Bogus Social Workers

[escargot]

Mass hysteria and misunderstanding, with a tiny bit of 'inept criminal thinking that saying 'I need to come in because I'm a social worker' will get them allowed into someone's house where they can pick up portable objects to steal and sell.' It would only take one person to say 'someone came to my door and said they were a social worker' (which may or may not have been factually correct), and the Chinese Whisper mentality will take over. Just try putting 'van seen driving around' in your local Facebook page, and suddenly everyone has seen a mysterious van up to all sorts down their road.

Yup, years ago there was a rumour in my home town that Purple Aki was on his way to terrorise children.

Someone showed me a letter about it that their kid's school had sent home.

All rubbish and Chinese whispers of course. The schools were fooled though.

 

[Enid Coleslaw]

Yeah, barely a week goes by people here aren't on social media frothing about men in vans trying to pick up children, despite there never being any actual missing children. We also regularly get people warning about dog thieves marking gates, but not once have I actually seen a marked gate and it's a small place, so I most certainly would have did they actually exist!

 

[Robbrent]

Bogus social workers feature in Peter Robinsons "Wednesdays Child" one of the Inspector Banks novels. Published 1988, which suggests that this was fairly well known phenomena at the time.

It's been going on for quite a few years, it's whipped up hysteria the general underlying theme is educated middle class people are going around stealing working class children it's (so I believe) quite a uniquely British phenomena probably deeply rooted in the archaic class system.

Put my point still stands it's never happened, but it's interesting looking at the underlying issues and of course mass hysteria (clowns in white vans anyone?)

 

[catseye]

Yeah, barely a week goes by people here aren't on social media frothing about men in vans trying to pick up children, despite there never being any actual missing children. We also regularly get people warning about dog thieves marking gates, but not once have I actually seen a marked gate and it's a small place, so I most certainly would have did they actually exist!

Ah the old 'dog thief' one. That seems to have died down a bit round here now Covid lockdowns are over and presumably everyone has discovered what a pain in the arse it is owning a dog.

 

[AnonyJ]

It's been going on for quite a few years, it's whipped up hysteria the general underlying theme is educated middle class people are going around stealing working class children it's (so I believe) quite a uniquely British phenomena probably deeply rooted in the archaic class system.

Put my point still stands it's never happened, but it's interesting looking at the underlying issues and of course mass hysteria (clowns in white vans anyone?)

This theme (educated middle class people are going around stealing working class children) stems, I believe from the 'Satanic Panic' cases of the later 1980s-early 1990s when misinformed and ideologically-driven social workers in tandem with some doctors actually did this in Nottinghamshire, Cleveland, Orkney and other locations in the UK. e.g., https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orkney_child_abuse_scandal

 

[Robbrent]

This theme (educated middle class people are going around stealing working class children) stems, I believe from the 'Satanic Panic' cases of the later 1980s-early 1990s when misinformed and ideologically-driven social workers in tandem with some doctors actually did this in Nottinghamshire, Cleveland, Orkney and other locations in the UK. e.g., https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orkney_child_abuse_scandal

Yes it did happen which is probably the seed of it all