Starting young
The Dom Post has a sad story of the death of a two year old. They had a photo of the mum:
My first thought was that the mother looked very young, almost school age. It transpires she is 19. But what struck me was this:
The 19-year-old and her partner of six years
I can’t imagine there are many people who are still with the boyfriend they had when they were 13!
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March 12th, 2009 at 7:34 pm
I nearly choked; not at the length of their relationship, but that they were deemed to have been “partners” since the age of 13 (when only just teenagers). Doesn’t that term imply an ‘adult’ relationship? Isn’t that illegal? Or possibly it’s sloppy journalism – using buzz words can be very misleading.
March 12th, 2009 at 7:50 pm
Yeah, Nell has a point. I started going out with my now wife when she was 14, we got married 6 years later, and have been happily married now for over 12 years. However, I wouldn’t have called her my partner when she was 14.
March 12th, 2009 at 8:00 pm
MarkS – excellent! I was married at 20 and we’re at >20 years together now and very happy. Mrs Getstaffed is an awesome woman, not the lest for putting up with my glaring faults for so long
As to the DomPost, story I agree with Nell214 – it’s probably sloppy journalism
March 12th, 2009 at 8:01 pm
David, because YOU can’t imagine it, doesn’t mean it cannot happen for others. Maybe you just need some relationship counselling.
Of course it is much more important to pick at their age and their relationship than it is to look at the actual story, but that’s you right wingers, isn’t it?
Being married at 12/14, mother at 13/14 was not that uncommon not so long ago.
[DPF: Fuck you are an obnoxious dork. This is not a political story. I just found it interesting. But no you have to wank on about right wingers and stereotypes. ]
[DPF: Oh yeah and the crack at relationship counselling gets you 20 demerits. Should be more but being a pillock does not qualify yet]
March 12th, 2009 at 8:11 pm
my own first thought was
that it’s sad when a much loved
human being dies
March 12th, 2009 at 8:14 pm
And it’s still an important part of Socialist supporter growth strategy today. Also, I think you’ll find that when it was ‘not uncommon’ life expencency was <50, free eucation didn’t exist and infant mortality rate was sky high. Keen for us to return there broker? Just another few terms of government and we’ll be back to the good ‘ol days eh?
Haiku Dave: Agreed. The loss of a loved one is tragic.
March 12th, 2009 at 8:18 pm
“Maybe you just need some relationship counselling.”
billysucker; maybe you just need a psychiatrist as clearly you have a loose screw in your head.
March 12th, 2009 at 9:32 pm
At least if she was with her partner she is not a teenager on the DPB. nonetheless it’s still a very tragic story and I feel for them. I’ve lost 2 family members after contracting meningococcal septicaemia in the same ‘fine’ hospital.
No accountability, no changes made. Another legacy of the last 9 years when the focus of the govt was to ‘fix’ your mind and not your injuries
March 12th, 2009 at 9:47 pm
Things I learnt from this post:
A toddler died.
Right wingers suck.
Socialists suck.
Labour ruined hospitals.
And people said reasoned discussion was a thing of the past in this ADD, texting age.
March 12th, 2009 at 9:50 pm
Patrick, that’s horrible! I’ve lost a friend this way. It’s so fast.
March 12th, 2009 at 9:57 pm
getstaffed One of them wasnt all that fast really. It took the bastards a full 2 weeks to kill my dad – (who was only in there for a back injury)
March 12th, 2009 at 10:55 pm
If I took my child to hospital with a high temp, crying, vomiting, sleepy/floppy/rash and photophobic etc, hell would freeze over before I would accept a decision to take her home. But then, I am not 19 years old, uneducated, bewildered and intimidated by “professional” people in a “foreign” environment.. This is not political , you morons. Some of you really need to grow up and get a grip on something other than your willies.
March 13th, 2009 at 5:59 am
To those commenting on the word ‘partner’ … I don’t think it’s really fair to assume a serious sexual relationship existed back then. Possible, yes … probable, a matter of debate … definite? No way.
I would imagine that there was no chance she considered the father of her baby to be her partner at 13. I can’t imagine any teenage girl thinking of the guy she was with as anything other than her boyfriend, even if they were having sex.
My expectation is that the word was chosen because now (and quite rightly, considering her partner to be the father of her baby) he IS her partner, and it would be a bit silly to say “Yeah, she had a baby with her boyfriend of six years”. If that word had been used, it would sound as if they weren’t serious about each other NOW.
I think it’s nice she’s been with the same guy since she was 13 (If they were having sex back then, I’m just glad the relationship didn’t end as she grew older). I hope the two are able to recover from the sad loss of their child.
March 13th, 2009 at 8:26 am
Fck – I can’t believe this has degraded into a discussion of the poor mother’s sex life and age – she just lost her son ffs. I don’t know how I would cope if I lost my 2 yo boy… Just let her grieve…
If she hadn’t been a pretty looking woman I doubt whether this discussion would have unfolded in this manner; the objectification is soo thinly veiled in this post’s discussion, that it makes me sick for her at this time…
Stand strong Ms Tobin…
March 13th, 2009 at 11:00 am
From a recent “Family First” communique (included in TGIF Edition)
In NZ in 2007:
54 15 year old boys fathered children
15 UNDER-15 year old boys fathered children
39 UNDER-15 year old girls gave birth to children
I wonder how many of these would understand a question including the term “financially able to support”, like that Pommie kid on TV didn’t?
March 13th, 2009 at 11:19 am
From Theodore Dalrymple’s famous Frontpage Magazine interview: (“Our Culture: What’s Left Of It”)
FP: “You have a fascinating essay in this collection: “Who Killed Childhood?” In it you profoundly illuminate the “egotistical inability to feel, compensated for by an outward show.” You connect this to the death of childhood. Could you talk about this?”
Dalrymple: “Childhood in large parts of modern Britain, at any rate, has been replaced by premature adulthood, or rather adolescence. Children grow up very fast but not very far. That is why it is possible for 14 year olds now to establish friendships with 26 year olds – because they know by the age of 14 all they are ever going to know.
It is important in this environment to appear knowing, or street wise, otherwise you will be taken for a weakling and exploited accordingly. Thus, feelings for others does not develop. Moreover, the model of discipline in the homes has changed, with the complete breakdown of the family (in my hospital, were it not for the Indian immigrants, the illegitimacy rate of children born there would be 100 per cent). Children grow up now in circumstances in which discipline is merely a matter of imposing the will of one person on another, it is raw power devoid of principle. Lenin’s question – Who Whom or who does what to whom – is the whole basis of human relations……”
The whole interview is a tremendously insightful comment on our social problems:
http://www.frontpagemag.com/Articles/Read.aspx?GUID=D2C70DCE-BF86-4761-9788-03AB7FAB2608
March 13th, 2009 at 11:28 pm
More sex education @ younger ages = more young kids having sex, who never would have thought of it before. Gee, thanks Family Planning…..
Lets just go to schools, hand out condoms and hope that kids don’t actually try it….duh.
The same thing is happening in the UK
March 13th, 2009 at 11:53 pm
but how many more
girls would have got up the duff
if they had no sheaths?
March 14th, 2009 at 11:02 am
the more you teach them
the more they want to try it
it’s only normal
March 16th, 2009 at 8:35 pm
i recall being
that age, what i don’t recall
is needing teaching