Report child abuse or not?

The neighbour of a friend has 2 lovely children; an 11 year old boy and a 8 year old girl. The children are very nice kids, but recently they started to behave rather rude.

The last few months, he often hears the children crying and the parents yelling at them. The parents also hit the children quite hard, not just spanking or so, but with the a stick on the head. The children have bruises on their head (black eyes, …) and on their face.

Because of this, the kids get bullied at their school and often throw a tantrum when they play with the children of my friend. He and his children also noticed some burning wounds on the legs of these children.

Should he call the police or look for someone to mediate?
What would you do?

I’m not sure how you could mediate between a concerned bystander, powerless child, and abusive parent. Call the police.

Here’s a number for social serices that VW gave me awhile back when facing a similar thing. 2720-6528. They speak English. I suggest calling them rather than the police. It’s a terrible thing, but you have already taken the first step to getting them help. :notworthy:

Yea call the number. I feel that one of the biggest problems here is that people just turn a blind eye to everything, nobody wants to get involved. Maybe if more people stand up and demand what is right things may slowly change.
More importantly these kids deserve better, they are kids for God’s sake !
help them

[quote=“shifty”]Yea call the number. I feel that one of the biggest problems here is that people just turn a blind eye to everything, nobody wants to get involved. Maybe if more people stand up and demand what is right things may slowly change.
More importantly these kids deserve better, they are kids for God’s sake !
help them[/quote]

Well, hopefully the people at the end of that phone number feel differently.

Burns!? Call them. :fume:

To be fair, people here are happy to get directly involved when the cops lead out those accused of the worst offences. A whack-whack here, and a whack-whack there, and the stupid bugger’s lucky to find himself in lock-up rather than the hospital. But to get to that point somebody needs to do something. Do call.

[quote=“dargus”]
Should he call the police or look for someone to mediate?
What would you do?[/quote]
Are you kiding me? I am sorry but your friend is a real idiot if he has to wonder “Should I call the police?” Come on… :loco: :fume: :fume: :loco: :astonished: :astonished:
Bruises, burns…what else does he need?

[quote=“igorveni”][quote=“dargus”]
Should he call the police or look for someone to mediate?
What would you do?[/quote]
Are you kiding me? I am sorry but your friend is a real idiot if he has to wonder “Should I call the police?” Come on… :loco: :fume: :fume: :loco: :astonished: :astonished:
Bruises, burns…what else does he need?[/quote]
I get the impression the OP isn’t asking if he should call someone – he already seems to know that. He seems to be asking whether the police is a good first choice, to which the answer is a resounding NO! They’ll do absolutely squat.
Use the social services number instead. If the police have to be brought in, let social services do it. They’ll know the best way to get the police to do something.

My friend could call the social service number and they take it up from there. He surely would prefer to do something like that rather than calling the police. His wife is afraid to lose face in their neighbourhood for doing so. Would you be afraid to lose face?

He warned his neighbours about the situation and threatened to call the police, if the situation would get any worse.
His neighbour replied that the so-called burnings wounds seemed to be the result of an abnormal kind of chemical reaction after their mother put some medicine on their legs (weird Chinese explanation). Furthermore, he said my friend and his children should mind their own business. On top of that, the neighbour also said that his children will not be allowed anymore to play with my friend’s children.

Other people in his neighbourhood are also getting involved in this.
Some of them support the neighbour. saying that corporal punishment is a way of education in Taiwan. Do people really turn a blind eye to siumilar abusive behaviour?

Yes, people do and not just in Taiwan. In the West lots of kids have died after being systematically abused for extended periods of time. Child abuse is worldwide, and so is turning a blind eye.

That’s what you can expect from confronting the parent— abusive or not.

[quote]Other people in his neighbourhood are also getting involved in this.
Some of them support the neighbour. saying that corporal punishment is a way of education in Taiwan. Do people really turn a blind eye to siumilar abusive behaviour?[/quote]
Nothing says we have to put aside our own morality because we live in another culture. If we believe something is wrong we have just as much right as anyone else to stand up for our beliefs. If we believe something is immoral, what’s stopping us from acting to prevent it?

There’s a time to respect other people’s culture and accept how they do things. When how they do things is abusing a kid, that’s not the time.

Call social services.

That’s what you can expect from confronting the parent— abusive or not.

[quote]Other people in his neighbourhood are also getting involved in this.
Some of them support the neighbour. saying that corporal punishment is a way of education in Taiwan. Do people really turn a blind eye to siumilar abusive behaviour?[/quote]
Nothing says we have to put aside our own morality because we live in another culture. If we believe something is wrong we have just as much right as anyone else to stand up for our beliefs. If we believe something is immoral, what’s stopping us from acting to prevent it?

There’s a time to respect other people’s culture and accept how they do things. When how they do things is abusing a kid, that’s not the time.

Call social services.[/quote]

Very well said, right on.

To the OP: dude, you need to call social services. I know that you’re probably concerned about becoming too involved and perhaps offending your friend and/or his wife, or making them lose face. But think about it this way: which is worth more, your relationship with your friend or the safety of these children? These kids don’t have anybody fighting for them. Your statement that the other neighbors are “getting involved” is a little vague. Why exactly does that mean? Have you they threatened to call the police and/or social services? Have they dragged out these abusive parents and monkey-stomped the shit out of the f*ckers? Or have they just smiled and nodded and mentioned over a spot of woolong tea that corporal punishment is necessary but shouldn’t be overdone?

That “chemical reaction” story sounds like a load of horseshit. How’d they get the black eyes? By falling down the stairs? I admire you for taking the first step but it’s to time to step up and call social services, the police, or anybody else who may do something to stop this abuse.

2 days ago, they called social services.
Some people of that service came, interviewed the neighbours, but they didn’t notice anything in particular. The mother hit the children, because she thought the children told somebody.
Yesterday, the youngest child was in the hospital with a broken jaw.
A concerned neighbour called the police and the mother is in jail now.
The father was not at home when this incident occured.
Looks like she is going to spend some time there to think things over.
The father wants to file for divorce and to take the children to his parents in the South.
Things happen really fast sometimes.

To the OP: dude, you need to call social services. I know that you’re probably concerned about becoming too involved and perhaps offending your friend and/or his wife, or making them lose face. But think about it this way: which is worth more, your relationship with your friend or the safety of these children? These kids don’t have anybody fighting for them. Your statement that the other neighbors are “getting involved” is a little vague. Why exactly does that mean? Have you they threatened to call the police and/or social services? Have they dragged out these abusive parents and monkey-stomped the shit out of the f*ckers? Or have they just smiled and nodded and mentioned over a spot of woolong tea that corporal punishment is necessary but shouldn’t be overdone?

That “chemical reaction” story sounds like a load of horseshit. How’d they get the black eyes? By falling down the stairs? I admire you for taking the first step but it’s to time to step up and call social services, the police, or anybody else who may do something to stop this abuse.

[quote=“dargus”]2 days ago, they called social services.
Some people of that service came, interviewed the neighbours, but they didn’t notice anything in particular. The mother hit the children, because she thought the children told somebody.
Yesterday, the youngest child was in the hospital with a broken jaw.
A concerned neighbour called the police and the mother is in jail now.
The father was not at home when this incident occured.
Looks like she is going to spend some time there to think things over.
The father wants to file for divorce and to take the children to his parents in the South.
Things happen really fast sometimes.
[/quote]

Shame the Social Services were so shite, but then they probably have limited powers (What would I know?).

Glad your friends phoned them before the broken jaw though, or they would’ve felt guilty afterwards.

If the broken jaw ended up being a result of social services being called, well it’s probably (actually, definitely) worth it in the long run.

Looks like this story is going to have a happy ending. Most excellent.

But wait…couldn’t the father be one of the abusers?

My first thought. Oh no.

My first thought. Oh no.[/quote]
I tend to think not – if he’s also an abuser, why would he be divorcing his wife and taking the kids to the grandparents? Sounds to me like it was the mother doing it. SHE hit the kids for alerting social services and SHE broke the kid’s jaw, he wasn’t even there. She probably had been telling him all kinds of convincing “fell down the stairs” stories and threatening the kids not to tell.

Anyway, at least she sounds like she’s out of the picture, at least for now.

She broke her own son’s jaw…amazing.

The seventh circle of Hell is reserved for child abusers.

-The father called a lawyer, who should take care of the divorce.
-Social services wanted to take the children away from the father,
but both his children seem to be in the South of Taiwan now.
-Looks like this story may have a happy ending after all?
-The mother is in jail, but nobody pays her bail.
-My friend feels very relieved about all this now.
-The other neighbours are very satisfied as well;
no more crying and no more shouting.
They all seem to think: piece and a silent environment at last.