Toddler found playing on highway
 

It boggles my mind that someone can give birth to a child, then so blatantly disregard their safety and not look out for their wellbeing. I'd give her the benefit of the doubt and say she was an exhausted single mother trying to raise two kids by herself, but it doesn't sound like it (even cutting through the media glitz).

Opinions on child neglect? It's the blanket charge to cover when kids get out or when we don't like the living conditions a kid is in, and I'm split on the issue myself.

Bah, that "parent"'s attitude is very irksome. Such despicable bahaviour. She should be thankful that the drivers on the highway were much more alert than she was at the time.

The other child was eating spaghetti off the floor..? Even in the best case scenario of that sentence (the child eating the spaghetti while sitting on the floor), it still is awful parenting shown by Ms. Dyer.

lol, is this statement coming from a lady who's half asleep or is that her in her most conscious state?

At least the kids weren't hurt and hopefully they'll find a better home soon.

lol'd at this
Oh hello, white trash.

I escaped our apartment in Regina, Sask. when I was 3 before my mom woke up, walked across the neighbouring freeway and went to a 7-11 to get some candy (I got it for free too!)

The only things I remember now (most of the story I was told by my mom), is getting the free candy, and how pissed my mom was when she came over to the store.

Brother, if ever there was an award for understatement of the year THAT would be it.

That chick does not, under any circumstances, need to be a parent. Anytime you can nonchalantly respond with "oh he got out again" to your 3 year old baby crawling into the middle of heavy traffic and playing duck-duck goose with a bevy of cars and a fucking tractor trailer then you need to be slapped. It's like something out of Looney Tunes or a Popeye cartoon. It's surreal.

She sounds like a straight up crackhead.

I'll bet the police didn't find your sister in a filthy apartment eating spaghetti off the floor.

This is the worst thing I can think of. And this is probably only the tip of the iceberg. I'll bet these kids were living a life of pure hell. This woman needs to go to jail and never get her kids back.

I can say that when I was maybe 4 years old, I was out in the yard playing and I decided to go for a walk all by myself. This walk involved going to the end of a busy street and into the woods to "visit the fairy" who lived in a water tower.

My mother was not asleep or anything. I was just allowed to play in the yard.

I got as far as halfway down the busy street before Mom figured out where the fuck I was and came after me. So yea, kids will do stupid things - and FAST.

That doesn't mean I defend this woman. It sounds like she's a pretty disgraceful parent, even by her response. "O, he got out again." Jesus Christ, lady. This happens a lot?

I've heard worse. i remember a story from a while back about this crazy lady who would frequently lock her young son in a small dark closet and pour bleach on him to "force the demons out." No one knew that any of this was going on until the boy died. I WANNA say he either fell from a window or died in a hospital. I forget because it's been so long ago. The killing part of the story was that the woman also had a little girl, but she treated her like a normal child. Unless I'm mixing up stories here, she had this psycho thing against men, so her very young son was doomed from the start. :(

That reminds me of those A Child Called It books. Apparently the mother treated all her other children just fine. I hate people sometimes.

Doesn't boggle my mind. I'll be reading a very similar story about my neighbor any day now, I'm sure. Welcome to America!

since we're talking about youngin's getting shafted, i just heard on the radio some 9 year old boy died today while hanging himself. He hung himself from the ceiling fan with the help of his sister while trying to imitate what they did to saddam.

Can't find the article but i heard it on NPR!!! pretty damn rediculous.

.....

why would any parent even let thier kid watch that to begin with?

I was just sitting here thinking the same thing. I have a nine year old son and it's just unthinkable to me.

Oh my, thats really sad.

There was a time when I used to only look at one side of the story. Not anymore. The quotes used in the article can be so easily brought out of context, in my opinion. What could be happening on the MOTHER' S side to be causing her to be living in that kind of condition? So many possibilities, though I have to agree that the actual incident's a bit...surreal and what's happening to the mom is not good enough a reason to let her child run rampant in the friggin' highway like that...

Wow. That is shocking. I hope the kids find a much better place to be with a more caring and responsible family. Although I have a relative who is very bad with his kids, this is still something that blows me away. And to think there are a lot of parents like this.... :(

This is probably very coldhearted, but that kid deserves a Darwin Award for doing that.

The news is corrupting our children, making them kill themselves. We need government censorship, for the children. Isn't that how these arguments go?

I think what really needs to be done is to take a large newspaper, roll it up, take all of these parents like this woman, smack her over the head repeatedly and go "NO!" and then wag your finger at her

I'll say it once, and I'll say it again once you have a child, your life from here on out should be dedicated to ensure that your kid to live in safe loving environment. I am absolutely getting sick and tired of parents being irresponsible with their kids because of their own selfishness.

As a parent you have an obligation to protect your children and try your best to be responsible for them. Yes kids will do dangerous things out of morbid curiousity, but thats not an excuse to allow themselves to place them in dangerous situations. You have to try your best to teach them and protect them in any and every possible way.

I sincerely hope this parent does not get her kids back unless she is willing to grow up and be responsible for her kids well being.

The thought of that made me LOL. Very poor living conditions though I must say.

This behavior derives DIRECTLY from cartoons and we're subliminally fed this imagery from the time we're kids. Do you guys really think it's a coincidence that Popeye could only turn into an invincible man after acquiring some "greens" and Olive Oyl was always absentmindedly letting Sweetpea run into traffic? This was clearly a family of drug-addicts and child neglecters.

It's obvious that the mom is terrible, but how about the drivers swerving out of the way. How about getting out of the car and driving the kid to the nearest police station instead of letting it sit in the street waiting to become road kill?

So, a filthy apartment, one kid eating off the floor, the other one walking on the highway, and the mother is sleeping. I wonder where the father was.

Don't get me wrong - the woman is guilty as sin and it is her fault the entire thing has happened.
I'm just wondering what kind of a scumbag has two children and doesn't give a piss about them like this. Not that the mother was much better, but come on. What's happened to being an adult and taking care of your own children - no matter how disinclined you are to do so.

[/waaay offtopic]

so many things i could say in response to this about my own familial situations (and probably countless others), yet so little time to say them in. =\

First, why is a three year old wearing a diaper? And for some reason, the three year olds at my daycare center when I think about have more than enough sense than to sit in the middle of the road. Maybe his mom's neglected has caused delayed mental development?

Shame he's going to have to wait a whole year to receive it now.

Plus there's the fact that you don't always notice obstacles in the roadway until you're practically on top of them. Don't know how many times I've had to swerve out of the way of an errant animal, and wouldn't have been in a position to simply pull off and take care of them even if I wanted to.

As was mentioned earlier in the thread I'm trying to think about this from the perspective that this was taken grosely out of context. Which made me think about the episode of the Simpsons where DCFS came to take away the kids from Homer and Marge, the latter of which could be considered an excellent parent.

For the sake of discussion we should consider that the story was greatly sensationalized.

Perhaps this was a rather hectic time for the mother and she just didn't get around to cleaning the apartment so it's dirtier than usual which the press turns into "filthy".

The mother goes to sleep and the kids decide to get into some mischief. The little girl opens the refridgerator, pulls out the spaghetti, it falls on the floor and she just eats it.

Then the kid opens the door and gets out into traffic.

The police go see the mother and she says "Oh, he got out again". Once again for the sake of spinning the story against her perhaps they didn't attatch the proper emotion to the quote. Maybe she really was upset, but for the sake of a story "OH! [my god!] he got out again?!" turns into what we see in print. Which is possible if the press got her quote from the police report [which are supposed to be unbiased] as to being there to hear it then not following up with the officers who were actually there.

Of course the smart thing to do would have been to install child-proof locks, but that most likely wasn't done.

Of course I'm not saying that this is how things transpired, but as easy as it is to pass judgement on what a hell-spawn the mother is it's just as easy to spin things to try and sell a paper.

omg that's aweful! idk what i would've done if that were my son or daughter!

"Oh, he got out again?"

Why are people like that allowed to reproduce?
They should take that woman's children and tie her tubes.
This lady doesn't seem to give a damn about the well being
of her kids and it's sad. Kids don't deserve to be raised like
animals eating off the floor and almost being road kill.