PBS Takes a Small Step Back

November 2, 2005

To its credit, PBS took a small step back from its film Breaking the Silence: Children's Stories  on Wednesday, November 2. As Round 2 of the campaign began, PBS changed its response letter. The new letter now reads "The stories profiled in Breaking the Silence: Children's Stories document a statistically small but serious problem in our family court system."

Yes, very statistically small, and we're glad PBS noticed. As we noted at the beginning of this campaign, the producers of Breaking the Silence: Children's Stories "cherry-picked a few highly unusual cases and pretended that they represent a widespread problem." And even among the few cases of alleged injustices that the producers highlighted, at least one is a lie. A Tulare County Juvenile Court concluded that Sadia Loeliger, portrayed as a heroic mom in the documentary, had committed multiple acts of child abuse, and adjudged both her daughters as dependents of the Juvenile Court in August of 1998.

The PBS admission follows on the heels of the column "Critics of Child Abuse Film Miss the Point in Rush to Defend Fathers" (Los Angeles Daily Journal, San Francisco Daily Journal, 11/1/05), co-authored by Sol Gothard, a retired judge featured in the film, and two others. Most of the 1,500 word piece is devoted to attacking columnist Glenn Sacks and the campaign against the film. However, the column inadvertently contained an interesting admission. The authors wrote:

"Over the last two decades, it has been reported that hundreds of children across the country have been placed in the custody of the parent they disclosed had sexually and/or physically abused them."

Sacks replied:

"Hundreds? Over two decades? In a country of 300 million people? Sounds like a woman has a greater chance of being struck by lightning than she does of losing custody of her children to an abuser."