You know, I've saved lives. Dozens. Maybe hundreds. I reattached a girl's leg. Her whole leg. She named her hamster after me. I got a hamster. He drops a box of money, he gets a town.

Simon ,'Jaynestown'


Natter 62: The 62nd Natter  

Off-topic discussion. Wanna talk about corsets, duct tape, or physics? This is the place. Detailed discussion of any current-season TV must be whitefonted.


beekaytee - Nov 16, 2008 8:08:19 am PST #1600 of 10002
Compassionately intolerant

Has anybody been following the Nebraska Safe-Haven debacle?

I just saw a news piece where more than 30 teens and kids have been abandoned, as opposed to the unwanted infants the law hoped to protect.

I must confess to wildly mixed feelings. On the one hand, if a parent is so...whatever it takes...that they can be okay with pitching their kids, the kid has to be better off without them right? Do we mean it when we say it takes a village?

On the other. The fuck? So much for the blood is thicker than water theory.

But, then, who foots the bill?

I know. Let's set up well-run Islands for Misfit Toys, where at risk kids get the attention, guidance and dare I say it, love, they deserve and tax the bejesus out of the parents who can't step up otherwise.


Gadget_Girl - Nov 16, 2008 8:13:46 am PST #1601 of 10002
Just call me "Siouxsie Shunshine".

I know. Let's set up well-run Islands for Misfit Toys, where at risk kids get the attention, guidance and dare I say it, love, they deserve and tax the bejesus out of the parents who can't step up otherwise.

This could become part of Buffista Island.


Sparky1 - Nov 16, 2008 8:19:31 am PST #1602 of 10002
Librarian Warlord

Has anybody been following the Nebraska Safe-Haven debacle?

Yes. I think you're being awfully hard on the parents to imply they don't love these kids, bonny, without much information about who these people are and what they're up against. Services for parents who want to get help for their older children are much thinner on the ground than they should be.

It seems like the problem may be that there's a whole lot of nothing in between the choice between giving them up or getting no help for them at all.

And my little liberal heart would be happy to have the gov't supply some of these services (mental/behavior health) since so many insurance policies won't cover them (or are limited in coverage) and it's damn expensive to seek that kind of help on one's own.


Strix - Nov 16, 2008 8:20:23 am PST #1603 of 10002
A dress should be tight enough to show you're a woman but loose enough to flee from zombies. — Ginger

I have gotten much better over the last year, regarding needles. I have been needle-phobix since a disastrous blood-darwing episode involvinh two arm casts over the elbow, an overeager resident, and a hospital policy on not drawinf blood from the legs or the necks.

I was stabbity. LIke 11 times.

What with all the sugery this year, I've gotten a lot better. I canNOT look at the needle at all, and always warn my docs. And my veins are rolly and splaty -- when they put in the pre-antaetheic for my operation, I bled so much it looked liked they's chopped of my hand.

Now, sutures. I can watch people including me being stitched up, take out stiches, get my hands bloody, whatever. It's the IV needles that really get me. And vomit. I'm a sympathetic puker. Can't even hear it, much less smell it.

I remember once when I was a kid, our dog threw up and I heard it/smelled it, and then I went, and then my sister went and my mom had to leave the room. Poor dad was stuck cleaning up 3 for the price of 1.


Strix - Nov 16, 2008 8:21:52 am PST #1604 of 10002
A dress should be tight enough to show you're a woman but loose enough to flee from zombies. — Ginger

Let's set up well-run Islands for Misfit Toys, where at risk kids get the attention, guidance and dare I say it, love, they deserve and

Hey, that's my new job! I start tomorrow! (Seriously, it mostly is!)


beekaytee - Nov 16, 2008 8:36:51 am PST #1605 of 10002
Compassionately intolerant

Yay Erin! The kids will be lucky to have you.

Sparky, I didn't mean to imply that the parents don't love their kids. I don't think love even crossed my mind.

It seems like the problem may be that there's a whole lot of nothing in between the choice between giving them up or getting no help for them at all.

The information that doesn't seem to be present in the stories I've seen is whether or not the parents have asked for the type of help you suggest. They certainly didn't seem to have in Nebraska.

The father who dropped off 9 of his 10 kids invoked the 'no questions asked' portion of the law. This struck me as less a cry for help than a statement.

And my little liberal heart would be happy to have the gov't supply some of these services (mental/behavior health)

See, my liberal heart wants us, as a nation, to go a step further. I'm having it up to here with the 'states rights' notion that we should be able to take care of ourselves.

The fact is, too many of us just don't. Is that something that deserves nothing but compassion or do we need to figure out a way to finance collective care?

I'm even less interested in a structure where we AREN'T challenged to be better people, but dang. There has to be some middle ground.


brenda m - Nov 16, 2008 8:47:37 am PST #1606 of 10002
If you're going through hell/keep on going/don't slow down/keep your fear from showing/you might be gone/'fore the devil even knows you're there

The information that doesn't seem to be present in the stories I've seen is whether or not the parents have asked for the type of help you suggest. They certainly didn't seem to have in Nebraska.

How on earth would we know this? Or do you mean they didn't ask at the hospital at the time of the event?


Barb - Nov 16, 2008 8:51:26 am PST #1607 of 10002
“Not dead yet!”

Has anybody been following the Nebraska Safe-Haven debacle?

What got me is that there were parents flying or driving thousands of miles to take advantage of the law. A dad who flew from Miami and a mother who drove from Georgia. And I know with the mother from Georgia, she made a point of saying that she loved her son, but she just couldn't get him the kind of help he needed.

Which makes me wonder about the difficulty in getting these kids and parents help in their home states.

And I think I remember reading something about how few of the children left were actually infants, which is who the law was intended for in the first place.


Sparky1 - Nov 16, 2008 8:51:37 am PST #1608 of 10002
Librarian Warlord

The father who dropped off 9 of his 10 kids invoked the 'no questions asked' portion of the law. This struck me as less a cry for help than a statement.

Why couldn't it be interpreted as someone in such distress that he couldn't talk about it? Can we even assume that the person asking the question was doing so in a compassionate manner and not in a shocked or accusatory tone that might scare someone?

Bottom line, I think the news stories being written about this issue are closer to tabloid journalism than investigative journalism.


beekaytee - Nov 16, 2008 8:56:21 am PST #1609 of 10002
Compassionately intolerant

Or do you mean they didn't ask at the hospital at the time of the event?

Exactly this.

And who knows how or why the stories are pitched the way they are, but I didn't seen any indication that parents said things like, "We've done all we could. Do you have any other ideas? Can you help us keep our kids?"

In fact, the reporter in the last bit I saw made a point of the fact that several of the parents drove from several states away rather than seek help in their own areas.

The lawmakers stressed that the attraction to Nebraska seems to be that the parents could abandon the kids without threat of legal consequence.

That is the crux of why the state is going, or has gone, into a special session to close the loophole of convenience.

I'm off to a clothing exchange, so I'll be away from my screen for a while. And, truly, while I'm sincerely interested in what folks think of this situation, I wasn't spoiling for a fight. Just profoundly moved by what seems like a good news/bad news paradox with this law.