I would think the first real bite of flesh would have been a hint that something was wrong.
Something is terribly wrong with this child, and as a parent, or grandparent, I think a quick trip to a hospital was in order.
Then again, how many American families ignore warning signs of anorexia…maybe not as gory or blunt as chewing off your fingers, but perhaps more deadly.
Out of curiosity…has anybody checked this story with Snopes?
It just looks like a supermarket tabloid story…
Not much you can really say… that’s fucking horrible…
Apparently she has brain damage… I hope it’s to the extent that she is totally unaware of her situation.
O.M.G
Is there any reason to believe she’d stop now that she doesn’t have any fingers left?
She still has ten toes, I assume. And I’m sure she can still get portions of her stumps into her mouth…why would she not start working on her arm now?
Yipes, I need to think about something else. This is making my head hurt.
I did. What is your point?
QtM, MD
I’m afraid not.
If this girl lived in a society that could afford the round-the-clock observation necessary to keep her alive, there might be an obligation to give it to her, no matter how ultimately cruel and pointless that would be.
But none of the solutions that would be possible here are possible there.
Although I support the idea that patients should be able to choose to be treated or not, up to being able to choose death if desired, I do not advocate the killing of people (or perhaps former people) who cannot make this choice for themselves. Active mercy killings are difficult to justify and easy to abuse.
Nonetheless, there are no outcomes in this situation which will not end in a series of horrible, nightmare-inducing events. A quick death for this girl is probably the best possible outcome at this point.
No, the best possible outcome would be a move to the US where her life would, apparently, be worth something. :rolleyes:
I’m not sure I want to live anywhere where the wealth of the society determines your obligation to help others.
Her life is not “worth” one bit more or less depending on where she lives. As it happens, I regard a life of full-body restraints and severe brain damage as horrific. I would personally choose death over that. But that’s not my point.
Because of where she lives, this girl will die a premature and horrible death. The nightmare of institutionalization is not a possibility. Given that, there now remains only the nightmares of slow and horrible death. A quick and painless death (even assuming she’s actually capable of suffering at this point) looks like a blessing.
I’m reminded of that response to “eat me” from the Zork games. It’s one of my favorite quotes:
“Autocannibalism is not the answer.”
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i assume it was quite nasty
Yes, it was.
Well, here, her life would be worth something, but just for the news value. The children of the poor are no better cared for here…yes, the resources are there, but without the proper paperwork (governmentally provided healthcare) or insurance, they are not available.
Unfortunately, the lives of the poor are not valued here, either. The ill and poor are valued even less.
It was all healed over, if that’s what you mean.
It was disturbing for other reasons.
Try the google cache of that page. I don’t know how long it will be up though. Also try this and this.
When I originally read the article, I interpreted it to mean the sensation of pain was absent on her fingers when she chewed them (the last sentence of the article is worded oddly). After reading some of the replies here, I realize it WOULD be more likely that all the pain nerves were useless. Still, I know firsthand the long term effects hitting a child has. It seemed to me to be a slightly better alternative.
Some of you are more caught up in the fact I would mention hitting a little girl then the news article itself. It seems to me you can’t differentiate between discipline and child abuse. If the first thought you had from reading my OP was “Oh my god, how could he stoop so low as to even contemplate striking a child?” then you don’t realize it’s exactly this kind of soft-heartedness that led to her being scarred for life. IMO soft-heartedness as exhibited by Marley23 is exactly why the grandparents allowed this to happen. It took 3 years for her to do this, don’t you think at one point they should have said ‘enough is enough’ and done something desperate?
My point, Qadgop, is it would be far better to teach her to control herself then to forcibly control her as some of you have mentioned. There is no possible way to monitor a person for 24 hours a day. What kind of life would that be anyway, to be in a straitjacket until she died? Qadgop, Would you really have rather used some type of artificial restraint (drug her, tie her down) then taught her to restrain herself? That, to me, is a hundred times worse then any type of physical abuse. I’m talking about pain (physical/psychological) which will be felt for a moment but remembered for a lifetime. You’re talking about turning a human being into a robot. Frankly, you and ratty’s refusal to consider physical punishment coupled with your immediate conclusion that forced coercion is the best solution is rather disturbing.
Let me try another example, what if every time you caught her you screamed and yelled to scare the shit out of her? Same end result, associating chewing fingers with a negative response, but no physical contact. Or is that still too unbearable to consider? :rolleyes:
And if you still don’t understand, let me put it this way.
It is the lesser of two evils. In the real world, sometimes the only choices we can make are evil choices.
ratty, please don’t try to second guess me. It just makes you look ignorant.
Oh please. I can resentfully agree that a little spanking might be discipline. You said “I would have beat the fucking shit out of her” and “if I saw her eating her hand again I would have fucking dragon kicked her.” That’s child abuse, PERIOD.
AND ALSO
It won’t be felt for a moment! It’ll never be felt at all! Are you not understanding this? The girl is brain damaged. She can’t feel pain! How would you beat this lesson into her head when she can’t feel it. Beating her when she was 2 wouldn’t have helped. Beating her could never have helped this problem! You might as well propose to beat a blind guy until he can see. It’s a tragic fucking situation, but just because your solution is desperate and impassioned doesn’t mean it’s right- because it’s actually the dead opposite.
Well by this reckoning there’ll be people in your country that meet the same criteria, “because of where they live”. Or are you saying the the US has reached the point where all things are possible?
My point here, less it be misunderstood, is that you seem very keen to write-off a life simply because they live in a poorer area of the world. In terms of mortality and serious illness we are all poor, but that doesn’t stop us trying.
I think TVAA was just saying that all the realistic outcomes for this girl absolutely suck. It has nothing to do with writing off the value of her life. It’s just sad, and it seems like the truth to me.
Damn far from it. But I think she’d have a better chance over here.
Precisely. As I stated before, we can discuss total restraint and lobotombies and drugs all we want, but that wasn’t an option as far as we know. This situation had no possible kind ending.
And I agree with TVAA. This tot doesn’t have a rosy future.
No, what TVAA said was the best outcome was her death, especially since of where she lived. It doesn’t take a great deal of insight to see that she’s going to have a tough life.
Not the point. There are people in all countries (including the US) that are ultimately beyond the help of their medical facilities. They will never have a normal life, their life will be downhill all the way. Are they better off dead too?
Cletus, are you a fucking moron? How many times and by how many people must you be told? Here, let me quote good ol’ “soft-hearted” Marley23: The girl is brain damaged. She can’t feel pain!
Don’t try to second-guess Qadgop- it makes you look ignorant.
You can’t teach her to control herself. SHE IS BRAIN-DAMAGED. She obviously does not respond to external stimuli in a normal or predictable way. Why is this so hard for you to understand?
And don’t even start with your self-righteous bullshit about ‘overpermissive parenting’ leading to this sort of tragedy. Spanking normal non-brain-damaged children is a very useful tool for correcting inappropriate behavior. Spanking a child who cannot feel pain is, excuse the term, flogging a dead horse. She seems unable to make connections between her behavior and its consequences, which is fairly common with people who have- can you guess what’s coming?- BRAIN DAMAGE.
Well, let’s consider the outcomes here.
Physical abusing this girl would would accomplish ABSOLUTELY NOTHING. Physically restraining her, though it may seem harsh to you, would definitely prevent her from chewing off all her fucking fingers. And frankly, it disturbs me that simply preventing her from badly injuring herself by using some type of wrist restraints is unthinkable to you, yet, and I quote: “beating the fucking shit out of her” is perfectly acceptable, even desirable. Can I ask what in the fucking hell is wrong with you? In what twisted world do you live that you actually believe it’s better to “beat the fucking shit” out of a brain-damaged child?
No, it won’t. Why? BECAUSE SHE CAN’T FUCKING FEEL PAIN, YOU MOUTH-BREATHING IDIOT.
No, he’s talking about stopping her from continuing to injure herself. You’re talking about injuring her further to…stop her from injuring herself further. Do you see why you keep being called stupid? Read that sentence back a few times and think about it. Don’t be afraid to ask for help with the hard words.
Okay, now we’re (maybe) getting somewhere. Since, ONCE AGAIN, she can’t feel pain, other methods will have to be used. Trying to get her to associate a negative experience, like being frightened or yelled at with self-injury could help her learn to control that behavior, if she’s capable of making that connection, which we don’t know. If she is as severely brain-damaged as I suspect from reading the article, that may not be possible for her. But it is a solution that stands at least some chance of working, which, as has been said so many times, beating her is not. Why? I hope by now you can guess. Scroll back up through the last few posts if you’re still stuck.
Oh, that’s fucking profound. Have you started printing up the bumper stickers yet?
The point here, when you get right down to it cletus, is that what you are proposing as a solution will not work. And it will not work for a very obvious reason. Yet you cling to your initial knee-jerk reaction for some unfathomable reason and refuse to listen to people who perhaps have greater reading-comprehension skills than you. It’s been explained to you several times, and you still don’t get it. Girl can’t feel pain; beating causes pain; girl cannot feel pain of beating. I ask again: what do you think keeping this information in mind beating her is going to do?