***
We do live in a civilized society, right? Every once in a while I can almost convince myself that we do and then I read an article like this:
The Spartans developed a training system wherein children were taken from their homes at the age of 7 and raised in military camps. There they were routinely beaten and starved, often to death. Extreme violence was encouraged as well as cunning and thievery. Usually the only way they got to eat was by stealing food from someone else and this method was lauded unless they were caught. The punishment meted out for being caught was severe and if they managed to survive all of this, their final test involved killing a helot, or serf, without getting caught.
Little has changed since the time of the Spartans; if anything the problem has gotten worse. Although their methods were barbaric to the extreme, the Spartans did actually train these children for war. Today children are thrown into violent situations with no training at all. They are simply brainwashed/threatened, convinced to follow commands and then used as sacrificial lambs. These are not tomorrow’s warriors; they are tomorrow’s serial killers. In the all too likely event these children are captured, their own military will not claim them or make any effort to get them released. They are considered disposable.
As if the physical and psychological abuse were not enough, these children are also abused sexually. Often young girls are kidnapped and held by the troops and then routinely raped and abused.
Facts About Child Soldiers
- Today, as many as 300,000 children under the age of 18 serve in government forces or armed rebel groups. Some are as young as eight years old.
- The participation of child soldiers has been reported in 33 on-going or recent armed conflicts in almost every region of the world.
- Child soldiers are used by armed opposition forces, although many are used by government armies.
- Children are uniquely vulnerable to military recruitment because of their emotional and physical immaturity. They are easily manipulated and can be drawn into violence that they are too young to resist or understand.
- Technological advances in weaponry and the proliferation of small arms have contributed to the increased use of child soldiers. Lightweight automatic weapons are simple to operate, often easily accessible, and can be used by children as easily as adults.
- Children are most likely to become child soldiers if they are poor, separated from their families, displaced from their homes, living in a combat zone or have limited access to education. Orphans and refugees are particularly vulnerable to recruitment.
- Many children join armed groups because of economic or social pressure, or because children believe that the group will offer food or security. Others are forcibly recruited, “press-ganged” or abducted by armed groups.
- Both girls and boys are used as child soldiers. In case studies in El Salvador, Ethiopia, and Uganda, almost a third of the child soldiers were reported to be girls. Girls may be raped, or in some cases, given to military commanders as “wives.”
- Once recruited, child soldiers may serve as porters or cooks, guards, messengers or spies. Many are pressed into combat, where they may be forced to the front lines or sent into minefields ahead of older troops. Some children have been used for suicide missions.
- Children are sometimes forced to commit atrocities against their own family or neighbors. Such practices help ensure that the child is “stigmatized” and unable to return to his or her home community.
- Few peace treaties recognize the existence of child soldiers, or make provisions for their rehabilitation and reintegration into society. Many former child soldiers do not have access to the educational programs, vocational training, family reunification, or even food and shelter that they need to successfully rejoin civilian society. As a result, many end up on the street, become involved in crime, or are drawn back into armed conflict.
Please visit the Human Rights Watch website and join the movement to stop this abuse of children.
***
There is a fantastic book on this topic written by former child soldier Ishmael Beah. The book is entitled “A long way gone: memoirs of a boy soldier”. I highly recommend it to anyone interested in this subject.
While I am not saying it’s alright to shove a gun into children’s hands and throw them on the battlefield, as Al Qaeda or the Nazis, it seems a gross over-simplification to describe Spartan training systems of some 2,500 years ago as “barbaric to the extreme”. First, Spartan children were not trained to fight as children, but were trained so they could fight, if need be in defense of their state, when they reached adulthood. Second, while “extreme violence was encouraged” as a part of the training environment, just as emphasized was order and political and social structure. Training children was not a means by which to quickly pick up a new weapon to use in war, but was a way of life Spartans were fiercely proud of and was the basis of their entire society. To vilify several hundred years of one of the most successful Greek city-states because it was based on a rigidly militaristic society that included universal training of male children seems both ignorant and a tad xenophobic.
so james you get all your info from this movie 300…
with an hint of racism….
greeks blah blah blah….o please!