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

[Blarg]

Repeatedly saying that people coming to a different conclusion than your own are jumping to theirs waters down the effectiveness of any point you could make. That's only good for preaching to the choir, because there's nothing really there besides the ad hominem assertion. What new does that contribute and why would that serve to convince anyone of anything they don't already believe?

[diebitter]

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Repeatedly saying that people coming to a different conclusion than your own are jumping to theirs waters down the effectiveness of any point you could make. That's only good for preaching to the choir, because there's nothing really there besides the ad hominem assertion. What new does that contribute and why would that serve to convince anyone of anything they don't already believe?

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All this contributes is a failed attempt to suggest finding out a little more before you conclude anything might be wise. As it's failed, it's not doing anyone any sort of service, actually.

[Blarg]

I think you got your English backwards there, but thanks for agreeing with me.

At any rate, as previously noted, this is a forum, not a private detective agency. What do you expect us to do to find out more before discussing this matter and drawing the best conclusions we can, as appropriate to a forum, not a court of law? Take a trip to her home town? Interview her neighbors? What is it that you would suggest doing to find out more, and have you undertaken said actions yourself? Failing that, have you truly refused to conclude anything? That doesn't actually seem to be the case.

Or is that whole business a red herring anyway?

[blackize]

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mkay, I can see making the point that sometimes it's best not to jump to conclusions based on assumption rather than knowledge isn't really making a dent here, so whatever, that's cool.

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Personal experience is a type of knowledge. And since specific details, such as the layout of her car, haven't been released personal experience is all we really have to go on. My point has been that it would take an odd configuration of her car seat or her throwing the car in reverse without looking to prevent her from seeing the child when she was backing up. The likelihood of either of these situations being the case I am estimating to be extremely small.

[punkass]

I believe we can come to relatively good assumptions.

There is a line between being negligent = bad mother and being negligent = criminally negligent. Leaving your child in the car to die in the heat crosses that line.

[Blarg]

My own personal experience of growing up in a foster family, which I know through experience to be personally frightening and repulsive to many people, has provided me with the knowledge that a great many parents do horrific things to their children, including things that endanger their mental and physical health. And they do it repeatedly, sometimes as long as they can until they go to jail or somebody dies. And then, they quite often do it again. I met them, and I grew up with their kids and lived with the results every day, from the time I was small myself. I do not find it nearly so unimaginable as do most people that parents could completely neglect, or intentionally harm or kill their children; it was a natural, daily part of my life for so many years. It goes on, like any other part of life. I know that the idea that someone would act that way is almost unimaginable to a normal consciousness, so much so that it is hard to incorporate into one's understanding and accept. It is easier to push away with all one's force. This provides a de facto way of ignoring it that makes one feel much better.

I also know the excuses and mind-set of the people who do this type of thing. I've heard it before. While others can hear something like this for the first time and reject it or be surprised by it, the effect is totally different when you are well past the point of believing such things simply cannot happen. Especially not among decent middle class white people, perhaps? But yeah, they sure do happen. They may well have happened in your neighborhood, or neighborhoods you aspire to, among people you know, or aspire to know. To nice looking people, too, and maybe kids even nicer than you ever were.

There's a recoiling from reality that says, "Terrible behavior by a parent toward his or her child could not happen!" It effectively says, "La la la la la la la, I'm not listening!" You would think it was the child whose need for consolation should be thought of first. But we treat kids like numbers, and the first number is Number 1. He's the first one whose needs are taken care of, even if it requires turning a blind eye to do it.

[Blarg]

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I believe we can come to relatively good assumptions.

There is a line between being negligent = bad mother and being negligent = criminally negligent. Leaving your child in the car to die in the heat crosses that line.

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This seems far from a cruel conclusion to me. In fact it seems the only one really workable in a practical sense. If this is not criminally negligent, what is? If such accidents are not so unlikely as to be preposterously so, which are?

That the lady has even been warned not to do this before seems to make something that is quite clear into something much clearer still.

Yet concluding such is posited as without merit as if by definition? And worthy of refute by ad hominem?

[NT!]

Having worked in and around the child welfare field for a while now, I can say a few things about this.

1. A mother without her status and connections would have been TPR'd (termination of parental rights) as fast as CPS could fill out the paperwork. Period. Not close.

2. This absolutely meets the standard for criminal negligence. Forgetfulness is not a legal excuse for incompetence in this case - the very nature of the parental relationship requires a certain standard of concern and responsibility for a child who cannot defend him/herself. Forgetting that a child is in a life-threatening situation is the very definition of incompetence, a failure or inability to live up to the responsibilities that come with a child.

3. There are many circumstances where child welfare workers or prosecutors do not file charges or remove children even when there is evidence of negligence (although usually not such gross negligence as this). As diebitter and Blarg have both mentioned, there are many, many instances of negligent behavior by people that society would otherwise term 'good' or even 'great' parents. Sometimes even if the parent is not good, the alternatives (out of home care) are even worse. There is a movement in the child welfare field towards family unification or reunification and away from taking kids out of their homes and communities.

All that said, most of the instances where such discretion is used involve more affluent people, and this woman has done nothing in my mind to demonstrate that she is capable of being a remotely competent parent. What makes this case more ridiculous is that a negligence claim would disqualify her from working in a school, which seems entirely fair. I don't care if she goes to jail or not, but she simply cannot be allowed to work with children in a professional capacity after a lapse like this. The safety of a child is the absolute number one priority of anyone working in the field, and certain things simply cannot be forgiven.

[Michaelson]

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My own personal experience of growing up in a foster family, which I know through experience to be personally frightening and repulsive to many people, has provided me with the knowledge that a great many parents do horrific things to their children, including things that endanger their mental and physical health. And they do it repeatedly, sometimes as long as they can until they go to jail or somebody dies. And then, they quite often do it again. I met them, and I grew up with their kids and lived with the results every day, from the time I was small myself. I do not find it nearly so unimaginable as do most people that parents could completely neglect, or intentionally harm or kill their children; it was a natural, daily part of my life for so many years. It goes on, like any other part of life. I know that the idea that someone would act that way is almost unimaginable to a normal consciousness, so much so that it is hard to incorporate into one's understanding and accept. It is easier to push away with all one's force. This provides a de facto way of ignoring it that makes one feel much better.

I also know the excuses and mind-set of the people who do this type of thing. I've heard it before. While others can hear something like this for the first time and reject it or be surprised by it, the effect is totally different when you are well past the point of believing such things simply cannot happen. Especially not among decent middle class white people, perhaps? But yeah, they sure do happen. They may well have happened in your neighborhood, or neighborhoods you aspire to, among people you know, or aspire to know. To nice looking people, too, and maybe kids even nicer than you ever were.

There's a recoiling from reality that says, "Terrible behavior by a parent toward his or her child could not happen!" It effectively says, "La la la la la la la, I'm not listening!" You would think it was the child whose need for consolation should be thought of first. But we treat kids like numbers, and the first number is Number 1. He's the first one whose needs are taken care of, even if it requires turning a blind eye to do it.

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I completely accept the perspective that you have outlined here and in other posts. However, no one in this thread has denied the possibility that this was a monstrous act by a woman with some sort of deep seated resentment towards her child. For the few of us who have chimed in against the general tone of blanket condemnation, we have all been ambivalent with respect to the facts of the case.

It seems to me, though, that where some of us consider it a possibility that a loving parent could have a brain snap that resulted in the death of a child and the tearing apart of a family, from the outset, with only the broad outline of the case on which to base your opinion, you have completely rejected this possibility. In fact, you go dangerously close to suggesting that wherever a parental mishap results in the death of a child it cannot be an accident (though perhaps I misunderstood the line I bolded above).

Let me reiterate that I'm not trying to be condescending or insensitive or whatever, I completely understand how your experiences have coloured your view of these types of events. However, you act like they give you a priviledged perspective, but I would say you just have a different perspective. You're very quick to characterise the rosy, oblivious, "la la la la I'm not listening" approach of those of us without first hand experience of abusive family relationships, but it's possible also that having spent your formative years in the company of children who were the product of abusive relationships you have formed a particularly cynical view of the idea of loving family relations. For those of us raised in and exposed to, broadly speaking, loving family relationships only you're probably right that it could be difficult to comprehend the despicable ways in which parents can treat their children. But likewise, your background seems to blinkered you completely from the possibility something like this could be a horrible and tragic accident.

Though as I have said before, on the balance of probabilities I suspect this case was more than just a tragic accident.

[DrewDevil]

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I sentence all you people that jumped to a judgement without not wondering about finding more out to watch '12 Angry Men'.

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DB - it's true... I haven't followed this case all too closely, but honestly, I can't think of many plausible scenarios that would in any way mitigate this woman's culpability. Can you?

-Al

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I can think of a lot of things that would affect this woman's mental state at this time - tiredness, upset in her life, a near accident on the way to work that jarred her etc

Whether these are in any way diminishing of culpability is another matter.


I guess I have some empathy because I have children that mean the world to me, but I sometimes do things in the extremely busy schedule I have as a working parent that are stupid and borne of forgetfulness. I've forgotten I've had a kid to pick up at a certain time from nursery because it was my turn rather than my wife's, I've driven off without making sure a baby seat wasn't properly secured in its seat, I've even left a side door open and started the car to drive off - only to be stopped by the kids shouting 'dad, you left the door open!' When kids are misbehaving for example, you can easily stop midway through doing up their seatbelts to chastise one, and go to the next task cos you've registered you've done the seatbelt up when you didn't. IT HAPPENS!

Honestly, I don't particularly want to defend her, she's at best an idiot, and at worst monstrous, I'm just pointing out we don't know all the circumstances. I was also pointing out that we all slip into idiocy from time to time, and we're lucky that most of us usually do it when it's have trivial consequences, not catastrophic ones like this. And that parents, particularly int he morning, have an awful lot to juggle when they are getting the kids and themselves where they're supposed to be to a specific schedule. I'm not trying to say 'hey, I know better than you cos I'm a parent' here, but I think until you have kids and have to get them and yourself ready each and every morning, you probably don't appreciate how much work and coordinated effort this involves before you even start the working day. And much of this effort becomes so automatic as there's so much to do, you sometimes register you've done something when you've completely missed it. IT HAPPENS!


Finally, talk like 'how could she not see the kid' is just the sort of instajump from assumption to conclusion without knowledge I'm suggesting we all guard against, mkay?

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Ah, now I get it. You're a negligent parent who endangers your children sometimes, and so you have empathy for this woman who let her child burn up in a hot car. And because you sometimes do things that could kill your children, you think all parents must be as negligent as you, right? "There but for the grace of god," etc.? "It happens" to everyone, right?

Well, you're wrong. If you're committing acts or omissions that could potentially kill your children, you're not "absent-minded." You're not "forgetful." You're criminally negligent, and you're a bad parent.

So stop endangering your kids and stop defending horrible people who let their kids burn to death.