Quote:
Originally Posted by JohnnyB
I have no background knowledge about foster services in Canada, but I came across discussion of foster services among some first nations Canadians yesterday that made me aware of how much of an issue foster services are for first nations communities.
Their discussion was pointing out that First Nations Child and Family Services was started in 1998, two years after the residential school system was officially ended, and that the percentage of kids in foster services who are indigenous is very high in some provinces despite indigenous people only making up a small percentage of the overall population. Several participants also shared how they had been taken from their indigenous mothers and put in numerous non-indigenous foster homes where they had experienced abuse as children, also sharing that they believed their mothers' lives had only really fallen apart after they had been separated from them. There were some implications that First Nations Child and Family Services was essentially just an extension of the residential school system and that it has been a vehicle for the racist separation of indigenous families and the abuse of indigenous children to this day.
As I have no real background knowledge, I would love to hear from somebody who has more familiarity with foster services in Canada. AFC maybe? Anybody else close to this?
Looking up the stats on percentage of foster children who are indigenous on wikipedia, it is shocking.
BC = 56%
Alberta = 74%
Saskatchewan = 87%
Manitoba = 84%
Yukon = 100%
NWT = 94%
Nunavut = 100% |
Wow. I knew that the foster system had a LOT of indigenous children, but this is insane.
I have two sets of friends who both adopted an indigenous child that was coming from an abusive situation, and it is a painful and sad procedure despite the amazing joy both families have gotten as a result of the children they adopted.
What I don't get about foster & adoption system is the red tape around it. At some point surely the positivity of being able to adopt a child who has no parents should erase some of the red tape that families have to go through in order to be approved. Never understood that.