Breaking the Silence: Children’s Stories

This groundbreaking PBS documentary was filmed in part at the 2005  Battered Mother's Custody Conference, and premiered nationally October 20, 2005 as part of Domestic Violence Awareness Month; showings continue across the country; check National Schedule of PBS airings.

  Please write to PBS stations who are showing Breaking The Silence and thank them!  Find contact info for your local PBS stations.

Breaking the Silence: Children’s Stories chronicles the impact of domestic violence on children, the systemic failure of family courts across the country to protect children from their abusers, and the legal injustices encountered by protective parents.

Breaking the Silence: Children’s Stories is a follow-up to the acclaimed 2001 PBS documentary, Breaking the Silence: Journeys of Hope, which focused on women and domestic abuse.  “Journeys of Hope documented how much we, as a society, made progress to combat domestic violence and serve its victims,” explains producer Dominique Lasseur (www.tatgelasseur.com).  “Children Stories reminds us that a lot needs to be done to better protect our children from the long term effects of living with violent abusers.” 

Documentary Chronicles Family Court's Failure To Protect Children,

 North Country Gazette, October 15,  2005

Click on the picture below to download this PBS flyer 

A powerful new PBS documentary, Breaking the Silence: Children’s Stories, premiers on October 20, 2005.  This long-awaited film chronicles the impact of domestic violence on children and the systemic failure of family courts across the country to protect them from their abusers.  Airing times and dates vary—please check your local PBS listings.

Growing numbers of protective, non-offending, loving, and fit mothers are losing custody of their children to their or their children’s abusers. Women who seek to exit bad or even dangerous relationships are often met with retaliatory suits for child custody. Many women who try to leave an abusive partner find that the family court system can become a place where the abuser is enabled and even facilitated in further victimizing her and her children.

The American Judges Association reports that one of the most common reasons for resuming a relationship with an abusive partner is the fear that the abuser will act on threats of taking the children. In fact, studies show that batterers have been able to convince authorities that the victim is unfit or undeserving of sole custody in approximately 70% of challenged cases.

Little known among the general public is the fact that, for almost two decades now, a controversial theory called " Parental Alienation Syndrome" (PAS) has been used as a courtroom tactic to silence abused children and their mothers. This so-called syndrome is not based on systematic research, is not recognized by mental health professionals, is not viewed as a psychiatric diagnosis, and has been rejected by valid scientists and ethical practitioners. Nevertheless, PAS continues to be routinely used in courts across the country, resulting in the removal of children from loving, safe, and fit mothers to fathers who batter the mother, abuse the child, and/or have a substance abuse or criminal history. Often, the mother is given only supervised visitation; in many cases, she loses all contact with her child.    Full Press Release