The child welfare system traumatizes black and brown kids

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The child welfare system, a system that was supposedly created to “protect” families, is defective. Today, many cases in family court that allege certain types of abuse and neglect are actually byproducts of poverty and community disinvestment that cause tremendous amounts of family displacement. I have seen children removed because of complaints of “dirty homes,” or because they were home alone while a parent went to work or had to run an errand, or because they missed one too many days of school. These are all situations in which additional support and investment could have helped families to preserve their households. Instead, they had to face an unforgiving system.