CPS in Ukraine...even war torn nations have less of a problem than the USA.

For being a nation considered to be "the lone superpower" on the planet, and being "the most advanced" technologically, the USA trails far behind many "less developed" countries when it come to the proper handling of their most important resources--their children. The USA has somewhere between 450,000 and 1 million children in state custody arrangements of one type or another, which is a woeful figure, and among the worst on a per capita basis of any nation on the planet--if not THE worst.

Yesterday, we began to make the assessment that the more "advanced" a society has become (and or the more socialist..i.e. big-government empowered) the WORSE the society does with regard to keeping children safe, properly nurtured, and WITH their families. We showed that Catholic Spain, even though living under various forms of socialism since the end of the Spanish Civil War in the 1930s, has far less of a track record with government interference in families than "greatly advanced" America. In fact, they have less than half the rate of government child abductions as does the USA.

While Spain has been "pacified" (though, not exactly "at peace") since the Civil War there are other nations that lack the religious fervor of Spanish society that still do fairly well in supporting their children despite decades of turmoil and very limited resources. One such nation is Ukraine. Although Ukraine has been an almost constant punching bag; being, as it is, wedged between the former Soviet Union (and current Russian federation) and the West. Ukraine suffered horribly in the wake of the Russian Revolution and was intentionally starved by Soviet troops during the 20s. In fact from 1918 until the mid 20s, Ukraine was caught in the vice between the "White Russian" resistance, and the Red army. During the Second World War, Ukraine was invaded by the Nazis, and many of the great battles between the Wehrmacht and Stalin's troops took place on Ukrainian territory. The nation was once again plundered and impoverished.

With the fall of the Soviet Union in 1989 Ukraine was once again thrown into turmoil, and her economy became a basket case. Indeed, Ukraine, despite being fairly technologically advanced and possessed of rich coal deposits and wonderful "break basket" type soil, has remained one of the world's lowest-ranked nations in terms of GDP, per capita, for decades. Then, of course, came the CIA-aided Euromaidan revolts of 2013 that overthrew the nation's democratically-elected Russian-friendly President, in an effort to install an American puppet regime amenable to NATO/EU membership. This led, once again, to great turmoil--especially in the Eastern Ukraine, where two former Oblasts seceded (Donetsk and Lugansk) sparking ongoing warfare, that has only settled into an uneasy stalemate the past couple of years. Then, the Russians took back The Crimean Peninsula, leading to more warfare and turmoil.

(Respublica Luganskaya..."Lugansk Republic"...Image courtesy of canstock.com.)

Poor Ukraine has been a battered ping pong ball for over 100 years, and the result is a nation where the median monthly income is less than $100 (where rents take up at least 3/4 of that for anything livable by western standards.) Despite extreme sub-Saharan/Bangladesh level poverty, and despite being a war-torn nation all that time, Ukraine, despite only moderate Russian Orthodox influence, and a basket-case central government that is too poor and detached to be called "socialist" or "democratic"...or anything else, really...Ukraine's rate of children in state custody is similar to the USA's.

In a nation of 47 million, (55--if you count the breakaway republics and The Crimean) 94,000 children are in state custody according to the most recent figures. (Source: https://www.unicef.org/ukraine/activities_11386.html) Most of these, in sharp contrast to the USA , or even Spain, are children who have been abandoned by desperate mothers unable to care for them. Considering that nearly 3 million people have been displaced in Eastern Ukraine at various points in time as a result of the turmoil and war of the past several years, that is a remarkably low figure.

(Downtown Lugansk, pre-war. Image courtesy of bridesofukraine.com.)

Despite nearly seventy years of domination by the atheist Soviet Union, and the total forced secularization of society, the Ukrainian family unit (and family values) have never failed. Despite severe economic depression, and the resulting sever alcoholism that has ravished many Ukrainian men (even many fathers) the women of Ukraine have largely held the family together, and families are honored and preserved at all costs in the same fashion as the Spanish-speaking world. It is not uncommon for parents to go without food so that the children can eat.

When I spent the summer in Ukraine after the 911 tragedy in the US (and death threats following production of my two videos and book questioning the official government faerie tale) I was extremely impressed by-- despite the lack of what Westerners consider "prosperity" and "modernism,"--two things. First, everyone was always dressed cleanly and neatly. Homes and apartments were kept spotless, and cleaned in a manner which would make professional cleaning services in the USA blush. Walking down the street you would have thought (but for the Soviet-era statues and the Cyrillic writing in the store fronts) that you were in any prosperous western city. (This was Lugansk, many years before Euromaidan.) The next thing was that the streets were also clean and QUIET. I felt safer walking through the streets of Lugansk than in any American city, and was never accosted by gangs, or threatened by thieves, etc. In other words, personal pride (despite the alcohol problems) remained extremely high, despite the woeful lack of resources.

(Pro EU protests in Kiev, courtesy of CIA machinations. Image courtesy of publicseminar.org.)

Family comes first in Ukraine. This is so ingrained in the culture, that there is no need for government involvement and abuse (despite the hardships) by parents of their own children is largely unheard of. Mothers send their husbands out if they must drink, or divorce them if they can't control the problem, but they protect their children at all costs. Ukraine has no formal CPS systems. They have residential homes, more like hospitals, where abandonned children receive medical treatment and food, but that's it. There are no CPS "brown sisters" or "caseworkers" terrorizing Ukrainian families looking for ways to seize children.

Ukraine DOES have a human trafficking problem, but it is NOT government-sponsored as in the USA, or church-related as in much of the liberalized West. Instead, desperate Ukrainians seeking to go west (usually to Germany or Britain) wind up instead being caught up in the sex trade. But it is private criminal gangs that are at fault, not a CPS bureaucracy that is charged with protecting children. The Russian mafia has been implicated in Eastern areas at carious times as well.

(Russian mob boss brought in for questioning. Image courtesy of rbth.com.)

The Ukraine, in summary, is a nation that has suffered more than almost any other on Earth (with the possible exception of Poland, Armenia, and..now..South Africa) and yet they have managed to keep family values first and foremost, have not succumbed to anti-family agendas of any kind, and remain a proud people that, for the most part, does what is right for their children without government intervention.