Scary neighbours: should I call child services?

check out the ACS website - they have guidelines for identifying abuse and how to report that abuse. I think you should report it, but it's up to you. I certainly wouldn't let concern for the adults make you hesitate reporting anything.

I really think you should report it. I think they have to investigate any complaint and I'm pretty sure you can make a complaint anonymously. It sounds like there's already a good likelihood these people will lose their apartment anyway. It's not your fault if they do, and maybe you can spare their kids further abuse.

If you're seeing them do stuff to the kids outside the apartment, just imagine what sort of hell is going on for those kids inside when the parents know they can't be seen.

I looked up the reporting info on NYC.gov for you:

To report, call the NYS Central Register Child Abuse & Maltreatment Hotline to Report Child Abuse and Neglect: 1-800-342-3720

What you'll be asked:
* the name and address of the child and family members
* the child's age, sex, and primary language
* the nature and extent of the child's injuries
* the type of abuse or neglect, including evidence of prior history of maltreatment of the child or siblings
* any additional information that may be helpful.

If you just want to ask questions about what the process is, call the Prevent Child Abuse New York Prevention Information & Parent Helpline: 1-800-342-7472

Do it do it do it.

The children's safety is paramount. Hitting a child in the face goes way beyond basic discipline - if that's how she treats her children in public, you can only imagine what she does behind closed doors.

If you call ACS, they will send a worker out to investigate the case. If they feel that there's justification for action, they will take it. This does not necessarily mean that the children will be removed. It could mean mandated parenting classes, therapy, drug tests, etc. Even if the children were to be removed, ACS would make every effort to place them in kinship care so that they would remain with family members.

So my advice is to make the call. The alternative sounds much worse.

I think the only thing that links the eviction issue to the ACS/kids issue is that IF they get evicted, the parents will have a harder time getting the kids back. They'd have to show an appropriate apt to return the kids to . . .
That is, if the kids are taken away, which I'm pretty sure doesn't happen on a slap.

Sounds grim.

I recently had an experience similar to Stacey's - on a train ride to JFK airport, I witnessed a lady beating the crap out of her child...slapping him in the face and punching him in his stomach and back. Before I was about to say something, a lady from across the aisle stepped in and confronted the mother. I went to sit next to the lady and she tapped me on the leg and briefly flashed her ACS card to me, so I knew this lady was going to be able to calm down the abusive mother.

A few stops before I got off the train, the abusive mother tried to start an argument with me, and I lost my cool and was a little ashamed of my mouth and actions - but oh well. Luckily, I was able to flag down a police officer at the JFK stop and provided my statement to him.

I ended up missing my flight, but that was the least of my worries as all I could think about was how messed up this kid was going to be later on in life, etc...

So, if I were you I'd call ACS.

It comes down to your gut feeling and common sense. If your gut feeling says abuse, then report it. No one has to know your name etc. Id' also report the landlor. If he's making life miserable. If he's acting as a catylist then he deserves the same attention from the Dept. of Housing and an advocate group who would be willing to help this mom.

Call ACS. Even if it doesn't feel like it, you'll be doing the kids a favor. I once witnessed a woman with four kids on the subway bite one of her kids to punish her for fighting over a piece of paper with her younger brother. I was with two of my own kids at the time, and didn't confront her out of concern for their safety. I can only imagine what her children's lives are like.

A lot of people, myself included, think it's never, ever necessary to discipline a child through hitting, and many consider "a good smacking" to be abuse. I'll leave it at that.

Totally agree. I have three boys, and while they frustrate me no end sometimes, I have never and will never hit them. Period. If I get angry enough that hitting one of them actually seems reasonable, I walk away.

apollonia666 wrote: [quote=armchair_warrior]spoil kids need a good smacking but abuse is abuse.

Ohh, man.

A lot of people, myself included, think it's never, ever necessary to discipline a child through hitting, and many consider "a good smacking" to be abuse. I'll leave it at that.

Do you have kids? Not that it is necessary to have them to have an opinion, but I have 2 kids and I will be the first to tell you that a pop on the rear very, very occasionally is the only way you can maintain control at certain times.

I grew up with a father whose afterwork release was to pound a couple of High Life studs and beat the shit out of me for the slightest infraction. He referred to me as either 'fuckface' or 'numbnuts' for the first 29 years of my life. Nothing like getting a beer can (not beer, but can) thrown in your face at the dinner table for turning your fork over to pick up meat on your plate. Ahhh, the military school of life! So, I know what getting abused means.*

Spanking is not abuse, but could be a part of abuse. Abuse is arbitrary and without conscience. If you spank, you should only do it in the simplest way with the clearest of purposes and on the very rarest of occasions. Often, all I have to do is raise an eyebrow when they are misbehaving and they stop. It has been so long since I had to spank them I can't remember the last incidence, but they resepct me when I say 'Stop it.' I do not like to spank. I actually go to great lengths to avoid it, but on rare occasions (such as holding down little sister for a "haircut") it happens.

One of my very good friends wrote the book on gentle parenting and firmly believes, as you do, that kids should not be spanked. She has the three most disrepectful children on the planet who act out with impunity. Her notion of punishment is 'Hey, Charlie. How would you feel if Sissy was doing that to you. Think about that in your "chair of respect" for seven minutes.' Charlie immediately gives her the bird, punches Sissy, taking whatever he wanted from her, then stomps over to his 'chair of respect' to ride out the seven minutes. Right. That works. Yeah, this is anecdotal, but when an expert on this sort of parenting has out-of-control kids, I take a grain of salt and consider the endorsement.

*Before he died of cancer in 2001, he asked for my forgiveness for his behavior toward me. It is a shame it had to come to that, but he was horribly abused as a kid and sat there and told me about all the stuff that went on in his house as a kid. If half of it was true, his behavior toward me and my brother was 1/100 as bad. It was tough to forgive him, but I did. We became good friends before he died.

I think getting in between a parent and their child is dangerous territory.

stacey wrote:
I recently saw a woman smacking the crap out of her child on Dean and Carlton and I confronted her about it - we got into a shoving match and the police came. She told the police she wanted me arrested for assault and the cops brought her, myself and the child to the precinct on 6th Ave. The cop then got both of our stories and his piece of advice to me was: "If I ever see this again I should call the police - if the family is known to me I should call ACS directly."

See. Butting your nose in makes things worse.

Hey look, it's all balance. I was raised in the old-fashioned manner, but I have not found it necessary or desirable to use corporal punishment with my child. That being said, would I look for the nearest police officer if I saw someone smack their kid on the rear? No, but obviously some situations are way over the line and need to be dealt with by the authorities.

On the other side of the spectrum, I don't think the "We don't use the word 'no' with our child" are doing their spawn any favors either. Before you laugh and accuse me of spreading stereotypes of typical Park Slope indulgence, let me assure you that that is quite literally the view of parenting that some of my friends take.

Drano wrote:
On the other side of the spectrum, I don't think the "We don't use the word 'no' with our child" are doing their spawn any favors either. Before you laugh and accuse me of spreading stereotypes of typical Park Slope indulgence, let me assure you that that is quite literally the view of parenting that some of my friends take.

My eldest wanted ice cream from that vile Maggie Moo's place on 7th. She began to meltdown because I said that it would spoil her dinner (god....) and had to elevate the discussion to dropping to her level, holding her shoulders and telling her "No, you are not going to get ice cream and you will never get ice cream acting this way." Some PS trophy wife with twins in a Bugaboo (now there's a stereotype) told me, on the street and unsolicited, that "Telling children 'no' is not a good way to get them to do what you want." It took me a doubletake to parse this asinine statement. I guess she had to go to Bryn Mawr to learn that.

metulj wrote: My eldest wanted ice cream from that vile Maggie Moo's place on 7th. She began to meltdown because I said that it would spoil her dinner (god....) and had to elevate the discussion to dropping to her level, holding her shoulders and telling her "No, you are not going to get ice cream and you will never get ice cream acting this way." Some PS trophy wife with twins in a Bugaboo (now there's a stereotype) told me, on the street and unsolicited, that "Telling children 'no' is not a good way to get them to do what you want." It took me a doubletake to parse this asinine statement. I guess she had to go to Bryn Mawr to learn that.

Well now, I agree with most of what you said, but I do rather like that cake batter ice cream from Maggie Moos.

Maybe Miss Nosy was one of the TCS squad. Pretty damned bold to make that sort of statement to a stranger...

ok....this is right in my area of "expertise," being a clinical supervisor for a mental health clinic dealing with children...

CALL ACS.

the worst that could happen is that they will tell you that its not reportable, which may be a possibility depending on a bunch of factors. it seems like you have enough information on the family that a report could be filed.

whether anything happens afterwards is irrelevant. if there's no mark on the kid's face, and nothing else is discovered if a worker comes and visits, the case will be considered unfounded and closed. don't worry about those things and worry about the fact we should get into the habit of doing something when we see something we know is not right. many children could have been saved in the past if someone would have just stopped listening to their IPod for a second and made a call.

just my $.02 on the matter.....

To answer metulj's question, no I don't have kids. I realize I might feel differently if I had kids, but I managed to get through my entire childhood without spankings and my parents managed to discipline me pretty well without that (maybe that's more because I was such a goody two-shoes as a child). I guess on second thought I see your point, and I do understand there's a difference between a smack on the rear end and all-out abuse. But it still doesn't sit well with me. If you CAN (not saying everyone can) discipline a child without hitting him or her, why do it?

About public confrontations... to my understanding (based on what I've heard from friends who are social workers, some stuff I learned in training to do crisis counseling a while back, and friends who are survivors of child abuse), it's not a good idea to directly confront an abusive parent in public, because abusers often take the embarassment and humiliation of public confrontation out on the child later on in private -- the fucked-up logic of "Look what you caused to happen!" directed at the child. As one friend who was abused as a kid told me once, "Whenever my mom would be slapping me in the grocery store and some well-meaning person got up in her face about it, I knew I was going to get a MUCH worse beating when I got home."

I know it's hard to not say something when you see someone hitting a kid in public; I used to confront people publicly myself before learning why it's best not to. If you do see somebody abusing a child in public it's better to try to defuse the situation -- acting sympathetic to the abuser ("They sure are a handful at that age, aren't they?" or "Looks like you're having a really trying day!"), distracting the abuser from hurting the child further, and then trying to find out some identifying info that you can use in reporting it later -- his or her license plate number in the parking lot or his or her name, if you manage to strike up a conversation. Difficult to do when what you REALLY want to do is beat the hell out of the abuser yourself, but better in the long run for the child.

Whatever you do you should ALWAYS report it to the proper authorities.