Arms for children

By guest author Luciana Karine de Souza

What does a society do when its children kill? This question became intensely personal in Brazil with the recent shooting death of a college student in São Paulo. The victim was 19 years old; the shooter was 17.

Graffiti boy with gun
Seattle graffiti by bartleby78. Used under CC Attribution 2.0 Generic license.

Child and adolescent psychologists teach us that emotional stability, autonomy, and independence come with time and flourish when children develop secure attachments to the adults who care for them. But what happens when the adults providing children and adolescents with reciprocity, sensibility, monitoring, and so on, do so not for a humane education, but for crime education?

In today’s world, adolescents, and even younger children, are often introduced to guns early and taught how to engage in crime, drug trafficking, robbery, kidnapping, and even planned assassination. These firearms can provide not only money, but also prestige, attention, guidance, safety, and, in a way, some sort of education (how to be brave and strong when shooting, how to be firm and clear when confronting).

When we study and teach the concept of attachment, we focus on the positive roles of reciprocity, sensibility, safety, proximity, and attention in child development. To promote strong and secure attachment, we try to give our children love, embrace them with warmth, and surround them with our dedication. We offer them our arms and a safe haven. We strive to protect them, educate them, listen to them, and learn with them.

These arms, the arms of love, are the arms our children and adolescents need: arms to embrace them, safe and fulfilling arms, arms that protect them from violence, war, and hate. Not arms that kill. Not arms that fill the gap left by weak attachments. Arms that make them want to live and to allow to live. No arms should be stronger.

Luciana Karine de Souza is a full professor at Federal University of Minas Gerais, Brazil. Her teaching and research involve personality and social development in psychology, education, and leisure.