'Stockholm Syndrome' Your* Ass! Major media, puzzled beyond belief by the fact that Shawn Hornbeck, a 15-year-old boy who was (supposedly) abducted 4½ years ago and 'rescued' last Friday, apparently never tried to escape his "abductor". He had more than ample opportunity to do so, including three — count 'em, THREE — occasions when he was in the extended presence of police but didn't say a word:

Tony Douglas [the 'abducted' child's best friend in his new home] previously told Fox News that on three occasions, police stopped Tony and Shawn for being out beyond curfew. Officers gave the boys a lift home, unaware of Shawn's real identity, Tony said.

Shawn himself has said NOTHING. We don't in fact know if he was abducted at all, or just ran away from home, found a kindly stranger who offered him a place to stay and an escape from an unhappy home situation, and the kid took him up on that offer. But that's not juicy enuf.
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No, media want to believe that this kid was so terrified of his 'captor' that he mindlessly gave up his freedom, took his "abductor's" last name, and stayed quiet about his 'terrible secret'. These commentators, who have absolutely no basis for their assertions, have rushed to call his behavior a perfect example of "Stockholm Syndrome", in which a kidnap victim comes to identify with his/her abductor. There's a far simpler explanation: an unhappy kid who hated his home situation (with a stepfather), escaped it, and did not want to go back.
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Today, ABC World News Tonight cited statistics that 797,500 children are reported as missing each year. They then backtracked a bit, to say that "most" of these children return home at some point, but the figure the audience is left with is 797,500 children are reported missing each year. This is a wickedly misleading statement that grotesquely misrepresents the reality. It is part of a larger set of statistics promoted by the vile National Center for Missing and Exploited Children ("NCMEC"), a rich organization that promotes preposterously excessive concern about 'our children' vanishing into the nite. Its website contains this summary of 'statistics'. Note that tho it is eager to say how many kids are reported missing, it doesn't trouble to tell you how many return home or are happily living with a noncustodial parent (usually their father) who loves them and takes terrific care of them!

The U.S. Department of Justice reports

797,500 children (younger than 18) were reported missing in a one-year period of time studied resulting in an average of 2,185 children being reported missing each day.
203,900 children were the victims of family abductions.
58,200 children were the victims of non-family abductions.
115 children were the victims of “stereotypical” kidnapping. (These crimes involve someone the child does not know or someone of slight acquaintance, who holds the child overnight, transports the child 50 miles or more, kills the child, demands ransom, or intends to keep the child permanently.)

So the real statistic of concern is not 797,500 but 115!
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Why does NCMEC act so irresponsibly?

The National Center for Missing & Exploited Children (NCMEC) receives over $35 million [taxpayer] dollars per year to assist with missing children cases.

Plainly it is in the interest of this rich organization to worry as many taxpayers as possible to keep tax moneys more than just private contributions rolling into their bank accounts. It is not, however, in the interest of society to keep promoting the insane idea that the children of the United States are disappearing at a rate of 800,000 a year! The total population of children (people under age 18) in this country is only 73 million. We are supposed to believe that 1% of our children disappear each year, and nobody notices!
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Actually, one report linked to from NCMEC claims that 1,315,600 children vanish each year from the home of their legal caretaker. So over the course of ten years, 13 million of our children have disappeared! Of course they have.
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If you believe that, I have a bridge I'd like to sell you.
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Why is it so hard for people in this country to accept that kids run away? It's practically a rite of passage. Almost all return home. But some become self-emancipated and never go back to a 'home' they couldn't stand.
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One commentator on Shawn Hornbeck observed that he had a pierced eyebrow, then remarked that that showed he had 'self-destructive tendencies' that proved he had been traumatized by his captivity! So all those people I see on the subway every day with pierced eyebrows or lips or tongues or noses have been kidnapped? My God! 35 million taxpayer dollars a year isn't enuf. We've got to send the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children at least a billion dollars a year or the Nation is doomed!
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* Take your pick of many media fools who have asserted, as tho they know, that the kid was suffering "Stockholm Syndrome". My pick would be Sean Hannity, the rightwing half of Fox News Channel's appalling program Hannity & Colmes.
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(The current U.S. military death toll in Iraq, according to the website "Iraq Coalition Casualties", is 2,020 — for Israel.)




- posted by L. Craig Schoonmaker @ 11:59 PM