# Parenting,Child Abuse and Welfare payments **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [December 6, 2008, 12:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/parenting-child-abuse-and-welfare-payments/475990 "2008-12-06T12:45:41Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![griffin1977](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/977dab/32.png) [@griffin1977](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/griffin1977)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2008, 1:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/parenting-child-abuse-and-welfare-payments/475990/61 "2008-12-10T01:53:29Z")
> [@](#): > > Cite? Even the most vunerable [groups](http://www.ojp.usdoj.gov/bjs/crimoff.htm#lifetime) in the US have nowhere near those rates of incarceration, and those those figures represent the LIFETIME chance of going to jail. That 49% is those who go STRAIGHT to jail from care, is doesn’t include those who commit crimes later in life. > [@](#): > > Well, that really helps your opinions, doesn’t it? Umm yes. The fact the literature doesn’t even give details of where that fact comes from shows how well established it is that spending time time in state care is damaging to children (if there was any doubt about it, they would take time to explain which figure support the claim). > [@](#): > > You appear to feel that children will do better raised by a parent, no matter what their situation might be, so you are looking for statistics to back this up. I’ve backed up my case with statistics, now its up to you to find some to back up yours. EVERY PEICE of available available information supports the idea that state is terrible at raising kids, for example [this](http://ideas.repec.org/p/nbr/nberwo/13291.html) from the US: > [@](#): > > Nearly 20% of young prison inmates spent part of their youth in foster care - the placement of abused or neglected children with substitute families. Little is known whether foster care placement reduces or increases the likelihood of criminal behavior. This paper uses the placement frequency of child protection investigators as an instrument to identify causal effects of foster care placement on adult arrest, conviction, and imprisonment rates. A unique dataset that links child abuse investigation data to criminal justice data in Illinois allows a comparison of adult crime outcomes across individuals who were investigated for abuse or neglect as children. Families are effectively randomized to child protection investigators through a rotational assignment process, and child characteristics are similar across investigators. **Nevertheless, investigator placement frequencies are predictive of subsequent foster care placement, and the results suggest that school-aged children who are on the margin of placement have lower adult arrest rates when they remain at home**. > [@](#): > > The state may make an appalling parent but is it worse than an abusive/extremely young/druggie/whatever parent? Obviously there is a point where the parenting is so awful that even the awful alternative of state care is a better one (the cases in the OP are clearly examples of this). However in those cases existing policies SHOULD have put the children involved in care, it was only the failure of the bureaucracy invovled that led to them not doing so, not the policy itself (if social workers had actually visited the families, they would have undoubtedly taken them into care, but they didn’t). ---
**Author:** ![curlcoat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/ea5d25/32.png) [@curlcoat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/curlcoat)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2008, 2:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/parenting-child-abuse-and-welfare-payments/475990/62 "2008-12-10T02:45:18Z")
> [@GorillaMan](#): > > This post displays exactly the prejudices and shortsighted ignorance that sex discrimination law has been battling against for decades. Bloody hell, have we still got this far to go? This has what to do with the subject? ---
**Author:** ![curlcoat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/ea5d25/32.png) [@curlcoat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/curlcoat)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2008, 2:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/parenting-child-abuse-and-welfare-payments/475990/63 "2008-12-10T02:47:29Z")
> [@GorillaMan](#): > > WTF? You want the facts, not some guy off the internet…so you want some guy off the internet to do the hard work for you? If some guy off the internet claims that an idea I have put forth will not work due to something that happened in Romania, if that guy wants to be taken seriously he needs to do more than just say “go read about it”. Lets try this and see how it flies, eh? I got my idea from a program that is in it’s fourth year in Spain and is highly successful. Don’t believe me? Go read up on it. ---
**Author:** ![curlcoat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/ea5d25/32.png) [@curlcoat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/curlcoat)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2008, 3:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/parenting-child-abuse-and-welfare-payments/475990/64 "2008-12-10T03:06:41Z")
> [@griffin1977](#): > > Even the most vunerable [groups](http://www.ojp.usdoj.gov/bjs/crimoff.htm#lifetime) in the US have nowhere near those rates of incarceration, and those those figures represent the LIFETIME chance of going to jail. That 49% is those who go STRAIGHT to jail from care, is doesn’t include those who commit crimes later in life. So it looks like my thought that UK stats don’t apply to the US is correct. > [@](#): > > Umm yes. The fact the literature doesn’t even give details of where that fact comes from shows how well established it is that spending time time in state care is damaging to children (if there was any doubt about it, they would take time to explain which figure support the claim). Actually, I was responding to your assertion that if I wanted to check the facts of something you present, I have to go buy the paper. Convenient. As for a well established “fact”, how long was it well established that black people were naturally inferior to whites? That women were too weak to work? Simply because something is repeated over and over doesn’t make it a fact. > [@](#): > > I’ve backed up my case with statistics, now its up to you to find some to back up yours. EVERY PEICE of available available information supports the idea that state is terrible at raising kids, for example [this](http://ideas.repec.org/p/nbr/nberwo/13291.html) from the US: I haven’t said that the state is good at raising kids, I’m saying that I feel that if the state would not pay people to have children on the dole that it wouldn’t take long for the birth rate among welfare mothers to drop by quite a bit. I also posit that the state probably isn’t any worse than drug pushers, abusers, teenagers, etc raising children. Even your own statistics show that 31% of jail inmates had a parent or guardian who abused drugs or drink, but only 12% were in foster care or an institution. Which doesn’t even mention whether or not those kids went to foster care because they were coming from a home where they had a parent or guardian who abused drugs or drink. Statistics are fun to play with. > [@](#): > > Obviously there is a point where the parenting is so awful that even the awful alternative of state care is a better one (the cases in the OP are clearly examples of this). However in those cases existing policies SHOULD have put the children involved in care, it was only the failure of the bureaucracy invovled that led to them not doing so, not the policy itself (if social workers had actually visited the families, they would have undoubtedly taken them into care, but they didn’t). Apparently it is difficult for the states to keep track of all the children that need help which is how so many slip thru the cracks and get abused, killed, start pushing drugs, etc. If the children at risk were already in state care, the social workers could keep better track of them. Of course, no one thinks that the child’s rights usurp the mother’s rights until it’s totally obvious that she is unfit, so the only real way to get those kids at risk out of trouble is to quit financially supporting abusers, druggies, etc breeding more abusers, druggies, etc. ---
**Author:** ![griffin1977](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/977dab/32.png) [@griffin1977](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/griffin1977)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2008, 3:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/parenting-child-abuse-and-welfare-payments/475990/65 "2008-12-10T03:07:07Z")
> [@curlcoat](#): > > I got my idea from a program that is in it’s fourth year in Spain and is highly successful. It seems to be your favorite word… Cite ? ---
**Author:** ![griffin1977](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/977dab/32.png) [@griffin1977](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/griffin1977)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2008, 3:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/parenting-child-abuse-and-welfare-payments/475990/66 "2008-12-10T03:17:00Z")
> [@curlcoat](#): > > So it looks like my thought that UK stats don’t apply to the US is correct. Not at all, they are quite comparable (that 20% figure is for all foster care, including long term care with families, which is different from being “in care” in the UK terminology). What difference there is probably due to the US cottoning on quicker than that UK how bad an idea it is to put kids in care in anything but as a last resort. > [@](#): > > Even your own statistics show that 31% of jail inmates had a parent or guardian who abused drugs or drink, but only 12% were in foster care or an institution. However, as you yourself pointed out taking kids from their parents is considered a last resort, and is quite rare nowadays. Drug and Alcohol abuse is, unfortunately, very common, so those number undoubtedly mean that foster care is orders of magnitude MORE likely to cause criminality than having a parent with drug or alcohol problems. > [@](#): > > If the children at risk were already in state care, the social workers could keep better track of them. OK I’ll quote that figure again… HALF OF ALL CHILDREN IN STATE CARE END UP IN JAIL AS SOON AS THEY LEAVE CARE! ---
**Author:** ![curlcoat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/ea5d25/32.png) [@curlcoat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/curlcoat)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2008, 5:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/parenting-child-abuse-and-welfare-payments/475990/67 "2008-12-10T05:14:18Z")
> [@griffin1977](#): > > It seems to be your favorite word… Cite ? It was a point I was making that I didn’t spend enough time on to make clear. There is no program in Spain, but I could easily create a webpage with all sorts of sites to important sounding doctors or whatever. Or, I could skew real statistics to support my idea and even make it sound like someplace it’s working right now. My point is, in order to get to the real facts one really needs to do more than just look one place, such as Romania, to decide if a theory should be pursued. Or rather, each example should be looked at in depth, as in the questions I’ve asked and never had answered about Romania. All of the things that can affect the results other than what you want. When I ask for a cite, I want to hear not only what gave you X idea, but also all the details that you used or ignored while coming to your conclusion. How can you have a discussion on a theory if your end of it is “go read up on Romania”? ---
**Author:** ![curlcoat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/ea5d25/32.png) [@curlcoat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/curlcoat)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2008, 5:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/parenting-child-abuse-and-welfare-payments/475990/68 "2008-12-10T05:39:48Z")
> [@griffin1977](#): > > Not at all, they are quite comparable (that 20% figure is for all foster care, including long term care with families, which is different from being “in care” in the UK terminology). What difference there is probably due to the US cottoning on quicker than that UK how bad an idea it is to put kids in care in anything but as a last resort. How did you come up with that? Your cite said that 12% came from foster care and the UK one said near 50%. How is that comparable? Just because you think that the UK “knows” that state care is worse than anything else, unlike the USA? > [@](#): > > However, as you yourself pointed out taking kids from their parents is considered a last resort, and is quite rare nowadays. I did? > [@](#): > > Drug and Alcohol abuse is, unfortunately, very common, so those number undoubtedly mean that foster care is orders of magnitude MORE likely to cause criminality than having a parent with drug or alcohol problems. Where do you get that? You assume that the foster parents abuse drugs or alcohol because such abuse is very common? > [@](#): > > OK I’ll quote that figure again… > > HALF OF ALL CHILDREN IN STATE CARE END UP IN JAIL AS SOON AS THEY LEAVE CARE! In the UK, under whatever system they currently have. Do you have any idea what sort of life the children had before they wound up in state care? Do you suppose it was less than ideal, which is why they were in state care, and perhaps that less than ideal start in life is why they end up in jail? ---
**Author:** ![griffin1977](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/977dab/32.png) [@griffin1977](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/griffin1977)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2008, 6:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/parenting-child-abuse-and-welfare-payments/475990/69 "2008-12-10T06:57:49Z")
> [@curlcoat](#): > > How did you come up with that? 12% was for all prisoners, the US and UK studies had figures of 20% and 40% respectively among YOUNG prisoners, but the comparison was comparing state care with foster care (which is different). > [@](#): > > Where do you get that? Simple arithmetic, the number of people in foster care (100,000s of thousand) is FAR FAR lower than the number of people who abuse alcohol and drugs (10s of millions at least), so where as the overall percentage of the is lower, that represents a FAR FAR greater chance per capita. ---
**Author:** ![GorillaMan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/50afbb/32.png) [@GorillaMan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GorillaMan)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2008, 10:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/parenting-child-abuse-and-welfare-payments/475990/70 "2008-12-10T10:41:18Z")
> [@griffin1977](#): > > Not at all, they are quite comparable (that 20% figure is for all foster care, including long term care with families, which is different from being “in care” in the UK terminology). This is why the phrase ‘looked after’ appears in British usage, to cover all those children on whose behalf the state has intervened, or rather is currently intervening, in some way. ---
**Author:** ![Lust4Life](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/ecc23a/32.png) [@Lust4Life](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lust4Life)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2008, 3:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/parenting-child-abuse-and-welfare-payments/475990/71 "2008-12-10T15:47:43Z")
Sorry to have neglected this thread but work has been getting in the way. My opinions are not only based on what I’ve seen in the media but from first hand observation both from the inner city in which I live and where my work has on occassion taken me into social housing, I cant see how it benefits children in any way to keep them with sociopathic parents,often living in self induced squalor and being given the impression that the complete lack of responsibility shown by the adult(s) in their family is somehow the norm and that it is the example that they should follow when they get older. As to the posters concerned about brave, struggling,young single parents being reduced to penury while doing their best to raise their children to the best of their ability IME in the U.K. that is the exception rather then the rule in the sort of situation that I’ve been postulating. Quite simply if many of the present day dysfunctional mothers had been in the situation of motherhood not excusing them from having to support themselves( rather then working people paying tax and national insurance paying for them to be able to have this lifestyle )then many would never have taken up baby farming in the first place. Many if not most of these women get themselves BFs who do not officially live in the rent paid social housing(Though in practice they often do) and these help out financially by paying out for the "fun "things in the womens lives,drugs,booze,cigarettes,nights out and sometimes holidays. Its often the case that if the children do not become victims themselves then they go on to be thugs even while still kids(Or can become both victim and thug)and spread their own brand of hatred and misery to anyone vulnerable enough to be unable to defend themselves against them,usually old people because they are physically weak. Please note that in the U.K. these “mothers” have every opportunity and encouragement to give them employment hunting skills,computer,literacy and numeracy training and job training for FREE and without mountains of red tape to do so. But most of them aren’t interested. The life style that they live has been a conscious choice not something that bad luck or circumstances have forced them into. I am NOT going to give a cite for this ,I reiterate that this is the cultural subsection of society that I was brought up in and am surrounded by where I live today. I know these people as neighbours etc. I find it annoying when people whos only knowledge of this society is from sociology courses and "Community workshops"an all the other P.C. industrys output tell me that I’m getting it wrong ot that I dont know enough about the subject. I’ve lived the subject not read about it or watched a jolly intersting documentary about it. ---
**Author:** ![griffin1977](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/977dab/32.png) [@griffin1977](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/griffin1977)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2008, 6:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/parenting-child-abuse-and-welfare-payments/475990/72 "2008-12-10T18:40:01Z")
> [@Lust4Life](#): > > I cant see how it benefits children in any way to keep them with sociopathic parents,often living in self induced squalor and being given the impression that the complete lack of responsibility shown by the adult(s) in their family is somehow the norm and that it is the example that they should follow when they get older. Because the alternative is FAR FAR worse. As demonstrated by the numerous cites above, the state makes the worst parent of all. ---
**Author:** ![curlcoat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/ea5d25/32.png) [@curlcoat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/curlcoat)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2008, 11:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/parenting-child-abuse-and-welfare-payments/475990/73 "2008-12-10T23:14:12Z")
> [@griffin1977](#): > > Because the alternative is FAR FAR worse. As demonstrated by the numerous cites above, the state makes the worst parent of all. And yet, those cites don’t prove that at all, if for no other reason than you really don’t have any idea what a child’s life is like living with a wefare mother. And, one of the big reasons that the state isn’t that good of a parent is because so much money goes to support these adults that are pumping out babies. If children living at boarding schools in Switzerland is thought to be such a wonderful education, why would a similar set up run by the government have to be “FAR FAR worse” than living in squalor with people who don’t care about you? Your knee jerk reaction to separation of mother and child is blinding you to the realities of what kind of life these children lead, and the futures they end up with. ---
**Author:** ![Lust4Life](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/ecc23a/32.png) [@Lust4Life](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lust4Life)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2008, 3:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/parenting-child-abuse-and-welfare-payments/475990/74 "2008-12-11T15:16:19Z")
> [@GorillaMan](#): > > I couldn’t let this one pass…cite? The Independant 11/12/08 THREE CHILDREN A WEEK-THE DEATH TOLL FROM CHILD ABUSE Christine Gilbert,the chief executiveof the Childrens Services Watchdog told a hearing of the Commons Select Committee on Children,Schools and Families that Ofsted had investigated 282 cases of child deaths brought to its attention between April 07 and Aug 08 and found most were as a result of abuse. 21 of them had been babies but only two of them had been known to Social Services before their deaths. ---
**Author:** ![Lust4Life](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/ecc23a/32.png) [@Lust4Life](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lust4Life)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2008, 3:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/parenting-child-abuse-and-welfare-payments/475990/75 "2008-12-11T15:21:43Z")
> [@griffin1977](#): > > Because the alternative is FAR FAR worse. As demonstrated by the numerous cites above, the state makes the worst parent of all. You mean that being beaten or starved to death by your own parent(s) is better then being adopted, fostered or being in a Childrens Home? ---
**Author:** ![GorillaMan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/50afbb/32.png) [@GorillaMan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GorillaMan)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2008, 3:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/parenting-child-abuse-and-welfare-payments/475990/76 "2008-12-11T15:28:11Z")
> [@Lust4Life](#): > > The Independant 11/12/08 > > THREE CHILDREN A WEEK-THE DEATH TOLL FROM CHILD ABUSE > > Christine Gilbert,the chief executiveof the Childrens Services Watchdog told a hearing of the Commons Select Committee on Children,Schools and Families that Ofsted had investigated 282 cases of child deaths brought to its attention between April 07 and Aug 08 and found most were as a result of abuse. > 21 of them had been babies but only two of them had been known to Social Services before their deaths. This wasn’t new news to me, I’ve heard plenty of similar figures before, often as a counterargument to misguided ‘stranger danger’ paranoia. Now it looks like we get to be just as paranoid about people inside houses. Or, rather, the people inside _other_ houses, with stereotypes and extremes such as _“a young,very immature and feckless mother whos baby was beaten to death by one of her boyfriends”_ being invoked. Abuse takes many forms, and isn’t something that only happens to poor kids, nor only in households relying on benefits. As for the “all too common” nature of _“a not so young mother of seven children(By seven different fathers)who arranged to have a relative organise a fake kidnapping of her young daughter with a view to claiming any subsequent reward money when the child was"found”"_, I’m still waiting for a cite. ---
**Author:** ![Lust4Life](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/ecc23a/32.png) [@Lust4Life](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lust4Life)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2008, 4:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/parenting-child-abuse-and-welfare-payments/475990/77 "2008-12-11T16:29:42Z")
> [@GorillaMan](#): > > This wasn’t new news to me, I’ve heard plenty of similar figures before, often as a counterargument to misguided ‘stranger danger’ paranoia. Now it looks like we get to be just as paranoid about people inside houses. Or, rather, the people inside _other_ houses, with stereotypes and extremes such as _“a young,very immature and feckless mother whos baby was beaten to death by one of her boyfriends”_ being invoked. > > Abuse takes many forms, and isn’t something that only happens to poor kids, nor only in households relying on benefits. > > As for the “all too common” nature of _“a not so young mother of seven children(By seven different fathers)who arranged to have a relative organise a fake kidnapping of her young daughter with a view to claiming any subsequent reward money when the child was"found”"_, I’m still waiting for a cite. I was obviously unclear in my message,it was my intention to convey that crimes of abuse were all too common nowdays. We’ve had cases in the fairly recent past of a mother starving one of her children to death and telling the Social Services to “Get rid of that thing”(The childs body)and a case of a child being murdered because its family thought that it was a witch. I stand by my statement that these sort of atrocities are all too common in the U.K. and no doubt elsewhere. ---
**Author:** ![ivan\_astikov](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/58f4c7/32.png) [@ivan\_astikov](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ivan_astikov)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2008, 4:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/parenting-child-abuse-and-welfare-payments/475990/78 "2008-12-11T16:33:19Z")
Surely the fact that they are such newsworthy events, is because they are far from common, **L4L**? ---
**Author:** ![GorillaMan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/50afbb/32.png) [@GorillaMan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GorillaMan)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2008, 4:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/parenting-child-abuse-and-welfare-payments/475990/79 "2008-12-11T16:41:04Z")
> [@Lust4Life](#): > > I was obviously unclear in my message,it was my intention to convey that crimes of abuse were all too common nowdays. I’ll agree that abuse is horrific, and many people will be surprised both by how common it is, and who the perpetrators are most likely to be. What I dispute is that there’s any evidence for it being more common nowadays, rather than merely more talked about. > [@](#): > > a case of a child being murdered because its family thought that it was a witch. Killing witches is a modern phenomena? ---
**Author:** ![curlcoat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/ea5d25/32.png) [@curlcoat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/curlcoat)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2008, 6:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/parenting-child-abuse-and-welfare-payments/475990/80 "2008-12-11T18:50:44Z")
> [@ivan\_astikov](#): > > Surely the fact that they are such newsworthy events, is because they are far from common, **L4L**? The news reports things that the population is interested in, not necessarily something rare. Just look at all the celeb “news” for an example. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/parenting-child-abuse-and-welfare-payments/475990.md?page=3) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/parenting-child-abuse-and-welfare-payments/475990.md?page=5)