Just for the briefest moment, I recognized the rage in the Ma'Khia Bryant video. I recognized it because I've seen it in foster and adopted kids, including my kids

Institutionalized kids -- kids who don't grow up with loving connections -- have terrible odds.

The frantic, irrational, uncontrollable rage you saw in that video is pretty common. Lots of these kids are basically brain damaged from having YEARS worth of fight-or-flight chemical reactions in their skulls.

Atlantic gave an overview here. https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2020/07/can-an-unloved-child-learn-to-love/612253/

Wife and I did a lot of training before adopting. I was surprised at the time how much of the training focused on RAD: Reactive Detachment Disorder and its less intense cousins.

I thought it was overkill until we actually adopted. Then we demanded MORE training.

Kids who grow up in more institutional environments end up worse, and the longer they live in institutional environments, the worse the outcome. Rule of thumb is that for every year in an institution, a kid loses a year of development.

Friends were fostering a 16 year old teen boy, and he loved to visit our house. His foster parents asked him why he loved it so much, and he said it was because of our "cool rug." They had no idea what he was talking about.

It was this. He liked playing with cars on this rug.

Outwardly he was 16, but inside he was a toddler. He had watched cops drag away his lowlife birth mom when he was young. One time he told me that that's all he saw when he closed his eyes.

My friends--his foster parents--ended up putting him back in the system because he tried to stab another kid with a knife, so he would up back in an institutional home.

Anyway. I don't know where I'm going with this. Shit, there's a lot of hurting kids who are victims of circumstances. Rest in peace Ma'Khia Bryant.

An amazing thread. Love you. https://twitter.com/BossierS/status/1384956895669202945