By Xin Ping
Alyse and Ava Williams, 6 and 9, had been used to their parents’ fighting with each other over their tight daily budget. Their father had been laid off in a warehouse since the breakout of the Covid-19 pandemic two years ago. On the first day of 2021, their mother ran out of their house after a big quarrel with their father who had prior domestic violence charges. Hours later, the two girls were shot dead by their father before taking his own life. They became the first children to die of gun violence in 2021.
The tragedy of Alyse and Ava is just one of the many harrowing stories of children suffering from poverty, maltreatment and gun violence across the U.S., shedding some light on the darkest chapter of human rights abuses in the U.S.
It is almost unimaginable that the U.S., the world’s largest economy, has the highest rate of child poverty among developed nations. Studies from Child Trends, an American non-profit research center concluded that child poverty rate in the U.S. stood at 17.5% in 2020, or roughly 12.5 million children living in poverty, almost the same rate as three decades ago. According to the Center on Poverty and Social Policy at Columbia University, in April 2020, nearly 22% of American children had at least one unemployed parent, the highest rate observed since 1967. Although the U.S. is equipped with the most advanced medical facilities and expertise, 45 countries maintained lower infant mortality rates than the U.S. as of 2019.
While poverty might affect the living standard of American children, family abuse and gun violence pose a deadly threat to their life. Over 3 million cases of child abuse are annually reported in the U.S, among which almost 10% suffered from sexual assault. It is estimated that 1,000 children per year die as a result of violence or negligence in the U.S., most of whom are younger than 4 years old.
The gun violence or “gundemic” ravaging across the country also takes a heavy toll. According to a 2019 study by the Center for Violence Prevention, Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, gun injuries were the second-leading cause of death among U.S. children and teens, and the leading cause of death of among high school students. In 2021, a child was shot every hour, according to calculation from the Washington Post. Data from the U.S. Center for Disease Control and Prevention indicate that the rate of gun deaths of children under 14 and younger rose by roughly 50 percent from the end of 2019 to the end of 2020. The report from the Children’s Defense Fund indicated that since 1963, almost 190,000 teens had been killed by guns on the American soil, four times the number of U.S. soldiers killed in the Vietnam, the Gulf, Afghanistan and Iraq wars combined. Most of the cases were only met with brief headline news.
Surprisingly enough, the U.S. is the only country in the world that has not ratified the Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC), enshrining children’s right to education, health care, expression, etc. In absence of child care aligning with the international standards or domestic political agenda designated for kids’ protection, American children’ rights have been deteriorating over the years. A 2020 report from the medical journal The Lancet found that the U.S. ranked 39th worldwide on measurements of children’s survival, health, education and nutrition. However, some U.S. politicians contend that “American children and families are better served by constitutional democracy than international law” and U.S. sovereignty should not be compromised. Thus their hypocrisy and double standard have been fully exposed.
There can be no keener revelation of a society’s soul than the way in which it treats its children, as put Nelson Mandela. Children’s rights and well-being have never been among the top priorities on the agenda of the U.S. government who is still obsessed with its hegemonic ambition and lecturing others over human rights issues. That undoubtedly is one of the blindest spots of the so-called “beacon for human rights”.
(Xin Ping is a commentator on international affairs, writing regularly for Global Times, China Daily, etc. He can be reached at xinping604@gmail.com.)
