Review child protection policies - get the balance right

national | miscellaneous | event notice Thursday September 09, 2004 22:49 by Robert Hamm - Sligo Olympic Handball Association soha2000 at gmx dot net 17, Meadow Vale, Sligo 071 9150428

Public presentation of fear issues

SOHA organises a series of talks to review child protection policies. The first event will be staged in Sligo at 24/25th of September.
It will deal with the public presentation of fear issues, which strongly influences the debates about child protection in various areas as school, child-care, yoth work or sport.

Review: Child protection policies
Get the Balance right!


Public Presentation of Fear Issues

Guest speakers:

Claire Fox, Institute of Ideas, London

Stuart Waiton, Generation Youth Issues, Glasgow


Public talk
Friday
24th of September
20.00 h
Sligo IT
Aula Maxima
Admission free


Workshop
Saturday
25th of September
13.00 h – 17.00 h
Model Arts Niland Gallery
Admission free
registration necessary
limited participation
see info on back




organised by Sligo Olympic Handball Association

supported by
Model Arts Niland Gallery
Sligo IT Sports Department



Debates about child protection in Ireland are going through all fields of work with children and youth.
Initiated after decades of neglect and on a background of high profile cases of sexual abuse these debates were more than welcome! However the discussions seem to have a paradoxical effect.

If the idea is to improve the quality of life (for children, for youths, for everyone!) then one has to realise that the constant drawing on fear issues in fields of work with children and youth is contradictory to the envisaged aim.

Positions currently circulated in codes of ethics, codes of conduct, guidelines etc. far too often paint a picture of harm and danger where rather trust and understanding would be required between partners in social interaction (child-care, school, sport, youth work etc.).

The whole debate runs out of balance, where fear becomes the driving force for behaviour. Dialogue of two teachers:
“If a child gets sick and parents can’t collect her, I would not bring her home in my car.”
“But sure, you could always take a second child with you in the car, to cover yourself.”
“Yes, but what about coming back from the house, when the sick child is left home?”
“Well, then take another child with you, so you have two on the way back as well.”

Where thoughts like this enter the minds of teachers (childminders, coaches, youth workers), something completely wrong seems to happen. Children are seen as a danger by their teachers/coaches as well as the teachers/coaches are designed as a danger to the children. That is not a healthy relationship!

Underlying the debate are moral traits that are deeply rooted in a fear of sexuality. And, the same old recipes are presented in a new look. Physical contact is suspicious, thus avoid it. Being alone with a child is suspicious, thus make sure that there is always someone nearby (as a teacher, if you are alone with one child in a class-room, always have the door open!). This is the breeding ground for neurosis – for ALL participants in the context. Do not think that there would be no effects for the children of neurotic teachers/coaches!

The whole debate is presented in the interest of children and the vocabulary that is used sounds progressive. Indeed there are elements in the various materials that would have a liberating potential, yet the context in which they are embedded fires back on them.

We wish to examine the whole complex in-depth and try to find a balanced position that is in the interest of all participants in social fields as child-care, school, sport and youth work.

The series of talks and workshops we are going to organise revolves around the following topics:

public presentation of fear issues
psychosexual development
gender issues in sport
construction of childhood / gender and class
‘child-centred’ and its meaning in settings as school, youth clubs or sport
sexuality discourse between pleasure and abuse
body ethos in sport and physical education

Our guest speakers in September are Claire Fox, Institute of Ideas, London and Stuart Waiton, Generation Youth Issues, Glasgow:

Claire Fox is the director of the Institute of Ideas (IoI), London, which she established to create a public space where ideas can be contested without constraint. Claire initiated the IoI while co-publisher of the controversial and ground-breaking current affairs journal LM magazine (formerly Living Marxism). The IoI has since worked with a variety of prestigious institutions in Britain and abroad.
Claire has a particular interest in education and social issues such as crime and social exclusion. She is highly critical of authoritarian developments such as New Labour's 'antisocial behaviour orders'.
Claire is a panellist on BBC Radio 4's The Moral Maze and is regularly invited to comment on developments in culture, education and the media on TV and radio. She writes regularly for national newspapers and a range of specialist journals. She has a monthly column in the MJ (municipal journal). Claire previously worked as a mental health social worker and as a lecturer in English literature.

Stuart Waiton is a community worker in Glasgow. He is the author of 'Scared of the kids: curfews, crime and the regulation of young people'. He writes regularly for the Times Educational Supplement about issues of child and youth policies. Stuart is currently working on his PhD research about the obsession with antisocial behaviour and the regulation of youth.
Stuart is one of the directors of Generation Youth Issues, an organization that considers the development of children and young people as a twin process of adult guidance and peer discovery.
Too often today adults shirk their responsibility to the children and young people in their community, perceiving them as criminals or nuisances rather than neighbours. The result is a distancing between the generations and distrust in the community. Part of the work of Generation Youth Issues is to contest the criminalisation of youth and the fear displayed by adults.
Paralleling criminalisation and fear is the image of children and young people as victims or at risk. The result of this has been the overprotection of children and the focus on the risk of the activities they face while growing up. Here adult interventionists meddle in peer relations and friendship groups fearing bullying, racism and the abuse of power while the activities that children and young people engage in are curtailed because they are deemed too risky. The risk panic has seen many opportunities for children and young people disappear or change significantly for the worse.

Public Presentation of Fear Issues

Workshop with Claire Fox and Stuart Waiton
September, 25th, 2004
Model Arts and Niland Gallery, Sligo

The workshop is open for everyone.
Spaces are limited, registration necessary
For inquiry about registration contact
../mailto:soha2000@gmx.net
and provide your contacts: name, address and telephone number