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The day I accidentally killed a little boy

bbc.co.uk

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Re: The day I accidentally killed a little boy

#551

Post by dragonwriter »

t3rmi wrote: post #546
RHSeeger wrote: post #476

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Part of it is society, too. If you were to let your (young) children play in the woods at a mile from your house... and something happened to them, there's a fair chance that society would blame you nowadays. Heck, I'd venture to guess that there's a fair chance the court could take away your parental rights in a situation like that. What is considered acceptable by society has changed a LOT over the years.

I would probably blame the sensational news coverage nowadays, we didnt have this 20 years ago. Back then news would contain sports/world events and bigger stuff. You hear about so many bad things happening you never think about the probability of it actually happening to you. Like all we read is "Child kidnapped" not "First child kidnapping in a year with lowest kidnap rate ever and in a place so far away that its n…

> I would probably blame the sensational news coverage nowadays, we didnt have this 20 years ago.

Yes, we did, and the media-driven false perception was already well-established 20 years ago; I saw papers about the media-driven false perception in the late 1980s or early 1990s.

Media sensationalism isn't new. Even the heightened form driven by the 24-hour news cycle is older than that (CNN, the 24-hour news network that drove the 24-hour news cycle, is 37 years old. Fox News and MSNBC, the two competing general 24-hour news networks that made that cycle competitive were each founded 21+ years ago in 1996.)

Re: The day I accidentally killed a little boy

#552

Post by bargl »

fernandopj wrote: post #116

As someone who is not a parent, and reading these comments from fathers on how unbearable must be to lose a child (even the thought of it), brought me back to a story which taught me to feel, years ago, to try understand what losing a child does to a person. It was the game Heavy Rain. It is a big part of the narrative to put you on the father's shoes, to lose a child and dive down to a limbo, how your life basically…

As a gamer who became a father. I played this game and felt pain, but on the flip side I couldn't even play this game now. All I'd do is picture loosing my son. I could see a lot of the repercussions playing out in my house though, aka relationship with my other son, wife, etc.

Re: The day I accidentally killed a little boy

#553

Post by megy »

rev_bird wrote: post #332
osullivj wrote: post #125

25ish years ago I was driving my Toyota MR2 along the Cowley Road in Oxford on a Sunday morning, heading for an out of town supermarket, to pick up some groceries. Two teenage girls ran out from behind a bus that was waiting at a stop on the other side of the road, right into my path. Those who've been in a road traffic accident will know that time slows down the instant you know things are out of control. I stood on…

>In British civil law, the driver is always culpable in an accident involving a minor, even if sober and below the speed limit, which I was. This seems like a weird construct, particularly given that minors do such stupid things. Two of them, together, literally ran into traffic, and the default is "blame traffic"?

Not at all. You are creating the dangerous situation in the first place. If you weren't driving, people could run across the road without fear of getting hit by you.

Re: The day I accidentally killed a little boy

#554

Post by dwaltrip »

gnicholas wrote: post #423
dwaltrip wrote: post #366

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My understanding, and what I remember from some brief research, is that kidnappings by strangers are incredibly rare. This would mean that the widespread fear we see nowadays is very disproportionate, and likely due to a variety of other social factors and not some actual underlying danger. Can anyone provide a quick corroboration/correction on this?

You are correct—it's around 100 stranger abductions per year in the U.S. http://reason.com/blog/2017/03/31/kidnapping-stats https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/five-myths-about-mis...

Thanks for the data/links. Glad to know it actually isn't a major issue.

Re: The day I accidentally killed a little boy

#555

Post by MollyR »

bargl wrote: post #549
MollyR wrote: post #284

I'm a mother with a young child. I don't think the childless and males can ever really understand the process of being pregnant for 9 months and then giving birth. I empathize with her, but if she killed my child. I could never forgive her.

I don't think the childless females can ever really understand the process either... I am a dad, and I saw a change in my wife the DAY my first son was born. It's easy to forget but we were all on the other side of having children at some point (regardless of gender). It's something that changes you, your relationships, your priorities. If someone accidentally killed my child I don't know that I'd forgive them either…

Sure people who aren't pregnant can never understand what it's like to carry their child inside them for 9 months.

You feel their movements inside you. You just know when they aren't feeling well.They respond differently when you eat certain foods. It's an almost spiritual connection.

Then to finally meet them after 9 months, I just can't describe it.

Re: The day I accidentally killed a little boy

#556

Post by YSFEJ4SWJUVU6 »

chris_7 wrote: post #75

If someone fires a gun randomly down the street, not aiming at anyone, but happens to hit someone, they'd certainly be arrested. Drive a multi-thousand-pound projectile down the street, kill someone, and it's just an "accident". The default needs to move to charging every driver involved in a fatal crash with manslaughter. Currently the police won't even perform basic investigative work that would make any charge pos…

I take your stance is the same for train drivers, too?

What an utterly silly opinion, anyway.

Re: The day I accidentally killed a little boy

#557

Post by bargl »

wffurr wrote: post #374
perfmode wrote: post #235

I was hit by a car when I was 7 years old. It was a hit and run. I was thrown into the air. Luckily, I only bruised my shoulder blade. It was certainly my fault I was in the road, chasing a frisbee. I can understand why the person would have run away from the scene. I wish there was more forgiveness in society.

"Chasing a frisbee" should never put one at risk of death. The fault isn't with you; it's with the driver (going too fast to stop for a running child) and the traffic engineer (built an unsafe street next to housing / parks / etc.).

I respectfully disagree. There is a reasonable requirement that as you're passing someone on the street if they aren't in front of you it's not your fault. You as a human have a blind spot at which point you can't be reasonable expected to stop.

They should have definitely stopped after hitting someone.

Fault could be the drivers if they were speeding, the person was standing in the road (not entering at a perpendicular), drinking, etc.

This is why you should have a dashcam for your vehicle. I always ALWAYS watch side yards and such for children (my mom called them snipers). I drive down the middle of the road when people aren't around (more distance between parked cars and my bumper) but no one is perfect and the Fault isn't always the drivers.

Re: The day I accidentally killed a little boy

#558

Post by Dramatize »

dsnuh wrote: post #507
PhasmaFelis wrote: post #505

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 2. Don't post pictures of your kid all the time on social media. No one really cares. Sorry. Send those pictures to your parents or friends directly. For many people, social media is how you send things to parents and friends. It's more straightforward than managing an email list, and needn't be any less real a connection. I don't deny that ubiquitous social media is deforming our interactions, but I think a lot of…

Use whatever app or medium you choose, my advice was simply that sending directly to specific people is a better than flooding your IG or FB with photos of junior every day.

90% of my Instagram content is my kid. Though I use it as a way to record highlights for me and my wife, rather than for outside consumption.

Re: The day I accidentally killed a little boy

#559

Post by bargl »

perfmode wrote: post #235

I was hit by a car when I was 7 years old. It was a hit and run. I was thrown into the air. Luckily, I only bruised my shoulder blade. It was certainly my fault I was in the road, chasing a frisbee. I can understand why the person would have run away from the scene. I wish there was more forgiveness in society.

That's an awesome attitude for someone who had the driver flee the scene.

Re: The day I accidentally killed a little boy

#560

Post by toyg »

upofadown wrote: post #188
toyg wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This young woman wasn’t speeding. Throwing her in jail would have done nothing but increase the amount of suffering in this world. She is being punished every day of her life as it is. In Italy they have introduced the crime of “automobilistic manslaughter”. It made no difference whatsoever. Nobody wakes up thinking “Today I’ll drive fast and maybe kill someone”, and nobody drives thinking “oh I must be careful or I’…

The post you are responding do does not say anything about throwing anyone in jail, just that there should be an automatic charge of manslaughter. Then the courts would decide...

When people say they want new crimes on the books, they do it because they want someone convicted - otherwise there would be no point. It's pretty clear that this girl would not have been convicted, so what would the point have been? To show her the horror of the justice system, "so she will think twice next time"? She's already doing that herself, every day, simply because she doesn't want to kill anyone else.

What we need is better prevention and less cars.

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