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Orphans of the Living: Stories of America's children in foster care
Pergamon
Children and Youth Services Review. Vol. 20, No. 7, pp. 657X65, 1998 Copyright 8 1998 Elsevier Science. Ltd Primed in the USA. All rights reserved 019@7409/98 $19.00 + .@I
PI1 so190-7409(98)00030-9
Book Review
Orphans of the Living: Stories of America’s Children in Foster Care By Jennifer Toth New York: Simon & Schuster, 1997 In Orphans of the Living2 Jennifer Toth, who previously described the plight of homeless people in The Mole People: Life in the Tunnels Beneath New York City, describes the lives of Damien, Sebastian, Jamie, Angel, and Bryan. What the children share are tragic life stories. Each story is difficult to read. We meet Damien, a month away from turning 13, at Central Children’s Home in Oxford, North Carolina. He was first placed with his grandparents when caseworkers judged him to be neglected due to his mother’s alcoholism. Damien was placed at Central when his grandparents could no longer influence him to attend school or adequately care for his five siblings. Damien desperately wants to return to living with his mother and becomes an increasing behavior problem. Sebastian is 14 when he arrives at Central. His mother was identified as mentally and physically unstable. There were signs of mental illness, use of heroin, and abusive relationships with Sebastian witnessing some of the battering. His sister tried to care for him but after a violent episode she pressed charges. When it was clear that no family member could or would care for Sebastian, he was placed at Central. Shortly after his arriving at Central, there is a sexual encounter between Sebastian and Damien. Their behavior continues to become more difficult and eventually they both are made to leave Central. Angel is an l&year-old African-American woman with five children and a 73-year-old husband who was her foster father. We leave her in the hospital having attempted suicide. In between is a short life of trauma, violence, and bad decisions by nearly all concerned.
657
658
Rook Reviews
Angel’s mother, Linda, was on crack cocaine at the time of the birth. She agreed to go through treatment and leave Angel with her grandmother. When Angel’s grandmother became terminally ill, she placed Angel with Mr. and Mrs. Brown. Linda reports her mother as being a religious and “good hearted women”. She started smoking pot and drinking wine at age 12 because it was the thing to do in her neighborhood. She ran away from home and led a life dominated by drug abuse. After completing a drug rehabilitation program, Linda raised her daughters for six years. During that time there was evidence of Angel being sexually abused by Linda’s boyfriend. The sequence of Angel living with her mother, grandmother, and the Brown family is unclear. However, it is clear that each time Angel was in serious trouble and did not know where to turn she called Mr. or Mrs. Brown and they came to her rescue. Angel works her way through more than a dozen foster homes and group homes. When she runs away from a foster mother trying to exorcise the demons from Angel, she calls Mr. Brown for help. Once again he responds. Even after Mrs. Brown dies he maintains contact with Angel. Although the system often will not allow him to visit or talk to her. At one point Mr. Brown gets Angel out of a mental hospital and she is formally replaced with him. Angel runs away and tries prostitution but calls Mr. Brown after being beaten by her pimp. When Angel is thirteen they have consensual sex and one year later her biological mother signs a consent for Angel to marry Mr. Brown. While this relationship is extremely troubling, it appears that Angel is using it to attain a stable life. For Mr. Brown, the marriage seems to be a natural extension of helping Angel and her children. Throughout their marriage she continues to get involved in sexuai and abusive relationships with other men and Mr. Brown continues to be supportive of Angel. Ultimately they loose custody of the children as a result of a sexual abuse complaint against Mr. Brown that is subsequently dropped. The author leaves Angel on her nineteenth birthday, in the hospital due to a suicide attempt, and one month after giving birth to her fifth child. If this book was a collection of tragic stories that portrayed “certain predicaments of human dignity” the work might be in the tradition ofLet Us Now Praise Famous Men (1960). The intent of James Agee and Walker Evans was to educate a broader public about poor tenant farmers in the south. What they did was powerfully describe the dignity of people
Rook Reviews
659
struggling to survive. There is an element of this in Jennifer Toth’s stories but it is preempted by her assertion that this book is about America’s Children in Foster Care. “A half million children are now consigned to the substitute child care system, a chaotic, prison like system intended to raise children whose parents and relatives cannot or will not care for them.” (p. 17) This is the first sentence of the book and clearly establishes the authors point of view. One could easily read this book and become enraged with the “substitute child care system”, but that would be unfair to the very system Ms. Toth is trying to reform. It is unfair because there is no discussion of the degree to which these stories are representative. Although Toth is a journalist rather than a researcher, her premise requires a research method. This is neither good quantitative or qualitative research. This presentation of the “foster care system” is unfair because there is no discussion of cause and effect. Of the myriad of tragic circumstance, some may be attributed to substitute care, some may be attributed to family or community factors, and some may be due to genetics or biology. Perhaps most importantly, this representation is unfair because the use of the term “system” allows enraged readers to target their anger at whatever they understand to be the “system”. In child welfare there are many choices. You can pick the juvenile court that attempts to make child and family development decisions primarily with legal knowledge. Choose the public child welfare agency that balances safety and permanency decisions with little ability to predict violent behavior. Pick the private child care institution that cares for adolescents in a congregate setting at a time of sexual inquiry and exploration. These are just three of many choices. Lacking in the debate and outrage about the “child welfare system” is the community. How did the community support Sebastian’s mother as she battled with mental illness and drug abuse? How did the larger society allow or foster the development of a community where Linda experienced smoking pot and drinking wine at age 12 as the thing to do? How did the community support, honor, or monitor Mr. and Mrs. Brown in their attempts to care for several foster children? Community is not a synonym for system. The word ‘system’ allows us to distance ourselves from the discussion. It is the problem of someone else. The word ‘community’ draws us into the discussion. We are part of
660
Book Reviews
the community. A community that is actively engaged in conversations about how its children are succeeding in becoming productive citizens will not insure against stories like those in Orphans of the Living. However, it does provide a starting place for reform efforts that we are a part of, that are concrete, and have a better chance of success. One of the biggest barriers to improving public child welfare is the ability to have informed discussions among citizens about public responsibility for children and families. There are few mechanisms available for this discussion and the result is a prevailing opinion that someone else should “fix” the system, family, or children. What is needed is an examination of community responsibility for vulnerable children and families and the development of mechanisms for discussions among citizens about their role and responsibility. Agee, J., & Evans, W. (1960). Let us now praise famous men. New York, Ballantine Books, Inc.
John Poertner University of Illinois
Saving Our Children from Poverty: What the United States Can Learn from France by Barbara R. Bergmann You [students] are about to be told one more time that children are America’s most valuable natural resource. Have you seen what they do to valuable natural resources? Utah Phillips
For poor children in the United States, life is pretty much the same before and after they are touched by the array government programs. That is, based on wage income alone 23.3 percent of American children are poor, after taxes and benefits are taken into account fully 21 percent of children remain poor. As you may already suspect or know, the story couldn’t be more different in France. There a greater proportion of children (24.7 per-
Children and Youth Services Review. Vol. 20, No. 7, pp. 657X65, 1998 Copyright 8 1998 Elsevier Science. Ltd Primed in the USA. All rights reserved 019@7409/98 $19.00 + .@I
PI1 so190-7409(98)00030-9
Book Review
Orphans of the Living: Stories of America’s Children in Foster Care By Jennifer Toth New York: Simon & Schuster, 1997 In Orphans of the Living2 Jennifer Toth, who previously described the plight of homeless people in The Mole People: Life in the Tunnels Beneath New York City, describes the lives of Damien, Sebastian, Jamie, Angel, and Bryan. What the children share are tragic life stories. Each story is difficult to read. We meet Damien, a month away from turning 13, at Central Children’s Home in Oxford, North Carolina. He was first placed with his grandparents when caseworkers judged him to be neglected due to his mother’s alcoholism. Damien was placed at Central when his grandparents could no longer influence him to attend school or adequately care for his five siblings. Damien desperately wants to return to living with his mother and becomes an increasing behavior problem. Sebastian is 14 when he arrives at Central. His mother was identified as mentally and physically unstable. There were signs of mental illness, use of heroin, and abusive relationships with Sebastian witnessing some of the battering. His sister tried to care for him but after a violent episode she pressed charges. When it was clear that no family member could or would care for Sebastian, he was placed at Central. Shortly after his arriving at Central, there is a sexual encounter between Sebastian and Damien. Their behavior continues to become more difficult and eventually they both are made to leave Central. Angel is an l&year-old African-American woman with five children and a 73-year-old husband who was her foster father. We leave her in the hospital having attempted suicide. In between is a short life of trauma, violence, and bad decisions by nearly all concerned.
657
658
Rook Reviews
Angel’s mother, Linda, was on crack cocaine at the time of the birth. She agreed to go through treatment and leave Angel with her grandmother. When Angel’s grandmother became terminally ill, she placed Angel with Mr. and Mrs. Brown. Linda reports her mother as being a religious and “good hearted women”. She started smoking pot and drinking wine at age 12 because it was the thing to do in her neighborhood. She ran away from home and led a life dominated by drug abuse. After completing a drug rehabilitation program, Linda raised her daughters for six years. During that time there was evidence of Angel being sexually abused by Linda’s boyfriend. The sequence of Angel living with her mother, grandmother, and the Brown family is unclear. However, it is clear that each time Angel was in serious trouble and did not know where to turn she called Mr. or Mrs. Brown and they came to her rescue. Angel works her way through more than a dozen foster homes and group homes. When she runs away from a foster mother trying to exorcise the demons from Angel, she calls Mr. Brown for help. Once again he responds. Even after Mrs. Brown dies he maintains contact with Angel. Although the system often will not allow him to visit or talk to her. At one point Mr. Brown gets Angel out of a mental hospital and she is formally replaced with him. Angel runs away and tries prostitution but calls Mr. Brown after being beaten by her pimp. When Angel is thirteen they have consensual sex and one year later her biological mother signs a consent for Angel to marry Mr. Brown. While this relationship is extremely troubling, it appears that Angel is using it to attain a stable life. For Mr. Brown, the marriage seems to be a natural extension of helping Angel and her children. Throughout their marriage she continues to get involved in sexuai and abusive relationships with other men and Mr. Brown continues to be supportive of Angel. Ultimately they loose custody of the children as a result of a sexual abuse complaint against Mr. Brown that is subsequently dropped. The author leaves Angel on her nineteenth birthday, in the hospital due to a suicide attempt, and one month after giving birth to her fifth child. If this book was a collection of tragic stories that portrayed “certain predicaments of human dignity” the work might be in the tradition ofLet Us Now Praise Famous Men (1960). The intent of James Agee and Walker Evans was to educate a broader public about poor tenant farmers in the south. What they did was powerfully describe the dignity of people
Rook Reviews
659
struggling to survive. There is an element of this in Jennifer Toth’s stories but it is preempted by her assertion that this book is about America’s Children in Foster Care. “A half million children are now consigned to the substitute child care system, a chaotic, prison like system intended to raise children whose parents and relatives cannot or will not care for them.” (p. 17) This is the first sentence of the book and clearly establishes the authors point of view. One could easily read this book and become enraged with the “substitute child care system”, but that would be unfair to the very system Ms. Toth is trying to reform. It is unfair because there is no discussion of the degree to which these stories are representative. Although Toth is a journalist rather than a researcher, her premise requires a research method. This is neither good quantitative or qualitative research. This presentation of the “foster care system” is unfair because there is no discussion of cause and effect. Of the myriad of tragic circumstance, some may be attributed to substitute care, some may be attributed to family or community factors, and some may be due to genetics or biology. Perhaps most importantly, this representation is unfair because the use of the term “system” allows enraged readers to target their anger at whatever they understand to be the “system”. In child welfare there are many choices. You can pick the juvenile court that attempts to make child and family development decisions primarily with legal knowledge. Choose the public child welfare agency that balances safety and permanency decisions with little ability to predict violent behavior. Pick the private child care institution that cares for adolescents in a congregate setting at a time of sexual inquiry and exploration. These are just three of many choices. Lacking in the debate and outrage about the “child welfare system” is the community. How did the community support Sebastian’s mother as she battled with mental illness and drug abuse? How did the larger society allow or foster the development of a community where Linda experienced smoking pot and drinking wine at age 12 as the thing to do? How did the community support, honor, or monitor Mr. and Mrs. Brown in their attempts to care for several foster children? Community is not a synonym for system. The word ‘system’ allows us to distance ourselves from the discussion. It is the problem of someone else. The word ‘community’ draws us into the discussion. We are part of
660
Book Reviews
the community. A community that is actively engaged in conversations about how its children are succeeding in becoming productive citizens will not insure against stories like those in Orphans of the Living. However, it does provide a starting place for reform efforts that we are a part of, that are concrete, and have a better chance of success. One of the biggest barriers to improving public child welfare is the ability to have informed discussions among citizens about public responsibility for children and families. There are few mechanisms available for this discussion and the result is a prevailing opinion that someone else should “fix” the system, family, or children. What is needed is an examination of community responsibility for vulnerable children and families and the development of mechanisms for discussions among citizens about their role and responsibility. Agee, J., & Evans, W. (1960). Let us now praise famous men. New York, Ballantine Books, Inc.
John Poertner University of Illinois
Saving Our Children from Poverty: What the United States Can Learn from France by Barbara R. Bergmann You [students] are about to be told one more time that children are America’s most valuable natural resource. Have you seen what they do to valuable natural resources? Utah Phillips
For poor children in the United States, life is pretty much the same before and after they are touched by the array government programs. That is, based on wage income alone 23.3 percent of American children are poor, after taxes and benefits are taken into account fully 21 percent of children remain poor. As you may already suspect or know, the story couldn’t be more different in France. There a greater proportion of children (24.7 per-