We'll start off with my thoughts on this, I think. The other posts should follow naturally on from it.
If you're reading this, then the chances are you do not think that child snatching by the state is a crackpot conspiracy theory.
The problem is, the people who are directly involved in forced adoptions rely (whether consciously or unconsciously) on the characterisation of those who oppose their actions as irrational or unhinged. In this way, they can contine to do what they do (often believing it to be the "right" course of action for the child) unimpeded.
Then there is everybody else, including many people who don't consider the relevance of something as apparently far-fetched as forced adoption to their own family situation. It is an easy and somewhat comforting approach to assume that you are sane and safe, and the proponents of an idea you'd rather not follow through to damning logical conclusions are just plain crazy.
An addition spanner in the works is that people who are comfortable exploring ideas that threaten the fabric of conventional society are also less likely to feel the need to conform in other ways. They may dress differently, say unexpected things or behave unusually in the company of other people. Again, rather than being curious as to why it is that somebody who is so clearly comfortable in his or her own skin makes us feel uneasy or alienated, it's much easier to label them as mad.
And finally, of course, there is the passion and emotion that people who have experienced the threat (whether theorectical or actual) of having their children removed - not to mention those who have had their children taken from them - this force of feeling is easily dismissed as mental instability. But you should know the quote by now:
Extremism in the defense of liberty is no vice; moderation in the pursuit of justice is no virtue.
And each innocent parent should be at liberty to protect their child. People who speak out about forced adoption are not insane by virtue of doing so. They are simply describing a brutal practice -- permanent removal of children from parents who have committed no crime against them, do not want them to be removed and do not know where they will end up - whether they are safe, well and happy.
Does anybody genuinely think that the killers of Victoria Climbie, Peter Connelly or Khyra Ishaq, who showed so little regard for the value of human life, would have campaigned so tirelessly for the return of their children if removed from them? Would they have made such an effort to raise their profile and gain as much publicity as possible? Or would they have slunk off somewhere else, glad to be let off the hook?
Amongst the children who are happy and relieved to have been removed from their parents and placed into care, are there any whose parents had not committed a crime against them? Almost certainly not.
It's understandable that people do not want to think about this in detail. It's easier to make throwaway comments that actually require a level of thought and analysis, such as: social workers are damned if they do and damned if they don't (it's complicated) or some people shouldn't be allowed to have children (that's coercive eugenics) or more children should be taken into to care (an easy assertion to make if there are financial incentives for doing so).
But returning to forced adoption for a moment, how can it ever be right that people who are not found guilty of a crime nevertheless have their children removed from them, permanently, and placed with strangers for the rest of their lives?
Forced adoption is perhaps too polite a way of putting it. It really is state sponsored child snatching. It is unnatural and immoral. It is a situation that people perhaps avoid thinking about because it is so distressing. But it happens, right here, in this country, and with the power that statutory services currently have, it could happen to any one of us.
As Ian Josephs rightly said, there is absolutely no need for a conspiracy theory. A complex set of independent, interdependent and dependent arrangements and agendas have unhappily produced an environment within which:
- Statutory services can intervene in families with ease
- Fallible individuals within statutory services have the power to make subjective assessments and definitions of suitability
- Fallible individuals within statutory services can remove children permanently from families without their parents ever having committed a crime against them
- Cases are heard in closed family courts which are not subject to scrutiny, do not operate with a jury, accept hearsay as evidence and rely only on the judgement of a single fallible individual (the judge)
- Parents and children are subject to gagging orders preventing them from deciding whether or not they want to put their private matters in the public arena for wider scrutiny
- Social services departments, lawyers, judges, expert witnesses, (fake)charities, foster and adoption agencies all benefit financially each time a child is removed from his or her family
Financially indexed adoption targets may have been dropped, but they nevertheless exist in a different incarnation. And as anyone responsible for performance knows, what's measured gets done, often exerting pressures and causing all sorts of unforeseen consequences elsewhere in a system.
Some lawyers are retained by local authorities; when this is the case it is not necessarily in the long-term interests of those professionals to put up a fight against their biggest source of income. We already know about parasitic fake charities. Foster carers can receive up to around £20k/child, so goodness knows what fees the agencies (often set up by ex-officials) managing these arrangements command.
And none of these people will feel the sickening heart wrench that parents bereft of their children are biologically destined to feel. Only those with real empathy and a desire for the truth will ever try. To come close to even imagining is painful, so it is no wonder that emotive language is used, personalities clash and tempers are lost.
Unfortunately, these outbursts can put people off pursuit the truth. But so, of course, can perpetuating the sterile, numbing vocabulary of the bureaucrat, or (worse) the slick corporate doublespeak of the social care salesperson.
The best we can do is be true to ourselves and use whatever tactics, information and contacts we have at our own disposal. A willingness to reflect on the efficacy of our actions and change where necessary is always valuable. We also need to remind ourselves that, although the world contains psychopaths, rent-seekers, crowd pleasers and professional cyncics, there are also people like me and you. I am an ex-local authority worker who not so many years ago didn't really think and probably wouldn't have believed that bad things happen, but now -- I do. My ability to think and challenge is the only leaving present I received when I finally walked out of that environment - and the best one I could have hoped for.
"Child Snatching" by the State conference: first thoughts
