Toll free help line for children kept busy all year round

Some time ago the UN Committee for Children's Rights published its annual report on the Czech Republic. The report was generally positive although the committee's inspection team found some areas that require attention: improving the state of the environment which has an adverse affect on children's health, especially in terms of rising asthma and allergies, bringing back the institution of school doctors and dentists - or at least ensuring compulsory medical check ups for children, and taking measures to curb the high incidence of accidents involving children - which is liked to the high mortality on Czech roads in general. Judging by the UN report it would appear that as far as physical and psychological child abuse is concerned the Czech Republic is in a similar position to other European states. But what position is that ? In order to find out something more specific about the situation I called Mrs. Jarmila Knight who works for a toll free child help line and speaks with abused children every day.

"We are running public campaigns to increase awareness not only of physical abuse of children but also psychological abuse which is much more prevalent and it is much more dangerous, because it is not visible. When a child is being physically abused you can see bruises but psychological abuse is much harder to detect. So it is something that the public needs to be aware of, to be able to detect the signs. At the moment we are targeting predominantly teachers because they are, more or less, the only other adult person in the child's life whom he or she can turn to for help. And they themselves often do not know what to do."

Are you dealing with a lot of this - I mean psychological abuse?

"Very much so. We have had some retrospective research done - a year ago actually - where it came to light that 80% of our children were in one way or another psychologically abused. "

80% of what group - of all Czech children?!

"Yes, yes. A group of grown ups were asked questions about their childhood and that is the result. 80% of them were - in one way or another - psychologically abused as children."

That is truly surprising. What forms of abuse are we talking about here?

"Yes, it does sound horrific. You see there are numerous forms of psychological abuse. What it often involves is belittling children, telling him or her that they are stupid, that they do not know how to do anything, that they are bad...constantly putting them down. The child then feels unwanted, unloved..."

You say that 80% of Czechs have experienced this. Would it not help that in raising their own children they would make a conscious effort to avoid making the same mistakes - or would they be likely to repeat the pattern unconsciously ?

"You are touching upon something that has been researched significantly in the past and mostly it depends on the actual personality of the child that has been abused. It's either way. Some children are strong enough personalities in themselves to see the pattern and try to avoid it and break it, others - and there are many such cases unfortunately - do carry on in the same behavioral pattern that marked their own childhood. That is a very dangerous phenomenon. We are seeing this in schools for example, where there's a lot of bullying going on. Many of the abusers are themselves victims of physical or psychological abuse in their own families. "

You work with abused children. They turn to you for help. What happens when you challenge the parents? Do you have cases where parents are completely unaware of what they are doing to their children - or do they get aggressive and tell you that it is none of your business?

"We do not generally contact parents. As a help line we are anonymous. Children call us with their problem, trusting that we will not take it any further and trusting that we will not "tell on them" so to speak. So unless there is danger of further serious abuse we keep the calls anonymous. We do not try to persuade children to tell us their name or where they live."

So basically, you can only advise the child what to do or who to turn to. You can't break the pattern with one phone call...so what do you do?

"Well, that's the problem, you see. We are back to preventive measures. Educational campaigns. For example we are currently running a campaign in the metro that concerns children's rights."

So children who call you get some comfort from speaking to you and some good advice but unless they turn elsewhere or someone in their vicinity gives them a helping hand they are pretty much stuck in the situation they are in......

"Absolutely. That is correct, unfortunately. It is terrible and that is why we have de-briefing sessions with our consultants because they feel very, very bad about not being able to provide immediate help - going in and saving the child, so to speak. That's very hard to take and in this respect we are more or less powerless. We cannot solve the situation for the child. Unless the child is willing to get help and says: Yes, I want you to do this, to phone my teacher, to arrange an interview with a social worker etc. etc. - unless the child wants to do that - we cannot act. "

Do children call you repeatedly?

"Yes they do. Many of them have actually been calling us for years and years. Telling us about their progress and what's been happening to them and so on. Yes, they do call repeatedly. Some of them..."

So you help them to survive?

"We help them to see their situation from the outside. We tell them how we can help, what their options are, we tell them what to concentrate on and how to best deal with the situation. We try to put it in the right perspective for the child."

Do many Czech teenagers and children run away from home as a way of solving their problem?

"Quite a few, yes. This has become a trend in recent years which we are trying to address - and again, we have been criticized for not addressing this problem adequately. Our main concern is that children who run away from home just want to solve their immediate problem with their family and do not realize that they are in much greater danger when for example they fall into the hands of various street gangs...commercial exploitation, sexual exploitation..."

They are also at risk from drugs, are they not?

Absolutely. That is one of the problems. And then once you get into this vicious circle of earning money some other way, that is very damaging to yourself and your soul but it pays for your way of life, then you can easily get past the point of no return."

Would you say that Czech children and teenagers have a bigger problem with drugs and prostitution that children in other states?

"I cannot actually say that with full conviction, because I simply do not know. But it is on the increase and it is a very worrying trend. It is a worrying trend all over Europe, all over the world and we have to address it much more seriously than we have done in the past. What is most worrying - and that is connected with the crime rate - is that although there is not an increase of children committing crime, the children who do so start much younger. That is a very worrying aspect."

Do feel that the fact that this is not a very religious country might play an important role in this?

"It might play a role, but I think that other countries who are much more religious than we are have the same problem. Somehow it is more to do with the new trends of civilization. Greater detachment. Busy parents. Not enough care for the child. Not enough concern for the child within the family group and not enough emphasis on family life."