Yeah, I Really Just Want to Have a Baby...

My professor told us we'd have to write a news piece over the weekend and gave out a sample piece he got from the New York Times. The sample he picked was an article about two parents who left their kids, ages 1 and 6, alone in a car on a SoHo corner (in the EVENING), with their 12 year-old uncle for over an hour. The mother was shopping for clothing; the father was shopping for food.

A passerby noticed these children alone in a car and told a fireman (since the station was right there). They preceded to call the cops. An interviewed officer said that the kids didn't even know where they lived or where their parents were.

Of course, the parents face imprisonment, possibly up to a year, for child endangerment. The article was balanced, though, explaining that in the Dominican Republic, where the parents are from, it's customary to leave kids unattended.

Our teacher gave out, along with the article, a page of questions corresponding to it. The last question was, "did you have an emotional reaction to the article?" Ha! Did I have an emotional reaction? Let's just say that I am still worked up.

Some kid raised his hand and said, "I think the passerby is retarded!" (Yes, he was that offensive.)

My hand shot up and I said, "excuse me--I would be that passerby." No one in their right mind would leave bajillions of dollars in an unattended car (and visible). Personally, I can't imagine how someone could have enough nerve (and lack of appreciation) to leave their children alone like that!

Not only that, but some kid had the nerve to say, "well, who's to determine what 'good parenting' is? How can you judge when a parent is bad blah blah blah????" in this totally snobbery way. If you need context: he said that because I made a comment that prison aside, what these "adults" need is parenting classes. Blah blah blah. I told him that I don't really care how people take care of their own children, but when they put their children into a situation that can bring harm to the children--that's bad. It's objective to say, 'someone being harmed is not a good thing.' Then, of course, we got into a discussion on that.

And I'm still sickened. (Sickened to the point where I am writing incomprehensibly...)