Antioch University and Horace Mann changed my life. Ten years ago today, when I first embarked upon my journey of obtaining a graduate degree, never did I think I would come across an institution of higher learning that challenged my commitment to contribute personally to the improvement of the human condition through responsible leadership.

At Antioch I learned that leaders are visionaries. They move people toward shared dreams.

At Antioch I learned that leaders are democratic and value people's input and get commitment through participation.

At Antioch I learned that leaders connect individuals with an organization's goals to create a highly positive climate.

At Antioch I learned that leaders always consider the welfare of others first, that only by giving of ourselves and serving others can we make the world a better place and find any lasting peace within ourselves.

My work as an educator has centered on the phenomenon of emotional abuse of children for a number of reasons, not the least of being a victim of it's insidiousness myself, but many children do not have the ability to articulate the maltreatment they are experiencing. Many do not know that what is happening to them is wrong.

We cannot rely upon the children to tell us about their suffering. We must speak for them.

I believe emotional child abuse (ECA) serves as the matrix from which nearly all forms of destructive and dysfunctional behavior originate.

Many people seem amazed and tell me I'm making broad generalizations when I tell them there is a strong relationship between ECA and environmental degradation; that there is a strong interrelationship, interdependence and interconnection between ECA and those who write computer viruses. That people commit acts of terrorism because they have been victims of ECA. The target of the terrorist is a symbolic representation of their original oppressor, even if that representation is oppressing them in the present.

Victims of ECA will also lead us into wars, as the symbolic oppressor must be destroyed at any price, no matter how much blood is shed, regardless of the destruction to our planet or the health and well-being of our children.

Unethical business practices and criminal behavior in the corporate boardroom also originates with how we abuse children. The list is seemingly endless; drug abuse, alcoholism, school shootings, racism, discrimination, domestic violence; the failure to find fulfillment in one's work, in reaching one's goals, in finding fulfillment in one's relationships. All are born of the seed of ECA in both macro and micro contexts.

ECA is the underbelly of all the unanswered whys.

For how could a human being who operates from a base of self-acceptance, self-love and self confidence, and who has the ability to feel compassion, empathy and respect for others, engage in such destructive acts in a systematic manner.

They could not!

Film director Stephen Spielberg told millions of viewers after a national broadcast of his landmark film Schindler's List, about the Nazi concentration camps, that one day, "We might understand why people kill."

Al Gore stated after the Columbine High School shootings that he did not understand why evil exists.

The fact is we do know why people kill and why evil exists.

It is because we allow our children to be abused in multiple contexts. In the home, in the school, in the community, by the very way we have designed our culture.

We must call upon our next generation of leaders to realize the threat ECA poses to our well-being now and in the future. For the combination of our emotional illiteracy, and our technological sophistication, could well spell our doom, if it has not done so already.

The late Carl Sagan wrote a wonderful novel called Contact where an alien race of beings sent to earth instructions on how to construct a spacecraft, so that one of our astronauts could travel to their planet. The astronaut appeared before Congress and was asked what would be the first thing she would ask this alien race of beings. Her answer was a profound one. She said she would ask them, "How did you survive your technological adolescence?"

You see, what she was really asking them was how they learned to stop abusing their children in multiple contexts? How did they educate their youth to become adults who are emotionally and socially literate?

Our current generation of leaders are either ignorant, unwilling or unavailable to respond to the threat ECA poses to our great nation and our world. The prospect of change is frightening and painful and to empower and involve those less powerful than ourselves is abhorrent to most of our leaders today.

Robert F. Kennedy said, "The people that are going to make a difference for this country and for the world are educated people. If educated people don't do it then nobody is going to do it. We have a special opportunity and responsibility to make a difference in the world and make a difference for this country."

Horace Mann was right when he said that the way to bring about social change is through education. Education is the key to bringing about a paradigm shift, a change in perspective.

For to end the suffering, we must redesign our culture and dispel the myth of materialism; the myth that we can find peace, fulfillment and self actualization through the consumption of products, services and celebrities; that we can reach outside ourselves to find inner peace by owning and controlling a physical object, or the lives of other human beings. We cannot.

Robert F. Kennedy also said, "Most men see things as they are and ask why? I dream of things that have never been and ask why not."

In that spirit, I seek a world where not one child will be exploited.

I dream of a world where not one child will be corrupted.

I seek a world where not one child will be terrorized.

I dream of a world where not one child will be rejected.

I seek a world where not one child will be ignored.

I dream of a world where not one child will be isolated.

Some people tell me I am naïve. But then, someone told me the world can only be changed by those that are too naïve to realize it cannot be changed. So I dream.

I dream of the world that John Lennon imagined.

A world of peace and goodwill.

So tonight, I pledge to you, in the tradition of Horace Mann, to move forward to bring about change through education, and to use my skills as an educator, to help put an end to the misery, the suffering, the pain, the bloodshed, the discrimination, the violence, the corruption and war.

And although I will not live to see my dreams fulfilled, the foundation, the matrix, can be built today to serve as a launching pad for tomorrow.

I ask you to join me in this journey, and in the words of Horace Mann, "Be ashamed to die until you have won some victory for humanity."

Contact: Oliver Tuthill   (Email | 206-364-9202)