fluff4: You ask why kids were in orphanages, and then answer: "Mostly it was threatend or real violence in the home." Your evidence?

The CLAN survey (2007) showed that the main reasons in order were:

father's alcoholism (20% - a high % were returned servicemen )
parents divorced (17% - plus unmarried mothers 8%)
one or other parent dead (16% - less than 2% had both parents dead )
parent's mental illness (14%)
poverty (10%).

Eight % said they didn't know why they were in orphanages.

The only reputable contemporary study is by Tierney in Victoria (1963). He gives these figures, showing significant differences between Wards of State and Voluntary Admissions.

State wards 1st, then --- voluntary admissions:

neglect (54% --- 19% )
parental separation (16% --- 36%)
behaviour of child (14% --- NA)
affliction of parents (8% --- 27%)
child born out of wedlock (NA ---11%)

While there can be little doubt that violence accompanies alcoholism in many cases, there is not much evidence to suggest violence played a significant part in orphanage children's lives - until after they were admitted.

Were the abuse issues associated with orphanages symptoms of the times or unresolvable issues that will always be a serious risk with that style of care?

I'm undecided. I suspect that the forms of abuse described can for the most part be kept at a lower rate in an institutional environment than they would in individual homes - we are much better educated today about child sexual abuse than people were in the 50's, attitudes regarding physical punishment of children have changed dramatically in most quarters and the technology exists to support independant monitoring of what goes on. A larger number of care givers hopefully equates to a better chance of a child having someone who will listen if things do go bad.

What concerns me more greatly is the difference between growing up in an institution and growing up in a family. I would have expected that was one of the advantages of foster care but the situation Country Gal describes suggests that many of those advantages may not exist. Kids should see their picture on the wall of the home they live in, they should have a sense of being connected to the main caregivers.

R0bert

It saddens me to say that as emotional; physical and sexual abuse can
often be inflicted at home within so-called 'normal families' kids
are not really safe anywhere in today's society!

Many kids in foster care; and many who were in the 'care' of institutions were also abused emotionally; physically and sexually.

What is really needed IMHO is better protection of at risk kids wherever they reside!

Sigh....

R0bert, I agree. Whilst my comment on orphanages was tongue-in-cheek, it would be less taxing on a monitoring agency to keep tabs on what is happening inside 1 institution, as opposed to 200 homes. And I do think that some of the problems in years gone back are symptoms of the times and our unwillingness and inability to recognise and confront them headon.

The situations I described appalled me - its basically emotional abuse of the kids by the system, and abuse that is likely to have a long-lasting impact. And what's super-sad is that these are what I would class as great foster-parents, and they have had enough and no longer want to be involved

Country Gal,

I knew you had to be joking! However, there is a serious movement in the USA to bring back orphanages. I think it's supported by the organised pedophile rings.

R0bert,

Abuse issues associated with orphanages were not 'symptoms of the times'. Child rape has always been a crime and always will be. And the rapists knew it then as they do now.

Nor were they 'unresolvable issues that will always be a serious risk with that style of care'. They were crimes that people could get away with because

(a) staff were never made accountable
(b) 'carers' were the dregs of society (who else would work there - long hours, poor pay, too many kids, no training, no qualifications, ask no questions, etc?)
(c) responsible authorities - the state, the churches, charities - put a very low priority on 'those sorts of children' ' children of the dangerous classes', 'orphans of the living' who were out of sight and therefore out of mind.

Your touching faith in large-scale institutions to provide better supervision and lower rates of sexual abuse defies common sense. The more kids, the more likely abuse can be covered up. Inspections of orphanages were notoriously window-dressing. As soon as the Visitor went, off came your best clothes, and woe betide anyone who had dared tell about what really went on.

As for "a better chance of a child having someone who will listen", the analogy that springs to mind is the sergeant-major tucking all his soldiers into bed at night. As absurd as expecting Old Lady Who Lived in a Shoe to tell each of her 'too many children' individual stories at bedtime.

The situation Country Gal describes is the extreme end of foster care. The situation in orphanages that I described was endemic. It's not hard to find good foster parents (but there's not enough I know). But it's almost impossible to find a good orphanage.

wearyMum is right: "What is really needed IMHO is better protection of at risk kids wherever they reside!"

Cheers for your support Spikey - really needed ATM

weary

Hasn't there been a big stink recently in England about an 'orphanage'
involving the digging up of child bodies?