tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2743746633913926150.post1648441389680400239..comments2024-03-12T07:00:44.143-04:00Comments on CHILDMYTHS: Events Leading to the Death of Ashley SmithJean Mercerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14619393019771381980noreply@blogger.comBlogger18125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2743746633913926150.post-10769163777953440152013-03-01T10:32:20.606-05:002013-03-01T10:32:20.606-05:00It's hard to avoid that conclusion,isn't i...It's hard to avoid that conclusion,isn't it?Jean Mercerhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14619393019771381980noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2743746633913926150.post-69453241708454804802013-03-01T10:29:36.423-05:002013-03-01T10:29:36.423-05:00Perhaps they didn't intend to - or rather, int...Perhaps they didn't intend to - or rather, intended not to.<br /><br />Here's a link to a story about a woman with undiagnosed mental illness who survived the prison system:<br />http://ca.news.yahoo.com/ashley-smith-could-very-easily-090002030.htmlS.E.L.Snoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2743746633913926150.post-24109590842032375882013-02-27T16:46:43.631-05:002013-02-27T16:46:43.631-05:00Now I got to it-- don't know what the problem ...Now I got to it-- don't know what the problem was. But,how very strange! How can anyone expect to get to the bottom of this, and figure out if anyone was culpable, if some information is off limits? I suppose the answer is that they don't expect to. Jean Mercerhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14619393019771381980noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2743746633913926150.post-25452751665657472162013-02-27T12:54:08.709-05:002013-02-27T12:54:08.709-05:00I don't seem to be able to get to this link-- ...I don't seem to be able to get to this link-- can you help?Jean Mercerhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14619393019771381980noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2743746633913926150.post-67525193301784944342013-02-27T11:05:15.485-05:002013-02-27T11:05:15.485-05:00http://fullcomment.nationalpost.com/2013/02/21/chr...http://fullcomment.nationalpost.com/2013/02/21/christie-blatchford-ashley-smith-and-jurors-blocked-from-answers-about-mystery-of-who-her-real-family-was/<br /><br />"It would be helpful, the juror said, if Ms. Smith could fill in the blanks: Ashley was confused “about her nephew being her brother and her sister being her biological mother. … Is that true? Was she confused?”<br /><br />Again, Dr. Carlisle jumped in.<br /><br />“What was in Ashley’s mind, what she knew, is relevant,” he said, “but the fact of it is not. We must not ask Coralee what the fact of that matter is.”<br />S.E.L.Snoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2743746633913926150.post-62747956789069210442012-12-27T11:14:26.142-05:002012-12-27T11:14:26.142-05:00Absolutely. People seem to think that adoption is ...Absolutely. People seem to think that adoption is a category unto itself, but it shares many characteristics with the step-parent scenario.Jean Mercerhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14619393019771381980noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2743746633913926150.post-86008225648342746032012-12-26T22:54:07.752-05:002012-12-26T22:54:07.752-05:00Yes, Jean it is "interesting"...and seem...Yes, Jean it is "interesting"...and seems to share some similarities with the types of abuse cases we have been seeing with adopted children in the news...no?Sunday Koffron Taylorhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00859347065249826781noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2743746633913926150.post-22957736648662676992012-12-26T22:19:53.483-05:002012-12-26T22:19:53.483-05:00Thank you, Sunday.
It seems pretty awful to say t...Thank you, Sunday.<br /><br />It seems pretty awful to say that anything about this ghastly situation is "interesting", but I would like to know more about the fact that the man Jeff Bell called this "more torture than treatment". Thus suggests that someone has represented to him that such actions toward a child can be done as a from of "treatment"-- though he may have heard that in some other case rather than this one.Jean Mercerhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14619393019771381980noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2743746633913926150.post-888324635735525522012-12-26T18:11:32.269-05:002012-12-26T18:11:32.269-05:00http://www.heraldtribune.com/article/20121221/ARTI...http://www.heraldtribune.com/article/20121221/ARTICLE/121229917?p=1&tc=pg<br /><a href="http://www.heraldtribune.com/article/20121221/ARTICLE/121229917?p=1&tc=pg" rel="nofollow">There, sheriff's officials say the girl was subjected to tortuous abuse — repeatedly strapped down to a board, or tied up in other fashions and left for hours, her mouth sometimes duct-taped to keep her from screaming. The other children told detectives Melissa was fed meals in a fenced enclosure that the children called “the corral,” sheriff's deputies say.</a>Sunday Koffron Taylorhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00859347065249826781noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2743746633913926150.post-91445089026150867712012-12-16T09:08:43.302-05:002012-12-16T09:08:43.302-05:00Very true-- and as Guantanamo shows, we've ev...Very true-- and as Guantanamo shows, we've even blurred the distinction between criminals and enemy soldiers.Jean Mercerhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14619393019771381980noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2743746633913926150.post-73155400893112146702012-12-16T00:22:10.766-05:002012-12-16T00:22:10.766-05:00loved the bit about if this happened at the hands ...loved the bit about if this happened at the hands of some terrorist group, we'd all applaud her, but if if she resists "us" that way, it's unforgivable (paraphrase...). That's the point. Our systems of punishment are those types of things that are unacceptable when others do it, but OK for us. I'd like to point out that if she had done something more heinous to get herself incarcerated in the first place, the story of her abuse in prison wouldn't get any traction, except from the most liberal of us. Apparently the things we do in the name of punishment are only crimes if our victims aren't criminals.Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14662691953403328653noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2743746633913926150.post-37129867443646256822012-12-09T18:48:04.189-05:002012-12-09T18:48:04.189-05:00Thanks for sending this along--Thanks for sending this along--Jean Mercerhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14619393019771381980noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2743746633913926150.post-56947167837256313072012-12-08T10:11:26.046-05:002012-12-08T10:11:26.046-05:00Wendy, perhaps this report by the New Brunswick Om...Wendy, perhaps this report by the New Brunswick Ombudsman and Child and Youth Advocate on the services provided to a youth involved in the criminal justice system will help answer some of your questions: http://www.gnb.ca/0073/PDF/AshleySmith-e.pdfAnonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2743746633913926150.post-54097402876448167722012-12-05T09:08:25.517-05:002012-12-05T09:08:25.517-05:00This information is all supposed to emerge from a ...This information is all supposed to emerge from a series of hearings to take place after the first of the coming year. I hope there will be some answers forthcoming.Jean Mercerhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14619393019771381980noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2743746633913926150.post-75021683465845503842012-12-04T21:07:26.597-05:002012-12-04T21:07:26.597-05:00Not to get off topic, but I am just reading about ...Not to get off topic, but I am just reading about this young woman and I watched the link that Marianne posted. What really struck me was where were the parents? If she were only supposed to serve one month, how could it have gone on for soooooo long? Why are they asking for a review of her time in the federal facility? Didn't they know what was going on? Wendy74https://www.blogger.com/profile/00373491475331181754noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2743746633913926150.post-25642493610692520222012-12-01T16:49:12.039-05:002012-12-01T16:49:12.039-05:00Nah, you don't find it interesting,you find it...Nah, you don't find it interesting,you find it incorrect, and by golly you're right. I've mixed that Tom up with the one Edgar in King Lear pretends to be. I will fix this..Jean Mercerhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14619393019771381980noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2743746633913926150.post-68668011852704931842012-12-01T16:33:08.696-05:002012-12-01T16:33:08.696-05:00I find it interesting that you attribute the lines...I find it interesting that you attribute the lines from the folk ballad "Tom O'Bedlam" to Shakespeare. What is your evidence for this?Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2743746633913926150.post-56093049282395990562012-11-28T04:12:42.933-05:002012-11-28T04:12:42.933-05:00The Fifth Estate produced an investigative video e...The Fifth Estate produced an investigative video entitled "Out of Control," available online (http://www.cbc.ca/player/Shows/ID/1386471229/). It's devastating and damning.<br /><br />This case is horrific. And, sadly, it's one logical outcome of the way many staff in institutions treat "noncompliant" children/teens (who may or may not be mentally ill when they're first institutionalized, but certainly are driven to illness and disorders by their treatment).<br /><br />I made myself watch the Fifth Estate video to witness the atrocities done to Ashley Smith in the name of order and control. But I would, at points, stop breathing, seeing what they did to a *child*: the depiction of the use of the "Wrap" (perhaps the best euphemism ever invented for a form of torture), complete with helmet, was certainly one of those points.<br /><br />This treatment is not far removed from what many children suffer in foster care when their caregivers are more interested in demanding obedience/compliance, cooperation, and happiness from them than in allowing the human being in their home and care to display a full (and highly understandable, if not always predictable) array of feelings, behaviors, and beliefs that are an expression of the difficult life they have lived.<br /><br />You are so right, Jean, about the abuses visited upon children in the name of treatment or rehabilitation---or in Ashley Smith's case, not even doctored so nicely. Simple and brutal incapacitation.<br /><br />At a senseless cost, she thwarted the institution's attempt at total control. I don't want to valorize her death. She deserved assessment, diagnosis, and treatment---and no more than the 3 months of incarceration that was her initial sentence as a juvenile. But she outsmarted her captors. They tried to put her into, essentially, a locked-in syndrome. And they failed. That the only action left to her was suicide is our failure, not hers.Marianne Miltonnoreply@blogger.com