Under the scorching sun of a beautiful Saturday, I witnessed magnificence of existence and innocence being exploited. From this phrase, I evidently mean witnessing a lovely child being tormented under the burning sun to earn some cents for a living, either out of compulsion or out of exploitation. This picture has been deeply captured by my soul and transformed into a translucent motive for expressing my standpoint on this questionable subject through this post.
A child miseducated is a child lost.
John F. Kennedy
From the perspective of John F. Kennedy, a child who is not bestowed with proper education is considered to be ruined. If a child is not educated due to familial conditions, poverty, poor mental capacity, medical problem or any other reason, then that child will sooner or later end up in the labor market at a very tender age where he or she is tortured and exploited or even over-exploited. It is demoralizing to still witness child labor in this contemporary society where the advent of technology has revolutionized the world.
If we consider the adage of John F. Kennedy, a plausible question to ask is:
How many children has the world already lost and is still losing?
Another wise question to ponder upon is:
If technology has transformed the world into a mechanized planet, then why is child labor still prevalent?
The United Nations and the International Labor Organization consider child labor exploitative, with the UN stipulating, in article 32 of the Convention on the Rights of the Child that:
…States Parties recognize the right of the child to be protected from economic exploitation and from performing any work that is likely to be hazardous or to interfere with the child’s education, or to be harmful to the child’s health or physical, mental, spiritual, moral or social development.
(Worst Forms of Child Labor Recommendation, 1999″. International Labor Organization & Convention on the Rights of the Child”. United Nations. Archived from the original on 2006-10-03)
Despite the above-mentioned convention, you will be astounded to note that according to UNICEF, there is an estimated of 250 Million children aged 5 to 14 in child labor worldwide, excluding child domestic labor (Affirming Rights, UNICEF).
Though numerous countries respect the stipulated convention, many are still resistant and employ children to perform repetitive and tiresome tasks in factories, to undergo mining operations, to indulge in prostitution which is a pure form of child abuse, to work in agricultural field or to sell things on the road.
I guarantee you that the majority of these children are working with tears in their eyes and pain in their hearts. These tears matter. It is deplorable to admit this fact but it remains an undeniable truth. The pure reality of life does not always project itself and child labor is a concrete example to demonstrate this. Millions of children are working under compulsion and they are being over-exploited daily. Some are victim of sexual harassment, some of moral harassment while some have to face severe hardships. These children need our help though they are unable to voice out because they are working with fear of being beaten or harassed. It is painful to see how various countries are still tolerant to this practice which should have been banned earlier.
It is high time to stop this wrong attitude of taking everything for granted in this world. It is time to realize that in this modern age, it is impossible to entrust anybody. Societal evils are increasing at an alarming velocity while ruining the peace and harmony in our society.
If you are still reading this post, then I have a genuine request with you all:
If you witness any form of child labor and child exploitation, then please denounce this act through the local authorities of your country. Further, please initiate social movement to discourage this bad practice where innocence is played with and violated. Child labor is the violation of human rights which must be outlawed in every nook and corner of the world. If we wait for something to happen, nothing will change.
Leadership is not a choice, it is a duty.
Resources will not come to you; you have to create the resources.
The above-mentioned quotes are taken directly from my book entitled My Message of Youth Leadership. It is our duty to stop child labor and as I mentioned we cannot await resources to come to us, we have to create resources to make things happen. The least action matters and can save the life of an innocent child.
I am ending here but my deep consideration for this subject and hope from everyone to discourage child labor will not end here.
References: Child-Awareness.com http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Child_labour
Graphics are genuinely fastidious source of teaching instead of passage, its my familiarity, what would you say?
Right!
Thanks for this comment friend.