Re this recent child abuse case, can we have just *ONE* thread for competitive sadding please?

[solidgoldbrass]

Yes it's awful
Etc.
But we don't need a McCann-esque thread frenzy all saying the same thing.

solidgoldbrass you have been talking a lot of sense today

My guess is there's probably no great correlation between the people who donated to the NSPCC last night and those who didn't talk about it on mumsnet.

But I think I see why people start these threads. First of all you get to publicly dissociate yourself from those mawkish classless people who read other people's abuse memoirs for fun - so that's dead elegant for one thing - but also, not only can you not stand to talk about things like this, you can't stand other people talking about them, which means you must be much more unhappy than all of them, and that means you win the competitive sadding hands down, while being the classiest people at the same time. You go girls.

I think SGB is a great poster who often talks a lot of sense and has a GSOH (to be a bit personal ad).

But I dislike the term "competitive sadding" in relation to this story unpleasant, condescending and dismissive.

People are very distressed and disturbed and want to talk through that. It's a completely understandable and human reaction.

some people have emotions

if cyber 'posturing' helps them express them then where is the problem?

if you dont want to read it - dont click

sorry if it's putting you off your cornflakes SGB but that's a real little boy who never had a life - if you don't want to talk/think/hear about it, don't but you can't censor others

behave.stop being deliberately contentious.you repeat yourself many times on MN same ole quips

online crack ring any bells

this is pertinent
should be discussed

Blimey. If people don't get into a frenzy about a case like this then there is something wrong. It is one of THE most appalling cases I've ever heard about. I am hiding the threads because I cannot bear to read about it, hear about it, or think about it. But people who are braver than me ARE thinking about it and talking about it, and so they should be. For one thing, the so-called "professionals" involved need to be held to account.

By SolidGoldBrass:

I find that competitive sadding (for the pinching of which excellent term I salute the departed fishwoman) is actually quite a toxic trend. People whine and posture and do lunatic things like 'light a candle on a website' and think that this is some kind of substitute for actually helping friends and neighbours or indeed sticking 50p in a NSPCC collecting tin.

I don't know anything about lighting candles but I really don't think anyone thinks that is a substitute for helping anyone. Obviously there were precious few neighbours and friends in this situation or it may never escalated this far, people just feel helpless and talking about these things generate interest and vigilance so that if we perhaps see a child that may be in danger in the future we won't turn a blind eye. Above all, what it does show is that there is overwhelming support for the little boy now, support that he never had in life - of course all too late but still there nonetheless.

No, I agree with Kally, I thought I was pretty hardened by now to this sort of thing, but today my husband had to hide the front page of my paper while I wailed in the supermarket because I had seen the picture... I have had to turn the news off every time it came on..and last night I had a nightmare about it..I honestly feel maybe I should only read the People's Friend, and of course Mumsnet and only watch Cbeebies, I would be less mentally traumatized.. I should probably also give up my frontline public services job ...Watching news about the Congo I saw parents who had walked for days in desperation to get simple food to save their beloved children's lives. Seeing this case...you get the picture. And Amy Howson (don't google it, you don't want to) and Tiffany Wright ( ditto) and the other 2 child deaths per week, and with £500 a week in benefits going into the house in respect of that child.. Starving to death would have been a better option than the life Baby P had..I'm sorry people think we shouldn't talk about it, I ageree we shouldn't be graphic but how many more children have to die? It is an ongoing holocaust, no question.

Surely the real issue is not about a load of navel gazing MNers who are competitively sadding or competitively hard-assing, it's about Haringey SS and, at a broader level, British society where we not only have this case but also Shannon Matthews on the same news bulletin

Wake up: it's not about you and your feelings but it is about you and your society.

Far more productive to ponder how you can make minor changes in how you live your life/ bring up your kids to make something like this less likely to re-occur

For example: if you think a child is at risk, report it and follow up that report. Don't "not like to interfere" but post about it on MN and so vicariously do something.

Help your child to read/ support teachers/ schools rather than think they "do enough in school anyway and don't need to do any homework" and then wonder why they leave school disillusioned, under-qualified and incapable of reasonable parenting.

Don't waste time apportioning blame: that's the job of the authorities.

I lived in Haringey for years and it was extraordinary how shoddy so much of it was. My friend is a parent helper in a Haringey school and, while well intentioned and well educated, she has no special training but is helping a child with Downs: there is proper help available within the school (including the teacher) but because this child is pleasant and easy and "won't come to much" she has been given my friend rather than getting extra help. Her parents don't demand any more so that's it: the parents and the school know what's best!

And no, I've never voted Tory before anyone goes down that line

By the way, I contacted the NSPCC once when I was fundraising for their full stop campaign to ask what they did with the money. I was interested because in my mum's day (50s) I know they sent uniformed officers round just as the RSPCA now does, but this stopped. They told me the money paid for advertising to raise revenue and awareness and to set up services for social services. I knew social services were paid for these services so I wondered how that worked. So I asked a friend who is a social worker why both of them were paid for this. Apparently it is because the NSPCC charges social services for these services it provides and they pay money to the NSPCC out of public funds. This money is then used by the NSPCC for- guess what? Advertising and raising awareness.
This made me very angry. Can anyone on mumsnet please please tell me, if you know, what in fact the NSPCC does about helping children? or is it the case that the RSPCA(for example) has more public support, sympathy and powers than any agency has to help children?
Sorry, but as you've guessed I have strong feelings about this. I once(couple years ago) called an emergency response social services team regarding a man who I and others saw swearing at, beating and kicking a toddler he was with. They would not come unless I could give them the child's postcode although my friend says the law states they have 10 minutes to respond. That's my twopennorth over, now does anyone have a solution ?

well dont diss the nspcc

i had cause to ring them a couple of years ago

haunts me how often phone was engaged

when i was a girl - no one rang - no one mentioned it......

Re Haringey and the hounding it will get... people did TRY not hard enough but they did

Just because people's feelings are 'genuine' doesn't make them immune to mockery or criticism. Some people genuinely feel that members of [insert name of any ethnic/religious/social group here] are inferior. That doesn't make them right.

Discussions on this issue and the word 'mockery' should not be combined

Or what? The sun will never rise again?

APPLAUSE for solidgoldbrass.

And I don't even like her

Greensleeves: We so need a raspberry-blowing emoticon on here.

The only thing I can think of regards this thread is get over yourself.

Lots of us are Mums of 17 month olds and this particular horror has affected lots of us. I really really pray that Peter is in a happier place.

To put it down to a 'sport' where lots of women have posted is disgusting. Do you really think that anyone is not appalled by this???

It's news for Christ sakes. News about a baby. You can't just ignore it or wish that threads would not appear.

I think that anyone who logs on and sees somthing they don't like should perhaps not look, but definitely not post and liken it to cricket. How, very unmotherly.

Admittedly I've only seen one thread on the Haringey cases but it is nothing like a McCann-esque frenzy - here there is evidence that the child protection system is not working, that the Victoria Climbie tragedy was not enough to get that social services team to get their act together.

It actually really makes me , these attempts at censorship of what others are allowed to discuss.

solid goldbrass I'm with you on this..

I understand people want to talk/discuss/cry etc.. but surely those who do can do so on one threead.. when it runs out start another..

we dont need 3/4 all the same..

but I disagree with your lighting a candle comment. I am on the bereaved mummies thread. Everytime one of our "remember days" come along we all light a candle in our own home to create a circle of light for our little ones. Practical help ? no but at least its a physical show that we are thinking of each other

Frasersmummy: there is a difference between whatever gestures friends and family find comforting in the aftermath of a death, and public posturing over the death of someone you didn't know and had never heard of before they died.

I dont know why, but I feel like I should read the awful things that happened to him, as he had the strength to live (for a short while) through them, so I feel I should show my respect, even if only by reading about it.
Does that make sense? It does in my head.