Millions visit Madeleine website

[gkd_uk]

A website set up to find missing Madeleine McCann has received more than 50 million hits, its organisers say.
Multinationals including BP, McDonald's and supermarket chain Carrefour are also supporting efforts to spread the image of the four-year-old in Europe.

Figures for donations to a cash fund to pay for the campaign to find her are expected to be revealed later.

Madeleine, from Leicestershire, was taken from the family's holiday flat in Praia da Luz, Algarve on 3 May.

BP, Shell, Esso, Texaco and Total/Els have all agreed to distribute appeal posters at their petrol stations.

Other backers of the Find Madeleine campaign include Carphone Warehouse, Budget car rental, British Airways and BAA, which is displaying posters at all of its UK airports.

Read more

 

[OldWelshGuy]

I have VERY strong views on this case so best I keep out of this thread I think.

 

[SoftwareMS]

Where is the news coverage for a Thomas Hickens??? and the webiste???e

 

[SoftwareMS]

I have to pull your chain here OWG, lets here it.

 

[OldWelshGuy]

Ok if you want it here it is.

They have lost a child yes and the not knowing must make it even worse. BUT What sort of parents leave 3 kids in an unlocked ground floor apartment alone when the oldest is 4? They CHOSE not to pay to use the complex baby sitting service and they CHOSE to go out for 2 and a half hours for a meal.

there are 2 villians here
1. the villians that took the child
2. the parents who neglected THREE children so they could go out for a quiet meal.

There is only ONE VICTIM however and SHE is completely innocent, her only fault being to trust her parents to protect her!

Temi, feel free to remove my post I will take no offence honestly.

 

[detoam]

I so agree with You OldWelshGuy.
I have kids and there is no way in freaking hell would I ever leave my kids on their own. They obviously can afford a whole lotta things, but cheaped out on the baby sitting service. to me they are far more guilty than those freaks that kidnapped the baby.
I as well have a four year old daughter. Her mother kidnapped her and her little brother from me and I had no idea what was going on for two weeks. I do know how those parents feel. Thankfully my daughter was returned safe and sound with the exception that both she and her little brother are very scared of their mother now. I hope their daughter will be returned to them as well.
Sadly chances of that are very slim by now.

 

[SoftwareMS]

I have given you a rep OWG because I completely agree with.

I hope I haven't caused anybody ofeence by doing that, if I have then I'm really sorry.

 

[dhscott]

A lot of people I have spoken to also agree. Someone asked me why someone has set up a website and I couldn't give them an answer. Do they expect people to jump up from their homes and join the hunt in Portugal or give them money or something?

I don't see the motive for such a site personally. Unless its for personal gain.

 

[OldWelshGuy]

The website is meant to raise the profile and to get the picture in front of as many people as possible. It is also for fundraising. Members of their family have given up their jobs to get involved. I wonder if they are drawing a wage?

Honestly I know how they feel as Detoam indicated so does he. BUT for 5 years Tracey and myself did not go out together as we had no baby sitter ew knew well enough to trust Lottie with. Our parents are out of the question, and it is only the last 18 months that Tracey's brother will babysit for us now he is back working at home.

Kids are the most innocent and vulnerable in society. We MUST protect them, ours and others. I run the Mini & Junior rugby section at our rugby club, and I am a child protection officer for the Welsh Rugby Union at our club. OUr kids range from 4 to 16 and although the older ones are a different ballgame as my main task there is more to keep an eye, I coach the under 8's & 9's.

When those kids are at my club they are MY kids, and I look out for them. When i hear of one of them being ill or having had an accident, I feel for them as they're ALL my kids.

The media keep on showing the parents and talking about what THEY are going through, but hardly a mention of the child really.

This is such a sad situation, but I think social services should now be seriously investigating these people with regard being fit parents. They were 10 days into their holiday so it is safe to assume that this was not the first time they did it.


Criminals, ESPECIALLY Perverts WATCH, they watch for hours, days, weeks months, THAT is what they do. They will watch to see which kids are allowed to run around, then they will watch that family some more. THEN when they see an opening (like the parents leaving them alone each night), they strike.

Many people have seriously attacked my views online, but I have asked them this simple question to try to get them to see it from the position that I stand.

If those 3 kids had died in a fire at their apartment, would you STILL feel the same pity towards the parents?

I don't think anyone will HONESTLY say yes to that, as we would ALL want to string the parents up. All three of these kids could have been taken, and the parents have been selfishly complicit.

 

[funkypilchard]

It's a strong view and I can see your point, unfortunately the arguments about whether they should have left the children alone or not are long since gone, i should imagine the mother will regret leaving her child alone for eternity, I still pray that they find that little girl but I also pray that she isn't suffering.

Because it is a British child the spotlight falls but if ANY good (as in repercussions ) could come from this situation then it should highlight the horrific trade in child trafficking for abuse across the world, whether it be British kids, African, Eastern etc etc.. in some countries parents sell their children to survive, they are promised the children will get a better life but in reality they are abused and sometimes die as a result.

I have been on a beach in Britain, I was unaware until after wards but a random man was videoing my 5 year old niece, my cousin asked him to stop, he ignored her and simply moved further away but still filmed... then she got angry with him and he left, a few years later in the same resort I noticed a man photographing what appeared to be children playing on a beach from a pier, I stood by him and he looked irritated at my presence and moved off, I thought he looked really weird so I followed him from a distance, he entered the pier and started blatantly taking pictures of young girls playing on the penny fruit machines, that is all he was taking pictures off, their legs, body etc, every time he started taking pictures I would approach him and he would move off again looking at me as though I was disrupting him, I approached the security guard for the pier who took note and as soon as he did the guy made a sharp exit off the pier, the security guard explained taht was the second person who had been chased off for taking pictures of children that day and it is NOT allowed without the parents consent

I later watched a programme on a well known child abuse case in Scotland where a young girl was snatched from a seaside town, the police asked people to come forward with holiday snaps to see what they could find and were horrified to identify so many known child abusers milling in and around the general public.

These people are seriously intent and persistent IMO which makes them even more difficult to track by all accounts and even more guilty of a premeditated crime (if that makes sense), I have heard police claim that the Internet is a good way of tracking these people but of this I am not sure?

I don't very often feel hatred in my life... but for this I am afraid I really struggle not to hate people that abuse children.

Another subject very close to this is, I joined a photo sharing website "flickr" some time ago and I bought my first camera, I took some innocent pics of my surroundings, one being a woman in a Burka dress, I uploaded it to my webspace, then I found it favourited by two people, I looked into their other favourites and discovered they openly had fetishes for this and their close contacts were into S&M etc etc.. some of the stuff was actually pornographic in intent but of random people, I then discovered whole groups and image pools on flickr which are dedicated to men taking pictures of random women (some seemingly very young) and salivating over them with derogatory comments on these unsuspecting victims, some naked, sunbathing on beaches, others of close up breast shots, in shops, on the street, walking with their partner etc.. then other people upload endless innocent shots of their babies and children and I just think, don't bother.. you don't know what someone is going to end up doing with it.

It seriously put me off taking pictures of people after I saw this.

I have no problem with regulated porn where people make a living and provide a service etc but to use pictures of people without their consent for the sexual gratification of others is surely wrong?

 

[detoam]

I wholeheartedly agree with You. But i do place a boundary on that. To me if two adults are going at it like monkeys by all means let someone take a picture. They knew the risk. It is the taking of the pictures of children that I am totally against. The problem is that there is no way to stop it from happening.
Here in Canada for example there is a well known pedophile who actually went to the Supreme court and won the case where he was allowed to publish a book depicting some very disturbing acts that he imagines. He argued that it is his freedom of expression.
To me I would say that this people simply cannot be in anyway reformed. And many of them have actually agreed. To them it is as natural as to the rest of us having sex with other adults. The only way I see to stop them is castration. It might be extreme, but I personally would be willing to suffer that guilt knowing that I might have actually spared some child experience that would undoubtedly be with him/her for life.

 

[funkypilchard]

To me if two adults are going at it like monkeys by all means let someone take a picture. They knew the risk. It is the taking of the pictures of children that I am totally against.

Sorry I meant the pictures taken (on flickr) are close-ups of half naked women (some very young) going about their daily business without their consent and then used to sexually gratify groups of people - I haven't seen any voyeurism on flickr.

I agree with castration, there comes a point where the rights of the innocent need to outweigh the rights of those wishing to cause horrific damage to other humans young and old, controlling drugs, castration, locked away.. I don't much care - I realise taht unfortunately some abusers were once abused themselves and I also find this extremely distressing but the only way to stop this in this case would surely be to break the circle.

At the end of the day, premeditated violation on a child by one or more people (and sometimes documented to make profit) is pure evil in every sense. :-x

 

[OldWelshGuy]

Please don't get me wrong here, I am not forgiving the pervert that took here (assuming that is what happened as there is no proof of that as yet!)

BUT I disaagree with the 'time for that has gone'. A child is missing BECAUSE she was abandoned. FAR from being left alone they should be prosecuted. and made an example of. They are unfit parents and I can't help but think that all of this work is not JUST because their child is missing it is also a subconcious attempt to ease their own conscience because they abandoned their children.

Just as we must protect kids from peadophiles, so we must ALSO protect them from bad parenting. It is simply not enough to say. Oh well they lost one child so probably won't do it again! that attitude is lunacy. they lost one child BECAUSE they were negligent.

Turn that around though from the childs point of view and you see how poor an argument it is. A cchild is Missing for ONE REASON ALONE, and that is that her parents abandoned her in an area where a pervert was stalking. Because we do not know where perverts are we should treat ALL areas as unsafe, and be dilligent at all times.

 

[gkd_uk]

Two parents from near where I live went out for a night out on a Friday night.

They left two kids at home and whilst they were playing they set the house on fire. The door was locked. The fire bridade attended site and had to knock the door down to get in. The kids were lucky to be a live

 

[OldWelshGuy]

But of course just like the Madeline case, the parents are not to blame of course!

 

[gkd_uk]

The desperate search for Madeleine McCann has been hijacked by conmen cashing in on her family's heartache.

The official website, launched to help find the missing four-year-old, has received more than 70million visits in three days.

In a sickening ploy a series of Internet sites with similar names have been created to exploit its high profile.

Read more here

 

[OldWelshGuy]

Sick isn't it

 

[gkd_uk]

How can these people even think of doing something like this. Totally disgusting

 

[TeamPlayer]

Ok if you want it here it is.

They have lost a child yes and the not knowing must make it even worse. BUT What sort of parents leave 3 kids in an unlocked ground floor apartment alone when the oldest is 4? They CHOSE not to pay to use the complex baby sitting service and they CHOSE to go out for 2 and a half hours for a meal.

there are 2 villians here
1. the villians that took the child
2. the parents who neglected THREE children so they could go out for a quiet meal.

There is only ONE VICTIM however and SHE is completely innocent, her only fault being to trust her parents to protect her!

Temi, feel free to remove my post I will take no offence honestly.

I have to sat that I raised three children. When we went on holiday, whether at home in the UK, or abroad, we would never have dreamt of leaving them to go out for a meal or anywhere else for that matter.

And if anything things have got worse over the years.

I do share your views on this.

 

[gkd_uk]

The parents have admitted that it was their fault for leaving her at home and feel very bad about this.

They also mentioned that if they were at home and Madeline was abducted from her bedroom they would still feel bad for not keeping an eye on her.