Should severely obese kids be taken from parents?

[prolesunited]

On August 4, 2004, 8-year old Dakota Main was removed from his mother's custody by Porter County Division of Family & Children in Valparaiso, Indiana. There was no home visit, no warning and in court soon afterwards, the lawyer for Dakota's mother proved there was no medical neglect or abuse of her child. So why was Dakota taken from his mother and sister?

Dakota is fat. He is 4 feet tall and weighs 175 pounds.

Dakota has one non-life-threatening medical condition which is not weight-related and is an otherwise healthy and well-adjusted child.

http://size-acceptance.org/dakota/

So, is the state right in taking this action or is it part of an effort to demonize people who are obese? What do you think should be done in such cases?

[LiberalVoice]

1. Thats fucking bullshit.

He has a disease. I was over weight and my mother did everything she could to help me.

This pisses me off.

[Cheswick2.0]

2. This is wrong

no an obese child should not be taken from his parents. What good is that going to do? This is child abuse.

[shraby]

5. Hell no!!!!

My brother and I were always "regular size" but my other brother always had a problem with his weight..and he wasn't a big eater either. Fer Chris' sakes, leave the overweight children ALONE. They have enough problems trying to adjust in an anorexic minded society. They are teased by their playmates, they sure as hell don't need adults "teasing" and harassing them!!!!!!!!!!!

[Dogmudgeon]

3. Traditional treatment of childhood obesity works best

Frequent teasing, taunting, and humiliation by other children.

Demeaning nicknames.

Social ostracization.

Daily paddlings at school and/or home.

Severely hypocaloric, foul-tasting meals, combined with lectures about the shame of gluttony.

Double chores, every day.

Military-school style discipline.

Enlist the aid of bullies to administer humiliating beatings after school.

Required nudity during some part of gym class.

And let's not forget, frequent admonitions that they're only doing it because obesity is such a health risk.

--bkl

[Exultant Democracy]

8. lets take it to the next level

make the kid strip down and circle with felt tip marker the parts of his body that he/she needs to change.

[Massacure]

10. Chores and Boot-camp might work

However it should be the child's choice to lose weight, not the parent's or the government's.

EDIT: I should also add that it wouldn't work for everybody.

[Xithras]

4. Not solely for obesity, no.

Really, it depends on the reason the child is obese. If your kid doesn't exercise much and is overweight, or if they have some condition that's making them obese, then a child should never be taken from his/her parents...bad parenting is not a crime.

But there ARE parents who are absolutely neurotic about their kids eating EVERY BITE ON THE PLATE, who then insist on giving them huge parent sized portions and punish them for not eating all of it. This actually happens to a minority of obese children, and is both physically and mentally abusive. If a childs weight problems are traced back to these types of situations, then the child SHOULD be taken away.

Also, there have been a few cases where a childs weight was so extreme that it began to cause health problems, and the parents refused to put the kid on any kind of diet. That essentially qualifies as medical neglect and should also be grounds for removing a child from a home.

[shraby]

6. I disagree totally.

Obesity is absolutely NO reason to deprive a child of it's parents.

[Djinn]

9. so even if (as the above poster mentions)

the kid is beyond obese and is at serious risk of imminent death and the parents refuse to look after the kids health by putting it on a diet they should be allowed to feed the kid to death?

would you say the same thing about a severely underweight child who's parents thought thin was good so kept them on a starvation diet?

[Xithras]

13. Ah, but my reasons have nothing to do with obesity.

They both had to do with physical and mental abuse. If you berate your kid into overeating and the consequence is that he becomes overweight, then you are mentally abusing your child. The child shouldn't be taken away for weight, but abuse.

And don't even TRY to tell me it never happens, because I've seen it happen. Parents put HUGE portions in front of their children, and then scream at them to eat all of their food even when the child is full. My own wife had it out with one of her students parents when the parent INSISTED that her child be given TWO trays of food at lunch, and that the school make him eat all of it...even though the child had told my wife previously that he didn't want to eat that much. The boy later told my wife that his mother was making him eat after school "because the school wouldn't feed him enough". The result? A severely obese 5 year old. And yes, they did turn the mother into CPS. The kid was later pulled from the school, but we never found out whether it was by the state or the mother.

Abuse is abuse, and forcing a child to do something unhealthy is definitely abuse. It is societies duty to protect ALL abused children, no matter who the abuser is or what form the abuse takes.

[skippythwndrdog]

7. Not unless they're kept tied down and force fed.

Gimme a break. What next? Are kids going to be snatched because of ugly glasses?

[Cleita]

11. Absolutely not until the parents have been counseled to

find out if they really are the problem. I grew up with a fat kid, whose parents were a doctor and a nurse. Now you know they had to know that their kid had a problem if they were part of the medical profession. They did everything to try to get him dieted down including padlocking anything that contained food in their home, but he managed to find food anyway and they really couldn't control him.

Years later I read that there is a disease where kids are always hungry. Of course, back right after WWII, even doctors didn't know about this disease, but I am sure my friend had it. Maybe sometimes parents are ignorant and feed their kids the wrong food and maybe a little counseling will help. I think taking kids away from their parents should be only in cases of abuse and when all other options have been exhausted.

Of course with our crappy health care system, the kids who need attention the most won't probably be the ones to get it.

[shugah]

12. i'm sure he'll be happy with the new 'rents

they will show him love by making him skinny! wow! i bet he'll never miss his real parents that loved him even if he was a bit heavy, pleasantly plump, obese, fat, chunky, etc.

conditional love beats a parents unconditional acceptance, doesn't it? i mean really! why worry about the emotional scars? no one can see those!

[prolesunited]

14. I don't think this is a case where

the child is chunky. At some point, extreme obesity *does* become a health issue.

I have very mixed feelings about this. That's why I posted the topic.

[shugah]

15. alright, my response minus sarcasm

i think taking this child away from his parents is wrong.

[depakid]

16. It depends

if there is evidence that the child is in danger of growng morbidly obese due to the mother's dietary choices and/or lack of supervision, and she refuses to take appropriate steps to remedy the problem, then that's probably grounds for neglect. I don't see that as any different than refusing to provide other types of medical treatment-

Since we don't have all of the facts here, it's hard to know what the real story is.

[KittyWampus]

17. How About Taking Away Kids Who's Parents Feed Them McDonalds

that shit is garbage.

How about taking away kids who's parents allow them to watch 6 hours of tv a day.

[BiggJawn]

18. Speaking as a fat person.

This is bullshit. So porter County CPS decided they needed to "intervene". (the social worker's favourite word)Why?

Would it not be more productive, less traumatizing, and less EXPENSIVE for Indiana's already-strapped taxpayers to have some counselling sessions?

Sure I understand trying to spare Dakota a life of Diabetes, (it's no fun, lemme tell ya!) But I think grabbing him from his mom like that falls under the heading of "negative reinforcemnt" or something equally damaging.

They screwed the pooch on this one.

[Tom Kitten]

19. This could be the start of a trend...

I can see the formation of special GOPS units (Government Obesity Police Squads)...they can carry special height/weight scales in the trunks of their patrol cars and cruise the neighborhoods searching for "suspected overweights"...Adults who fail to pass the standards can be detained and sent to special "Obesity Declamation Camps" where they undergo rigorous physical workouts accompanied by starvation diets and frequent ridicule and abuse by privately managed "guards"...

Minors who are overweight shall be seized by the state and placed in a special PSI-OPS program (Pro Self Image-Obesity Prevention System), co-sponsored in part by Coca-Cola and McDonalds (who own "stock" options), where they will be indoctrinated and given life affirming medications in order to provide hope that eventually they may yet become productive members of society...

Minors shall be indoctrinated by showing them specially prepared videos showing the fate of famous obese people such as Fatty Arbuckle, Fats Domino, Minnesota Fats, Chubby Checker, Notorious B.I.G.,former NBA player Lafayette "Fat" Lever, Stockard Channing and George Plumpton...

Malcontents who fail to accept reindoctrination shall be subjected to humiliating public displays of self debasement as a last ditch attempt of redemption, such as the building of nude human pyramids where the skinny and the slim can amass and shout hoots of derision, hopefully convincing the hopelessly obese to come over from the dark side...

[Ilsa]

20. No, but the mother needs some training

about how to raise a healthy child. They don't have to take the child away for that.

[TreasonousBastard]

21. OK, now where did this idea...

that all parents know what they're doing start?

You screw, nine months later a baby pops out and all of a sudden you're an expert? You need a license to take care of OTHER people's kids, but nothing at all to take care of your own.

Frankly, I'm amazed that as many kids turn out reasonably OK as they do. Just think what a country we'd have if more parents actually knew what they were doing.

This kid's pretty far from the norm for even heavy kids. Something's definitely wrong, but we don't know the whole story.

[oldcoot]

22. No!

Separating children from their parents is extremely traumatic and can cause permanent psychological damage to the children and the parents. Moreover, most states do not commit accurate resources to child services and do not always do an adequate job in weeding out the "bad apples" when selecting foster parents. How many times in the past months have we read story about foster or adoptive parents neglecting or abusing children? Even if children are not abused, they are frequently moved from foster home to foster home. In this case, the foster home does not sound like a good choice because the foster parents were having the kid chop wood with an ax (I have had to take away an ax from children much older than Dakota because they thought the ax was a toy).

Clearly, taking a child away from his/her parents should only be done as a last resort unless the child's life is facing grave imminent physical danger or the child is being sexually abused. Unfortunately, this appears to have been the Porter County Division of Family and Children's first step. The mother received no warning and no social worker visited her. I believe that educating and counseling the mother would have made more sense than taking the kid. I think that the individual responsible for making this decision as well as the head of the Porter County Division of Family and Children should lose their jobs.

[roguevalley]

23. keep him at home with court supervision with medical help. I don't know

that a parent wants a severely obese kid. he needs help but the parents are into giving/getting it or can't. Having taught for
27 years, I can tell you his life will be hell in school unless
someone helps all of them.

[eridani]

24. If he is going to be put with foster parents, give him to--

Cheryl Haworth's folks. Wonder how many of the people who abuse fat kids can do any of the following.

http://www.fortunecity.com/olympia/romario/912/gnews186.htm

Even four years after her debut, she continues to make observers exclaim. In Frederick, she snatched an American record 264.6 pounds and lifted a record 319.7 pounds in the clean and jerk. She runs the 40-yard dash in five seconds flat, an excellent time for an NFL lineman. She has a 32-inch vertical leap, which would satisfy a college basketball coach. Her flexibility is equally impressive: She can do a split both with her legs splayed to the front and back as well as sideways.