[BibChr]

See now, this is the sort of story that makes the whole discussion of abuse so complicated.

(I’m making these numbers up from my impression, so....) for every ten stories of overzealous, intrusive, statist CPS workers/busybody neighbors, there’s one of these gut-wrenching, pathetic stories of genuine abuse.

If one of my neighbors notices one of my (homeschooled) kids isn’t in the government re-education center, he can report us anonymously and make our lives miserable. That’s wrong; and it happens.

But what’s the better system? Something has to allow for the rescue of poor little lambs like this poor, poor kid.

That’s one for which I haven’t come up with a simple, one-size-fits-all solution that would work in the real world.

[grey_whiskers]

I ran across one peer-reviewed study (too lazy to look it up presently) which indicated that the ratio of false charges to true by CPS-type caseworkers was about six false for every true.

Full Disclosure: Don't remember the study well enough to know if it blamed that on incompetence, "making quota", or sexual allegations in divorce.

No cheers, unfortunately.

[jude24]

If one of my neighbors notices one of my (homeschooled) kids isn’t in the government re-education center, he can report us anonymously and make our lives miserable. That’s wrong; and it happens. But what’s the better system? Something has to allow for the rescue of poor little lambs like this poor, poor kid. That’s one for which I haven’t come up with a simple, one-size-fits-all solution that would work in the real world.

That's because you're rationally trying to balance two competing values - liberty vs. the need to intervene in cases like this to protect the innocents.

If you ever do come up with an answer, I'm all ears. I suspect that the current system is the absolute worst, except for all others.