about the couple who 'should' have been on flight MH17?

[JaneFonda]

In the news, the British couple and their baby who swapped off flight MH17 to take another one instead.

In the interview, they said that 'someone must have been watching over them'.

AIBU to find this incredibly disrespectful? I feel so angry that they are suggesting that 'someone' or a God or something was watching over them, but not over the 298 people who died.

I feel so angry that they are suggesting that 'someone' or a God or something was watching over them

Maybe were unlucky to very recently lose someone and think that person is watching out for them - looking for something positive in personal tragedy. I don't know but I seriously doubt it was meant to be disrespectful to others on that plane or their relatives.

They just cheated death they are in shock and dealing with the media something which I image they hadn’t trained or had to do before – I think it's beyond mean to judge them on their performance.

Yabu. They may have been thinking about a deceased relative "watching over them" rather than a god choosing them to survive and let nearly 300 other people die.

They may have been talking about a god or God and I don't see that as a particular issue either. I'm fairly sure that they didn't mean that they were more worthy of survival than others. They were just overwhelming happy to be alive, as would we all.

It's also a safe bet that there were a fair few Christians/Muslims/Buddists/whatever on that flight. They died too. It is a tragedy for everyone.

Yes, YABU to find it incredibly disrespectful and to be angered by the emotional comments made by this couple who, by some stroke of luck, were not shot down as they travelled to their destination unlike their fellow passengers.

Ironically, in your further comments, you go on to compare the "someone watching over me" response to this atrocity to those saying it after winning a game of football. That is pretty tactless in itself OP.

Its not just you who noticed the turn of phrase OP, the DM article is getting lots of similar comments at the bottom.

They were in shock - was that not completely obvious? Had they been on that flight, they would have been killed. Have you ever been in that position op? I assume you must have, to be so horribly judgmental: you clearly reacted in a better, more appropriate, less emotional way.

YABU.

Jeez, anybody actually read the bit where the OP said she WBU?

I really don't understand why some people hammer away with the snarky posts long after someone says 'oops OK then'

I think it's such an horrendous event that most of us are struggling to process it, even from the comfort of our sitting rooms.
I watched the news last night and felt voyeuristic as they showed footage of the relatives on buses, and angry as they showed people at the crash site and horrified by some of the reports on the radio last night.
It's too many emotions really. It's too enormous.

I felt the interview with the couple was tactless really but they've just watched these events unfurl and their disbelief and relief must be overwhelming. I doubt I could have conducted a tactful interview.

I understand what you mean op but I think you are focusing on the wrong thing. Personally Putin is the one fucking me off.
I get your discomfort but I doubt many would deal with that situation well.

Totally reasonable for them to feel that way, but it's a bit much for the news channels to keep showing the clip.

YANBU I happen to agree

I think it was unreasonable of the news crews to interview them. They look shocked in the clip, barely able to process their brush with death. Not the time to be interviewing someone, OR the time to be analysing their every words and taking offence at it. They are just a normal family, not politicians or someone who thinks about everything they say. To them, that must be how it feels. End of.

If you believe in God then you must believe when good things happen to you that it is His will and when bad things happen to others then that is His will too.

It's the whole 'God works in mysterious ways' isn't it? But there's no avoiding it really, it goes hand-in-hand with believing in any god who has a hand in early events.

waits for the word fairies to be used

I think museumum has it spot on.

But i also agree it was maybe just something they said like I did a few weeks ago after the safe delivery of my new grandson, things got very scary for a while and after he was safely delivered I surprised myself by saying Thank You God.

I dont know where it came from, it just did.

If you believe in God then you must believe when good things happen to you that it is His will and when bad things happen to others then that is His will too.

I think God gives us free will and the ability to mess up all by ourselves. He is not some puppet master with a stick going "you die, you survive".

As I seem to keep saying on here and sorry to be so boring, my husband has cancer and lots of our Christian friends have had cancer and died as a result. Good and bad things happen to believers/non believers and good people/evil people. If faith was as simple as God rewarding his flock and punishing the unbeliever then we would all have a faith.

Miss guided and fallible people have caused this tragedy and lots of ordinary people have died as a result. Immeasurably sad.

YANBU

I know what you mean, and all the posters wading in who seem to be incredibly outraged need to calm down.

I thought the same thing as you, it struck me as an odd thing to say. I get that it's a turn of phrase and the couple were under pressure but it shows a selfish mindset thinking of themselves and not the poor souls who took their seats and died instead of them. Who was looking out for them?

Also I don't believe anyone is 'looked out for' by any one or thing or 'higher being', it's a v external way of thinking.

I understand what you mean , OP. I thought it was a bit tactless of them to say it, however, they were in shock. I don't think they meant anything by it at all, I just don't think they were in a position to process what had happened and come up with 'the right' response.

It's such an unbelievably devastating thing to have happened.

Tbh they normal people who just learnt the plane they should have been on has crashed and all those poor people died. They response it totally normal. Put yourself in their shoes. How would you feel at the exact moment you learnt this... Much as you feel for those people your first natural response would be for your children and loved ones.. Later it will hit this poor couple. Survivors guilt is horrible. I hope they and all those who have lost loved ones get the support and more importantly the privacy from the papers..

I dont for a minute believe anyone can judge them. They had just escaped death and unless people here have escaped death then they really have no idea, do they?

I thought it was often said that god takes the ones he loves the most early, I'm sure if the relatives of a child who died in the disaster said that it wouldn't cause offence despite the crux of that saying is that god loves some of us more than others.

I do wonder if they were made to miss the flight because of the huge number of children on the flight and possibly there were not enough oxygen masks for children. 80 children is a huge number of children on a flight of 300, if you take away the people working on theflight it works out that nearly 1/3 of the passengers were children, I fly regularly and I've flown that route and I have never been on a flight with so many children.

Oh for goodness sake. In their circumstances I would most definitely have been looking down at my tiny baby and be thinking "thank God (or whatever) that we weren't on that plane". I make no excuses for that.

Like lots and lots of others, when a microphone is shoved in front of their faces, they descended to cliche. Everyone does it, including celebrities who expect an interview.

Sorry, that was in response to this:

I thought the same thing as you, it struck me as an odd thing to say. I get that it's a turn of phrase and the couple were under pressure but it shows a selfish mindset thinking of themselves and not the poor souls who took their seats and died instead of them. Who was looking out for them?

Well yes, if you take them at their word they are saying that they believe 'someone' thought that they should survive and those who took their place shouldn't.

It's not something I would say because my default setting is not belief in higher beings or whatever, but they were pressed for a profound comment in front of the media and reached for a banality. It's not fair to hold it against them.

YABU - I thought they conducted themselves with great dignity. Mind you, I don't imagine they'll be watching "Final Destination" anytime soon!

I absolutely cannot comprehend why I am on a thread arguing this stuff when there must surely be bigger issues surrounding this event than what one traumatised person said to camera on the spur of the moment. They are ordinary people and have no obligation to only say whatever the "right" thing is deemed to be by certain others.

I always take lines like 'someone was looking over us' as the person saying they were lucky. Never took it as them suggesting that the people who weren't 'lucky' were somehow being forgotten about by whichever god they believed in