Children and the Net

[mpd@netcom.com (Mike Duvos)]

> On Sun, 31 Jul 1994, Mike Duvos wrote:

> > Had it not been for the fact that having children covered with
> > scars, welts, and bruises is not considered child abuse in the
> > state of Texas, all the children would have been removed from the
> > compound prior to the raid, and only the adults would have been
> > toasted.

> Puh-leeze! There has been little to no evidence of ANY abuse of the 
> Branch Davidian children. The only thing we know is that Koresh liked his 
> mates young but that doesn't mean the rest of hte children were abused 
> and, of course, Koresh's kink is quite normal in quite a few places. Are 
> you forgetting that the BDs were investigated for child abuse and cleared 
> earlier?

These facts were well documented.  Child welfare workers visited the
compound and examined the children.  Signs of previous physical
punishment were noted as well as a room devoted to that purpose and
the appropriate paraphernalia.

A doctor at Baylor University Medical Center was asked later why 
this didn't cause the removal of the children, and said that while
such behavior would certainly be considered abuse in a medical
sense, it did not meet the legal definition of abuse according
to the laws of the State of Texas.

Texas, of course, is the leader on the national corporal punishment
bandwagon and dishes out over 250,000 state-sponsored beatings every
year in its public school system.  So far all efforts to ban the 
practice have been successfully opposed by the teachers union.

-- 
     Mike Duvos         $    PGP 2.6 Public Key available     $
     mpd@netcom.com     $    via Finger.                      $