{"id":1689,"date":"2024-07-30T18:07:31","date_gmt":"2024-07-30T23:07:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/theelman.com\/index.php\/2024\/07\/30\/ontarios-war-against-children-and-families\/"},"modified":"2024-07-30T18:07:31","modified_gmt":"2024-07-30T23:07:31","slug":"ontarios-war-against-children-and-families","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/theelman.com\/index.php\/2024\/07\/30\/ontarios-war-against-children-and-families\/","title":{"rendered":"Ontario\u2019s War Against Children and Families"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
Katelynn Sampson died August 3 2008. I carry her with me to this day. <\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

If a government had decided to lead a war against its own children and families how might it prosecute that war. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

I\u2019m thinking the first thing it might do is eliminate the Ministry that was responsible for the well being of children.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The next thing it might do is get rid of the institution responsible for amplifying the voices of children and youth. Then threaten those organizations working with children with cuts or liquidation if they spoke up about the war to come. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Once the groundwork has been set. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Undermine the system meant to protect children , as archaic as it is, with something called a \u201ctransformation\u201d or better yet a \u201credesign\u201d that tinkered on the edges and caused chaos and near collapse. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Not finished yet. To really win this war hollow out every system meant to touch the lives of children and families ( complex needs, addictions, mental health, therapy, daycare, special education, intimate partner violence, disability\u2026.) <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Leave them alone, unsupported, unprotected. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

And while doing all this stoke the fog of war by talking about how much money you as the government spent and throw out some shiny objects like, I don\u2019t know, free beer or something <\/p>\n\n\n\n

This war is not fictional.  It is raging in Ontario.  I can not hold in my heart that this war could have been planned and undertaken  intentionally.  I refuse to allow myself to believe that, yet make no mistake , it is not hyperbole, it is happening.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The government of Ontario must end its war.  It must find, with every fiber of humility it can muster, the will to make peace.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The government must call the Legislature back now to establish a non-partisan All Party Standing Committee on Children and Youth.  The Opposition Parties must participate in good faith for the sake of our children.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Committee must immediately call upon the Ombudsma<\/a>n of Ontario, the Coroner of Ontario and the Minister of Children, Community and Social Services to separately testify and report on the record 136 children connected to the child protection system who died in 2022 \/ 2023.  The Committee must learn how these children died, hear analysis of the circumstances of their deaths, and review what these institutions have done to stem the tide.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The government of Ontario must follow the lead of the government of British Columbia and task the new non-partisan Ontario Standing Committee on  Children and Youth to work across the aisles, across the whole of government, with all Ontario, to create a new \u201cchild well-being system\u201d that will replace or at minimum complement our current child protection system providing every child and family with what they need, when they need it, in order to thriv<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This is a way out.  Take it Ford Nation. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

If a government had decided to lead a war against its own children and families how might it prosecute that war.  I\u2019m thinking the first thing it might do is eliminate the Ministry that was responsible for the well being of children.   The next thing it might do is […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1689","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/theelman.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1689","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/theelman.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/theelman.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theelman.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theelman.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1689"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/theelman.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1689\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/theelman.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1689"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theelman.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1689"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theelman.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1689"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}