Saddam Hussein keeps on killling

[Rach3]

A day after Saddam's execution, a 10-year-old boy in Texas hanged himself from a bunk bed after watching a news report on the execution. Police in the Houston suburb of Webster said the boy, Sergio Pelico, tied a slipknot around his neck while on the bed but had not mean to kill himself.

"I don't think he thought it was real," Julio Gustavo, Sergio's uncle, said afterward. "They showed them putting the noose around his neck and everything. Why show that on TV?"

Something similar occurred in Turkey, where 12-year-old Alisen Akti hanged himself Wednesday from a bunk bed after watching TV footage. His father, Esat Akti, told a newspaper in the southeastern province of Mus that his son had been affected by the televised images.

"After watching Saddam's execution he was constantly asking 'How was Saddam killed?' and 'Did he suffer?'" Akti was quoted as saying. "These television images are responsible for my son's death."

Nine-year-old Mubassahr Ali, from the eastern Pakistan town of Rahim Yar Khan, died hours after Saddam when he also mimicked the ousted leader's execution, local police official Sultan Ahmed Chaudhry said.

"The ill-fated boy used a long piece of cloth, tied it with a ceiling fan and wrapped its other end around his neck. Then he stood on a chair and fell down," Chaudhry said.

In Yemen, at least two young boys died and another was injured in apparent imitations of Saddam's hanging.

One of the cases involved a 13-year-old junior high school student who hanged himself after watching Saddam's execution on television, a Yemeni security official said.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070114/ap_on_re_mi_ea/saddam_mimicry_hangings [Broken]

What the HELL are little kids doing watching televised executions? What kind of barbaric parents would force that on a ten-year-old, too young even to comprehend that hanging results in death?

(And for that matter, what kind of barbarians televise the murder of a man as if it were a simple political event, and not something fundamentally and utterly perverse?)

 

[radou]

What kind of barbaric parents would force that on a ten-year-old, too young even to comprehend that hanging results in death?

There is nothing mentioned about parents forcing kids to watch/comprehend that.

(And for that matter, what kind of barbarians televise the murder of a man as if it were a simple political event, and not something fundamentally and utterly perverse?)

I agree with that.

Anyway, I wouldn't be so sure that the events with these kids occurred due to viewing that execution only, though. There can always be something more to it. Btw, how do you explain the countless hangings in westerns we watched in our childhoods? I know they never inspired me to try out anything similar as a game.

 

[Kurdt]

To be honest, anyone who can be that influenced by television deserves anything that's coming to them. Beyond that if they are too young to comprehend things depicted correctly then surely some blame should be apportioned to either parents or networks that broadcast the images.

To say that Saddam is killing from beyond the grave is a bit contrived since I'm sure he'd rather not have been hanged.

 

[ranger]

"After watching Saddam's execution he was constantly asking 'How was Saddam killed?' and 'Did he suffer?'" Akti was quoted as saying. "These television images are responsible for my son's death."

Yup. And I'm sure McDonalds is responsible for heart attacks.

 

[Rach3]

To be honest, anyone who can be that influenced by television deserves anything that's coming to them.

A ten year old deserves to hang to death?

 

[Kurdt]

A ten year old deserves to hang to death?

No. It is clear however that these people who are influenced by television are not part of the average populace.

 

[Rach3]

You've never met a kid in your life, have you Kurdt? Any ten-year-old has no grasp of the distinction between reality and fiction; plus they imitate everything they see. It's odd to me that you see this as being an abnormal case, blaming it on unusual stupidity or the like.

 

[Rach3]

To get back to my OP question - what the hell kind of parents show their kids a televised execution? :grumpy:

 

[Kurdt]

You've never met a kid in your life, have you Kurdt? Any ten-year-old has no grasp of the distinction between reality and fiction; plus they imitate everything they see. It's odd to me that you see this as being an abnormal case, blaming it on unusual stupidity or the like.

I'm sure that when I was ten years old I could distinguish what would be bad for me and what would not. Kids are not as stupid as people would have them be. If it were a normality then the number of reported deaths of children hanging themselves in the same manner would be much greater because I am fairly sure that a significantly larger number of children than these few cases would have seen the footage.

 

[ranger]

Any ten-year-old has no grasp of the distinction between reality and fiction;

I disagree with that. By the time children reach the middle school years, they can distinguish between the two.

 

[Anttech]

No. It is clear however that these people who are influenced by television are not part of the average populace.

That is absolutely absurd, Every time you want CNN news, or whatever you are influenced by the TV...

 

[Kurdt]

That is absolutely absurd, Every time you want CNN news, or whatever you are influenced by the TV...

You are influenced to form opinions or perhaps takes certain actions depending on the circumstances. To be influenced to the point where you take your own life is not common. I could have perhaps articulated myself better but I thought the context was clear.

 

[arunbg]

To be influenced to the point where you take your own life is not common.

Well, I'm sure that the children didn't actually want to lose their lives in the process of imitation. They just saw an event receiving a lot of publicity in the media and wanted to mimic it, "know how it feels".
Otherwise these are not accidents or mishaps, just plain suicide.

Parenting has a lot to be blamed. By the age of 10 or so, one would expect adults to have taught children how to use proper discretion and learn to discriminate what is seen on TV.

 

[verty]

When I was young, I was fascinated one day by the TV, how I could press one channel button and another would pop out, it was like the one button was communicating to the other. So I pressed two buttons simultaneously, they both stayed in but another released both of them. So I pressed them all in simultaneously...

I don't think young children think ahead all that much.

 

[Averagesupernova]

I pretty much agree with everything Kurdt has said. When I was younger a kid about 4 years old hung himself accidentally. Kids do things like this and that is why parents need to watch them. Where I come from the average ten year old is smart enough to know that hanging causes death. However, they are not necessarily smart enough to think about putting a noose around their neck standing at the top of the stairway while the other end of the rope is tied to something and how a simple mis-step could mean their death.

 

[radou]

Any ten-year-old has no grasp of the distinction between reality and fiction; plus they imitate everything they see.

If it was so, about 90 % of us wouldn't be typing on this forum right now.