Sean McCann, swimmer

Yes, I remember a lot of anger and disgust at the time. Many of us parents of young children who wouldn't have taken such risks.

I was almost an adult at the time and working class and I can tell you the feeling where I'm from was, if they weren't doctors the authorities would have taken the twins for that behaviour. And honestly that probably is the case, at the very least they'd have been removed pending investigation

And yet, she has completely dominated his life, and always will. Not her fault of course, but he will always be 'Madeline McCann's brother.'

It’s wild to me now!

But at the time that was the norm in these holiday centres for the middle classes.

And just because you wouldn’t have done it back then doesn’t mean a large percentage of the parents on this type of holiday don’t or wouldn’t.

It was she main selling point.

kids were in crèche (open 8-6) whilst parents sailed including their high tea in crèche. They were put to bed, parents went to the restaurant and they were “supervised” through baby listening.

100% agree with this, ^

I agree with you, except that I don’t think the norms haven’t really changed much since 2009…. 1979, maybe, but not 2009. That’s irrelevant though really.

I don’t know anyone who did, ever.

He is too young to even remember Madelieine.

"The media" will do whatever they want to in order to get the clicks.

The thing is even if he’d changed his name, it will always come up when his parents watch him compete etc. He was a very young child now having to live in the shadow of his murdered sister and that was clearly nothing to do with him. I feel sorry for him that his achievements will be associated with an extremely traumatic event for his family. The media should pipe down and let him be.

And this 💯

This 💯

Of course they are. As would any other parents be. Why should they not be proud of their son? What a fantastic achievement to make it to the Commonwealth games. Whatever happened to his sister and whatever we might think of how the McCanns and their friends behaved at the time has no bearing on Sean's achievements.

Totally agree. We were discussing that very thing.

Yeah it's just the normal workings of international sport. Most of the time you can qualify through your own birthplace, residence for a set number of years, birthplace of a parent and in some sports a grandparent. Sean is by no means the only member of the Scottish team to have been born and live elsewhere and qualify for Scotland through a parent. Was the same on their recent world cup team too. McTominey is from Lancashire.

It doesn’t though. It’s the same for the Olympics, Football, Rugby etc. You can compete for either the country you were born in or the country/countries of your parents. It’s been the same for a very long time.

Unfortunately, his sister's story is still larger than his. I honestly hope they get some closure on this.

Agree.

Let's not pick a happy moment to shreds.

I follow tennis, and I do - but only dimly, now it has been raised again - remember he was connected.

Mostly he's just Andy Murray, more connected to Wimbledon than Dunblane in my mind. Actually, I do also tend to connect his mum's face to Andy's name a lot!

Yep. And it's not as if the Internet suffers from a shortage of places to discuss the McCann parents behaviour.

I agree with various pp that it's inevitable he's going to be referred to as brother of Madeline unless and until he becomes so successful that his medals become the story. But people can still give over about the whys and wherefores on this one specific thread and have those discussions somewhere else instead.

The press are pathetic and nasty. They need more censorship. He is himself and should be known for his own achievements.

I don't follow tennis.

I remember employing a babysitter for early mornings I’d seen advertise in a local newsagents in the early 2000s, not because I loved my babies any less but we were much more trusting and relaxed back then. Turned out she was a genuinely lovely girl. Still have young children now (large age gaps) and wouldn’t dream of using anyone who wasn’t a contact or fully vetted etc we are much more wary about absolutely everything now from the moment we conceive. People are far more judgemental now as to how good a parent you are being whereas the attitude back then was that it was the perpetrator who was at fault not the parent for not being careful enough and accidents were just considered unfortunate. There weren’t the awful things said about parents on social media that happen now unless had been deliberate abuse then of course people
back them would of been horrified. The one thing people did judge you on back then was how well your child behaved and how clean and tidy they looked, people are much more understanding of children’s needs and behaviour now which makes things easier as a parent!

I’ve just looked to try on both browser and app, and despite being still open, it doesn’t change.

Although, when it first broke, the people I worked with were somewhat critical of the parents' behaviour.