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Topic: Abandoned Kids... What do you do?

Jeff Stuckey
Film Handler

Posts: 62
From: Oklahoma City, OK, USA
Registered: May 2003

posted 06-23-2003 11:01 AM

I used to manage a second-run theater in Tulsa, and had this problem constantly. Although, it wasn't just for one movie. It was usually the parents dropping the kids off with about $20 for the noon show, and not coming back until after the theater closed (after midnight). I thought it was incredibly sad, and it always pissed me off. Of course these kids run out of money half way through the day. So being the nice person I am, I usually refilled their stuff for free. The REALLY sucky thing about the whole thing was that WE would have been responsible somehow if these we left and the kids were still out on the sidewalk. Looking back, maybe I shouldn't have been so nice to those kids. Maybe if I were crappy, the parents wouldn't have brought them back. Of course, then my home office would have probably gotten a call. It's really a no win situation for everyone. I just wish that some people wouldn't reproduce!!

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Bobby Henderson
"Ask me about Trajan."

Posts: 10973
From: Lawton, OK, USA
Registered: Apr 2001

posted 06-23-2003 05:38 PM

That's one of life's contradictions.

People who have no business breeding often breed prodigiously, just spitting out kids like rabbits or hamsters. And many don't even want kids in the first place or are unable to treat kids any better than a neglected housepet.

Then you have couples who desperately want kids, but the would-be mother has endometriosis or the fellow is shooting blanks and they're spending thousands upon thousands of dollars at the fertility clinic or sifting through reams of paperwork so they can adopt. My cousin Jeff has three adopted kids. He and his wife had to deal with lots of red tape to qualify.

It is pretty disgusting for a parent to leave a kid (or kids) at a movie theater alone for many hours on end. Oklahoma has some really disturbing child care problems, particularly how infant and toddler age kids are treated. Two things need to happen.

First, the parents need to know just how badly they are harming their children by ignoring them or dumping them off from one place to the next. They need to feel ashamed.

Second, the government/educational industry needs to be totally revamped (with many many people being severely FIRED). Oklahoma spends more than half its state budget on education --with a great deal of it going to fat cat administrators/politicians and their harems of do-nothing assistants and ghost-employee friends. The teaching profession needs to be a competitive profession that attracts the best kinds of people instead of low-paid failures. The day-care pre-K ED system needs to be changed so single mothers can actually work and still be able to afford day care and pre-K education for their kids.

Here's an example of how f**ked up the system is. My boss' step-daughter is a young, working single mother. She just got a 50-cent per hour pay raise. But the raise got her day-care assistance nearly cut off. The raise actually amounted to a more than $100 per month pay cut! [Mad]

This is exactly why many single mothers try hard to stay on welfare. When they hold down a job they do more starving. [fu]

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John Spooner
Expert Film Handler

Posts: 186
From: South Australia, Australia
Registered: Jan 2003

posted 06-24-2003 02:00 PM

"Ultimately, the vast majority of blame on a person growing up to be a screwup sadly comes down on him or herself. Having a bad childhood gives NO ONE the license to commit crime, abuse kids or do any other selfish crap."

Dear Bobby. What you say in this paragraph is so true and can be summed up in 2 words which most people don`t like hearing, namely SELF RESPONSIBILITY.
John Spooner.

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