Family Forum / Parenting / Adoption / September 2004

Hello,

When challenged to discuss a questionable claim she has posted to
these newsgroups Fern will, rather than engage honestly, rattle off an
ad hom or two, and immediately post a flurry of even more questionable
propaganda.

Her responses consist of sound bites rather than reasonable,
thoughtful attempts to rebutt others challenges to the claims.

Her posts endings are replete anti CPS and often anti government
materials, referances to websites of the same nature, and claims she
cannot and does not support with facts.

In ascps, we are culled down now to two propagandists, a bigot of
fundamentalist mindset, and an out of work freeloader.

I'd say we've humored them long enough, and that some real business
can be done here now without engaging them at all, other than to
occasionally laugh in appreciation of the comic relief they offer.

They actually believe there are still people that will fall for their
nonsense, and I suppose there will always be a few, but then, that's
who they are themselves, people that fall for each other's nonsense.

From a 2004 informational report of the NASW,
NASWChildWelfareRpt062004.pdf

"'As the United States enters
the 21st century, the depth and
breadth of society's most insidious
ills continue to affect children
profoundly. Racism, poverty,
violence, and abuse of alcohol
and other drugs impinge on the life of every
child in the United States. Children are
influenced by the society in which they are born
and raised; they, in turn, influence society.'
David Liederman, 1997"

In sharing child welfare social worker opinions from a nine issue
survey, they offered the following:

"They [workers] described how public
perception impedes their ability to establish trusting
relationships with families; how time spent on
paperwork takes time away from direct interventions
with families; and how long work hours and the
general lack of available resources for clients are
points of frustration."

The public perception of CPS is misconstrued by those that themselves
are or have been clients of CPS or by those that are currently finding
a second career for themselves as paid, or ego fulfilling,
propagandists. Clusters of needy, misinformed, misathropic anti this
and anti that types flock to them, along with the few families that DO
have legitimate complaints against CPS.

These families in real need are in turn fed off of by the former group
of dedicated propagandists and hangers on. Rather then being helped
they are too often led astray wasting their energy on CPS "reform"
outlandish schemes instead of focusing on their own pressing need to
deal with CPS, their own child(ren) and the own family.

Doug, Fern, Greg, bobb, you aren't fooling anyone.

Common propaganda ploys of the Anti CPS phony reformer crowd.

(Not in any particular order)

- claiming that children in foster care suffer more mental illness,
or other negative conditions, leaving the less knowledgeable to assume
foster care itself caused the condition the child actually came into
care burdened and crippled with by prior care-givers...usually
parents.

- claiming that CPS is an "industry" when in fact researchers have
pointed out for decades that it is chronically underfunded to perform
its mandated tasks.

- referring to sorely needed services for children injured and
disabled by their own parents as being delivered by "jacklegs" in it
just for the money flies in the face of authoritative research that
shows such services are in fact in terrible short supply for lack of
funding.

- focusing solely on failures in various areas of the agency, such as
fiscal responsibility, foster parent malfeasance, and similar concerns
when these are traceable mostly to individual person's criminal or
unprofessional behavior, for which they are punished,  and are rare
occurrences.

- claiming CPS actively seeks out cases of abuse, when the truth is
all CPS investigations begin as reports from the public and mandated
professionals, and even families themselves. The only "outreach" from
CPS, and others for that matter, are pleas to report abuse and
information on how to do it properly and responsibly.

- stating that workers waste their time and tax payer money driving
around in state cars looking for occurrences of abuse by stopping
innocent families they encounter and harassing them.

- claiming that CPS deliberately investigates families they know
beforehand are innocent, and using post investigation failure to found
a case as reason to support the above nonsense...a non sequitur .

- the previous bit of chicanery is further exploited by claiming that
because CPS doesn't have proof beforehand sufficient to found or
substantiate they are therefore remiss in even opening an
investigation...and even more disreputable use of non sequitur.

- promoting false assumptions based on partial or out of context
information, such as claims of comparisons of malfeasance by one group
being greater than that of another group when the groups are highly
dissimilar, as in a foster family group is dissimilar from the general
population of families in there relative availability for monitoring
by the state.

- claims that CPS regularly engages in illegal behaviors to force
parents to comply with mandated services.

- attempts to hide real abuse and neglect behind euphemism.

- conniving arguments that the U. S. Constitution protects abusive
families thereby insinuating no equal rights for children exist, or
ignoring counter-arguments that children do have rights that
government should and must protect.

- and that government is deliberately malevolent toward children and
deliberately destructive of families.

They walk away from successful rebuttals and return to their "argument
by volume" and insinuation. And later simply repeat the same lie they
were clearly defeated in espousing earlier.

What they don't respond to is often as telling as how they boldly lie
by commission of untruth or spinning partial truth.

Kane