http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090828/ap_o...ung_sailor

What do you think of this? I think she should be allowed to go, and I think it's way too nanny-state for the government to interfere. Wondering how many agree.

(08-30-2009 07:55 AM)Owl 69/70/75 Wrote:  http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090828/ap_o...ung_sailor

What do you think of this? I think she should be allowed to go, and I think it's way too nanny-state for the government to interfere. Wondering how many agree.

Although this doesn't answer your question, I was impressed by some of the vivid words used in this article:
"Dutch judges Friday called a 13-year-old girl's plan to sail solo around the world "undeniably daring and risky," but refused to scupper it completely"
[The writer must have meant "scuttle", since "scupper" is a noun and means simply the drainhole in the walls surrounding a ship's deck or a rooftop]

"autumn storms that regularly lash the Bay of Biscay"
Not the first time lash been used to refer to storms, but still a good image, especially in conjuring how the storms would feel to a person in small boat -- I can't help but picture Winslow Homer's evocative seascape The Gulf Stream. A nice variation on lash (especially since he was no doubt a hockey fan) is when Gordon Lightfoot's ballad Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald mentions "when the gales of November come slashing" -- conveying sharp angles of incidence as well as sheer violence.

"Laura's father, Dick Dekker, was in court for Friday's decision but said nothing to a scrum of reporters following the case."
Now that's a good image!

(08-30-2009 07:55 AM)Owl 69/70/75 Wrote:  What do you think of this? I think she should be allowed to go, and I think it's way too nanny-state for the government to interfere. Wondering how many agree.

Tough call. Not sure where I stand.

To help myself think through it, I'm pondering a similar but related scenario. Let's imagine a different 13-year-old who was going to embark on the same trip with the same prep, with the one twist that no one but her parents and herself knew what she was planning.
If she then went on the trip and died at sea, should the government then prosecute her parents for child endangerment or neglect (or whatever; I'm not sure of the exact legal phrasing)?
I think my answer to that question is yes, but I'm still thinking about it.

(08-30-2009 07:53 PM)georgewebb Wrote:  [The writer must have meant "scuttle", since "scupper" is a noun and means simply the drainhole in the walls surrounding a ship's deck or a rooftop]

According to M-W online, "scupper" is also a verb in British English, meaning "to defeat or put an end to". http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/scupper

I think the definition of child endangerment has been expanded in the last two decades. I know a woman who has a felony conviction because she left her sleeping 7 year old in a motel room while she went down to the pool. She told me once that if she was in Wal-Mart and let her child browse in the toys while she shopped, if anything happened it would another felony. I saw another young mother leave her child in a car with the AC running while she ran into the post office to check her mail. She could see the car through the glass, was never more than 30 feet away, and was in and out in less than a minute - but, I thought to myslef, if something were to happen, anything at all, felony. I don't know how young parents cope these days, as I watch young mothers unbuckle three kids, drag them into a store, buy a newspaper, and then go spend another 10 minutes rebuckling the kids in. It would have worn me out when I was 25. I guess I must have committed child endangerment about 10,000 times. And I was good parent, for the times. I guess I would be evil now.

Going back to the example, it is an extreme example, but the pattern is clear - once the camel's nose comes into the tent on the most extreme examples, then the oversight spreads and spreads until we reach a point in which any action/inaction with a bad result is a crime. The contemplated action is not illegal on the part of the child, as say driving a big rig would be. It's up to the parents, IMO. If parental decisions are always going to be under review, including retroactively, then a lot of self-reliance and boldness will be stifled. I let my eldest son take his first job at 13. If I had had to worry about prison if he had a problem, I might not have. It was good for him.

Remember the US girl (preteen IIRC) a few years ago who was trying to set a piloting record and died in a crash.

(08-31-2009 02:05 PM)JSA Wrote:  Remember the US girl (preteen IIRC) a few years ago who was trying to set a piloting record and died in a crash.

Yes. Your point?

Maybe a 13 year old girl trying to sail solo around the world isn't such a good idea.

I'm still not certain on this one. I don't think the parents are being negligent in this case, unless she really doesn't have the full skillset. No sense from the article whether she does or doesn't. There's almost no way to really know her mental/emotional ability to handle whatever she might face. She's probably physically capable, if push came to shove. Her technical skills/knowledge? The British teen makes a good point, though it comes across a bit snarky in the article - can she handle any sort of mechanical/boat related emergency she might face? Or at least well enough except in the most catastrophic conditions? Because many adults would be in the same boat (pun intended) before deciding to do such a thing. This isn't going to be a long picnic she's on. It's going to be tough.

That's how I look at it, at least.

(08-31-2009 02:46 PM)JSA Wrote:  Maybe a 13 year old girl trying to sail solo around the world isn't such a good idea.

Maybe it isn't, maybe it is.
And maybe it's a whole lot more her business than it is yours or mine--or the government's.

You asked.

(08-31-2009 01:17 AM)JOwl Wrote:  

(08-30-2009 07:53 PM)georgewebb Wrote:  [The writer must have meant "scuttle", since "scupper" is a noun and means simply the drainhole in the walls surrounding a ship's deck or a rooftop]

According to M-W online, "scupper" is also a verb in British English, meaning "to defeat or put an end to". http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/scupper

Interesting!

(08-31-2009 03:39 PM)Owl 69/70/75 Wrote:  

(08-31-2009 02:46 PM)JSA Wrote:  Maybe a 13 year old girl trying to sail solo around the world isn't such a good idea.

Maybe it isn't, maybe it is.
And maybe it's a whole lot more her business than it is yours or mine--or the government's.

The thing is, it's clearly her parents' business -- more so than her own business, in my opinion. Her parents are obligated to make decisions for her in her best interest. And I think the government has some duty to enforce that obligation.
I don't really have a good sense for what the likelihood of her surviving the trip is, but at first blush it strikes me as unduly risky.

(08-31-2009 02:46 PM)JSA Wrote:  Maybe a 13 year old girl trying to sail solo around the world isn't such a good idea.

You're absolutely right - maybe it isn't a good idea. Maybe letting her wear make-up or stay out to ten or car date or do ski racing or getting her a pony aren't good ideas either. So who is to say - her parents or the government? If it were my granddaughter, i would do all I could to stop it, but I wouldn't call 911 just to get my will imposed on her. "Please, government, stop us before we make a mistake!" In the end, one must decide who has the call here. I would rather it not be the government, even if individuals make the wrong call IMO. The government already has some control; expanding it would just bring us closer to the situation that so many say they abhor - everyone marching in lockstep, individuality penalized.

This could be one of those situations without a good resolution - thank goodness they don't come up often, so let's not use them to set precedents.

Well, that's my best answer to a thorny question. I think I came down on the side of principle vs. pragmatism, this time.

(08-31-2009 06:41 PM)JOwl Wrote:  The thing is, it's clearly her parents' business -- more so than her own business, in my opinion. Her parents are obligated to make decisions for her in her best interest. And I think the government has some duty to enforce that obligation.
I don't really have a good sense for what the likelihood of her surviving the trip is, but at first blush it strikes me as unduly risky.

I do not think the government has any such duty. The government screws up enough already without getting into this. I suppose the Dutch government may have a better track record than ours, but either way I think they're overstepping here.
You admit that you don't have a good sense of the risk involved. Neither do I. That's why I'm fine with letting the people who do have a better sense of the risk than I do make the call.
And I'm betting that the father and daughter have a better sense than you or I or the Dutch government.

(08-31-2009 08:52 PM)Owl 69/70/75 Wrote:  

(08-31-2009 06:41 PM)JOwl Wrote:  The thing is, it's clearly her parents' business -- more so than her own business, in my opinion. Her parents are obligated to make decisions for her in her best interest. And I think the government has some duty to enforce that obligation.
I don't really have a good sense for what the likelihood of her surviving the trip is, but at first blush it strikes me as unduly risky.

I do not think the government has any such duty. The government screws up enough already without getting into this. I suppose the Dutch government may have a better track record than ours, but either way I think they're overstepping here.
You admit that you don't have a good sense of the risk involved. Neither do I. That's why I'm fine with letting the people who do have a better sense of the risk than I do make the call.
And I'm betting that the father and daughter have a better sense than you or I or the Dutch government.

Just to be clear, when you say you don't think the government has "any such duty", are you referring to the specifics of this situation, or do you mean that as generally as it sounds?
My claim was simply that if a parent fails to meet his obligations to his children in such a way that the child's life is put at risk, then that parent should be subject to prosecution. I'm trying to understand if you disagree with that general position, or if you're disagreeing that this situation rises to that level.

My feeling is that there is a continuum out there, where the parent who dumps an infant to die in the trash should clearly be subject to prosecution, and the parent who lets his child play football clearly should not. I don't see any bright line in between those extremes. I consider a situation like this to be at least open to debate; I think it's reasonable and appropriate for the Dutch government to be investigating.

I don't think the fact that I'm not particularly informed on the subject after reading an AP news article should have much bearing on the ultimate outcome here. Take some detail that's hinted at in the article: "They acknowledged [the girl's father] had tried to stop the trip and then to make it as safe as possible." Does that mean he was originally against it but changed his mind? Or he didn't change his mind but felt he couldn't control his daughter and decided to make the best of it? Or something else?
I just don't know.

(08-31-2009 11:51 PM)JOwl Wrote:  My feeling is that there is a continuum out there, where the parent who dumps an infant to die in the trash should clearly be subject to prosecution, and the parent who lets his child play football clearly should not. I don't see any bright line in between those extremes. I consider a situation like this to be at least open to debate; I think it's reasonable and appropriate for the Dutch government to be investigating.

I know you addressed this to Owl 69 but if you don't mind I would like to respond to this portion.

Except for the last sentence, i agree with you. As for the last sentence,
I think whether it is reasonable and appropriate for the gov to be investigating and possibly enforcing a decision is exactly the point we are debating.

True, there is not a bright line, but as I mentioned in an earlier post, the gray area is moving all the time, and the direction is always the same. Things I did as a parent, a good parent, 35-40 years ago are now illegal, at least in some circumstances. I had friends who were operating heavy farm machinery at the age of ten. That line has moved, I am sure. My mother drove a car at 11 - I drove at 14. That line has moved. It was OK for me to let my kids walk 6 blocks to the park, play unsupervised, and come home after dark. Does that still happen, or is it now an example of child endangerment? I just think we need to be careful about adding to the definition of negligence, since it never moves back.

(08-31-2009 11:51 PM)JOwl Wrote:  Just to be clear, when you say you don't think the government has "any such duty", are you referring to the specifics of this situation, or do you mean that as generally as it sounds?
My claim was simply that if a parent fails to meet his obligations to his children in such a way that the child's life is put at risk, then that parent should be subject to prosecution. I'm trying to understand if you disagree with that general position, or if you're disagreeing that this situation rises to that level.
My feeling is that there is a continuum out there, where the parent who dumps an infant to die in the trash should clearly be subject to prosecution, and the parent who lets his child play football clearly should not. I don't see any bright line in between those extremes. I consider a situation like this to be at least open to debate; I think it's reasonable and appropriate for the Dutch government to be investigating.
I don't think the fact that I'm not particularly informed on the subject after reading an AP news article should have much bearing on the ultimate outcome here. Take some detail that's hinted at in the article: "They acknowledged [the girl's father] had tried to stop the trip and then to make it as safe as possible." Does that mean he was originally against it but changed his mind? Or he didn't change his mind but felt he couldn't control his daughter and decided to make the best of it? Or something else?
I just don't know.

I mean this specific case, but I would probably extend it a bit more generically than that statement would imply on its face. Following your continuum approach, if the girl knows what she is doing (and I think she does), I'd put this much closer to playing football than to leaving her in a dumpster.

A for the father, from what I've read he's investigating things like moving the boat to Portugal and going from there or even moving to New Zealand (the daughter has dual citizenship), although NZ has said they won't let her go, at least not yet. Apparently she also previously sailed alone to England (in what may or may not have been an attempt to start this trip) where the English authorities stopped her; he came over to meet her and was directed to accompany her back, but she sailed back alone. Obviously England is not much of a trip, but the story suggests that she has at least some idea what she's doing and that the father is pretty well onboard with what she's doing.

I have also read that the mother (parents are divorced) is living elsewhere (Switzerland IIRC) but is supportive of the effort. Mom is clearly not in court seeking to take girl away from reckless, endangering dad, which speaks volumes to me, even after discounting that Europeans are simply less litigious than Americans. I would tend to question the statement you quoted from the AP article as the outlier; my own biases may be showing here, but the media seem generally to be pro-nanny-state, so it wouldn't surprise me that the writer latched onto a revelation of initial skepticism and played it into a line that insinuates far more than it is worth.

At the end of the day, it may be a moot point. She can't make this trip without stopping along the way, and anywhere she stops has the potential to shut her down like the Dutch (or English). Even if she picked her route very carefully, the possibility that an odd storm or accident could force her to make an unplanned stop might bring this into play. Another issue that I see from my old port security days is that if she gets lost, somebody's coast guard and navy may spend a whole lot of time and effort and money looking for her; that might be a legitimate government interest, but it's probably not the Dutch government that would be on the hook for that.

I may be projecting too much of the US government onto the Dutch government here, but I expect my government to protect the borders, fight fires, keep citizens safe from those who intend to rob or hurt or kill them, promote a stable environment for commerce, and even provide some kind of safety net for those who are "less fortunate" (i.e., experiencing the inevitable bad consequences of bad life choices). Let it get those things right before venturing into other areas. Let the Dutch government figure out what happened to Natalee Holloway before trusting them to destroy another girl's dream.