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Silence is Not an Option

Why do drug addicted parents retain custody of their children?

By Robert Green

My response cannot fit within a limit of 1000 words. I will be responding over on the blog page.

Posted by: Rita | Jun 10, 2008 18:48

I have a question for Mr. Green.

On a very old Phil Donahue show (probably 20 years ago), the topic was child abuse. There was a panel of "experts".
One of them, a social worker with Child and Family Services, which I prefer to call Child and Family Disservices, said that a child who has been removed from abusive parents and put into foster care is ten times more likely to be abused there. In your poignant and hard-hitting essay, you made note of this agonizing fact, but without the numbers.
I remember how shocked I was when I watched that old show and learned that foster care was not the "soft place to fall" that I'd previously thought it was.
I trust your research; do you know if that 'ten times more likely' statistic is true?

Thank you for speaking loudly for the children who are forever silenced.

Posted by: Eileen Alana McGuire | Jun 15, 2008 05:15

Well, talk about a dilemma. On one hand, the court takes the children away from this so-called mother knowing what flawed system he is sentencing them to, sort of out of the furnace and into the frying pan; on the other hand, leave them with mommy and give her the chance to "do the right thing" knowing the statistic that your article pointed to.
How would you like to be that guy? It's difficult to comment without knowing all the details of this woman's case. Are there alternatives for the surviving children other than returning to mommy or foster care? Are there grandparents, aunts, uncles? Has social services been called to this house before? And where is dad?
Whatever the case, I feel your outrage and certainly understand the impulse to punish this woefully inept example of motherhood.
Sorry, there is no other point of view coming. I thought there would be, but I was wrong. I can, however, take solace, however discomfiting, that some of the most interesting adults come from tragic beginnings. Please don’t think I am suggesting that we all go out and start abusing our kids; I’m just trying to rationalize—pathetically I’m sure--the incomprehensibility of what awaits these kids and this family.

Posted by: Tom Alfera | Jun 30, 2008 18:27

Eileen, I will be writing an article on the foster care system that will address your questions in the next few months. Please check back in the near future for more on the system that saves and fails.

Best,
Robert

Posted by: Robert Green | Jul 04, 2008 11:52

WHY NOT ASK THE JUDGES AND CASE MANGAGERS IF THEY WOULD LIKE TO GIVE THEIR CHILDREN TO THIS DRUG ADDICT MOTHERS. THINK THERE ANSWER WOULD THEY DESERVE ANOTHER CHANCE.???

Posted by: MARIA LCPACCIONE | Sep 10, 2008 12:25

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