Girl Coached in Hate

May 27, 2009 permalink

A girl who says her mother taught her to be a racist was coached to say those things, according to her mother. There is no way to check on a story like this with the names withheld, but coaching a child to say what the social worker wants is commonplace in other cases. Earlier story.

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Girl 'force-fed' race remarks, mother says

Woman in custody fight blames social workers, denies raising children to hate minorities

May 27, 2009, Steve Lambert, THE CANADIAN PRESS

A mother at the centre of a Manitoba custody battle denies raising her children to be hateful racists.

The woman, who cannot be identified under Manitoba law, says her daughter appears to have been coaxed by social workers into saying she was taught to hate visible minorities.

"I think my daughter was either force-fed to say these things ... or she was coaxed, maybe into saying them, if she did in fact say them," said the woman, who now lives in another province, in a phone interview with The Canadian Press.

"I'm looking at these things that are being said, and I think, 'No, my daughter would never say that.' "

Manitoba Child and Family Services is trying to gain permanent care of the girl and her younger brother, who were seized last year after the girl showed up at school with racist symbols on her body.

The mother says she only drew one small symbol to demonstrate racial pride and has no idea who put the other markings on her child.

She also denies testimony at a custody hearing by two social workers, who said the girl was exposed to skinhead videos and raised to believe non-whites should be killed.

The social workers have also said the girl casually and frequently used racial epithets. The mother said she taught her children to be proud of their heritage but not to hate others. "That's not something we ever preached to our children," the woman said.

The violent videos were only historical programs about World War II, she said. Allegations of drug use in the family home are also untrue, she said. "We have a very hard stance against drug use. It's not a white thing to do."

It's not just social workers who are behind the accusations. According to a social worker who testified yesterday, relatives of the parents have said the two were skinheads who met on a racist website.

The couple at one point travelled to Brandon, Man., where one relative believed they were trying to set up a white supremacist group, the social worker said. It's not yet clear whether those relatives will testify in the case.

The mother does not have a lawyer. The father has filed an affidavit showing he plans to argue he has a constitutional right to raise his children according to his beliefs.

The racism concern is not the sole reason cited by child welfare officials for seizing the children. The parents are also accused of neglecting the kids' emotional and education needs, and being physically violent with each other.

Source: Toronto Star