familyservicehub Why pediatricians worry about family separation:
We have a lot of information about the harm done to children who are taken from their parents.
- Nicolae Ceausescu, Romania’s communist leader during the 1980s and 1990s, believed that Romanian economies would be improved if more Romanians were born. He therefore encouraged people to give birth to children for whom they did not possess the means to provide care. Many Romanians grew up as orphans.
- Between 1910 and 1970, approximately 1/10 of Aboriginal Australian children was removed from the families they were raised in to be raised with white Christians.
- Many children in China, also known as the “left behind” live outlying village while their parents go to work.
Separating children from their parents triggers a stress reaction in their body, which secretes cortisol. The molecules can damage the brain at first, and then kill it. The brain cells cannot repair themselves. This type of stress is toxic and can cause permanent damage to the gray and white matter.
Children who have been separated from their families at a very young age – those Romanian children, or the Aboriginals in Australia – can suffer long-term effects of PTSD and even permanently damage their fight-or-flight response. They have difficulty separating what’s safe and what’s dangerous. So they are afraid of things they know to be safe.
The stolen Aboriginal children have double the rate of gambling and criminal arrests, as well as 60% more alcoholism.
Separated children are more aggressive, withdraw from relationships and suffer significantly higher levels of anxiety and depressive disorders. It is more common for them to engage in high-risk behaviors, become pregnant while still a teenager, or commit suicide. This can impact their emotional growth, which may lead to a lack of resilience and adaptability in later life.
These people are at a higher risk of developing long-term physical conditions such as hypertension, cardiovascular diseases, diabetes and obesity.
According to Dr. Hansa Bhargava of WebMD, the disease can potentially alter their DNA and “affect how their brain and body function for the remainder of their life.”
Separating children from their families, as well as beating them is child abuse. This is before we even consider how the kids are treated in cages, in constant noise and light without their parents’ comfort and supervision.
What happened so suddenly?
Let’s start with some history. It was legal to enter the US with no visa (and pay an entrance fee), until 1929. Then, it became a crime. Between 1930 and WWII, thousands of Mexicans faced prosecution for illegal entry (85-90% of inmates at the border prison business grew to be Mexican). Most white people were given a free pass.
Suddenly, World War II struck and we needed these Mexican agricultural workers desperately. After saying “come in!” we didn’t pursue much more until 2005.
Early 2000s, life in places such as El Salvador, Guatemala and Honduras was much more dangerous. As gangs multiplied, people began to flock towards our border in greater numbers looking for a better life for their family. In the period 2003-2005, illegal entry at our southern borders increased from 4000/year up to 16,500/year. By 2010, it had reached 44,000 and by 2013 it reached 97,000.
Recent numbers have decreased, but families are coming in greater numbers.
Immigration crisis has arrived.
We reacted. In 1997, a court ruled (Flores Vs Reno), that if the child is not released within 20 days, the government must either release them to their parents or an adult relative. This was expanded in 2015 to include children who were arrested along with their family members, and not only unaccompanied minors.
We did not have the beds to accommodate everyone, so we practiced “catch-and-release”. Immigration was aimed towards prosecuting those who were dangerous for our national security and criminals that had committed felonies, rather than misdemeanors. Families went, too.
The Attorney General Sessions, on 4/6/2018 announced the new “zero-tolerance” policy. This meant that every adult who crossed the border illegally would be arrested and charged with the misdemeanor offense of border crossing illegally. Their children were left stranded.
It is illegal to not wear a seatbelt. Were we expecting to be forever separated from our children if caught without a seatbelt on?
More than 2300 children are being held in cages as I type. The government won’t allow us to see any other photos than those that the boys themselves release. Staff members are reportedly not permitted to comfort or touch the babies, but they do care for them. Hitler experimented on babies to test how they would react to food, care and love without any affection. All of them died.
Currently, they have no plans to return these children to their parents. Parents have been informed that they may never again see their children. Some parents were deported back to their country of origin without their kids; others have searched for their child for several weeks.
When the HHS head says that we do not separate families, then she’s lying. Our president is lying when he says he’s just following the Democrat laws. It’s not a law. Just a policy change that could be reversed with merely one command. Sessions is defending this by citing the Bible. I can’t.
Sessions says that he is hoping to keep people away from the experiment if they know it will be happening. Trump claims that if Dems approve his Immigration Bill, (funding the wall and disavow Dreamers), he’ll end the program.
Yesterday the UN’s Human Rights Council criticized the practice of family separation, saying “The thought that any state would seek to deter parents by inflicting such abuse on children is unconscionable…People do not lose their human rights by virtue of crossing a border without a visa.”
Today we have left the Human Rights Council.
What can we do about it?
We must first stop the separation of families. S.3036, a bill currently in the House to end it is being considered. It was signed by 100% of Democrats, but not 100% of Republicans. While children suffer, our representatives are playing games. Tell your representative that you don’t want to see this happen. Senator Shelby is the Alabama representative at 202-224-5744.
Give to Kind.
What are the long-term options?
- Help South American countries become safer so that families can remain in their own homes.
- Our aim can be better. We can aim better.
- We can demand that employers of foreign workers in construction and agriculture pay a fair wage, have the correct visas and do not allow child labour.
- You can apply for asylum if you have been the victim of domestic violence or gang violence.
- The path to citizenship can be streamlined to make it accessible to everyone.
- Our court system can be better funded so it doesn’t take two to three years for an asylum application.
- In the meantime, we can still work while taking care of their children and use anklet bracelets.
- Instead of treating these children as political pawns, we can bring in big-headed people who are more knowledgeable about immigration.
- Democrats and Republicans can come together to work on problems, instead of fighting like children over a small prize.
As Americans, we abuse and harm children in order to gain political advantage. This must stop. This must end.