WOMEN ARE NOW taking a leaf out of men’s book, partying just as heartily and not worrying that they have children to care for at home.
Coroner Faith Marshall-Harris made this complaint yesterday as she addressed the congregation of the Church of Christ the King, in Rock Dundo Park, St Michael.
She said one problem faced by families was that some fathers were not as supportive as they should be.
“. . . What has happened in the community to cause further breakdown is that a number of our mothers who are very young are no longer the mothers of yesteryear,” Marshall-Harris remarked.
“They themselves are starting to take a leaf out of men’s book and saying that if you can party, so can I.
“Secondly, the extended family seems to be eroding in that granny is also partying still.”
Marshall-Harris charged that both mothers and fathers seemed to cease seeing parenting as their first and primary job “once they brought this child into the world”.
The coroner stressed that abandonment of children was one of the most serious and traumatic events in a child’s life, even though it may be internalized by the child and not expressed. It was “most traumatic to young boys in our community”, she pointed out.
“I do not speak from the basis of just feeling, for every young person who I feel is traumatised in this way, I order a psychological investigation,” she told the gathering. “And so out of these evaluations we know what causes the breakdown in this child’s life.
“That is how I would know things like his mother and his father are into constant fights, which is one of the big problems that we have.
“The domestic abuse is leading to a lot of trauma in children. They watch it happen, they see it happen and unfortunately.”
Marshall-Harris added: “Since the church is such an important and cohesive force in this community, then I believe that the church has a tremendous role to play in assisting these troubled persons with children.”