Missing Children

Parent Cafe
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<p>What’s with all the missing children? Every night on my news show, they have a moment for “Have you Seen [Name of Child]?” Every night, it’s a different child – some have been missing for a few weeks, some for decades. They show a photo, age-advanced if appropriate, and give the date the child went missing and how old he would be now. I realize that some of the teenagers may be runaways, but they show many many children under the age of 12 who have been missing for months, if not years. </p>

<p>Why don’t we hear about these kids?? I would expect the media to be all over these stories. After Etan Patz, are we all jaded?</p>

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<p>Most are the victims of non custodial parent kidnapping.</p>

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<p>^I agree. Check out post #13
<a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/parent-cafe/1299861-weird-behavior-youve-witnessed-flight.html[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/parent-cafe/1299861-weird-behavior-youve-witnessed-flight.html&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

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<p>How do you know this?? How do you know they’re not kidnapped by strangers, sexually abused, and killed?</p>

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<p>Because on average, most missing kids are victims of custody fights. </p>

<p>When my kids were little–80s and early 90s, the media was filled with the statistic that “1 million kids a year disappeared.” We were all suppposed to be terrified of stranger kidnapping–this was the beginning of the era of never let your kids out of your sight.</p>

<p>But I remember thinking–what can that possibly mean? There were maybe 50 million kids in the country-- 1 out of 50 were disappearing??? My kids school had 300 kids in it, but 6 kids had not disappeared.</p>

<p>It eventually turned out that the “1 million” meme came from adding up all custody disputes, even if the kid was missing for an hour, and all runaways, same thing. Actually, and thankfully, stranger kidnapping was incredibly rare then, as it is now.</p>

<p>But the atmosphere of fear, suspicion, and loss of freedom for kids has been enshrined in our culture. To everyone’s detriment.</p>

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<p>Is it less heartbreaking when your child is missing if the kidnapper is the other parent or a grandparent? I don’t think so.</p>

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<p>Less heartbreaking? Probably not, but IMO it’s a bit more comforting. The odds are much lower that a parent or family member is going to kill or rape the child than a stranger who kidnaps him/her. </p>

<p>Truthfully, the media is only “all over these stories” if the kid is a beautiful little white kid from a nice neighborhood. Think back. When was the last time you remember a minority kid whose disappearance made national news. Personally, I can’t think of any but I don’t watch Nancy Grace. Kaylee Anthony, Elizabeth Smart, Madeliene (?) McCann, Jonbonet Ramsey, Shawn Hornbeck.</p>

<p>VH, we do know that most are kidnapped by a family member. We know because most kids who are reported missing are returned. <a href=“http://www.missingkids.com/missingkids/servlet/PageServlet?PageId=2816[/url]”>http://www.missingkids.com/missingkids/servlet/PageServlet?PageId=2816&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

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<p>Perhaps it depends on the demographic of your area. Missing children in my diverse area are covered. One of my friend 's brother disappeared and was found murdered. He was black and that got coverage. More recently, a case that broke my heart got huge local coverage. A woman was arrested on a drug charge. CPS wouldn’t let her four year old son stay with relatives. He was placed in stranger foster care and disappeared off the face of the earth. Just gone. And the city doesn’t seem that concerned.</p>

<p>I disagree that having your child kidnapped by a relative would be in any way comforting.</p>

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<p>ZM, I said national news. I’m from the Detroit area so locally it’s much more diverse. But nationally, nope.</p>

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<p>Romani, I’m in NYC. You know, we think it’s all about us! In terms of media, there is a lot of overlap. But you make an excellent point in general. The lives of minority children seem to attract a lot less concern. A lot less.</p>

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<p>It’s true- in so many areas. Missing children is only the tip of the iceberg for how little concern is paid to minority children (and children in poverty for that matter- minority or white; lip service- plenty, action- little) :(.</p>

<p>Sorry, back to the OT…</p>

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<p>oooh. I thought this was a thread about missing children, as in missing our children…</p>

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<p>I certainly miss my 24yo child jym, even though he usually responds to texts within minutes. The idea of him being abducted by anyone ever makes me ill.</p>

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<p>Of course any missing child is beyond distressing, but first I do agree that most children in custody cases are not at the same kind of physical risk as in stranger abductions. And that’s what the OP was envisioning.</p>

<p>Secondly, the vast majority of missing kids are not missing for long–thankfully.</p>

<p>Most “milk carton” cases are either runaway or custody disputes. Yes, they’re distressing, but that’s a different kind of issue than the stranger abduction/killings/sexual abuse that the OP refered to. Again, thankfully, those cases are rare (and should be rarer), but over-hyping the reality as has happened in the past only spreads fear without changing anything.</p>

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<p>Some of those biological parents are dangerous to their kids. Spreading fear is different from spreading alertness.</p>

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<p>Yes, that’s true. Again, the OP asked in the context of these being stranger abductions, which would require a different kind of alertness.</p>

<p>I think it’s important not to conflate the two.</p>

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<p>From missingkids dot com:</p>

<pre><code>Nearly 800,000 children younger than 18 are missing each year, or an average of 2,185 children reported missing each day.
More than 200,000 children were abducted by family members.
More than 58,000 children were abducted by nonfamily members.
115 children were the victims of “stereotypical” kidnapping. These crimes involve someone the child does not know or a 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.
</code></pre>

<p>According to the website, these statistics are from a 2002 study, so the results are a little old. I have no idea if things are better or worse than ten years ago.</p>

<p>Regardless, 58,000 children were abducted by nonfamily members – who? Next-door neighbors? And 115 children were victims of “stereotypical” kidnapping. (What an interesting phrase.) That’s a heck of a lot of families impacted by this. I imagine each one of those children has parents, siblings, grandparents, cousins, neighbors, classmates, etc. At a minimum, I’d assume 25 people in each one of these children’s lives. I just don’t understand how this happens and we don’t hear about it.</p>

<p>I also wonder how the study knows it was “only” 115 children. Maybe I should read the study to find out how they conducted their research. </p>

<p>Here’s the study: </p>

<p>Andrea J. Sedlak, David Finkelhor, Heather Hammer, and Dana J. Schultz. U.S. Department of Justice. “National Estimates of Missing Children: An Overview” in National Incidence Studies of Missing, Abducted, Runaway, and Thrownaway Children. Washington, DC: Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention, Office of Justice Programs, U.S. Department of Justice, October 2002, page 5.</p>

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<p>I think it’s important to understand that most “missing children” are either runaways or kids who are caught up in custody disputes, not kids who have been kidnaped by strangers.</p>

<p>Runaways are a serious problem. Custody disputes are a serious problem. But these problems are not the same as kidnaping by strangers, and they need to be addressed in different ways. </p>

<p>Very little is accomplished by working to solve the wrong problem.</p>

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<p>garland, I understand what you’re saying, but I’m a psychologist. Sometimes family members are the worst offenders for sexual abuse.</p>

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<p>From that study, they only know the details of about 30%. 200,000 children were abducted by family members that they know of, 58,000 were abducted by nonfamily members. That leaves 442,000 where it sounds like they have no idea who took them - many of those may be runaways. But of the known cases, a very small percentage fit the model of a stranger picking a random kid and putting them in danger.</p>

<p>I’m sure nonfamily member means neighbors or someone else the family may have known - not complete strangers. I recall several years ago a girl in the next town over who was invited by a neighbor to go our for ice cream, and he ended up taking her 30 miles away and killing her - that’s what they mean by nonfamily member.</p>

<p>When a local child (or even adult) is missing, we hear about it on our local news. I don’t think there are really that many that are worthy of national news. Even many of the cases that have made the national news haven’t really been that newsworthy.</p>