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Sex, Love, Needs, Rights

Is having a child for the direct purpose of filling your own unmet needs a type of abuse? This is the general question I want to address in this article.

Many people don't consider having a child in order to use them to fill their unmet emotional needs any kind of abuse. But I think it probably is. To help support my position, I would like you to consider the following scenario to show how having a child in other to fill your unmet emotional needs could be considered similar in principle to a more widely known form of abuse, that of sexual abuse.

Let's say I told people that I wanted to have a baby so I could create a child which I could use to have sex with. I explained to them that I wanted to fill my unmet sexual needs. Wouldn't most people around the world would feel disgusted and think I am a very sick person?

But what if I said I wanted to have a baby so I could have someone who loved me unconditionally, and in this way try to use the child to fill my unmet emotional needs? This would not raise many eyebrows. In fact, most people probably would not understand the implications and ramifications of this.

Now consider this reality...

The other day I read an article which said that around 80% of the pregnant single teenage females interviewed said they wanted to have the child so they would have someone to love them unconditionally.

What do we, as society, think about this? Is this okay? Is it healthy for our species to have children for this purpose? Is starting out this way likely to lead to children with emotional problems later in life?

A teen who we provide online emotional support to told us that her father used to force hugs on her. He tried to make her feel guilty when she pulled away. I have heard similar things before.

What if he wanted her to masturbate him? And what if he tried to make her feel guilty when she told him she didn’t want to? Would this have any emotional consequences for her?

While staying with a family in Australia for several days I met a teenager whose father used her in many ways. One of these ways was to give him massages when he had migraine headaches. She did this on his hairy, bare back. My instinct told me something was wrong with this, but I didn't know just how dysfunctional the family was at the time. What I did know is how much the daughter hated giving him the massages, and that she only did it because she was taught it was her duty and she felt guilty if she didn't do it.

Years later this same daughter told me two facts which confirmed the family dysfunction. First, the oldest daughter who was giving her father massages told me at age 20 she tried to kill herself. Then she told me one of her younger sisters had accused the father of sexually abusing her.

So I am wondering now… when two people have sex and create a human being, what “rights” do we give those two people ? Do they have the right to use their children and teenagers to fill their own unmet needs, even at the expense of those same people's emotional well-being? I am also wondering if it is fair to say that a god of some sort somehow gives these people, now suddenly called parents, certain rights.

You have probably heard the phrase “God given right.” Parents have told me for example, it is their "God given right" to have children, regardless of how good of parents they will be. But what does it mean exactly to have a god given right? Let’s imagine there is a god and that this god gives two people who have sex certain rights when they create a human life which most of us around the world call “their” “child.” (see
note on my use of quotes).

I am, by the way, very unsure of how these rights would have any practical meaning if no one else believed either a) that there even was a god or b) that the god gave the two people called parents certain rights over the new human they created through a sexual act.

If the god did not have his or her own police force and jails, and no one else enforced or believed in the god-given rights, what practical value would they have? If for example a child or teenager decided they didn't like being used or abused and they wanted to leave, what good would it do for the parents to say "It is my god-given right to force them to stay with me and to use force to return them to me if they escape." Who would return the child or teen to the parent? Would their god somehow cause the return? And if the god wanted the child or teen to stay with the parent until some arbitrary age, why would that god allow the child or teen to leave in the first place?

Also I am not sure what happens when two groups of people who do have police forces and jails, or nuclear weapons, think that they are the agents of some particular god, and they are here to here to "carry out his or her will", but those groups of people disagree on just what their gods’ will is.

But let’s simplify things for the point of this discussion. Let’s say there is just one god. Let’s call him “God” with a capital G, as so many people around the world actually do. So what rights does “God” give two people who have sex and create a new human life?

I am going to assume that most of you reading this will agree that “God” does not give the father the right to ask or demand that a son or daughter he has created, to give him oral sex when he desires it or feels a need for it. I am also going to assume most of you will agree that “God” doesn’t give the father the right to obligate his so or daughter to masturbate said father.

But what about the story in The Bible? In that story two daughters have sex with their father so they can keep the family going. (
See below) Is it a man's God given right to have sex with his own daughters to keep the family going? According to the bible story Lot's daughters chose to have sex with their father, so we can't blame the father for sexually abusing them. But what if the bible had said instead that Lot got his daughters drunk and impregnated them? Or what if it said he convinced them that as his daughters they had a "duty" to him to have sex with him to keep the family going? Or that he had a "God given right" to rape them in order to keep the family going? By the way, I personally think that it is much more likely that a father would force sex upon his daughters than that the daughters would decided to have sex with their drunken father.

So I return to the question of what "rights" does a parent have when they create a new human life? And perhaps more importantly, what are the mental health consequences for giving parents the "right" to use their children and teenagers to meet their unmet needs. At this point in history most countries have decided it is not ok for parents to use their children to meet their unmet sexual needs. We might also say that most countries don't allow parents to physically abuse their children so the parents can feel more powerful and in control, thus filling those unmet emotional or psychological needs.

But what about the other emotional needs and the methods used by parents to try to get their offspring to fill them? What about a parent who never felt appreciated so they force their child to always say, "Thank you." Or what about a parent who never got the respect they needed from their parents so they force their children to say things like "Yes, sir" and they teach them not to question their decisions because that would be "a lack of respect"?

I hope that this article has given you something to think about.

S. Hein


My quotes around "their" and "child"

I don’t like either the word “their” or the word “child”, that’s why I put them in quotes.

When it comes to whether a child or teen belongs to the parents and thus can be called "theirs," I have a simple saying -- "Something isnt "mine" unless I can sell it." So I don't usually say "My country" - since I can't sell it, or "My girlfriend" etc.

Also I don’t believe a 17 year old is a child. Nor do I think a 13 year old is a child, although some are much more mature than others at 13. I have seen some of the writing done by a few 13 year olds and I feel confident that it is on the level of most first year university students.


Lot and His Daugthers

Here is one quote from Wikipedia

In Gen. 19:30-38, Lot's daughters incorrectly believed they were the only females to have survived the devastation. They assumed it was their responsibility to bear children and enable the continuation of the human race. On two subsequent nights, they got their father drunk enough to sleep with them, and they became pregnant. The first son was named Moab (Hebrew, lit., "from the father" [meh-Av]). He was the patriarch of the nation known as Moab. The second son was named Ammon or Ben-Ammi (Hebrew, lit., "from our nation"). He became the patriarch of the nation of Ammon.

 


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Here is another quote from http://www.biblestudy.org/question/was-lot-alcoholic.html

 

Lot, after fleeing Sodom, got drunk and had sex with his daughters.
Was Lot an alcoholic? Was he tricked to do what he did?

Q. Was Lot an alcoholic who committed incest? Or was he tricked into getting drunk and having sex with his daughters? Why did Lot do what he did?

A. To answer your question concerning Lot, no, he was not an alcoholic; not even close. You will find in the New Testament book of 2Peter that Lot is considered a good man, righteous in God's eyes.

"If by turning the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah to ashes he condemned them to extinction and made them an example to those who were to be ungodly; and if he rescued righteous Lot, greatly distressed by the licentiousness of the wicked (for by what that righteous man saw and heard as he lived among them, he was vexed in his righteous soul day after day with their lawless deeds)..." (2Peter 2:6-8, RSV)

The scripture that discusses Lot's sex with his daughters is found in the book of Genesis:

"The sun was rising as Lot reached the village. Then the LORD rained down fire and burning sulfur from the heavens on Sodom and Gomorrah. He utterly destroyed them, along with the other cities and villages of the plain, eliminating all life—people, plants, and animals alike. . . Afterward Lot left Zoar because he was afraid of the people there, and he went to live in a cave in the mountains with his two daughters.

"One day the older daughter said to her sister, "There isn’t a man anywhere in this entire area for us to marry. And our father will soon be too old to have children. Come, let’s get him drunk with wine, and then we will sleep with him. That way we will preserve our family line through our father." So that night they got him drunk, and the older daughter went in and slept with her father. He was unaware of her lying down or getting up again.

"The next morning the older daughter said to her younger sister, "I slept with our father last night. Let’s get him drunk with wine again tonight, and you go in and sleep with him. That way our family line will be preserved." So that night they got him drunk again, and the younger daughter went in and slept with him. As before, he was unaware of her lying down or getting up again. So both of Lot’s daughters became pregnant by their father." (Genesis 19:23-25, 30-36 , NLT)

Consider the awesome and powerful events that Lot's family experienced in a relatively short time. They witnessed the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah totally destroyed by fire and brimstone rained down from heaven by God. Then Lot's wife is turned into a pillar of salt because of her disobedience. The family is eventually forced, out of fear, to live in a cave. Given the situation wouldn't you be a bit distressed and afraid of what might happen next? Lot's daughters must have thought it was the end of civilization and that they were some of the only people then living. They were obviously greatly concerned about the future of their family (and possibly the human race). This concern led them to do what they did.

Lot's daughters, wanting to continue the family, got their father so filled with food and wine that he became totally unaware of what was going on. Their intent of preserving their family name was a noble one, but they certainly went about it in the wrong way. Other Recommended Bible Study Materials:

By the way, just before this, according to the Bible, Lot also offered his daughters to some men who evidently first wanted to commit homosexual rape upon some male "angels" staying with Lot. Is it Lot's God-given right as the father to offer his daughter's virginity to the men?

Here is section from Genesis 19:8

I have two daughters which have not known man; let me, I pray you, bring them out unto you, and do ye to them as is good in your eyes."

Lot refuses to give up his angels to the perverted mob, offering his two "virgin daughters" instead. He tells the bunch of angel-rapers to "do unto them [his daughters] as is good in your eyes." (source)