I would suggest that this week's ISYN Roundtable discuss the double standard with regard to appropriate care from a parent and that of a childcare provider. This blog is about pointing out the things that nannies are doing that the parents might not realize. Sometimes they are harmful, often benign. I understand this and think it is a great resource. What I don't understand is the number of celebrities that rallied around the McCann family from the get go to pledge their support and money to help find their daughter. This in light of the fact that they were beyond neglectful in leaving their three small children alone in a hotel room so they could go out cavorting with their friends. There are missing children everywhere who have been snatched from even the most overprotective parents and then to these parents, so much support? Was it because she was a cute little, white girl? Why is it so easy to gloss over a parents neglect? Setting aside the fact that I personally feel the mother drugged the child because her tantrumming proved to be inconvenient to the mother's "me time", why? Why? A mother forgot to drop the child off at daycare at the child dies in the car. And the mother is not charged. Why? I agree she made a mistake, but if it were a nanny, wouldn't she be in jail? Why this double standard when it comes to parents? The mother was not even charged. And if you see the tape of her being interviewed, yes you might feel sorry for her. But a child's life is lost. Gone. And it's okay? Can you imagine the support a nanny would receive if she left three children alone in a hotel room so she could go out with her nanny friends? She would be lynched. As well she should be. But the McCanns were embraced. Why?
Sources:
Madeleine McCann
Cecilia Slaby
Submitted by Colleen, Ohio
If you have a suggestion for a Sunday Roundtable, please email I SAW YOUR NANNY.
65 comments:
You mustn't ask such questions.
Everybody knows the McCann's and those in the McCann party who took a similar attitude to childcare, are beyond reproach. And that to suggest otherwise makes you the devil's spawn.
Incidentally, it was clearly a successful strategy as it would seem that they had employed it throughout the holiday, and on a previous trip to Greece.
Very good point, Colleen. We see it time again. Father leaves infant in a car that's too hot versus the nanny who does. Parents routinely beat their children to death, yet you only hear of nannies who hit children. Neither excusable, by the way.
America is only one of two countries that has not ratified the Children's Rights Ammendment.
The case of the mother who left her child in the car. Sorry but if she had been poor, she would have been arrested.
And if she had been a nanny, she would have been arrested, made to wear a bullet proof vest and then shanked in prison.
No one is looking out for the rights of that dead child. Boo hoo the child's mom is crying. A human being's life was snuffed out. Doesn't matter by who!
Well, here is another infamous double standard, then: how come parents, unlike nannies, do not get paid at all for taking care of their children - after all they do that 24 hours a day if they stay at home?
Applying that standard, sicko-
then anyone who volunteers with children has the "right" to maim, abuse and murder a child, is that correct?
But if you are getting paid to spend time with a child, you are held to a higher standard?
Shouldn't we instead be focusing on the rights of a child? Children have no voice.
Interesting post! I am the parent of four very busy and active kids (2,12,12,14). I am very involved and have part time child care when I am working. I have done all the right things in terms of finding great care and I am very blessed that my two year old loves her "nana".
That said~~ I got a call at work that they were both in route to the ER via ambulance and to meet them there (concerns of a closed head injury). I get there and my daughter after being looked at was fine and her Nana a mess. They were busy asking me questions about the care she receives. I finally asked what happened. Turns out my daughter had fallen after standing on a tall table and landed on her head on the tile. Fortunately no damage except a bruise and a few tears.
I spoke to her nanny who told me she climbed up on a tall table she told her she needed to get down and to wait and she would help...before she could help my daughter fell. I have no doubt what she said was the truth. She was clearly upset...and once I realized we escaped without major injury. I explained that my long legged two year old has climbed everything in my house. I have no knobs on anything and every piece of furniture that can tip is bolted down. I took her crib down and her dresser out. Her mattress is on the floor and her windows gated. All in an attempt to keep her safe....SHE STILL climbs! I also know that had she been in my care the same accident could have happened.
I trust the care my nanny gives her and my daughter clearly loves her. Nana cries if she skins her knee. Yes, I still randomly check as does dad and my best friend. Everyone who sees them together tells me the same thing~~My goodness they love each other.
As bad as it can be.....sometimes it is simply an accident!
Yes, I agree there are bad nannies and bad parents but lets not punish them all without knowing all the facts.
I look at that woman and find it hard to believe that she has friends at all. She seems so full of herself. Poor Madeleine McCann. If only she had been born to someone with maternal instinct.
Or poor Madeleine McCann....
If only she had had a no nonsense nanny looking out for her best interests. Since mom & pops did appear all about themselves.
The mother of Cecilia Slaby had left her alone many times. Even two days before the incident. Why hasn't she been charged??? Read this story (this one) and you will wonder. Also, we see pictures of the grieving mother and feel for her, but where are the pictures of Cecilia Slaby?? If her face was all over the news, then people would feel for her (THE VICTIM) and not the mother.
parents do not get paid to supply care to their children because it was their decision to have the children. and when the parents need to go back to work or want to go out for the night, they have to pay someone else to watch THEIR children. thats not exactly a double standard in any sense.
THIS STORY
Sorry, I am not schooled in linking.
it is just like getting your house cleaned. some people hire some one else to clean their homes, but if they had decided to clean it themselves should they get paid? no. People pay other people to clean their homes as a luxury to make their lives easier. People shouldn't get paid to care for their own children just as they shouldn't be paid to clean their own homes.
let's not get too far off topic here with silliness. this isn't about paying someone to do a job or not too. it is about people paying a price for hurting children. and children having equal protection against anyone who harms them whether the person is an evil man at the playground or mommy, whether it's nanny B or Senator X.
Anyone recall the Law & Order with Tom Skerrit as the Judge who found the poor mother guilty but let the upper East side mother go free because he was a classist bastard?
Clermont County Prosecutor Don White has the same history. A poor mother cleaned the nostril of her child with a q tip that she did not know had been used to clean a meth pipe and she had the book thrown at her. What is different here? This is a tragic accident. No more so than Brenda Slaby
who had been warned time and again about leaving her baby in the car!
He says he isn't going to change his mind. Well he should still know how disgusted we are with him!
Prosecutor Don White
101 East Main Street
Clermont County County Courthouse
Batavia, OH 45103-2949
Phone: (513)732-7300
Fax: (513)732-7826
The British couple...
nice looking affluent and obviously on the receipt end of undeserved positive press (then). It's against the law in most states to leave a child under a certain age alone... without adult supervision. Clearly, they are guilty of negligence and child endangerment at the very least, although I do think it's far-fetched to consider them suspects of their daughter's probable demise. Wasn't there a case of two black women who went out to a bar and left their children home alone and they perished in a house fire? Isn't that the very same premise? The two black women, if I recall, are in deep doo doo.
I would hope if a nanny acted as either of these neglectful parents she would be arrested. I also feel that these parents should be arrested. The Britsh couple have said that they did it because they didn't want to leave their children with someone they didn't know, yet they leave them alone!!!! That is craziness! I don't even like to walk to the end of my short driveway to get the mail without both of my child's monitors when they are napping.
No matter who did this they should be in trouble. A nanny would be in more trouble and it is only cause she couldn't play the "poor mother" role. A double standard and one we shouldn't have to talk about cause it shouldn't happen.
We don't like racist comments on this blog, 3:01!
As for the larger issue here, the reason why it is thought to be reasonable to punish a mother in a less harsh way than a nanny would be punished for the same deed is because it is thought that the mother has already been given an extremely harsh punishment as a result of the accident that she committed. The nanny who kills a child does not have the same loss that a mother has -- the nanny has not lost her own child.
This is the reasoning behind mothers or parents receiving a lighter punishment than a caregiver would, for the same crime or accident.
I think it is important for people to know that mothers, when compared with fathers, are punished much more severely for accidents/crimes against their children. Society holds mothers to a higher standard than fathers, when it comes to the treatment of their own children.
Racist comments are not tolerated and will be deleted. Having said that,it is quite impossible to monitor a blog 24 hours a day.
Oh the difference between the black women and the McCanns- and this has nothing to do with what country but public perception and support vs. outrage is that the black women went out to a club or bar while the white couple went out to dinner at some schmaltzy resort. If these black women left their children alone to attend a cancer benefit or to have high tea at the Gebles', then no one would bat an eye.
I want to see Kate McCann fry.
Why does race have to be brought into everything? I'm so sick of it.
12:37 PM.... you have some crazy logic.
That isn't a double standard.
Why should you be paid to have kids and raise them?
Besides that, welfare does pay many a person to sit at home doing nothing all day, while the people who truly need it are out of luck.
These cases are strikingly similiar.
Brenda Slaby had been caught leaving her baby in the car a bunch of times before.
Kate Mccann (and her husband) always left their children alone on vacation. (more money for wine).
Brenda Slaby returned to the car a number of times and totally missed the site of her dead child in the car. But a passerby noticed right away.
Kate McCann (and her husband) said that they returned to the room and checked on the child and she was fine.
Both should be charged with murder. Not manslaughter. Murder.
And locked up.
Am I the only one who saw all over the news and internet yesterday that Mrs. McCann is now the prime suspect due to the baby's blood being found in her car????? I suspected these people did it all along. Justy like Jon-Benet Ramsey's parents were obviously involved in her death.
459, didnt you read the OPS pooint? She thought that all along. At the least, from the get go this bitch was absoluteley neglectful, careless and reckless and yet all those weak ass Brits started ponying up cash and pledhing allegiance to kate mccann's ass. bullshit. that's what that is. you read all the stories on that. its curious to know a little bit more about their friends. folloow the money from the paypal account and see who's account that landed in. a bunch of bullshit. and now that bitch says she wants her privacy.after she manipulated the world with her alligator tears. i would pull her out of the uk by her pixie cut and lock her up for life. those other children should be in protective custody away from dr and dr danger-bitches.
517-
Dr & Dr Danger-Bitches?
I kind of like that.
OP-
regarding all of the other children who get taken from caring and protective parents, you are so on the money. 77000 children go missing every year in the UK.
All that money J.K. Rowling and David Beckham offered up to find the girl who was never missing-just killed at her parent's hands, might it not have been better spent aiding any of the 77000 other families?
It is so refreshing to read these opinions here...
I'm from Ireland and very few people here or in the UK have had the nerve to say the McCanns were responsible for what happened to Madeline. Every time I brought it up I was called a heartless b***h and worse. This from people who were outraged that I took a nap for half an hour beside the toddler I was looking after, in his house with all the doors and windows locked and the alarm on. As a nanny I would expect to be locked up for neglecting those children the way their parents did, and rightly so. If it's not okay for the nanny to do it, Mummy and Daddy shouldn't do it either.
I have to say, I don't believe anything the portuguse (SP) police say.
they made so many mistakes, that i think they are trying to cover it up now.
I'm glad to see I'm not the only one who thought the McCanns were irresponsible. These cases are extreme however. There is a double standard for nannies and parents--and there probably should be. Afterall, a nanny is holding him or herself out to be a childcare professional and is being paid for that skill. There is no training for parenthood other than on the job training. I know I make stupid mistakes from time to time(i.e. walking away from the baby's stroller to pick up my daughter who had fallen from the jungle gym, putting the children in the car and driving away without putting the stoller in the trunk, almost dropping my infant because I was trying to hold onto my toddler's hand while trying to get the baby in the car seat one handed) and it's easy to have lapses in attention. However, when I changed from daycare to nanny care I hired someone who has worked with multiple children and naturally does the things it took a bit of trial and error for me to fall into (like putting the older child in the front seat with the stroller in front of the door while securing the baby in the back--duh). Simply put, I expect her to know and I employ her because she does know what she's doing when it comes to keeping my kids safe. Accidents happen--but an experienced nanny should know better than anyone how to minimize the chance that they do.
All these people who rally behind the McCanns, are they the same fools who sent money to Nigeria thinking they were helping some billionaire get his funds out of the bank, hoping for a million dollar pay out? Who are these people.
And anyone else think that the UK are especially soft on crimes against children in general?
Remember the mother from Australia who claimed that a dingo abducted her baby? She took the baby camping and when her child went missing, a lot of parents called her neglectful and asserted how they would never do anything like that, because they were perfect parents.
When the cops couldn't find any trace of the child, they named the mother as a suspect and she was sent to prison. Years later, the child's bones were found in a dingo den.
She definitely was a suspect from the beginning. But certainly being white, and having a cute white girl made it a "hot" item, while loads of not so cute kids go missing every day. Remember-over 89% (?) of these "abductions" are by family members. Custody battles.
In any case-if she was a black woman or nanny she'd be behind bars from the beginning. Remember Susan Smith? Her crocodile tears?
It infuriates me when friends of the accused are quoted as saying how nice they are. Sure they were nice! So was Ted Bundy, and every other pedophile who knows how to maniputlate people.
She did a fabulous job.
So I wonder, if she did indeed cover up an accident--HOW EVIL IS IT TO KEEP PLEADING FOR MONEY?!!
Here in St Louis a father left his 9 month old child in the car and the child died. The mother put the child in dads car but forget to tell dad the child was in his car. He went to work and never looked in the back seat. Both parents are professional and the mother is a ped. doctor. No charges were filed.
Just a week earlier a daycare worker went to a local museum and left a child in the centers van for only a few minutes and the police came and arrested the worker right then.
Is there a double standard of course there is. I have been a nanny for over 10 years and we have to double check and triple check the children that are left in our charges.
I am considered over cautious but better that than sorry.
Money donated to the Bring Madeleine Home site, the web page people across the world PROMOTED in the days after her disappearance goes into the paypal account of Mr McRae. And the accounting seems to be a bit off. Someone definitely needs to take a closer look. It isn't a not for profit company and even the family spokepeople say they have used the money for consultants. If you had that kind of money, what would you use it for? Me, I'd hire the ex Israeli commandos to go find Madeleine. Them? Nope.
I am 3:01 that 3:21 accused of a racist comment. I have read and reread my post and I cannot see anything about race, let alone something racist. Can someone fill me in? Did I make some glaring error that I am not catching??? Did someone else post at 3:01 too and has since been deleted? Pls fill me in.
yes, there was an outright racist comment previously posted and now deleted from 301. It was removed so let's stop talking about it.
What I want to know is how an anethesiologist over drugs her kid. I know she really wanted to knock the tiny three year old as she had proved such a nuisance the night before, why with her, "i want mommy" whining when Kate was trying to continue drinking. Does she have a drinking problem. That is an awful late of wine to consume in one day, even on vacation. I think someone needs to take a look at any deaths Kate McCann may have caused in her practice. We know it couldn't have been anything like benadryl, which begs the question-why did kate mccann have it with her anyway?
creeeeeeeeeeepppy
and as for donut lady, maybe she has that disease where you showboat for strangers and aquaintances and then treat your own kids and spouse like crap. was it her turn to buy donuts?
Trip,
It is plenty evil.
Especially considering how moved families who have lost their own children were to donate their money to this cause... thinking they were helping someone they shared a common experience with.
As for the McCann party:
They should all be in jail. Not just the parents but the whole lot of their friends. Did you see the picture of the man the friend from dinner had the sketch artist draw of the man she (kate's friend) allegedly saw carruing madeliene off into the night? It's a freakin' cartoon.
Thanks 12:12 I didn't want to bring something back up I was just really upset think that I had offended someone.
Yes, interesting that NOW the McCann parents are suspected in her death. But all along I've thought they should have been arrested immediately and prosecuted to the fullest extent possible for reckless endangerment, neglect and any other legal charge that could be applied. As for the donut lady, she should most certainly be charged also.
Any parent with a meth pipe in the house deserves to be found guilty as charged.
cali mom,
maybe so. but meth pipes are lower class. i mean how many hedge funders are coked out of their minds at any given time? The snow is always blowing in the hedgefund capital of the us. so just because these guys and their sahms dont need paraphnelia to shove up their behemoth nostrils, they should be above the law. Their sheets are 1000 count and their q-ips are not encrusted with coke?
Diario, the Portuguese paper reported that "investigators admit the probability that Kate slapped Maddie and she then hit her head.
What I want to know is:
If the parents were being so safe and they were sooo close...
Then where on earth was the baby monitor?! For goodness sakes! At least use a monitor!
See. That makes me think that they didn't do so called "everything" to assure their children's safety!
1:19, any evidence of coke found in a house with children, especially if it accidentally contributed to a child's death, should also be enough to find the parents guilty as charged. This applies to any illegal drug.
if the above post has any veracity, does that then mean that after killing her child, she and her husband disposed of the body somehow and then went to dinner as if nothing happened, feigning surprise at finding their daughter missing when they returned to their room? Cold.
This is all well and good, yet leaves me pondering the presence of an actual nanny in this posting. This board is supposed to be about nannys, charges and how to expose drunks on the job. I myself drink a quick eye-opener on the way to work every morning. It helps me take the edge off and makes those little angels a little more tolerable. I also sneak in a few whiskies with my coffee...unless my boss is home for some reason. Either way, I think getting a healthy buzz on makes you more effective as a nanny.
Oh Yeah, sure Rudie
You are an ass
Of course Rudie is an ass. Best to ignore.
So Kate McCann literally slapped the shit out of that sweet little girl? And all this time all of those fools across the pond have been rallying around the slimeballs and emptying their change purses in to their account?
235, are you kidding me!? I mean, seriously!?
Why would you even humor someone who does not know how to spell the plural form of nanny?
BACK ON TOPIC:
why is no one talking about donut lady? do you leave your babies in the car?
I guess, I feel like these people honestly forget that their children are in the back of the car? As a nanny even when I get home, I check for kid stuff left behind. How can you not see a child in their car seat (I don't care how big of a meeting it is or how many donuts you are carrying)? Yeah, yeah she will have to live it with the fact that she killed her daughter but I feel like she should be punished more.
The McCann parents are another issue! All the crying and publicity they got and it turns that they had something to do with it! Disgusting. Why stop at one, why not kill all 3? Horrible Horrible.
I think it would be very strange for parents to kill one child, leave the others alone, and then go out to dinner. Doesn't that seems strange? Wouldn't you think they'd kill all three if they were going to kill any?
Not if it were an accident. If I accidently killed one of my kids, I wouldn't finish the rest for good measure.... but I would call the police/hospital and not go out to dinner....
I get what the OP is trying to say. We say of the mother, "she is going to have to live with that for the rest of her life" as an excuse not to charge her. This means we are not thinking of the victim. Just because someone is related to a child should not excuse the law from securing the child's right to LIFE. Cecilia Slaby's death was barely acknowledged. How many people have gotten charged with SOMETHING for leaving a dog in a car? I dont think she should be locked up and the key thrown away. I do think that she should be charged or offered a plea.
Just for your information, OP, you shouldn't talk. You are a very neglectful mother. I know who you are and you are no better than the poor little McCann girl's mother. You put your children in a situation that you found bad for them because it would have been incovenient for you to do otherwise.
You are also racist.
239-
just what in the hell are you speaking about? OP? racist? You know her?
C-R-A-Z-Y
On the Slaby story: I remember seeing something similar a few years ago about a dad whose baby also died in the backseat of his car. If I remember the story correctly, he was out of his normal routine--he didn't normally do the daycare drop off and totally forgot to drop the baby off and that the baby was even in the backseat of the car. It was horrible for all concerned and the dad and the rest of the family was completely devastated. I don't know if he was charged, but it was a tragic accident--nowadays parents are often stretched to the limit--companies are focused on productivity and cost cutting and expect long hours and double and triple duty for the same pay. Often one person is doing the jobs that would have been assigned to 3 or 4 people just five years ago. There are a lot of overstressed, sleep deprived parents and caregivers out there (because the longer corporate hours translates into longer childcare hours). These incidents happen enough I wish the car manufacturers could develop an alarm system (similar to the monitor in my infant's crib) that detects the presence/breathing of a person in the car. Might prevent some of these accidental deaths in the short run. In the long run, we need real re-examination of priorities--Corporations, employers and the government should enable parents to be better parents by offering a reasonable work week, more time off, and providing benefits that raise the quality of care given to children and the treatment of caregivers. (i.e. allowing parents to buy insurance for caregivers at their employers' group rates, companies paying nanny agency fees, providing emergency daycare, licensing individual caregivers, not just group care situations, etc.). Whether these families will ever find peace is doubtful, how can you after the death of a child that you contributed to, but change is overdue and I doubt what will drive it is a jailcell. IMHO
what i found hard to understand is the parents continual requests for privacy. also their statements regarding negitive media coverage. if my child where missing i would demand media coverage. i would have my childs face and my plea for their safe return on every tv station in every language accross the world. i would never hide away as they have. i would case the neighbourhood harrassing the whole country if i had to. wether they killed the child or not they have placed her in a dagerous position and they need to be made accountable.
I just don't know what to believe anymore. Shame on Maddie's parents if they know what happened to her and are denying her a proper burial.
YES! Thank you for pointing this out! I have had near arguments with people on this same point...what the heck were those parents thinking, leaving three kids alone in a HOTEL ROOM in a strange city??? Unforgiveable, in my opinion. Also imho, it has taken them way too long to publicly point a finger at the parents (doctors, nonetheless). I am hoping that the Portugal police have been looking at the parents all this time and simply not saying it....
Regardless....that poor little girl... :-(
All you parents out there who think you can buy love and affection for your children by hiring a nanny, think again and don't do it. My husband and I NEVER hired anyone to raise our children. We knew only we could do it right and we sacrificed big paychecks to do so. All the kids we knew who had nannies are so screwed up today. Like the kid we knew whose nanny never disciplined him for throwing sand in children's eyes at the park is now in jail. Or the kid who could do no wrong in his parent's eyes even while he bit other children and is now in drug rehab. Or the parent we know who did their kid's schoolwork, no surprise there, the kid is a drop-out and can't get a job even if he was motivated to do so. Bottomline, wake up parents, and do it right. You only have one chance. It takes years of dedication and you can't pay someone to give your child what they need. Because you care you are the only ones to give them structure, discipline and motivation. Live in a smaller house, drive one car, don't go to private schools, whatever it takes. Children take 24 hours of your day and you better be prepared to give the time to them. Or don't have children. You don't deserve them.
I have been waiting to hear the results of the testing done on the wall of the hotel room Madeline was in. Does anybody have that information yet? That would be pretty much concrete proof of her parents' guilt, and also fit with the hard slap/head hitting theory. Strangers who commit a crime do not bother to clean up the crime scene.
Maybe one of the parents went to check on the kids, accidentally killed Madeline while "disciplining" her for something, panicked, hid her body somewhere, and then went back to the table and tried to act as normally as possible, leaving the other parent as well as thier friends to assume she was kidnapped? (I believe there was also some speculation that her body was moved in the mother's car long after the initial disappearence, which would also make sense in that event.)
But they went to see the POPE! That throws me a bit. I can't imagine a truly religious family would DARE involve the Pope in this and not be scared to death of eternal damnation. (Although maybe they figured they were halfway there already if they had murdered thier child.) If they did that and they are lying, it would just go to show that at least one of them is unbelievably cold and manipulative (as if murdering their beautiful little daughter and letting her little body rot somwehere is not evidence enough of that!)
PS 3:01 LOL, I looked all over the place too to figure out what you had written that could possibly be construed as offensive. I like when the little message is there in place of deleted messages.
I know nothing about the McCanns, and very likely neither does anyone on this forum. Please give them a break, if only because, when all is said and done, we all need one.
I will not give them a break! I will not. They were narcissitic swine that cared more about swinging, getting their drink on and partying on their F A M I L Y vacation. They didn't give a rat's ass about their children.
And I think they killed her. But even if they didn't, they should have their other children yanked from them and handed over to responsible parents.
3:12, AMEN. They do not deserve a break, nor do they deserve to have their other children anymmore. This might be a different thing if they had left her alone for only 5 minutes, in some situation where it was completely unavoidable, for the first time ever and had been nervous about it and were now admitting responsibility for endangering her by their total lack of common sense, and accepting some blame. But they are NOT, and this had been a frequent and continued habit with these a**holes and they act as if thgey did nothing to be ashamed of and scream that everyone should leave them alone, after whipping up attention to her disappearance.
"Everyone" deserves a break? What utter bullsh*t. Does Scott Peterson desrve a break?
Post a Comment