Child Soldiers. What Should be Done

Child Soldiers

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Each day, children eating dinner have their houses broken into by men, and then have to choose the toughest decision of their life. Between beating their parents to death or being killed themselves. This is the problem children face all over the countries in South America, Africa, and Asia. This is a travesty that must be stopped before more and more children and tortured, killed, and scarred mentally for the rest of their lives. The forces taking these children though will lie about why they will say “We use children due to a shortage of adults” (An Overview, SKS.sirs.com.) While in most cases they are using the children because they are easier to make into a killer (An Overview, SKS.sirs.com.) Or because “Children make good fighters because they’re young and want to show off. They think its all a game” (The Use of Child Soldiers in Africa, Relifeweb.)

Poverty is the backbone of this problem. Without poverty the child soldier problem would shrivel to a very small amount. Poverty causes children’s families to need money so the choice is to send your child to a farm to work for a few years and earn possibly only as much as $100 or send your child to a armed force group to earn money. A survey shows that currently 61% of child soldiers live in a family with $0 worth of income, and that 31% of the 61% of the child soldiers are living in a family with over 6 siblings. This shows that the majority of the children are joining because of the money issues. (Causes, Young Blood.) If 61% of them have no income the chances of the 49% other having much more than $2.00 of income a day. (The poverty mark.) is not very good.

Another cause is the lack of education or education from the army. This problem is happening everyone including the U.S. The lack of education may cause children to turn to the army to learn whether its army tactics or not. The education of the army is what is affecting children everywhere including the U.S. The recruiters will come to high schools and attempt to lure children into joining the army. While this may not be a child soldier in some developed countries with the optional protocol, (a document made by the U.N. to stop child soldiers.) it sets it to a minimum of only 16. This means that it could convince a 16 year old to join the army. (Child Soldiers, United Nations.)