Kind of disgusting that states see a problem with this, but the constant stream of abuses of children within state care doesn't seem to be a problem. In those cases, the state is fighting ... to protect the perpetrators.

https://www.houstonchronicle.com/politics/texas/article/Fost...

TLDR: the state does not protect children.

Far, far worse is the "troubled teen industry".

Nobody in this game is in it to actually improve living conditions for children, either in or outside of state care. Not the porn industry, obviously (though you regularly see arguments that they provide "a way out" for some youngsters, some of it is bound to be true). But also definitely not the state. If they wanted to improve children's living conditions, the youth services residential facilities need SERIOUS upgrades, all of them, to the point that children are often better off at home, abused, than in state care. They are regularly denied necessary medical care. It seriously looks like state legislators are in this fight exclusively to look good while making things worse.

Yet this is supposedly the reason we're having a discussion about it at all.