2old2beamum ?we come from different ends but we both care?
Your post highlights a really important issue here. We need to properly acknowledge both ends of the spectrum, because there are children living with the consequences of each. For every child, whether they are removed or not, it is vital the decision making is steadfast and accountable.
Key professionals working with the process, including those here on this thread, admit the system is not perfect, and this can only mean children (and their families) fall through both ends of the net. We do indeed need to acknowledge and care about the fallout from each.
The issues of children remaining too long in abusive and neglectful homes or in care must of course be addressed, but in a way that doesn't abuse or neglect the rights of children to stay with a loving family where that is possible; through a process which provides adequate and timely assessment (?and monitoring and support?) and most importantly, one that is answerable, up to speed and open to challenge and change!
We also need to accept that decisions need to be made about a child?s future based on the information available, within appropriate & realistic timescales. But where information may be incomplete or flawed, or the process has timed-out, we have to ask questions about whether our system has enabled the best decisions to have been made for a child.
In such cases, where adoption is the decision (and this isn?t to undermine in any way the importance of other outcomes) I am interested to know what the repercussions are for the children, their adoptive and birth families when/if the system has failed in this way? Because I am not sure this has really been explored.
As caring human beings it is hard for us to look at this end, because we naturally want to focus purely on protecting children that rightly need protection.
But what is a child in this situation (and their adoptive family) likely to understand about reasons for their adoption? This understanding is important for an adoptee. How are they going to view society that has allowed these life changing decisions, if they have happened in error, without scrutiny?
Who do birth families turn to after such decisions have been made? Particularly since their voices seem lost in a cloud of stigma, secrecy and conspiracy theories. It seems that Family Courts, or even the European Courts, are the only places where these issues can be addressed, and this simply cannot remain the case.
Conspiracy theories, as far as I know, are often based on elements of truth. And this is the nitti-gritty of the issue here: What is the truth and how do we get to it so we can feel secure with our system?