This morning, On BBC Radio 5, there’s a debate going about the McCanns whose daughter hasn’t been seen since they left her and her two younger twins unattended in their hotel apartment one evening.
A text vote was run on the programme during which, by a 2 to 1 majority, listeners who texted had voted for no more coverage and to leave the parents alone. The listeners who voted thought the coverage (the format of the programme was a radio phone-in) was unfair on the parents due to some of the callers criticizing them. Some had said that the media coverage would have been completely different 4 months ago had they been working class and from a council estate rather than two middle class doctors.
Gerry McCann had clearly sensed the changing nature of the police investigation a couple of weeks ago and I wrote an entry about it at that time. For 4 months he travelled around the world meeting Popes and Presidents and sought as much publicity for the Find Madeleine campaign from as many press sources as possible. Celebrities had contributed to the Find Madeleine campaign (though the fact we know that they contributed says that might be more to do with their own publicity than their compassion for the McCanns).
Then he announced that he felt upset at reports his daughter may already be dead, might even have been killed on the first night of her disappearance. For the first 4 months he and his PR team had been able to control the media campaign and the direction of the media’s output. We all know that the media is a two headed monster. He and his wife had already realised that the focus of the investigation was now putting a spotlight on them, just as it had on Robert Murat, and they didn’t like that. They were now unable to direct or influence what the media output would be.
I don’t know if they killed or were involved in the abduction of their daughter or not. I’d prefer to think they weren’t. They are however guilty of abandoning their 3 young children (all under the age of 4) in an unlocked room while they selfishly went for a meal nearby. As a parent of a daughter a few months younger than Madeleine I find that hard to accept how reckless they were that night, and have right from 4 May.
What surprises me more however is the fact that those who texted in to this text vote complaining of negative coverage and criticism of the McCanns. Perhaps there are a lot more reckless parents out there than I think.
And I thought that this sort of thing only occurred over here in the States. Kids being left at home while the parents pop out for a bite to eat or a few pints. Kids being left in their car seats, locked in sweltering cars while Mom shops in air conditioned comfort. Kids being locked in closets (or even the occassional dog kennel) while the parents go off to work. I truly do not understand what goes on in these folks’ heads that make them think it is okay to leave their kids unattended like this for even a short amount of time.
It seems we can’t go a month without some manner of “Home Alone” story in the news. More often than is tolerable these incidents end in tragedy: abductions, fires, accidental deaths, etc. It is truly appalling.
There’s a bad movie in this….or worse still a docudrama….
Mike, I’m surprised you hadn’t heard about it already. Everywhere you go in Europe (and beyond) has posters of the little girl up, and at luggage carousels in airports worldwide. The parenst are making themselves out to be caring, doting types….but I don’t know any of those who leave 3 young kids in an unlocked room out of sight.
Manuel, I give it a year before we see a docu-drama about this on TV, whatever the outcome.
I was aware that little Madeline had gone missing and that the parents were suspects, but this was the first I had heard anything regarding these particulars related her disappearence (or maybe just the first time it sunk in that this was another ‘Home Alone’ incident).
I guess it’s a sad commentary on the world we live in where these sorts of things have become so commonplace that they don’t grab my attention like they used to.