Speak out to stem the tide of child killings

THE senseless killing of children indicates that the message of zerotolerance for these heinous acts has not reached the right eyes.

A change in the nation’s attitude has to start at community level. Children are most often abused and killed by people they know, and people known within the community.

There has to be a change towards a more proactive approach of childcare and protection by the entire community. In the close-knit environment of our communities, someone knows when and how a crime against a child has been perpetrated. Empowering these individuals to speak out will be critical in our efforts to stem the wave of violence against children.

This is one area of crime that we have to pull our collective energies together to address. Our children should not be victims of the culture of violence in our nation when we can act to prevent their abuse and murder.

The state of numbness we have reached wherein we dismiss child murders as just another horrible news item is a worrying one that we must shake ourselves out of. The escalating cruelty against the nation’s children should not only move us to tears, but also to action.