Man poured coffee over baby in Aus- what is the world coming to?

[Imuptoolate]

Just saw this on the news and it made me feel sick to read it.

Link

Baby is sitting on a picnic blanket with his family having a nice time in the park, when a stranger comes over and pours a thermos flask of coffee onto the baby. Why?? It’s just evil.

It’s getting to the point where I’m scared to take my DC out anywhere public with all of these random attacks happening all over the place, by strangers to innocent children. It’s horrible. Are other people feeling the same?

*Edited because original link didn’t work.

That link doesn't work but I've just seen the police chief on ABC desvrive the suspect as “a male person”. Ffs. It’s man. Again!

It's disgusting. I said the same to DH the other day about feeling wary about going places with the kids or sending them places. Logically I know the chance of things happening is very small but these sort of random, senseless attacks by men are really fucking terrifying and seemingly on the increase.

Are other people feeling the same?

No. Not at all.

It's absolutely horrific, of course it is. And of course it's another fucking Man attacking those weaker than him.

But no, I don't feel the same. I'm not worried about taking my DS out and about as these awful things are thankfully so rare that the risk doesn't balance with the guaranteed harm that keeping him wrapped in cotton wool at home would do to him.

More male violence. Whilst I haven't heard of coffee being poured on a baby before, men hurting smaller people isn't new.

It’s getting to the point where I’m scared to take my DC out anywhere public with all of these random attacks happening all over the place, by strangers to innocent children.

Try not to think like this. Shit things happen, but it's not getting worse. Shit things have always happened, but the world is getting smaller. 30 years ago no-one in the UK would have heard about this. It would have been a tiny article in the newspapers if it got reported at all, there'd be no time at all for it on the evening news. Facebook didn't exist to spread this information around the world, we wouldn't be able to talk about it on Mumsnet.

Now, there's an infinite amount of space for all news on the internet, 24 hour rolling news has to fill its time with stories from around the world, Twitter, Facebook, TikTok, Reddit all amplify every bad story that happens, because outrage gets more clicks, more ad revenue.

What happened to this child is horrendous, what happened to the poor girls in Southport a few weeks ago was horrendous. Every school shooting that happens in the US is horrendous. We should rail against them, we should get angry, we should use that anger to do whatever we can to stop it happening again.

But our children are no less safe than they were a year ago, 5 years ago, 10, 30, 50. Shit things happen. Shit things have always happened. The only difference now is their reach.

I was chatting with my hairdresser a couple weeks ago about the state of the world and how scary it is. He said that men rarely pick on another big man it’s nearly always a woman or child (and now a baby ffs). He lives in dodgy area and said they should all come there and start something but they never would!

One can only assume he has MH issues .It sounds a horrific incident .Thankfully rare ,also in Australia .There was a similar incident here when a baby got punched in the face, by an old man thought to have Dementia .Thankfully the baby was all right absolutely terrifying for poor Mum though.

I was in an airport recently, my son asleep on a row of chairs. A lady walked behind him with a coffee and it just felt off, so I stood up and leaned over him just in time for her to "fall" and spill coffee all over me. I was fine,, winter coat luckily. i was angry and said "wtf are you at", she apologised profusely for being clumsy but the thing is she wasnt. Im sure of it.
So its really unnerving to read this. I hope this child is ok. And spilling coffee on kids is not becoming a "thing". And the man is locked up.

Evil things have happened since the dawn of time. You just hear about them so much more now because of social media/world news.

A few decades ago you would have never known about a man pouring coffee on a baby in Australia. Always be vigilant and use common sense, but don’t let it ruin your life.

Random attacks have always happened - it hasn't got more dangerous to take your kids out and about! It's just that now we have 24/7 news and social media so we are bombarded with this stuff all the time. It's information overload and it's stress and anxiety inducing.

Wtaf? I'm scared to click the link and read another horrifying news story. What is the world coming to.

It's made my Mum and I feel sick as very similar happened to me when I was 18 months old.

A woman in a cafe came up to us and made an evil face at me, shouted and screamed at me and threw the contents of her teapot over me. It was the 80s before temps were checked on hot drinks so it was freshly boiled and I was scalded. I was in bandages, and got quite a bad chest infection which left me semi conscious and showed signs of trauma for a while. Although we aren't supposed to have memories of being so young, I can actually remember flashes of it and my recovery.

My Mum and Aunt were also traumatised from seeing it all. Nothing was taken further with the woman as she was found to have Dementia on further investigation.

For ages afterwards, my Mum would bundle me up in thick padded ski suit type clothing no matter what the weather and cover my face as much as she could as she was terrified someone would do it to me again. She said she felt so helpless and guilty. I was wearing a white frilly dress and ribbons in my hair that day and she thought if she hadn't have made me look nice, I never would have got scalded. She'd thought the lady had come over to coo at me at first, then it all happened so quickly. I can imagine this baby boy's Mum will have so much to process.

On the brightside, I have no scars, just a weird sensitive patch near my elbow from nerve damage. Pictures of me from then being treated in hospital are very similar to the ones of this poor little chap, so I'm hoping he will be ok too with no serious, lasting injuries or scars. I see that strangers helped by pouring bottled water on him. I was plunged into a cold bath in the flat above the cafe by a nurse who was there. It must have been so distressing for all involved in this incident but those actions by the people with the bottles of water may have stopped the burns penetrating any deeper into the skin. It should never have happened though. Poor baby.

Dementia or command hallucinations/delusions aside, I can't understand how on earth a person could do this to anyone. Let alone a poor defenceless baby and a lovely family enjoying an innocent picnic. Sheer evil. I hope he is found and that the family get help to process all the trauma they've been through. Scary world.

You know before Covid, the thing we could say was that crime rates were lower now than when we were kids, it’s just the reporting that has changed. (At least where I grew up) I haven’t actually checked to see if that is still true. I’m kind of afraid to check to be honest.

Poor, poor little child.

Horrific - but so random and very rare. These incidents are devastating for the victims, but the statistics against being victim of something so random are huge. It doesn't make me afraid to go out. We can't live our lives in fear of things that are highly unlikely to happen to us.

What a nasty human being! Everywhere I look and read, it's grown adults either hurting children or bashing them online. 🤮

Oh that's awful..Poor you. An innocent little child.

I hope the little Australian baby will recover, too.

Probably the cold water in your case helped- They say that scalds/burns need about 20 mins of cold running water which is a huge amount of time, especially when a poor child is screaming in pain.

My son reached up suddenly as a toddler while I was making drinks for a visitor, pulling a hot coffee cup onto his chest from a table- I stripped his top off as it was acting like a compress, and put him under running cold water-in the sink

Despite the cold water, the scald caused almost immediate blistering - We went to straight to Casualty, thankfully not as overcrowded in those days, where they trimmed off the skin from the blisters and dressed the wounds.

Son had to have his dressings changed daily - but thankfully no scarring.

I'm so sorry, @PerkyMintDeer

But your horrible experience suggests that this probably isn't a 'what is the world coming to' story , or necessarily even a male violence one (though so many are). Until/unless there's evidence to the contrary I'd be inclined to think the man is sick, rather than downright evil. (If he's not sick then he's exceptionally evil)

I wish I hadn’t read that article. Poor baby. How heart breaking and cruel. I hope that man gets what he deserves.

Same, 'ill'or evil, he should be locked away. But awaiting the sympathisers who'll offer reasons for why he just had to do this, and why all sympathy should be for him.

This is a horrendous story.

But if you allow it to affect you to the extent that you mention in your post then I would say that maybe you need to work on your anxiety. Having a mother afraid to take you out in public because of an infinitesimally small chance of a random attack is, statistically, far likelier to screw you up.

It’s hard not to be haunted by these things, it’s just horrific. I still think often about that poor little boy who was attacked at the Tate Modern. Yes these things are statistically highly improbable events but I don’t think it’s an overreaction to remain vigilant of strangers when out with babies and young children with this stuff in mind. I’m not overly convinced that the argument that it’s just that we hear about things more now is all there is it to it either - we have a mental ill-health epidemic going on and not nearly enough funding to ensure that people are getting or adhering to the treatment they need to keep people around them safe.

It's always happened, unfortunately. Tina Fey was randomly slashed in the face as a 5yo in her front yard decades ago. It's always hits home a little more when it's a little one.

To be fair it was a 50/50 chance.

A 50/50 chance great a violent crime was committed by a woman? I don’t bloody think so!!