Customer Reviews

Wounded Innocents: The Real Victims of the War Against Child Abuse

5 star:		(7)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I have been involved with various aspects of the child protective service system for over 25 years. Based on my own experience, this book does not exaggerate the appalling dangers our families and children face at the hands of these systems. I found the accounts, chilling as they are, to be very accurate reflections of what I know to be everyday occurances in our child welfare system. This author has examined the data and the facts and done the homework that all of us should be doing.

wexler's book should be required reading. i wish i could get "dr" laura to read this book. it would certainly give her pause before saying kids are better off in foster care or an institution than with their parents... the situation in our nation with respect to child protection is tragic. the power of these programs to act is beyond the power granted in the constitution to our police. no search warrent is needed. a child can be taken with notifying the parents, without review. the records are sealed. wexler has done a service by writing this book. recommended highly.

Wounded Innocents will enrage any one who really cares about children in general, a particular child, or about the American idea of America.. Richard Wexler well documents the abuses of innocent children and their famlies an the hands of their self-appointed and very often misguided and unqualified saviors. I read this book in small increments because I would often become so angered at what I was reading that I would throw it across the room. I always picked it up again.

Richard has nailed it. This system is out of control and speaking as one who has been hit, I am very grateful to him for letting in the light.

The book tracks history of child intervention and describes the present situation adequately, but does not assess the reasons for the present situation in a societal context. He does not analyze the role of the press, training, and prosecutorial bias of the courts and the attack generally on the Constitution, although he does describe the result in great detail. He shows the harm that unrestrained child protection does to children, families, and society, although he understates the problem. The book is well researched and footnoted, as well as being well written. Some suggestions for change would be helpful.

Wexler lays out a clear and compelling case for implementing thorough change in the system of child protective services. A system informed by the thinking that state adjencies need to intervene in disfunctonal families; coerce and force families apart; is out of control and whats more shows by their own statistics that they do a far worse job than that of the disfunctional family they claim to be helping. Ultimately child protective services is fueled by the ever increasing need for money to follow up on what are many times false allegations in ever increasing proportion to the erroneous and misinterpreted statistics, that the general public is told are factual. In addition children who are placed are worth approximately thirty thousand dollars, or more (per year),to the 'child savers'.than what they have to pay out. Finally after careful study of the "child savers"' statistics it is glaringly obvious that there are many more children being abused in placements than they would be if kept with their families. If recources were to be used to do more thorough investigations before removing these children from their homes much of this abuse would be averted. Please read his book, for your families freedom depends on being informed and having the tools to effect change. This book is written with a balanced view by a research journalist who is honest and straight foward giving sound advice for changing the system to save children and families. Robert Locatell

I believe Richard Wexler had his heart in the right place when he wrote this book. The problem is in the execution. The book was first published in 1996, but almost all of the actual research that he cites is from the 1980s. Most of the cases and incidences he cites are from the 1980s as well. Research and knowledge and practices in any field changes over time, so citing old research isn't the best idea. Most of what he cites in NOT even research at all. In numerous occasions throughout the book he cites some person's personal opinions as if they were established facts. He makes sweeping generalizations based on anecdotal evidence.

He rails against "child savers" but he never really defines who that term refers to. It seems to be some amorphous group that sometimes includes politicians, legislators, social workers, case workers, welfare workers, cps workers, the medical field, and any other group whose individual members have made an error in judgment at any one time or another. At the same time he uses quotes from various people in these same fields to prove various particular points of his. Are CPS workers all lazy and incompetent, or are they scapegoats of a broken system? Are social workers to be quoted, or are they all incompetent? Do they hold Master's degrees or are they all minimally trained if trained at all? He can't seem to make up his mind.

I think if Mr. Wexler sat down and edited his book and made the facts and the logic a little tighter it would be a more valuable critique of the field of child welfare and its policies. However, it would also probably make it less entertaining. People love rhetoric. This book is just a long news feature piece. It is not research by any means. Wexler sheds light on some very real issues and problems, but he does so sloppily. This could be a really great book with more work. Good read though.

This book was a real eye-opener. Anyone dealing with the court systems in the USA and who have faced a divorce and been involved in a custody battle. It discusses of the current child protective system in this country. The problem with U.S. child-protective system is not that it hurts parents, though of course it does, the author says. The problem with our child protective system is that it also hurts children - the same children that it is supposed to protect. The author discusses of how the system hurts children who have never been maltreated, by disrupting their families, invading their privacy, breaking up families, separating them and jeopardizing the bond of trust that is essential for healthy parent-child relationships. It is too easy to pull the children away from their parents, wreck the homes and dump the children in the foster care system. "Foster care is the garbage dump," "That's what they do with kids when they don't know what else to do with them - throw 'em in foster care."

Bu the author has noticed that this is not the worst of all, the system harms the children who really needs help: the abused children. This is because the false and trivial reports flood the system, and then untrained, inexperienced, uninterested workers try to go through all these reports. The assessment system of the abuse and neglect does not separate what is a real abuse and what is just a custody battle complaint made by the revengeful ex or jealous neighbor.

In the name of "child protection," children have been let to stay or placed in an environment where they are severly physically and mentally abused... instead of leaving them with their families and loving parents.
This book is a valuable lesson to anyone who thinks that the protective services is doing good for the families and children by separating them.

This book ia an excellant education source regarding the plight of the child welfare system. I did not realize that this was such a problem until I read LaMonte McNeese's book "How to be strong, when falsely accused. It was an eyeopener for me and more people need to speak out and educate others so that change can occur.

I feel so strongly about this book that our association is planning a protest march in washington dc.