concerned parent

Can everyone please download the poster of Madeline McCann from the Sky News website and display it in as many places as possible. She is the 3 year old who was abducted from her holiday apartment in Portugal 9 days ago. She has very distinctive eyes and the Sky News poster shows this in detail. It is feared she is now out of Portugal and somewhere in Europe. Please also warn parents to be extra vigilant of their children while on holiday this summer. Thanks

jdr

Thanks for the concern, but there is already a thread on Maddie at the top of this page, one in Siesta time, and one in the Portugal page.
A lot of people have already printed it out in English and Spanish.
Everyone is wishing for a speedy and happy conclusion to this sad affair.
regards jdr

Starseed

It's a sad affair, but it's also becoming something of a circus in the media. Reminds me of the Princess Diana tragedy, which produced obligatory emoting on a huge scale.

Worse things are happening every day, everywhere, to helpless pensioners as well as children, yet this one case seems to require semi-mass hysteria. The parents now have an audience with the Pope. What next? The Queen? The Dalai Lama, followed by Presidents Bush and Putin?

( I'll probably get censured / banned for being so "heartless" ....)



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CarolineW

I so agree with your sentiments. I find it difficult to imagine people who were not middle class (GP and Consultant in this case) or having the resources and contacts to employ PR and fund raising agents, access to private jets,two solicitors flown out from the UK and the Pope could possibly have received the same positive treatment by the media. There is a suspicion that ordinary working class people would have been left largely to their own devices and roundly criticised for leaving unattended children long before now. Not forgetting the kids left with relatives while these trips take place.

I know a lot of people who feel quite uncomfortable the way this is panning out- like the Diana hysteria as you say. The pressure on public servants to run around after them/organise visits around Europe and so on at risk of a big black public mark if they refuse must be quite heavy. Some of my friends are asking what the funds they have raised will be used for as all that seems to be spent on travelling and funding the relatives who have given up their day jobs to move to the Algarve for the duration.

None of this minimises my sadness for the parents or fears for the child. Far from it. I simply don't want to see it any more unless there is some real news-not the PR stunts we have been seeing lately. Sorry.

Starseed

Well, bless you for saying that.

But it's not just the parents' actions; it's the response of the people in general that I find disconcerting. The website has had 70 million hits since it was set up. Why are people so obsessed / sentimentalised about this? As you say, there is no news. I'll take an interest when there is news, real developments; until then, it smacks of self-indulgence by the website-hitters.

God knows how they'd have managed back in 1940. Back then, bombs falling all around them, relatives being killed, they just gritted their teeth and got on with life. Thank God they did.

Not sorry.

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Mitzyboy

There have been so may threads and comments on BE that I think its all been said before.

Needless to say, if I was in those parents position I would be doing all I could to raise the profile of the situation whether it involved "PR stunts" or not, I wouldn't care. I'd visit the Dali Lama if it made a difference!

"People feeling uncomfortable" versus "trying all you possibly can to get your child back" just doesn't balance out and I don't think anyone should level criticism against parents just trying to do what they can in these circumstances.

The alternative of just doing nothing, going home, and accepting the situation is just ...... well ....... not an alternative at the moment.

Lets not get into another blame the parents thread please and just let them get on with whatever they have to get on with to keep the profile high and her image in peoples minds. Who knows, a miracle might happen!

trutje

I would shit on the Queen's grounds if that would help to bring my daughter back!

Starseed

Dutch or British Queen?

trutje

Both