By Marianne Haslev Skånland
I have read Mia Kristensen’s account of the experiences of a family deprived of their children by Scandinavian ‘child protection services’ (CPS), in Norway called Barnevernet. I have for over 30 years now been engaged in trying to assist in some of the work for families hit in this way and I know that what Mia writes is true for so very many, and is the result of a country’s very dysfunctional ‘child protection’.
The stories are most often told by parents or grandparents. The children who are in the hands of the child protection system are usually prevented from writing or saying openly anything that goes against the official version of the story, or they are afraid to speak because if they do, they know they will be isolated even more radically or their parents will be sanctioned against. For example, the rare, allowed meetings children-parents will be cut down on or taken away altogether.
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But in some cases we hear more about the children’s perspective. Here are two stories. I know them to be true.
The first is about a day of celebration which is something like Christmas for Norwegian children: The two children of a family were taken into foster care. In spring came the ‘seventeenth of May’. It is Norwegian Constitution Day and is often called ‘children’s day’, the celebration being concentrated around happy events for children.
The CPS have a principle of preventing reunions on occasions which can make children feel emotional about their family. However, in this case the 9-year-old girl was allowed by the CPS to visit her parents. Her younger brother was not. So the day was a misery for the girl. She did not want to take part in any happy celebration or watch parades, did not want to eat anything (children’s favourite food and ice creams are usually high points for them on ‘syttende mai’). She cried helplessly all day because her brother was not allowed to be with them and because they were not allowed to show that they loved their parents.
The other case has been taken up by Wings before:
Landmark Report Exposes the Realities of Norwegian Child Protection. It concerns the municipality of Samnanger in Norway, which had got a new mayor and a head administrator and several politicians who wanted radical change, standing up against what the CPS had been doing. There was quite a fight in the community, but they managed to commission a realistic and revealing report of three local CPS cases. The report and some newspaper articles let the children have a voice too. One of the cases concerned a family of father and four children, now of age.
One of the boys said: “I didn’t have so many friends at school. Then the CPS also took my family from me.”
The oldest was a girl who had been 17 at the time and had not been taken. But although she had been allowed to remain with her father, she too was hit hard by the destruction of their family life: The CPS took everything I had – and smashed it.
The youngest, a girl, had been only 7 years old when she was separated from her father and all her siblings. Her reaction had been to be desperately frightened, unhappy and upset. The diagnosis of the CPS was, as expected, not to face the fact that this was the result of their actions, but to put her into institutional care and through her childhood and youth have her treated with various drugs, supposedly to calm her down and lessen her ‘abnormality’.
The two lawyers making the report found her, on the contrary, to be normal and to communicate very realistically about the CPS ‘care’. She told them that she had been very afraid all the years in foster home and institutions. – It should take no great imagination on our part to see that she had experienced simply a variant of what prisoners from concentration camps and other places of torture tell us.
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The European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg has found the Norwegian state guilty of over 30 violations in 24 CPS cases concentrated around Article 8: the right to private and family life. But the Norwegian authorities have not been willing to return the children even in these cases.
There seem to be fewer takings into care now in 2025 than earlier, but the way the CPS practice ‘protecting’ children is of the same kind as before. Mia Kristensen’s story could be from Norway any time between 1950 (or before that) and today.
One item of ideology is to my mind a dominant factor explaining official intransigence: It is widely believed in our society – and the teaching of this in the education of social workers has not changed – that biological family is of no particular importance to children, that siblings are just playmates for the time being, and parents simply replaceable ‘caregivers’ doing a job of providing a stimulating environment for children who are with them nearly accidentally. Therefore, families who desperately want their children returned home are simply seen as self-serving and vain.
How Norwegian experts came to reject biological kinship as relevant in child welfare policy
There is no understanding in the social work of many Western countries, certainly not in northern Europe, of how deep the natural bonds of love are which bind close relatives together. Or, in a variant formulation: Love is taken to be only a product of success. Only perfect parents and children, who are also completely satisfied with each other and whose lives develop in every way splendidly, are thought to experience mutual love and solidarity, as satisfaction. Hence, such imperfections as poverty and illness are suspect in the eyes of these ‘experts’, cf for instance A Christmas Wish,
and examples e – h here:
The Child Protection Service (CPS) – unfortunately the cause of grievous harm
Part 2: Content, dimensions, causes and mechanisms of CPS activities
This belief in the cause of a feeling of belonging and trust is age-old and is found in many societies. In the USA there was a wave of this ideology about 25 years ago:
Hillary and Bill Clinton – zealous promoters of forced adoptions in the USA
(Section 3 of the article traces it, in a very short sketch, back more than 2000 years.)
I know there have been cases where U.S. authorities have separated children from parents when arresting them as unwanted immigrants. But there have also been loud protests against it.
I recently came across three videos in connection with disregard of children’s needs of their family and of the home or country they feel is their own. The videos stem from a Senate Hearing in Washington DC on 3 December of this year. The hearing concerns proposed legislation about one particular tragic action of Russia in the present war: abduction and down-right enslaving of Ukrainian children. The Hearing was bipartisan and with representatives of the House invited as well:
–Breaking news: Senate holds critical hearing on Russia war crimes against Ukrainian children | AC14
–U.S. SENATE HEARING: Ukrainian Ambassador Exposes Russia’s Child Abductions | DRM News | AC1F
–Lindsey Graham Asks Ukraine Ambassador If Russia Has Admitted To Abducting Children In Occupied Land
What is shown in the videos is glass clear and I very much hope that this initiative in the U.S. Senate will carry over to a clearer understanding that not everything we do to the children of our own societies is in ‘the best interest of the child’ either.
In Europe too the emphasis has become very clear that the return of Ukrainian children to their own country, and to their own families if they are alive, is the top priority in a peace settlement, and that the abduction of them is a very serious war crime.
Norwegian society is generally more placidly subservient and admiring of our own authorities than I think Americans are, so ideology without a solid, factual basis is even more difficult to see through in Norway. I do not see what we can do but continue to try and find out about it and document it as well as we can, and continue to spread information about it – in the true best interest of the child.
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Marianne Haslev Skånland has worked as a professor of linguistics at the University of Bergen, and is now retired. She has worked on analysis and criticism of science, both generally and in areas of linguistics, psychology and child protection, and was a member of the scientific advisory board of Stiftelsen för rättspsykologi (The Foundation for Forensic Psychology) in Stockholm. She has functioned as an expert witness in child protection cases before a District Court, an Appeal Court and a County Committee, altogether five times in Norway, and once before Länsrätten in Sweden.
She is engaged in social questions concerning human rights and health, and specially interested in the question of the scientific basis of the views of social services and the justice system concerning psychology and social life. She has lectured for many years on the position and influence of behaviorism and other schools of thought in linguistics and anthropology.
Wings of the Wind 
Thanks for highlighting this, Chris. It is really heartbreaking to think of the actions of this government organisation, even in the face of international condemnation. This is really evil and I will remember innocent victims, both parents and children, in prayer. The Lord knows who they are.
You’re welcome, Elizabeth, and I really appreciate your comment. Indeed, the Lord knows who they are. Thank you for your prayers. One of the reasons I started studying this situation almost ten years ago was that I found it hard to believe that any civilized government could be guilty of crimes like this. My study eventually led me to my own city where the “Child Protection Services” split up a large family just like they do in Norway. I wrote about it here:
Two New Convictions of Norway in the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) in cases concerning child protection (Barnevern) and a similar case from my own “backyard”
In the case in my city, people in the community went to bat for the family and the entire family was released back to the parents who had done nothing wrong. We know how Jesus loves the little children and that he ordained family life. For any government to intrude to an evil degree is completely unwarranted.
Thank you again for your comment, Elizabeth. I hope you have a great day!
I was shocked to read this at one of the links you provided…
“I also remember that Hillary Clinton has in some context straight out agitated in favour of every American family being obliged to accept a visit (inspection) by a social worker twice a year.”
That’s horrible! I wonder how many people knew that. I wonder where this world headed as the days get darker.
I’m wondering right along with you, Cathy.
I didn’t know this either until I read Marianne’s article that you were reading. Even though she has focused mostly on the problems in her own country, she has gotten very educated over the years on things happening in other countries as well.
You did well to get that far down the post, Cathy. I appreciate your interest. It is hard not to be shocked the first time you hear about this.
For you or anyone else reading this who would like to see Marianne’s website, which is filled with years of information on this topic, here is the link:
https://www.mhskanland.net/index.html
Most of the articles are done in the Norwegian language but she has also translated many of her articles in English for people abroad.
Chris, I was reluctant to click ‘Like’. Because I don’t like this news of what is going on with children. This past Sunday, my kids church lesson was on when Jesus was separated from his parents by ‘doing His Father’s will.’ The title of the lesson was that Jesus is our treasure. To his earthly parents who were afraid after they lost Him, they recognized that Jesus was their treasure. The Lord, who wants all children to come to Him, is heartbroken over the way those imprisoned in the CPS system are being treated. They will face their Maker one day with this. Will join in praying for them. Thanks for sharting.
I understand your reluctance to hit the like button. Anyone who likes this, in my view, isn’t liking the major problem that exists. They are liking that this information is getting out so that something might eventually be done to stop the problem.
The reason I’ve publicized this is because I feel the same as you, God wants the children to come to him. Breaking up families, an institution created by God, is harmful to everyone involved when done for little to no reason.
Thank you for your prayers.
Thank you for sharing this deeply moving post. It’s heartbreaking to read about families who have been separated, and especially to hear the children’s voices that are so often unheard. The personal stories you’ve shared remind us that behind every policy and system there are real people, real hearts, and real loss — something no community should take lightly.
At the same time, I appreciate how this article brings attention to a topic that many around the world may not know much about. Systems intended to protect must be continually examined with compassion and justice, especially when cultural differences and family bonds are at stake. Your careful reflection helps open a space for understanding, empathy, and hopefully meaningful conversation and change.
You are welcome, Livora Gracely, and I appreciate your comment. It is heartbreaking to hear of these stories and you are so right to state that this is something no community should take lightly.
Marianne Skanland, who wrote this article, lives in Norway and has seen the effects of the awful philosophies that are embedded in the Child Welfare System there. I have learned so much from her. I have found her to be balanced and realistic about the problem. I worked around social workers for five years and I still learned things about the CPS system in the U.S. that I didn’t know from Marianne’s writings.
You made a very good statement here:
“Systems intended to protect must be continually examined with compassion and justice, especially when cultural differences and family bonds are at stake.”
People who have moved from other countries to work in Norway almost seem to have been targeted at times. A movie has been made in India about the case of an Indian mother who moved to Norway only to have her children taken from her. The name of the movie is Mrs. Chatterjee vs Norway (2023) and is based on the true story of Sagarika Chakraborty, an Indian mother whose children were taken by Norwegian child welfare. (called Barnevernet)
The reason I have been posting about this problem for almost 10 years now is explained very well by your last sentence. Change is needed and many efforts have been made to bring change to a broken system. To this point almost all efforts have failed. Still, helping people to be aware of this issue and discussing it with them may, in the long term, help in creating eventual overwhelming condemnation that will force these awful systems to be corrected.
Thank you again for your insightful comment.
I pray for reform
Thank you for your prayers, Pastor Jim. I hope you are getting some rest during this holiday season.
Thanks
😔💜
Lord God this was hard to read. My brother and I could have our fair share of fights as kids, I cannot imagine what it would be like to not have a Christmas without him. I am so thankful that our Triune God will hold these people accountable for what they are doing to children and families.
May the Lord strengthen you as you bring these issues to life. God bless you, Chris.
I really appreciate your comment, Mandy. It is pretty hard reading and that’s why I decided to publicize it here after the worldwide protests of 2016. There are many wonderful people who live in the Nordic countries, one of them being my Norwegian friend who wrote this article. Because this subject is so awful, it is important to find people who have a balanced view of it. I met Marianne on Chris Prunean’s blog called “Delight in Truth” when he was publicizing the problem in 2016. He is an American who is of Romanian descent. He became very vocal in 2016 when a Romanian/Norwegian Christian couple had their five children taken from them by the Norwegian Barnevernet. After many protests the family was reunited but they went to live in another country because they didn’t want any more problems. Marianne knows all about the strange philosophical views taught to the Norwegian Child Welfare Services workers. I have come to understand that Marianne is one of the most knowledgeable people on this subject. She also published this article on her website at:
https://www.mhskanland.net/
It is on her front page now. Much of her website is in the Norwegian language but at the moment there are several articles in English there as well.
Thank you for your interest. At this point prayer is the main thing we can do about the problem. You are so right about these people being held accountable eventually one way or the other. As Christians we know that we reap what we have sown. Thank God for His mercy. I pray that anyone responsible for these types of crimes comes to understand God’s mercy and that what is being done is very cruel. How they could not know is beyond my comprehension.
Thank you for your kind words, Mandy. I will continue to try and understand when and where this problem is rearing its ugly head.
May God bless you as well!
Thank you for sharing all this, Chris! I appreciate it!!!!
You’re welcome, Mandy!
😢 these stories break my heart.
Welcome to the Wings of the Wind, bnave, and I appreciate your comment. I’ve been watching this now for the past 10 years and these stories break my heart as well. It is always understandable when parents who abuse their children are separated from them. The problem is that so many of these cases are not even close to “abuse” level. I have articles here on my blog written by me and a friend in Norway who has been criticizing the Norwegian Child Welfare Services a lot longer than I have. I posted one of her articles here that includes very ridiculous reasons that certain children were taken. This is only a sample of things that happen in countries like Norway and Denmark where this is a real problem. Several of these stories have to do with parents who, for whatever reason, can’t afford certain things. An example is #1 that says: “The father is out of work and cannot support the family.” Instead of taking the children and paying a lot of money to people who don’t even know the kids, why not just assist the family for what Norway calls “the best of the child?” If you read down the list you will see the insanity of some of these decisions. Many of the kids who are taken are split up and the parents only get three or four visitations throughout the year. I have read about cases where the children are sent very far from one another making it difficult for the parents to travel so far for each child. Anyway, the system is based on “psychobabble” as my friend calls it that biological parents in a great many cases have no better connection with their children that some random foster parent. I’ve always found this idea to be quite absurd.
Here is the list if you are interested in seeing it. Remember this is only a sampling of ridiculous reasons for taking children from their biological parents:
https://chrisreimersblog.com/?s=reasons+children+are+taken
So sad! Here, we do everything we can to help families stay together. Unfortunately, there are times when CPS has to intervene, but even after that, we still do all we can to reinstate the parents’ rights if they do what is needed to accomplish this.
That’s great, bnave. There are countries that are much better than Norway. That is for sure!
Thanks for your comment!