The Glade 4.0

In this case, I think it's the Hospital (i.e. State) that is projecting (mental) mental illness here, not the parents.

I'm not labeling anyone. I'm suggesting alternate interpretations of the 'facts' instead of jumping to conclusions based on 2 angry parents unverified testimony.

I'm sure the girl is actually doing great in the hospital, is healthier than she's ever been and that her father is risking jail time for no reason. That makes a lot more sense than a state institution wanting to cover something up. Even though there's no evidence for it, the dad is probably **** in the head.

Absence of evidence that YOU have seen. The courts have seen it. CPS has seen it. The medical professionals have seen it. You're just choosing to ignore the fact that it exists, because it doesn't fit with your world view.

I'm surprised to see you all basically advocating for ignoring patient privacy. That's essentially what you're asking for-- there is no defense they can offer without violating those rules.

So let's just make some up then? Or just assume there must be some because the State can do no wrong?

I'm not making up evidence. I'm suggesting that there are other interpretations of the facts we DO have, than the bad-dystopian-novel one that you're espousing.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/cristy-ba ... 43997.html

My math says you're all wet on this one, TheRiov; even the Huffington Post is crying foul against Children's Hospital and the State of Massachusetts.

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Or, maybe we could just accept a clearly biased source framing the entire incident with prejudicial language rather than corroborating it with a "less alarmist source" as TheRiov put it, to turn things around. Snarky comments about "the Man" and "the State" aren't evidence, nor is the culture of cynicism they represent. I don't really buy TheRiov's theories, but I also don't buy the original story at all, especially not from a website like "policestateusa.com or .org or whatever the ****." If it were DailyKOS, people would be laughing it right out of the forum.

It's a technique these days when one doesn't like anything anyone in authority does, to run off the the press or the internet, selectively present facts, frame them with extremely biased language, and generate public outrage from people who just leap to the assumption that the underdog must be right.

It isn't a matter of "the State can do no wrong" but rather "the State must be proven to have done wrong in the same way as any other party". Maybe instead of just dogpiling TheRiov and trying to use sarcasm and cynicism as a substitute for facts, someone could find a more credible source.

Oh wait. That would require more effort than typing a one-line response acting disgusted.

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"Hysterical children shrieking about right-wing anything need to go sit in the corner and be quiet while the adults are talking."

https://www.google.com/search?q=justina ... ff&tbm=nws

Its all over different news sites. /shrug.

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Holy shitsnacks!

If there was something legitimately wrong with the parents, don't you think they would remove the girl's sister from their custody as well?

I kind of hope that one of you gets your kid taken away from the state next time you visit a hospital so we can just blame you and contemplate whether or not you're just a bad parent.

Mitochondrial diseases may be hereditary or emergent, and since Justine's elder sister suffers from a mitochondrial disease (the frequency rate among American children isn't all that low -- 1 in 4000), it's very likely both sisters could have inherited the same mitochondrial disease. The evidence in this case suggests that a hospital and state agency are about to get raked over the coals.

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Read on this that she had a port put in so they could flush fluid out since she can't go potty unassisted. If it's all in her head:

1. Why did the doctor's at Tufts put it in if it's "all in her head"

2.Why did it seem to help initially?

I want to believe that something's fishy in the telling of a story, that a medical institution really wouldn't do all this stuff without good cause. Hopefully time will tell before its too late.

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I prefer to think of them as "Fighting evil in another dimension"

I tried to find out information about the initial diagnosis and couldn't. Has anyone seen anything? That doesn't make or break any theory posited here, but it doesn't really support the parents.

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In time, this too shall pass.

the original post. It says "her regular phsyician."

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I too am very skeptical of this. They discharged her from the hospital into the foster care system. They might have ignored her original doctors initially, but surely they've talked to them by now. Massive coverup doesn't work when you kick them out to certain death without treatment. Are the foster parents and coroner going to go in on the conspiracy too to keep it quiet?

Also, if she really has this serious genetic condition and has not received any treatment for it for over a year, how is she still alive? Hell, she was diagnosed with the genetic condition in 2011. If lack of treatment is causing her to be " dying," how did she survive the first 12 years of life?

Regardless, even if she is sick, its just a misdiagnosis. Those aren't exactly rare. This would be a pretty egregious ****, but other people have gone un/misdiagnosed for over a year too and died. The state's actions, assuming the hospital diagnosis is correct, have not been unreasonable. So the "OMG STATISM" is really unfounded here.

The "OMG Statism" was founded as soon as they relieved the parents of custody of their child without proof of abuse, neglect, or harm. That said, Mitochrondrial Diseases can be emergent, and Justine Pelletier's specific type may not have manifested until she was older or may have been triggered by another illness.

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And then there is that had gag order

Edit: autocorrect corrected

This situation is getting more and more interesting: the Massachusetts Department of Child Services has been refused by multiple foster care groups over the last year. It seems, incidentally, that state legislators are now getting involved and will be putting pressure on DCS to reunite Justine with her parents.

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That is a huge mischaracterization of the situation. If it was "just a misdiagnosis", she would have been immediately discharged from the hospital at her family's request, and they would have ignored the misdiagnosis and/or gotten a third opinion. We wouldn't be reading about this case.

Lets speculate wildly here:

Please spin for me a scenario where all parties have understandable motives, (if not ones we personally agree with), that would create the scenario we're being presented with.

I can come up with several scenarios that involve only one or two parties that are in some way at fault. (negligence, abusive, mentally ill, etc) when those parties are the parents.

In order for this to unwind as the parents are describing I see something like 20ish people who have to be in collusion and with malicious intent.

Occam's razor is killing this for me.

No there just has to be one person high enough in the chain to force everyone to try to cover their ***.

This is how burreacracy works (as in it doesn't).

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"...but there exists also in the human heart a depraved taste for equality, which impels the weak to attempt to lower the powerful to their own level and reduces men to prefer equality in slavery to inequality with freedom." - De Tocqueville

This.

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Holy shitsnacks!

Not really, when you consider bureaucratic process. All it takes is for the attending physician to suspect that the girl is being abused (via wrongful medical treatment in this case) and for the child services case worker (who is likely to defer to the doctor in a case of suspected medical abuse) to agree. At that point, the machinery of child protection rules kick in and everyone else that's involved in the process - hospital staff, CPS staff, courts, etc. - just follows the procedures laid out in the relevant laws.

Mostly agreed, though I would hedge a bit by saying "without more proof of abuse" and adding "and/or a risk of imminent harm to the child if the parents retained custody". In other words, I think kids should only be removed from the custody of the parents prior to a formal hearing if there's a significant risk of something bad happening to the kid in the meantime.

Again, I ask: How do you know what proof there is? You're making statements about how there isn't any proof, but absence of evidence is not evidence of absence.