I am fortunate to never have had a direct interaction with them myself, but I know several people personally who have, (none of the interactions were pleasant) and am aware of some worse cases (Look up Drake Pardo for a recent, egregious example.) I understand the--I hesitate to say 'need', given the frequent abuses we see, so I'll go with 'benefit'--of protecting the young, old, and incapable from abuse at the hands those that are supposed to be caring for them. But the government has as much, if not more potential to abuse these people than their natural caretakers. Just take a look at the results of the foster care system and tell me if that is a better alternative, on average, than even the caretakers whom these children are being taken away from.

I am appalled at the abuses performed by 'social workers' in the name of 'protecting children, the elderly, and the infirm' (moreso of late), but I am even more appalled that the institutions and individuals within the government so rarely step in and actually stop such abuses from happening. In the case of Drake Pardo I mentioned above, there was a court ruling that the actions taken by CPS were illegal and that Drake should be returned to his parents. CPS refused to comply and it was months before Drake was reunited with his parents. Frankly, it surprises me that more parents, when faced with such abuses at the hands of the state, don't take matters into their own hands rather than wait for court cases to resolve while their children are kept wards of the state.