Should Vice Principal Lose Her Job? - (*Warning-Gruesome topic")

[Blarg]

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The reason it wouldn't deter future incidents is that the deterrent reason is only useful for reckless or intentional conduct. You can't deter accidental conduct preceisely because it was accidental.

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This isn't an accident though. She has been warned on several occasions not to leave her child in the car. And I don't believe for a second she didn't see the kid while she was backing up or while she was taking donuts out of the trunk.

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Me either. This stretches credulity beyond the breaking point. I think the only people talking about forgiving her for making a simple error are people afraid of their own stupidity and making a very dumb leap of empathy. That fear is unwarranted, too. No matter how unconfident you are that you will not do the wrong or the stupid or shameful thing sometime, that is all very, very, very far from killing your kid through this kind of negligence. NOBODY is that big of a [censored] up by accident.

[RR]

Here is another article about this.

http://news.cincinnati.com/apps/pbcs...15019/-1/CINCI

[Harmonium]

Kids, dogs, front seat, back seat - does it matter? How people can be that stupid is beyond me. Thinking about everything except where they are at now, and these are the people you're driving on the highway with too.

This woman is holding down a job making $77k a year, is described as a good, reliable employee, and it doesn't occur to her once all freaking day that her daughter might be in the car? How reliable is that?

[Blarg]

That's why "I forgot" is such an asinine excuse.

[katyseagull]

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For those who have compassion for this woman. Is it because you feel that you aren't beyond doing this?



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I think it's partly this. Also, whenever someone has something tragic happen to them I tend to imagine what it would feel like to be in their shoes. This makes me feel sympathy for them because I assume they will be feeling the same remorse and horror that I would be feeling.

Years ago when I was in h.s. one of my best friends lost her life in a car accident. The accident was her mother's fault and my whole family felt nothing but compassion for her. I remember it so clearly. It was a really tough time in my life. I have often thought of my friend's mom and dad over the years and hope they are doing ok.

[absoludicrous]

This is such a common occurrence. Why? How hard is it to remember your child is in your car, jesus christ. These people are proving to society they are indeed UNFIT to parent. Sickening.

Wonder what it would be like to die from exposure to heat.

[DeuceKicker]

I'm undecided about consequences, mainly because I only watched the Today Show clip and don't know details of the previous warnings.

However, I'm struck by the EXTREME judgmentalism--which may just be a result of the extreme emotionalism--of some of the views. Extreme emotionalism often kills any ability to think logically about a situation.

The fact is that this happens dozens of times every year across the U.S. The at-times absurd armchair psychology being practiced is as head-shaking as the OP's story.

I guess the mob mentality wasn't confined to her home town.

[Blarg]

Yeah, killing your child is not a subject that should stir up strong feelings. And anyone with strong feelings clearly can't also be logical. Torch-waving, angry villagers with pitchforks, maybe!

[DeuceKicker]

People with strong feelings can be logical; they just aren't trying very hard in this thread. I don't want to get in a flame war, however, especially when I'm ambivalent about the woman in question.

The phrase "killing your child" is an example of the emotionally-charged language that strikes me as extreme. You're not supposed to put your newborn in a crib with loose bedding, yet a number of babies die every year from getting twisted up in loose bedding and being strangled. Did those parents "kill" their child? What about the parent who lets their baby sleep with them and rolls over in the middle of the night and smothers them. (I think this happens much less often, but can still happen.)

Is there anything that can happen to a toddler that we'll call an accident?

Again, the previous warnings cloud the issue to me. Still, I remember a news story from years ago when I was living in Michigan. A man left his baby in the car all day and it died. It normally wasn't his job to take the baby to daycare, but his wife couldn't for some reason and he completely forgot.

The reaction from the community was pretty heavily weighted toward support and empathy.

Besides, I just don't see what purpose sending the parent to jail serves. Despite how things are being worded in this forum, she did not choose to leave her baby in the car.

As an aside, I'm not sure what I expected, but it seems that posters with children are generally being more sympathetic, while those without are finding it easiest to level blanket condemnations.

[Stagger_Lee]

When a heroin addict leaves some methadone in the kitchen and a kid drinks it and dies everyone is outraged.

When a woman drives drunk, crashes and kills her child everyone is outraged.

When a woman leaves her house to go out drinking and the house burns down killing a child everyone is outraged.

When an Asian couple leave their kids in a car in a casino parking lot and the kids die everyone is outraged.

When a professional upper middle class white woman locks her kid in her car in a school parking lot..........

When a professional upper midddle class white woman lets her child;s stroller roll into a lake while she takes a phone call.....

When a professional upper middle class couple leave their kids alone so they can go out drinking & eating and the kid goes missing...........

Each case has the same culpability, same neglect, same result. In all cases we feel sorry for the suffering of the child and the agony the parents must feel. They all deserve to be punished.

We need to drop the double standards. If this was a casino parking lot and an Asian woman with exactly the same poor excuses would the sentiments be the same?