http://www.gamesarefun.com/news.php?newsid=5197

Tragic for the child and disgusting behaviour by the parents.

It's another sad case of parents being retarded morons, who should never be allowed to have a child.

I fear however, that the media will try to put the blame on the computer games, which is just plain ridiculous. This tragedy could probably happen just as well with them being at the movies or walking through a park or having a drink with their friends. It is related to computer games about as much as to the shoemaking industry, becuase without shoes those bastards wouldn't probably be able to leave their house.

Just my sixpence.

Ditto legs. Preferable imo.

Nonsense, accidents happen. So what?



A couple of hours, i.e. < 5 is neglect? Over five hours is neglect? Why? Because they played World of Warcraft? What if they were at home and they simply slept? I have been told that sleeping for ~5 hours it not that unusual. The baby suffocated on its stomach, so I don't expect that it made too much noise. If they were at home it would have been called 'Sudden Infant Death Syndrome' and it would not be interesting enough to make it in the news.

Union.Simon.616, yeah but its the korea gaming craze story again. You heard about the people that spend weaks playing on online multiplayers and the games that their government have banned because too many children were playing them constantly?

So I'd say it's the parents' responsibility to make sure such "accidents" do not happen. This isn't exactly the same accident as, let's say, twisting your ankle.



I wouldn't exactly give a shit as to for what reason and for how long they left the child alone, the important thing is, what happened to it and that nobody was apparently watching it. That, I would call neglecting. But of course you're right, if it wasn't related to video-gaming and, as Spud pointed out, the Korea craze, it wouldn't probably even made local news. None the less, this is something that just shouldn't happen.



Right, I overlooked it at first. Yes, that does put the entire situation in a bit different light, but still the bottom line is that an infant died, because its dumbass parents decided to just enjoy themselves.

haven't read the full story, but from personal experience they should be hung.

Playing a game at home for 4 hours is one thing, but they left the baby alone?

I can honestly say none of mine or the wifes kids have been left alone for minutes at that age, let alone hours.

Union.Simon.616, you are absolutely right, it should not happen. However, accidents happen everywhere. I would totally agree with you when it was one of the cases where parents leave there childen for days unattended or leave there children in a hot car for hours. But in this case they could have put it normally into its bed in the evening and found it dead next morning. You simply cannot watch a child 24/7. How long does it take for a child to suffocate? Probably only a few minutes. So it does not really matter whether they were 5 hours, 1 hour or only 30 minutes away. Might sound cruel, but this is IMHO nothing more than a case of bad luck.

You never slept? You wife never slept? There was always one of you awake? There was never even one minute where not at least one eye pair was awake watching the baby? Sorry, I don't believe you.

In all fairness, they shouldn't be hung. Infact someone said the same thing on the above link but i might as well say it again, that's not what they actually 'deserve' given the entire spectrum of crimes. It would undermine the entire legal system completely. Its manslaughter at best and i don't think its even that legally speaking; child neglect that unfortunately resulted in a fatality, rather than murder or something where a death penality would actually be applicable. I don't think it will be classified as man slaughter either. The child died, but they didn't murder it of course.

"they should be hung" is what i expect from Sun headlines obviously, but in reality, that's not a sentance that should be given out even in countries that have the death penalty. Then again, some arab countries, among wacky obscure places, chop your hands off for stealing bread so there i hate to think what happens. Hangings a bit more in line with that kind of 'overkill'. I dunno what the legal system is like in america, but in the uk, I doubt it would be anything more than 5-10 years, if that. Given the nature, its probably not going to be anything anywhere near a long sentance, probably somewhere round a year.

It undermines the whole concept of the judicial system.... even if they are absolute scum or not.

Obviously you didn't mean it beyong outrage i assume, else you've just put crimes like corporate embeselment and neglect to hung drawn and quartered... then again it doesn't sound all that bad

Edit:
Wargand new replies raises very good points as well, the article doesn't say anything about what time it happened or anything, it could very well have been put to sleep. But i think its the fact there was no one at home, its illegal to do that in the uk, legally you need a babysitter and rightly so.

Actually I do think this is a borderline case. Though I think that leaving a baby alone for 5 hours can happen. Gaming is absolutely not an acceptable reason for it. And it might be illegal to leave a child alone at home, but even if it wasn't it would not mean that this would not have happened. No, I have no children, but many friends have. And one thing they all told me: They where really really glad when the time came that their children slept through. But even if they still set up there alarm clocks to wake up every two hours to check. Where is the guarantee that nothing terrible happens after two hours and ten minutes?

@ Spud, I did not literally mean they should be hung, more of a metaphorical thing.

@Wargand, the thing is you are correct that you cannot watch kids constantly, but on the other hand, if you were in bed at night and wake up for a drink or the toilet, it is a parents instinct to just stick ya head round the corner, so to speak, and just check. There is always a chance you could do that within seconds of them stopping breathing, maybe the kid could be saved.

Imagine the house caught fire, smoke alarms would wake you up and you could save the child, you fuck off out and the poor sprog will probably fry.

Does anyone commenting here actually have kids? It is so easy to have opinions, but parenting is pure instinct, even now I check the kids are fine when I go to bed

Everyone is glad when the kids start sleeping thru the night, hell yeah it is great, but you still have the instinct. We often get awoken by one of the kids coughing, it is just pure instinct.

At the end of the day, leaving a baby alone for any amount of time is terrible, this is my opinion and no-one will change it.

Yes accidents happen, but if you are there to catch the tail end of it the outcome can be so different.

I gotta say that for the first time I massively disagree with you wargand, and no offence intended, but you have no bond with a child, so you are not qualified to comment. Before my kid popped along, I had all these opinions and ideas, and trust me, they soon went out the window.

The bond should be so strong you will do anything to ensure their safety.

I will comment no further on this matter now, people like that piss me off. They chose a game over the well being of their child, that is not acceptable under any circumstances. You have children and they are your priority for years, simple as. If you wanna have 5 hour gaming sessions with your partner then stay at home or get a qualified babysitter.

Addendum:
Sorry Wargand, but I do not see how this a borderline case. They left a completely defenceless baby alone, for fucks sake what is wrong with these ppl?

A few minutes while you have a bath, yeah that happens, and you are still nearby, but going to a cunting internet cafe just to play a game.

My blood boils when I hear shit like this, you do not even wanna know what I could do to these wankers.

Missed this but for what it's worth hee's my sixpunce.
I have kids, 3 of them in fact and i would say that this was totally irresponsible parenting, I understand it was highlighted over the game craze in korea but TBH it doesn't matter what they were doing,you just don't leave a 4 month old baby alone in the house full stop. If they had been at home there may have been a small chance they may have noticed. I have a 14 month old and even now when she goes downs to sleep day or night one of us will pop our heads round the door to check she's ok right up till we go to bed. we still check on the other 2 even thou they are both well past the danger age for this type of thing to happen. This was neglect and even tho I agree that it could have happened while they were at home, when you have kids you take every step you can to ensure they stay alive, cus once they are gone thats it. I think these people will suffer in having to live with what they did for the sake of a video game because they will allways ask themselves "would it have happened if we were at home" probably not.
very very sad

TaKYoN and Dr Phibes, right on, guys, I agree with every word you say. This is just the way you behave with kids, specially infants, it even goes beyond the simple responsibility, as Tak wrote - it's more of an instinct to watch your offspring, specially during the time when it's most vulnurable and defensless. What these people did isn't even irrisponsible, it's just as if they simply didn't give shit about their kid. They wanted to have fun, so they just went for it. While of course it is for the judicial system to decide what to do with them, it is still very, very wrong and it just pisses me and I bet everybody who ever had a child, off. It pisses off horribly.

But the saddest thing for me is actually that things like this happend in this day of age on regular bases and are considered by general public as normal. Exactly as Wargand wrote: "Accidents happen".

And this particular case just got highlighted because it's connected to one of the currect hot topics, otherwise it probably wouldn't even made the evening news.

But the fact is: It is normal. People make mistakes. Mistakes cause accidents. I think this is normal and we have to live with it. You want to condemn the couple? Do it. I am sure the parent of the dead baby would do exactly the same if the same thing had happened not to them, but to their neighbours. For some reason some people seem to believe that something like that could never happen to them. Fine, perhaps this special case cannot, but there are many many more possibilities to make mistakes. Whenever I watch a trial regarding a traffic accident I think that car drivers are supposed to be gods. "You should have known...", "You should have been able to...". Yada yada. If you cannot see at least ten seconds into the future and can solve differential equations in your head, you are not fit to drive a car. If you do anyways and you have an accident and it involves children, everybody tries to outplay everybody else in self-righteous disgust. I just wonder who are the aliens who constantly pass me with high speed when I drive normally? I usually do. Or from what planet come those I see drinking alcohol and then entering their cars? Are those the same who demand to hang those who did not have the luck not to cause an accident while drunk? Probably yes.

So don't get me wrong. It absolutly don't want to excuse everything as unavoidable fate. But sorry Tak, I just get goose pimples when I hear someone demand death penalty for stupidity.

And Union what are you willing to accept to prevent such or similar accidents for sure? You could remove the childern from their parents as soon as they are born and raise them in special locations under constant surveillance. You could prohibit cars and never ever a kid would be killed by one. Doesn't this sound great? Of course hollidays near water is forbidden, too. The kid could drown. The windows in houses cannot be opened anymore. The kids could fall out.

And no, I never had an accident of some sort. I was lucky.

Wargand we all know accidents happen but IMO this is an accident that could have been prevented and this is why.
At 4 months old most babys can roll over but sometimes have difficulty getting back on their backs. If this baby had been put down on it's back( I've never heard anybody suggest you put them down on their front) and rolled over it would almost certianly have cried out untill falling asleep again.Now i'm not suggesting that the parents would have 100% heard the cries they could have been doing anything in that short space of time it take to suffocate but there is absolutly no way they would have heard from the internet cafe. Also at 4 months all of my kids were feeding at between 1hr and 3-4 hr intervals even bottle fed babys are fed at 4-6 hr intervals. Did they not think he might be hungry ofr thirsty.





People who get behind the wheel drunk are concidered irrisponible criminals
because they have neglected their responibility to eveyone else and caused death or injury to others. They are usually sent to jail

IMO this goes beyond stupidity it is neglect of parental responsibility
which has resulted in the babys death. And I would be concerned if these people had or have other children as they obviously have no maternal instincts at all.



now thats to over the top



No you teach your children how to cross the road wont stop it I know but again minimise the risks as much as poss



Teach them to swim. Wont be 100% but sure does cut the odds



Window locks allow you to open them enough to let air in but not the kids out
Bit of pain not being able to open them fully in summer but it's one of the tiny little things i sacrifice gladly for my kids safety.
A bit like not being able to just get up and go out for hours on end doing exactly what i want.I gave that up when I had kids.

Dr Phibes, I doubt there was even a single accident in history of mankind, which could not have been prevented.


According to your own interval not. You said 4-6 hrs. They were 5 hrs away. This is in between 4-6 hrs. So generally there seems to be no problem. As some of you admitted it is possible that you watch your baby carefully, but in the time you have to go to the bathroom, it rolls over and suffocates. In this case I would not blame the death of the baby to the parents. But they left the baby alone. This is were I see the only problem in this case. Even if this tragedy did not happen, this and not the death of the child is where the parents are to blame. What if somewhere in the house a fire starts? Nobody would be there to safe the baby. If such recklesness is punishable depends on the Korean laws.



Yada yada, I think this hypocrisy. I constantly see how people drink and drive. As long as nothing bad happens noone is considered an irresponsible criminal. If something happens the same people which yesterday drove home after a few drinks with friends demand to put the accident driver permanently in jail or worse. Generally no problem with this, culpable negligence must be punished. I just don't like the self-righteous condemnation of those who had the bad luck that their mistake led to a catastrophy.


Neglect of parental responsibility? Sure. But I would see the death of the baby seperated from that. I suppose just like the drunken driver, leaving a baby alone happens more often than you think, but usually nothing bad happens. And concerned if these people have other children? Perhaps they are as shocked as most of you here? Perhaps next time the would be over cautious? Btw. is known how old the parents were?


I am sure if someone could check everything you did or did not, there would be more than one event where you were lucky that nothing bad happened.

Wargand wrote

We arn't talking about a dog here this is a 4 month old baby even if they went for 5 hrs dont you think thats cutting it a bit fine ?
and its not that i think its ok to leave a animal alone but this has to be put in perspective and if it was in this country it's illegal to leave a child that young alone.
I think the age of this baby is the crux of the reaction, humans have the most defenceless young and for the longest period in the animal kingdom, at 4 months they are so so helpless and IMO these people were more than stupid they must have known it was wrong.
Most babys that die like this die in 6-10 hr sleep periods not when people are having a bath or out in the garden.



This is off topic and I havn't drunk at all since I was 14yrs old when i had some awfull experiences. So I can swear on my kids life I have never drunk and drove.So i would say that it is only your opinion that eveybody thinks it's ok till something goes wrong, because IMO anyone who d+d, accident or not is a totally irrisponsible



Absolutly true no one can be perfect parents mine wern't and as my kids get older they tell us sometimes we don't allways get it right and usually they are right. It's a learning prosses for all but if anything ever happened to any of them at least we would take comfort in the fact that we did everything we could to stop it.

TBO the country or the relevent laws don't matter as much as the fact that this was morally wrong for any parent to leave a baby so young alone for any amount of time.
I don't know if you plan to have to have any kids but if you ever do you will look into your kids eyes and you yourself will wonder how these people ever did what they did.