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View Full Version : Man Conducts 'Social Experiment' On Child Abduction -- With Shocking Results



Teh One Who Knocks
06-01-2015, 11:50 AM
By Jared Keever - Opposing Views


http://i.imgur.com/TLV2tUe.jpg

A video, recently published on YouTube, purports to show how easily children can be lured away from a playground by a stranger.

The Daily Mail reports the video (shown below) was posted to the YouTube channel of a video prankster who goes by the name “JoeySalads.”

In the video, labeled by JoeySalads as a “social experiment,” the man, after getting permission from parents, uses a puppy to lure the children away.

In three separate instances, the man approaches moms sitting on a park bench, watching their children play on a nearby playground.

He asks each of the women if they have taught their children not to talk strangers. After assuring him that they have and that their children would never walk off the playground with a stranger, they give him permission to approach the kids and try to lure them away.

After introducing a small, white dog to each of the children and telling them the dog is named “Doughnuts,” he asks if they would like to “go see the other puppies.”

In each instance, the child agrees to go, walking off with the man while holding his hand as the mother sits and stares, appearing shocked.

“Over 700 children are abducted a day, that’s over a quarter million a year,” he says, addressing the camera at the end of the video. “Are your kids safe?”

The video has been viewed over 800,000 times and news of it is quickly spreading across the Internet.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gGIDHrYKJ2s

But one blogger, Lenore Skenazy, who runs the blog Free Range Kids took exception to the video, arguing that it ought not be shared as if the man were doing a public service.

“Not addressed are a few salient facts, including the biggie: Isn’t it more than likely that these kids feel fine going off with this man because they just saw him talking to their mom?” Skenazy writes.

“After this bizarre scenario that he calls an experiment — without ever telling us how many kids he approached who did not go off with him — he says 700 kids are abducted a day, presumably by the type of person he’s warning us about: a ‘stranger,’” she continues.

“Which is interesting, as the U.S. Dept. of Justice puts the number of children abducted by strangers at 115 a year,” she adds. “He says 255,550 a year. The crime stats say 115 a year.”

Skenazy also notes that most crimes against children are committed by someone they know -- not a stranger. She calls the message in the video “scary” and “misleading.”

"Thanks, Mr. Salads,” she concludes. “You have emptied the parks, locked children inside, and frozen parents’ hearts, with a big lie. And a cute puppy.”

Fodster
06-03-2015, 12:33 AM
Fuck me that's risky, lucky he weren't shot!

Hal-9000
06-03-2015, 06:49 PM
115 per year is too many, there's no acceptable limit to child abductions. And those are the children that were assumed to be abducted. The actual number of missing children per year is higher than that.

RBP
06-03-2015, 07:24 PM
115 per year is too many, there's no acceptable limit to child abductions. And those are the children that were assumed to be abducted. The actual number of missing children per year is higher than that.
Stranger abductions doesn't include parental abductions.

RBP
06-03-2015, 07:24 PM
But Lenore is spot on.

Hal-9000
06-03-2015, 07:30 PM
Stranger abductions doesn't include parental abductions.

And there's a large variation between missing children stats and stranger abduction stats, that was my point. Downplaying a certain type of statistic (stranger danger) is hard to quantify because they really don't know the reason behind some missing children incidents.

RBP
06-04-2015, 03:15 AM
And there's a large variation between missing children stats and stranger abduction stats, that was my point. Downplaying a certain type of statistic (stranger danger) is hard to quantify because they really don't know the reason behind some missing children incidents.

I hear ya. I get it. But... Kids are at far more risks from family members than strangers (90%+). Kids are far more at risk from a whole slew of things than strangers. Why focus on missing and ignore kids killed by cars and every other danger? Because it's easy to create a bogeyman and ignore things that we think we may have been able to control.

Teh One Who Knocks
06-04-2015, 11:30 AM
I think what helps perpetuate the myth of 'stranger danger' is the 24/7 news cycle now. If a kid is abducted in Podunk, Idaho, the 24 hour cable news channels are all over it. Something like that would have never made national news before 24 hour cable news. So now, everyone hears about every disappearance now as soon as it happens, no matter the circumstances. I would posit that child abductions are no more prevalent now than they were when we were all growing up (per capita).

RBP
06-04-2015, 11:33 AM
Yes. :agreed:

Having a national safety campaign named STRANGER DANGER didn't help any either, despite it being dropped because it was proven totally wrong. But that stuck with people.