Crimewatch - Madeleine McCann

[DodgyAgent]

I'll play (only the first one as the rest can be looked up easily enough):



I am going to assume that 'your eye' means 'the eye of a trusted person' (teacher, family etc) and say that it depends. I take my eye off them when I put them in bed but then their bedroom is at a level of security I am happy with, could it be breeched? Of course it could but I think it is safe enough.

Our house doors are usually locked unless we are going through them.

When they are playing in the garden - we have a high fence and a locked gate so I check on them every 10 minutes or so at least.

In an unfamiliar environment I have them watched pretty much constantly unless there is somewhere secure for them to be (a room in a locked apartment etc). Then I might relax and watch TV in the next room, the access to their room would be looked or I would make sure I would notice someone entering.

Good for you. So anyone who does not safeguard their children with the obsessive amount of control that you exert they get their children abducted then they would be behaving irresponsibly?

[MyUserName]

Have you ever left your children unattended?

If I had an electric fire and switched it on before leaving the house for the evening and whilst I was out my unattended electrical fire caused a fire which burnt down my house and my neighbours - would I be responsible?

[DodgyAgent]

Not at all, just culpable for the situation leading to it.

DA, all you are trying to do is mitigate what they did. Others will not, as they'd not leave their kids alone full stop.

As I have said before your point of view is not supported by anyone in any sort of mainstream (or blog) journalism.

[cailin maith]

Good for you. So anyone who does not safeguard their children with the obsessive amount of control that you exert they get their children abducted then they would be behaving irresponsibly?

Why would a parent not want to ensure to the best of their ability the safety of their children?

Why do you think he is showing an obsessive amount of control simply because he is ensuring the safest possible, least risky environment for his children?

Really? I am genuinely interested in how you think it is wrong to do that?

[MaryPoppins]

As I have said before your point of view is not supported by anyone in any sort of mainstream (or blog) journalism.

I am genuinely puzzled as to why you'd think anyone would care whether their parenting style is 'supported' by journalists.

[Hairy]

As I have said before your point of view is not supported by anyone in any sort of mainstream (or blog) journalism.

This doesn't mean there's no merit. It also doesn't bother me as I maintain my own thoughts about it all.

So, define unattended.

Oh, and my wife and I are very happy with how we bring up our children by the way.

[MyUserName]

Good for you. So anyone who does not safeguard their children with the obsessive amount of control that you exert they get their children abducted then they would be behaving irresponsibly?

I did not say that, I merely answered your question. Why would you call my behaviour obsessive?

My 4 year old is autistic and difficult to predict and my 2 year old likes opening doors and will happily walk through them and shut them again. Hence our external doors are kept locked most of the time.

When they play in the garden we lock the gate, otherwise they might open it and wander off. Or someone might open it and snatch them or steal things from the garden.

In an unfamilar environment they might end up doing anything from my son getting into a random car with an open door to my daughter getting caught in a behvioural loop and repeating the same actions without any observtion of the environment (oncoming cars, causing an obstruction for other people etc).

I am wary of allowing unobserved access from their bedroom to outdoors in unfamilar areas as much to stop them from leaving as to prevent people coming in.

Which part of this strikes you as obsessive?

[Churchill]

It is good to see the Jury is out. The guilty of neglect case that the Mccanns seem to be answerable to is being reviewed by all you jolly responsible parents.

What you have to consider m'lud are these questions:

1. What is a permissable length of time can you take your eye off your kids? Is it 5 minutes, 15 minutes, 45 minutes or 1.0000000000.19999 minutes?
2. What were they doing when they were absent from their kids? were they working? were they attending church? or were they god forbid enjoying themselves eating dinner with friends?
3 In the time that they were away from their kids did they have a line of site to the door of their apartment?
4. How often if at all did they go back to the room to check their kids?
5. What horrible foreign country were they in?
6. What sort of place were they staying? Was it an apartment in the midddle of a city of paedos or was it in a gated area on a holiday site?

Now remember there are a lot of people who are disgusted by the behaviour of the Mccanns so we must get this right. We need to establish at what point the Mcanns fell over the boundary of what is acceptable parental behaviour (to the sanctimonious judgemental affluent middle class parents with serious personal issues about their own parenting) and what is an abandonment of responsibility. Once we have established this we can then sentence them (you have lost your child and it is your fault so we throw you to the mob) or dismiss them and see if anyone else may be responsible for the abduction of Madeleine.

Certainly one of your more twattish posts.

[Hairy]

The notion anyone is odd for locking the door when they, and their children, are in their house, is in itself odd.

It's not odd, it's ensuring they don't come to harm, possibly a central tenet to being a parent. It's obvious why some on hear do not understand that, but for a parent to question it?

[MaryPoppins]

but for a parent to question it?

I'm assuming he's attempting to be the devil's....what's the word.....

oh, yeah...

twat.