something I've never seen mentioned here

mostdefiled

http://member.preventchildabuse.org/site/PageServer?pagename=adv_edu_home_splash

I've never seen mention of the politics of child abuse or child abuse prevention on here before (I've observed before I've joined, but I'm not going to say that I couldn't have missed something), but the above is a link to a law bill that would fund local child abuse prevention programs. I did a senior thesis on why our government doesn't want to prevent child abuse, even though it is very preventable, it makes good economic sense, and it extreamly effective. But anyway, if this is something that any of you are interested in, this is a good law, and now is a very good time to harange your elected officials into passing it, if you are so motivated.

Urban Hiker

I'd like to hear more about your thesis.

I know I've been pissed for several years that despite an instance where my mother was the instigator, cops took my younger sis to jail. She ended up serving a five day sentence, which was severely traumatic and she will forever carry the domestic violence tag with her wherever she goes.

My sister was a hellion, but where's the parental accountability?

mert

As terrible as it is, child abuse will never be erradicated. People in general suck, unfortunately. My dad used to shake his head at all the "End Child Abuse" campaigns (he and my mom were social workers, and worked specifically in child protection for over twenty years).

That said, it's something that we need to do everything possible to minimize. I'm usually very liberal, but my old housemate was shocked to hear my reaction when a semi-local man who killed his child asked to be protected in jail. I know he has to be protected - and I don't believe in the death penalty - but if anyone deserves to be killed, it's someone who can kill his or her own child. I don't have kids yet, but I know I would die or kill for my nieces or my nephew, and would likely do so for any child... Maybe I'm just a bit too maternal, though.

blackredyellow

mostdefiled wrote:

http://member.preventchildabuse.org/site/PageServer?pagename=adv_edu_home_splash

I've never seen mention of the politics of child abuse or child abuse prevention on here before (I've observed before I've joined, but I'm not going to say that I couldn't have missed something), but the above is a link to a law bill that would fund local child abuse prevention programs. I did a senior thesis on why our government doesn't want to prevent child abuse, even though it is very preventable, it makes good economic sense, and it extreamly effective. But anyway, if this is something that any of you are interested in, this is a good law, and now is a very good time to harange your elected officials into passing it, if you are so motivated.

I'd also like to hear more about why you think our government doesn't want to prevent child abuse... I just can't see that.

And the idea that child abuse is very preventable just doesn't make sense to me. No matter what education is out there, no matter how many times a worker visits a home to talk to parents, unless there is someone there at the moment abuse is going to take place to stop it, abuse will always happen.

Yes, this bill may help a little bit really, how far will $500 million over three years go to provide more home visits? The impact just seems very marginal for that money.

mostdefiled

Basically, all the evidence demonstrates that if one or more parent(s) really bond with their children during infancy, they will do a pretty good job at raising that child, protecting them, and fixing what they need to fix in their own lives to become good parents-be that drug addiction, mental illness, domestic violence or whatever else, if they have the support. The highest-quality, evidence-based programs succeed at preventing child abuse 90% of the time in high-risk groups- yes, there is always that 10%, but one of the other advantages to these programs is that, by having a mandated reporter in and out of the household a lot, the abuse is likely to get caught earlier and whatever needs to happen can start happening earlier. This is actually one of the things that makes the programs look less effective than they actually are- abuse gets caught by workers in these programs that wouldn't get caught otherwise. And there are always going to be families that don't want to participate in, or drop out of the program, or that don't score within range to be offered it (to qualify, the new parent(s) take a standardized assessment of risk factors known to both raise and lower the odds of abusing their children, and parents who score within a certian range are offered the program, parents who score out of range are not).

As to why there have been volumes of good research about the preventable nature of child abuse published in some of the most prestigious English-language journals, over the course of the last 30 years, and the concept still isn't widely embraced, well... child abuse is a really good way to prevent upwad economic mobility. I believe that is one big motivitation the government has not to fund it. Another is that people don't demand it, partially because we'd rather demonize child abusers than do anything to keep them from becoming abusive. I'm not saying that sticking up for child abusers is necessarially a good thing, nor that demonizing them isn't satisifying. It's just that we have no evidence that it makes good public policy.

Not everything works for everyone. When I look back on my family, when I was growing up, I don't think that there is any program out there that could have helped my sister and I- my parents were both educated, high-functioning psycho's. If the public understanding of and acceptance of mental illness were, 20 years ago, what they are now, that might have made a difference. There are never simple, blanket answers to complex problems, but sometimes there is evidence reguarding what works and what doesn't, even if it doesn't work all the time. Luckilly, child abuse is one of those areas where we have a good idea of what can work, and when we choose to practice it, I think we can have a big impact.

blackredyellow

mostdefiled wrote:

Basically, all the evidence demonstrates that if one or more parent(s) really bond with their children during infancy, they will do a pretty good job at raising that child, protecting them, and fixing what they need to fix in their own lives to become good parents-be that drug addiction, mental illness, domestic violence or whatever else, if they have the support. The highest-quality, evidence-based programs succeed at preventing child abuse 90% of the time in high-risk groups- yes, there is always that 10%, but one of the other advantages to these programs is that, by having a mandated reporter in and out of the household a lot, the abuse is likely to get caught earlier and whatever needs to happen can start happening earlier. This is actually one of the things that makes the programs look less effective than they actually are- abuse gets caught by workers in these programs that wouldn't get caught otherwise. And there are always going to be families that don't want to participate in, or drop out of the program, or that don't score within range to be offered it (to qualify, the new parent(s) take a standardized assessment of risk factors known to both raise and lower the odds of abusing their children, and parents who score within a certian range are offered the program, parents who score out of range are not).

I sort of have a problem with the idea of a home reporter... What decides a high risk family who gets assigned something like this? Is it based on past abuse allegations/suspicions?

mostdefiled

Participation in the evidende-based programs is ALWAYS voluntary- I'm not aware of any home visiting program that isn't. The voluntary nature of it is very important to most program officials. Families are told up front that the staff from the program are mandated reporters. As for how families end up in the program, there are a few ways. In communities where the number of workers is in sync with the demand, every new family is asked to fill out a risk assessment (and this is voluntary, too), and it's a standardized tool that asks about well-researched things that increase the risk that a parent will maltreat their child. Just like there are risk factors for things like diabetes and cancer, there are risk factors for child abuse. After a family is assessed, and if their score falls into a certian range, they are offered a slot in the program, if there are enough to go around. In communities where there aren't enough slots, well, they figure something out, and each site probably figures it out a little differently.

Sorry it took a few days to get back to you, I lost posting privledges for some reason over the weekend.

DriftingByTheStorm

so why doesn't the government want to get rid of child abuse?

I don't think you answered that part.

I know a lot of child protective service employees are actually pedophilles and pederasts themselves, but what is your General Theory of Government Child Abuse Conspiracy ?



oh,
Conspiracy of Silence is a fucked up documentary on this subject.
check it out.

puremagic

What I have noticed that whenever someone wants a controversial bill passed in the fields of health, education, or law enforcement, they always say its for the "children". This Bill is no different. All the programs in the world won't prevent child abuse. Your post is misleading in that same respect. The Bill is designed to oversee the development of a child in its parent's home using 'education' as the keyword. It affords the government access to your home to tell you how to be parents. The Bill requires mandatory parenting classes for all new parents. My problem with bills such as this is that they tend to become mandatory and restrictive. Again, this Bill is no different, it sets up voluntary visitations, yet, once those visitations start the officials determine when they stop, not the parents. The Bill is designed for the DHHS to oversee the development of a child in its parent's home using 'education' as the keyword. Child abuse doesn't know race, religion, or economics so all homes would be subject to this Bill.
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Education Begins at Home Act (S. 667): Wolf in Sheep’s Clothing
Jeremiah Lorrig
Deputy Director
Federal Relations

October, 2007

Introduction:

The Education Begins At Home Act (S. 667) establishes a program that brings the government into homes by establishing and growing programs that would bring unelected government officials into homes to inspect the family environment.

Background:

Senate Bill 667 is a wolf in sheep’s clothing. Despite the seemingly homeschool friendly title, the Education Begins at Home Act expands unelected government officials’ agenda into homes. While it is based on the accurate assumption that almost all children learn first and best at home, S. 667 seeks to insert the government into that process. S. 667’s stated goal is to expand Head Start’s1 Early Home Visitation program to “increase school readiness, child abuse and neglect prevention, and early identification of development and health delays, including potential mental health concerns, and for other purposes.” In practice, this will mean government officials will be in hospitals and homes implementing an agenda established by unelected federal officials whose standards may strongly offend many Americans.

Although these “home visitation” services are voluntary, once they begin, they are to occur “not less frequently than a monthly basis.” Unfortunately this wording seems to disregard the desires of the child’s parents. These entanglements are a good example of how strings are attached to so many well-intentioned government programs that end up either impotent or harmful to those involved.

In addition, this bill includes some other concerning goals. For example, government officials are invited in the home by the parents and yet go in looking for deficiencies in how the parents have chosen to raise their child. They look for signs of child abuse, “developmental delays,” and evaluate the child’s “behavioral skills.” All of this is done under the pretense of increasing the parents’ awareness of governmental services.

Education Begins At Home: A Second Mortgage

The first line of S. 667 states that its purpose is “To expand programs…” This bill takes Head Start (see footnote number 2), an already costly program, and expands it by $400 million. Furthermore, looking at the precedent that Head Start already has set, one can see that it will just continue to expand government control into families’ homes at an ever growing costs to the tax payer.

Education Begins At Home: Nanny State

Section 5 of S. 667 expands the “Head Start” Act by stating that the government will now “provide additional services to parents to support their role as parents (including training in parenting skills, basic child development, and sensitivity to cultural variations in parenting norms and attitudes toward formal supports).”2 The government will “develop and implement a systematic procedure for transitioning children and parents from an Early Head Start program into a Head Start program or another local early childhood education program.”3 This creates a government program that exists to perpetuate another government program. This will create a system that makes it easier for the government to expand its authority from 1st though 12th grade students in the public school building into the homes of people with children under the age of 3.

HSLDA is also concerned that the content of the “help” provided by these “early development programs” will be open to politicization. For example: who is going to determine what the “strategies for helping families coping with crisis”4 are most effective? Is it going to be an unelected government official who has a social agenda? There is no protection against the inherent politics involved in government work. This could be especially volatile when the government is advising a pregnant mother regarding “the relationship of health and well-being of pregnant women to prenatal and early child development.”5 In this instance, a pro-abortion unelected official could counsel a new mother to adopt his or her version of “family planning.” This “service” could very well become an arena for many significant political battles, and giving federal officials a soapbox that could be used to promote controversial “alternative” lifestyles or even abortion.

Education Begins At Home: Who Cares About the Non-Profits?

In S. 667 Section 9 another door is opened to rampant politicization: government classes on how to raise one’s children. Although this program is voluntary for the family, it is not voluntary for the hospital where the baby is born. Every hospital, military hospital, and birth center would be required to request parents to participate in a parenting class.6 This class will include “strategies for caring for [the] infant’s social, emotional, and physical needs.”7 In the political culture that pervades government offices, hospitals could be forced to provide classes that they fundamentally disagree with. Catholic hospitals, for example, could be forced to request that their patients to take classes that advocate abortion and birth control. In this legislation the hospitals are required to request that their patients take these classes. With the content of these classes being unclear, unelected government officials will be left to determine what a healthy family looks like. This is a recipe for disaster.

Conclusion:

This legislation is a huge spending bill which creates a nanny state where the government tries to teach people how to be parents. In the process, they establish requirements that every hospital provide this training without placing limits on what is going to be taught. Controversial or politicized content may be required at some point that may interfere with, for example, a religious hospital’s beliefs. S. 667 opens a Pandora’s Box by asking the government to become the expert in parenting, while not protecting the religious organizations that might be caught in the crossfire.

blackredyellow

puremagic wrote:

What I have noticed that whenever someone wants a controversial bill passed in the fields of health, education, or law enforcement, they always say its for the "children". This Bill is no different. All the programs in the world won't prevent child abuse. Your post is misleading in that same respect. The Bill is designed to oversee the development of a child in its parent's home using 'education' as the keyword. It affords the government access to your home to tell you how to be parents. The Bill requires mandatory parenting classes for all new parents. My problem with bills such as this is that they tend to become mandatory and restrictive. Again, this Bill is no different, it sets up voluntary visitations, yet, once those visitations start the officials determine when they stop, not the parents. The Bill is designed for the DHHS to oversee the development of a child in its parent's home using 'education' as the keyword. Child abuse doesn't know race, religion, or economics so all homes would be subject to this Bill.

Thanks for the counterpoint... Like I said, I have a problem with the "preemptive" home monitoring. Of course if there are allegations/suspicion of child abuse, I am fine with home monitoring, but as a preventative measure I can't agree with it.

And I do think child care classes are a good thing, and education as a whole is important for all parents. But, to have a class as mandatory or to have home monitoring based on who the gov't decides as high risks, is not right.