It was very disheartening to read in news24 this morning about this poor little girl who was burned in the hands by her parents.

The news site wrote that the little girl, aged five, had never even received toys or gifts in her life. Her mother and stepfather had thought she had stolen 30 cents, just 30 cents and had forced her to put her hands on a hotplate and then hit her while her hands were still on the hotplate.

The police received an anonymous phone call about a girl walking around with burns on her hands. The police reported that the bandages found on her where put on by the neighbours and not even the parents. Can you believe it! The neighbours knew about this and probably all the other abuses and never even called the police, and the one person who did was not even brave enough to leave a name. When the police found her the wounds on her hands were already going septic and was taken to the hospital. While at the hospital, she told them that her parents beat her all the time.

There is another news story in news24 about a murder of a four year old boy by the lover of his mother. The mother and her lover were sentenced for his death last week.

I know you can't temper with any one's right to being a parent but they are just some people who should not be allowed to be parents. I don't understand how someone can stand to see her child in pain, a pain caused by them. Obviously the girl's parents knew that what they had done was wrong because they didn't take her to the hospital.

In the other case, both murderers were women so you can't say that a woman is more nurturing and loving, or that she can't control what a man does to her children, but it's all bull. The hatred that one can have for one's child is very mind-boggling.

I sometimes wonder after reading about child abuse, what we can do as a society to stop this. I for one believe that first of all the neighbours were also abusing the girl because they knew about the abuse and they did nothing about it. If we as a society stand up and act when we see abuse and stop the parents or parent then that would be a stepping stone to ridding society of this evil. Also I think, and I know that this will probable be controversy, that parents who have been proven to be abusers should never be allowed to be parents again. Either to the abused child and to other unborn children. I believe this behaviour comes from within them and will never go away so children should never be raised by them.