary. ...It's crazy up there. You can't even believe it. It's ... you know, we're up on this ridge where you're totally exposed."
On the Top of the World
After five weeks on Everest, Jordan reached the summit -- an accomplishment of a lifetime. "It felt really good. You know, it wasn't so much for the record, but, you know, I was just so happy that our whole team had done it," he said.
For a boy who has yet to finish eighth grade, Jordan seems to understand the words of Edmund Hillary, the first man to climb Everest, who once said, "It is not the mountain we conquer, but ourselves."
But when asked if other 13-year-olds should try Everest, Romero said he wouldn't recommend it.
"I wouldn't recommend it because it is a hard mountain and we prepared for it," he said. "To the kids out there, I just want to encourage them ... to dream big ...to find their own Everest."
Jordan Romero will become the youngest member of the Seven Summits club if he successfully climbs Mt. Vinson in Antarctica. That trip is planned for December.
You can watch the video on You Tube here
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What are we doing with our children. We are already in hell so why keep dragging them into the same hell hole we live in. They are children, if you didn't happen to have accomplish what you wanted in your younger years, they are not here to accomplish it for you.
You have them because you love them not because they are your gang to let them do your dirty work in the name of their dreams. They are children, their dreams are not completed yet. Today they want to be a hatter, tomorrow they want to be a matador, and maybe next they want to climb a mountain .
Sources :
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