Not so cheerful thread

[PaulB]

That's ridiculous. The man planned to take the kids in advance. He kept his plans secret. He made sure that he was over the border before he told anyone where he was. The kids didn't know of the plan and nor did the mother. They had no opportunity to say goodbye to their mother, and will never see her again. They had no choice in the matter, and he paid htem no consideration. He's made it quite clear that the mother is at risk if she makes any attempts to return to find her children.

Yup, "the father took his own kids". Say that if you like. It doesn't change the impact of what's been done at all.

Clearly you've made your mind up on the matter but to say the children will never see their mother again is bordering on the hysterical. And I notice that once again in all of this, the man has been judged and found guilty before all the facts (other than the subjective ones we have from you) are in.

 

[PaulB]

Hmmm, someone who is completely detached from the situation telling someone who has known the family well for several years, that he's making a judgement without sufficient facts and is being hysterical. Interesting.

Did you not read that bit?

Come on lad; you must admit you went over the top saying they were never going to see their mother again. It sounds like the script from a Tim Burton film. What's to be achieved by this misery anyway?

 

[Crackle]

I am serious. You say "Someone snatches" the kids in order to maximise the impact of it all. "The father took his own kids", which is just as accurate but doesn't have the emotional fear-based impact, is a perfectly legitimate way to address the matter.

Aha! A member of fathers 4 justice is unmasked.

 

[PaulB]

PB. Full of compassion.

MP. Full of oestrogen.

 

[PaulB]

Do you have kids PB?

Oestrogen has nothing to do with it. I can't imagine what it would be like to be told, out of the blue, that your 3 and 7 year olds are a now couple of thousand miles away and warned not to try to contact them.

Yes, two. So don't imagine it. What good's it doing you to put yourself in her position? There's enough troubles to be going round without taking on someone else's when you can't do nothing about it.

 

[Crackle]

Why should he not? Obviously it's affected him or he wouldn't have posted it, so we're a bit past, don't think about it. If you don't have a lot of sympathy, fair enough, keep schtum but telling others what to think about things is a bit daft don't you think. Do you really think there's nothing to see here, move along. It's a fairly grim story, not one with a simple resolution, I bet Syrian law is fairly sympathetic to him otherwise he wouldn't have gone there.

 

[barq]

Aside from the argument above... how awful for the mother and scary for the kids involved.

 

[Mr Pig]

I'm not saying that I think he was right in how he went about it but I think it's too easy to just look at this from our side. The people were Syrian, there is no reason why either parent should not go back home if they want to. England is not automatically where the boys should be because they've been here for a couple of years.

I don't agree at all that the mother should automatically get custody of the children. We hear about discrimination against women all the time but the way men are treated in custody disputes can be horrible and totally unfair. Does a man not love his children as much as his wife? Bollocks.

So as I see it the man has as much right to the kids as his wife. He may have looked at the British legal system and realised he had little chance of getting custody of the boys, or even decent access, so he's taken the matter into his own hands and gone home to the country he knows and trusts.

To us this is a terrible crime. How dare Johny Foreigner not trust in our way of doing things when we're so clearly superior to the rest of the word. But to him, and probably most of the people who live in Syria, he's done little wrong.

Parents are not supposed to split up and if they do it's one of those situations that can't be put right. There is no correct answer, people get hurt no matter what happens. It's just a case of who and how much.

 

[Globalti]

I fully agree with that. I have been to Syria many times and know some Syrian families. One thing that Syrians have in common with all middle-eastern nations is a strong family life with warm, extended family lives and big shared mealtimes, a lifestyle that does not depend on alcohol. Syria is also a safe and in some ways more civilised country than Britain; you can walk around Damascus or Aleppo late at night and have absolutely no fear for your safety. This is hard to explain to anybody who hasn't experienced the warmth of Arab hospitality and friendship and the easy-going social life. By comparison many British people are nasty, ill-mannered drunken oafs.

The majority of posters on here have automatically sided with the poor mother who is without doubt distressed at the loss of her children. However they have no idea of the full story from the point of view of the father or his family; it is perfectly possible that the father was concerned at the bad habits and yobbish behaviour of his sons' peers and acted to prevent his children from becoming damaged in the same way. Why do we always assume that our way of life is best and dirty Johhny Foreigner is just a primitive unwashed oik? Damascus is the oldest continually-occupied city in the world and has a level of culture and civilisation that puts most British cities to shame.

 

[magnatom]

How can you possibly, even consider that there is any justification for what the father did!

First off, you should actually read the article. The children were born in the UK and were not just in the UK for a couple of years.

More importantly though the father has deprived the children of a relationship with their mother. Not only is that insanely cruel on the children, it is also a terrible crime against the mother.

Do you have kids Mr Pig? If so, could you imagine your wife suddenly taking your children away so that you never see them again? I challenge you to tell me that you would see nothing wrong in your wife doing this.

As for, it might be right in Syria. What do you know of Syrian culture to even suggest such a thing? Are you suggesting that the Syrian people support child abduction!?

 

[Globalti]

I know nothing about the case or the family but Syrian society and manners are strongly influenced by France and indeed many older Syrians only speak Arabic and French. Having lived in France where social structures are more rigid than in Britain and having spent many weeks in Syria I can easily see how a Syrian family might be shocked at the apparent collapse of the once-respected British culture into a disgusting morass of alcohol, drugs and celebrity-obsessed, intellectually shallow trash.

 

[PaulB]

I have a lot of sympathy for the father. When my children were the ages these kids are, there is not a power on earth that could have separated me from them and if I thought they'd be better off with me, that's where they'd be (of course that changed when they became teenagers but that's another story!) I notice we are only hearing the mother's story and obviously we have some sympathy for her plight but it seems some are overlooking the dad's concern.

 

[magnatom]

But none of that, NONE of that, has anything to do with this case. We aren't talking culture here, we are talking about a father who took his kids away from their mother in such a way that they would never see her again. The fact that they are Syrian, French, German, Irish, British etc has absolutely nothing to do with this. Abduction is abduction.

So can anyone provide some justification for this. Please let me know what this would do to you, if your kids were abducted in this way.

 

[magnatom]

I have a lot of sympathy for the father. When my children were the ages these kids are, there is not a power on earth that could have separated me from them and if I thought they'd be better off with me, that's where they'd be (of course that changed when they became teenagers but that's another story!) I notice we are only hearing the mother's story and obviously we have some sympathy for her plight but it seems some are overlooking the dad's concern.

Yes we are only hearing the mothers side. Quite correct. Why is that though? Hmm. the father has taken the kids away and gone into hiding to keep them away from the kids. If the father had a justifiable reason for what he did, don't you think he would be willing to share that?

I have two wonderful sons and another child on the way. I love them to bits. However, there is no way I would even consider cutting them off from their mum. That is an incredibly selfish thing to do.

 

[Globalti]

I would certainly do it if I thought my child was under threat.

I my wife did it to me I would be devastated and would never stop trying to get my child returned.