Hi Marcus, I have to be honest in saying that I found your comment confusing. Child labor and child abuse exists everywhere, so I’m unclear as to why, when I neither saw nor heard about it, would I be expected to include child labor in a reflective piece about my observations on raising children in Morocco?

For the record, child labor and child abuse is still very much alive in America, as I’m sure it is in your country too. If the Moroccans are guilty of child labor, it certainly wasn’t a norm, as far as I could see, but it’s understandable (though violence never is) as child labor is prevalent in poor countries, and Morocco is a very poor country. People need to survive. Having said that, I encountered plenty of poor families, but I never encountered one where the children worked.

It is still less than a hundred years since child labor was made illegal in America. Throughout history children of poor families have worked at early ages. One has to look at child labor within a cultural context and a historical context before making judgments about it.