Imagine being in McCann's Situation

[JBRnotforgotten]

I don't know how they are making it through all of this and now being told not to talk about Madeleine's dissappearance.. I think they deserve to be treated different . They did make a mistake and now they are suffering from the fact of that and I think we need to support them as much as possible. All is innoccent until proven guilty right? I know they have to be questioned and all but there should be a limit so they can find their daughter and move on past this horrible nightmare. I mean look at yourself and if that happened what in this moment could you look around and see that would make you a suspect of the dissappearance? I know I would probably be in the shock they are in from little petty things to tough decisions you will face later like well that is suspicious now that I look back at it..But I just Pray for Them to continue to be strong for that baby she needs them and they need their strength to get them through another day,days must feel like months to that family. I dont want to come accross Rude or anything I just really feel sorry for them.

[Pelicanette]

I have great compassion for Kate and Gerry. Not only have they been through a terrible and traumatic shock, they have not been able to live in peace at all since it happened. I think they are being treated very shabbily by many people, and I just bless the friends who are standing by them and the strangers who are helping them from around the world and showing their support. I cannot imagine being in their shoes.

[Jayelles]

I have great compassion for Kate and Gerry. Not only have they been through a terrible and traumatic shock, they have not been able to live in peace at all since it happened. I think they are being treated very shabbily by many people, and I just bless the friends who are standing by them and the strangers who are helping them from around the world and showing their support. I cannot imagine being in their shoes.

Ditto. They have a lot of support here. I have not yet come across a single person who thinks they are involved in any way shape or form. People feel heart sorry for them and are concerned for Kate McCann's health. She seems to be fading away in front of our eyes. Having said that, I do know of someone who believes in their involvement (a friend of my niece) -but when I heard this, I wasn't surprised because this person is a chronic moaner who has something bad to say about everyone!

[JBRnotforgotten]

I agree Kate looks like she is wiltering away....Glad she has lots of support and all that so she has some feeling of love around her from the world

[Pelicanette]

I am glad to see some compassionate and reasonable people on this forum. One forum I visited was filled with people who seemed determined to lynch the McCanns and they were fond of saying that nearly everyone in the UK suspected the parents. I did not think that was true.

It is time for fairness in judging the McCanns.

Mark Klaas, who lost his nine year old daughter Polly to a sadistic predator, has said that there is no rule book for how grieving parents behave. He was very pro-active, like Gerry. He was out and about, nailing up posters, talking to the press. He felt he just had to do something active when Polly was taken from her bedroom.

His wife behaved very differently. She was almost catatonic, took to her bed, would see very few people, could not bear to go before the press.

I have observed the parents and other relatives of missing children over the years, and all are accused of "behaving strangely" in one way or another after learning that their children are missing.

Some, like Samantha Runion's mom, literally run down the street shouting at passing cars and trying to talk to people in their houses. Others are in such shock that they can barely move. Some, like Ed Smart, collapse and have to go to the hospital for a while. Others appear to be made of steel and are very stoic.

People behave differently in the face of such a trauma. Mark Lunsford was quiet and sober and said little but he was also out looking for his daughter Jessica.

It is just not fair to imagine what we would do in a similar circumstance and blame anyone who does something different. None of us knows what we would do.

One thing is certain: the parents have to carry on. They have to be strong eventually, especially if they have other children. And sooner or later, they have to get back to their normal lives or to as much normalcy as they can find.

None of us can judge them, because we have not walked in their shoes.

[LadyFisher]

I am glad to see some compassionate and reasonable people on this forum. One forum I visited was filled with people who seemed determined to lynch the McCanns and they were fond of saying that nearly everyone in the UK suspected the parents. I did not think that was true.

It is time for fairness in judging the McCanns.

Mark Klaas, who lost his nine year old daughter Polly to a sadistic predator, has said that there is no rule book for how grieving parents behave. He was very pro-active, like Gerry. He was out and about, nailing up posters, talking to the press. He felt he just had to do something active when Polly was taken from her bedroom.

His wife behaved very differently. She was almost catatonic, took to her bed, would see very few people, could not bear to go before the press.

I have observed the parents and other relatives of missing children over the years, and all are accused of "behaving strangely" in one way or another after learning that their children are missing.

Some, like Samantha Runion's mom, literally run down the street shouting at passing cars and trying to talk to people in their houses. Others are in such shock that they can barely move. Some, like Ed Smart, collapse and have to go to the hospital for a while. Others appear to be made of steel and are very stoic.

People behave differently in the face of such a trauma. Mark Lunsford was quiet and sober and said little but he was also out looking for his daughter Jessica.

It is just not fair to imagine what we would do in a similar circumstance and blame anyone who does something different. None of us knows what we would do.

One thing is certain: the parents have to carry on. They have to be strong eventually, especially if they have other children. And sooner or later, they have to get back to their normal lives or to as much normalcy as they can find.

None of us can judge them, because we have not walked in their shoes.

I agree with you! You cannot judge anyone on behavior during such a stressful time! My heart goes out to the McCanns and Maddie! :rose: For all of them:rose:

[Jayelles]

Excellent article:-

http://www.belfasttelegraph.co.uk/news/opinion/article2950726.ece

Kate McCann, a victim of our emotional tyranny
Tuesday, September 11, 2007

Everyone has a view on the disappearance of Madeleine McCann – but only the media have the power to inflict on us a tsunami of prejudice masquerading as detection.

Thus it was that listeners to the hitherto dependable BBC programme Broadcasting House were involuntarily made aware that the one-time TV darts commentator Mr Sid Wadell thinks there's something really rather fishy about Madeleine's parents, Kate and Gerry McCann.


I don't know why a man whose only previous claim to public attention was his ability to scream "One hundred and eighty!" for the benefit of blind darts fans should have been thought a suitable newspaper reviewer for Radio 4's main Sunday morning news programme....

[One2Snoop]

Excellent post Pellicanette! :beer:

I can't even begin to imagine what it would be like to be in the McCann's shoes, not even for a minute. I will continue to pray for them and pray that little Maddie is found soon. :rose:

[rashomon]

I am glad to see some compassionate and reasonable people on this forum. One forum I visited was filled with people who seemed determined to lynch the McCanns and they were fond of saying that nearly everyone in the UK suspected the parents. I did not think that was true.

It is time for fairness in judging the McCanns.

Mark Klaas, who lost his nine year old daughter Polly to a sadistic predator, has said that there is no rule book for how grieving parents behave. He was very pro-active, like Gerry. He was out and about, nailing up posters, talking to the press. He felt he just had to do something active when Polly was taken from her bedroom.

His wife behaved very differently. She was almost catatonic, took to her bed, would see very few people, could not bear to go before the press.

I have observed the parents and other relatives of missing children over the years, and all are accused of "behaving strangely" in one way or another after learning that their children are missing.

Some, like Samantha Runion's mom, literally run down the street shouting at passing cars and trying to talk to people in their houses. Others are in such shock that they can barely move. Some, like Ed Smart, collapse and have to go to the hospital for a while. Others appear to be made of steel and are very stoic.

People behave differently in the face of such a trauma. Mark Lunsford was quiet and sober and said little but he was also out looking for his daughter Jessica.

It is just not fair to imagine what we would do in a similar circumstance and blame anyone who does something different. None of us knows what we would do.

One thing is certain: the parents have to carry on. They have to be strong eventually, especially if they have other children. And sooner or later, they have to get back to their normal lives or to as much normalcy as they can find.

None of us can judge them, because we have not walked in their shoes.


Very well said, Pelicanette. If the McCanns are innocent (and I believe they are), words fail to describe the what they must be going through.

jmo

[Pelicanette]

Here in the US, there have been a number of very high profile cases of missing children. In every case, the parents behaved rather differently and sometimes strangely, whether or not they were suspects. It is just such an overwhelmingly frightening situation, and the mind surely must try to figure it all out and to process it all with great difficulty.

If you are not familiar with the cases, you might want to read a bit about them, and you will see that the parents always were criticized for what they said or did not say, did or did not do, for collapsing or for being strong, for crying or not crying. Many people put them under a microscope and decide that they are not doing what they should be doing, but there is no rule book for that.

I remember when lovely little Samantha Runion was picked up from the front of her home and thrown into a truck. A little playmate witnessed the whole thing. Samantha cried and screamed, but it all happened in mere seconds. Her poor mother was seen that night trying to stop passing cars and ask them if they had seen her daughter. Of course, she could not do that forever. She soon was given a sedative and took a calmer approach.

The mother of Elizabeth Smart had decided, after nine months, that she had to "let go" of Elizabeth and recognize that her daughter was probably dead. She said she did it for the sake of her other children and because she and her husband had to go on with their lives. Soon after, Elizabeth was found alive and in the hands of her captor.

I could go on and on. In every single instance, the parents got some criticism for their behavior. If they collapsed and had to be hospitalized, it was because they knew they were guilty. If they cried a lot, they were putting on a show. If they did not cry, they were cold and callous. If they talked too much, they wanted the limelight. If they did not talk, they were not trying to find the child. It is really very unfair.

[Jayelles]

Yesterday, the McCanns were forced to issue a statement saying that contrary to stories being published by some Portuguese tabloid, Gerry IS Madeleine's biological father.

The newspaper responded by saying that they had sources which claimed that the *real* father had been traced through a sperm bank and to "bring on" the lawsuit.

It's very confused reporting (as seems to be the standard in this case). However, it seems to be connected to the DNA which was found in the car being an 88% match to Madeleine's. The suggestion was that it could be the twins' DNA. Now they are trying to suggest that if Gerry isn't Madeline's biological father then there wouldn't be an 88% match between her DNA and the twins' DNA and that the DNA MUST be Madeleine's and that this means SHE was in the hire car 25 days after she disappeared.

I'm truly sickened by this because it shows so much ugliness in human nature and it doesn't change any of the important issues.

Supposing it was Maddie's DNA in the car - it could still have gotten there through secondary transfer if the car was used to transport her things to the new apartment.

If they are going to argue that it was primary transfer - they still have to explain how the McCanns hid her body for a MINIMUM of 25 days and how they hid it, retrieved it, and re-hid it under the glare of the world's press.

The Data Protection Act is an extremely powerful legislation in Europe - it wouldn't be at all easy to get around it in order to find out who a sperm donor was (if at all).

Madeleine has a "look" of Gerry. I think she looks like Kate too, but Gerry looks Irish (I wasn't at all surprised to discover that his mother is Irish) and Madeleine has a slightly Irish look too. However, more importantly, little Sean is his father's double. My first reaction when I saw the family studio photo was "Oh my goodness, that wee boy is the spitting image of his Dad!". So I tend to believe that whatever their fertility problems are, it isn't that Gerry is infertile!

IF (and this is a BIG if), it transpired that there had been some kind of mix-up at the fertility clinic (either through fraudulent dealing or incompetency - there was a case recently where it transpired that one of the doctors at a clinic had been using his own sperm!) .... then I doubt that the fertility clinic would have been able (or willing) to simply provide the name and address of the "real" father at the drop of a hat. Gerry McCann obviously believes he is Madeleine's biological father (and I truly don't think for a minute that he isn't). So if it turned out that he wasn't her biological father, then the clinic could be in a LOT of trouble.

SO again, just like the other "a source close to a source says " stories which have come out of Portugal, this story just doesn't "add up". In fact, it stinks.

I honestly don't know how this family are bearing up. It's like an unimaginably bad nightmare although I daresay that some of the more ludicrous stories would have the effect of making them angry - and anger is an emotion which often gives us strength.

There is no way I'd go to Portugal on vacation now. In fact, I was in Marks and Spencers recently and there were some lovely pink grapes for sale (I'm very partial to grapes). I picked them up and was about to put them in my shopping basket when I noticed they were from Portugal and I quickly put them back! I felt guilty about it later because it's not the poor grape farmer's fault that this is all happening - but I was annoyed at the time and I know I'm not alone.

[One2Snoop]

After reading your post Jayelles I don't know what to say other than OMG! :eek: :cuss: :flamemad:

[Pelicanette]

The McCanns will have reason to sue any number of publications and individuals when the dust settles. They have been libelled and slandered. There is no doubt of that.