15 www.rnca.ca What is Child Abuse? continued Child abuse includes physical, sexual and emotional abuse. It also includes neglect, and any violence that children see or hear in their families. The person who abuses the child can be: • a parent • a brother or sister • another relative • a caregiver • a guardian • a teacher, or • another professional or volunteer who works with children (for example, a doctor or coach). Abuse may take place in a child's home, or it may happen in other places, like other people's homes, schools, community centres or places of worship. Sometimes the child's parents lived abuse as a child, such as in the residential schools many Indigenous peoples were forced to attend. Abuse that someone lived as a child, whether it happened in their home or outside of it, may change the way they parent their own children as abuse is often a learned behaviour. This booklet deals with child abuse in the family. In Canada, there are federal, provincial and territorial laws to protect children from abuse. Some types of abuse are crimes and are listed in the Criminal Code,* which is a federal law. Federal laws are laws that apply across Canada. Even if the abuse is not a crime under the Criminal Code, provincial and territorial laws could be used to stop the abuse. Child abuse can cause long-term health problems. www.justice.gc.ca Reproduced from the Department of Justice publication Child Abuse is Wrong: What Can I Do? without affiliation or endorsement of the Government of Canada. Every child deserves protection from abuse.
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