U.S. Navy picks up 1-year-old who became sick at sea
By Susanna Capelouto, CNN
April 7, 2014 -- Updated 1221 GMT (2021 HKT)

(CNN) -- A 1-year-old girl who became seriously ill on a sailboat hundreds of miles off Mexico was on a U.S. Navy frigate Sunday and in stable condition, the U.S. Coast Guard said.

Her parents thanked those who played a part in their rescue.

"We are very thankful to be safe and well. We also appreciate all the concern, thoughts and prayers of everyone back home for the health of our daughter Lyra. She is doing well now, and her medical condition continues to improve," Eric and Charlotte Kaufman said in a statement.

They defended themselves against critics who question their decision to sail with their family.

"Please know that this is how our family has lived for seven years, and when we departed on this journey more than a year ago, we were then and remain today confident that we prepared as well as any sailing crew could," they wrote.

...more at link
http://edition.cnn.com/2014/04/06/us/pacific-rescue/

_________________
Do not go gentle into that good night.
___________ Rage, rage against the dying of the light

Thanks for suggesting Blink. Will definitely look it up. The story that stirred my interest in social media drama was that of Rebel Heart, the couple who had to be rescued at sea, along with their baby and toddler. I read chunks of their blog and kept up with the 1,500 plus comments that were left there within days.

Wow all around. Forget whether or not they are good parents or made a good decision. What was mesmerizing was the incredible rigidity of almost all the folks posting. One side- and it was that- parroted the same line over and over....these guys are "living the dream" and everyone who disagrees with taking babies on board are jealous, afraid of risk, couch potatoes who have no life and whose children eat junk food and play video games all day. The false analogies comparing risks were so absurd as to be splendid comedy.

The other side had some range. Some tried to use reason to explain their views. Those few quickly fell away or were drowned out by the masses clucking about their tax dollars being wasted. A rabid handful posted they thought the parents should have drowned. A larger minority advocated taking the children away from their parents.

But all that was just one layer. More interesting to me was the parents' use and response to social media. Here was a woman who wrote in her public blog about when she had sex and when she had her period. She blogged about her father being a sex offender (uncharged), and urged strangers to help her bring him to justice, and she wrote openly about being suicidal not long before they set sail. Photos posted included a pic of one daughter with her genitals fully exposed; another showed the same 3 year old holding a shotgun.

This couple sought publicity and used it to direct the largest possible public audience to their blog and to their FB and Twitter pages.

Then their rescue story broke. Commenters in online papers around tge world slammed them. Social media lit up with ragers. And then? The couple erased every negative comment off their blog, turned off comments everywhere they could, and complained, loudly, that the public had no right to intrude upon their blog space, and that they in any case had no interest in hearing what people thought about them.

Yep....that whole dynamic is pretty interesting to me.

Just wow.

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If your mind is agitated you will find agitation everywhere. Where else will you find peace if not within you? __ Papaji

The punch line: after saying they didn't care what the public thought, the husband began posting on sailing forums that he had a story to tell about what went wrong and about the rescue...(wait for it)....and that anyone who really wanted to know would be willing to pay for the book he's writing about it all.

PS. The rescue cost almost $700,000. The couple wasn't charged a penny. They received over $20,000 in donations, which they kept. After they pocketed the donations ( no more were forthcoming) they suggested future contributions be made to a charity ( other than themselves, I guess).

Hope I want to know if you are going to buy the boaters book . I haven't read about the saga other than what you posted, anyone who lets a woman and man take off on a journey like they did (with two tiny kids) when she was recently writing that she was suicidal is a few fries short of a happy meal. And IMO their "20,000" in donations should have been given back to the US tax payers to reimburse the rescue effort. Take your chances with your own life, not small children's, and when things go sour, foot your own bill.

I think social media has turned many people into nutters, I often wonder at events if people are really going to remember the event itself or if their recording the event is actually what is marinating in their brain.

Truly a brave new world.

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If your mind is agitated you will find agitation everywhere. Where else will you find peace if not within you? __ Papaji

Carma...I thought they were nuts for taking babies on an ocean crossing, but I didn't really care one way or another until I read Charlotte Kaufman's blog (the mother).

One of her blog postings turned that around. She writes of how miserable SHE is, that she looks forward to only 2 times in the day: when the babies are taking a nap and when they go to sleep for the night.

The post continues with Charlotte writing to one of her babies (I am paraphrasing, closely, not mocking): " when you woke up today you said, mommy can I have some of that special treat you made last night? " And I lied to you and told you that you must have been dreaming.

When you grow up you'll understand. Actually I baked a coffee cake for me and your dad and we ate it after you fell asleep. There was still some left but I wanted to share it with your dad again tonight so I told you that lie. In all fairness though I DID give you 4 pieces of candy this morning.". Really.

Her baby is trying to learn how to walk on a boat that is pitching enough she's covered in bruises from rolling around all night. Her toddler has nobody to play with, nothing to look at but open sea, has been seasick for days and is finally OK, and has parents who like it best when she's asleep. Maybe they needed a treat too?

Their utter selfishness is mirrored in their relationship to social media. They seem to believe that it exists to promote and benefit them...a one way street. Hmmm.

And no, I won't be buying their book, but I suspect you already know that.

Well they sound like people that shouldn't be parents. The mom sounds emotionally unwell, like a juvenile girl who has brought one of those battery operated dolls home for a school project. Sad, even sadder is to think that one day those (girls?) will read their mothers words and their feeling that their mom really doesn't like them very much will be confirmed. Sick people.

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If your mind is agitated you will find agitation everywhere. Where else will you find peace if not within you? __ Papaji

See, I'm fascinated by them precisely because I don't think they ARE sick. I think they represent a new normal...at least a new American monied normal.

My answer to the chicken and egg question about social media and this flavor of folks is that they came first and they created a social media universe which reflects their sensibilities perfectly... self centered and self serving, unreflective, and exploitative.

Unfortunately I will have to agree with your analysis of the "new normal", I'll still label it as sick though. A moral sickness, a spiritual sickness, a societal sickness, a whole generation that can't look past their immediate self satisfaction. I think the people that display the traits like the mom in the story are not emotionally well even if they are the new normal. It isn't natural to dislike your own children or to put yourself and your own gratification to a grotesque extent before their well being. I still come down to thinking she is a sick woman. So yes I am lumping all the self serving immature, me first women who act like 3 year old girls and men who act like 3 year boys as sick individuals, even if it is a "new normal."

In fact I bet their brain scans or maps "emotional responses" would be more in line with a toddlers brain than with the brain of an adult who has demonstrated mature behavior.

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If your mind is agitated you will find agitation everywhere. Where else will you find peace if not within you? __ Papaji

I hear ya. I will say I don't think its accurate that she dislikes her kids. Neither parent seems to have any awareness of their own limitations, unsurprising because that's part and parcel of myopic self aggrandizement. They want something therefore they are entitled to have it, end of story.

Charlotte didn't like sailing, was suicidal several months before sailing, had never made an ocean crossing, was violently seasick for days into the voyage. Her husband did all the sailing. She had primary responsibility for taking care of a toddler and a baby in cloth diapers, 24/7, no breaks, no escape, no where to get a minute of privacy. I think she was simply overwhelmed and barely hanging on.

But I keep coming back to the social media angle of this story. IMO only their friends and family should know what is so widely known about her state of mind. We know because she gloried in telling us.

Charlotte's own blog posts are what gave the story legs. Folks who might have read the story, shook their heads at fools and turned the page instead found themselves clicking on the link to her blog online papers provided, and there it all was. The irony is that her own words extinguished for most readers any sympathy or benefit of the doubt they might have accorded her.

And....she just doesn't get it. Still. There's a new article about her in a local San Diego pub, in which she pointedly says she and her husband simply ignore all their "bleating" online critics.

I keep hoping others see the delicious ironies in this story. About the Kaufmans themselves I could care less.

Rumpole...could you please change the name of this thread? Its really not about the Rebel Heart......I'm hoping for a conversation about social media...

Fore you Hope....... anything

Name a Title....

_________________
Do not go gentle into that good night.
___________ Rage, rage against the dying of the light

Well we will have to agree to disagree, I hope Rumpole doesn’t lock the thread .

Anyhow I don’t care what her circumstances are, to deny a small child a little happiness and to take pleasure in that denial is perverse to me. So are there mitigating circumstances that made caring for two young children exceedingly hard, yes without a doubt, and I think those circumstances lead her to dislike her children.

As to your larger point of social media changing societies psychological makeup, I couldn’t agree more. We are in my opinion becoming a narcissistic society, (I hate to say that only because it is a term so misused ).

People posts about their most intimate moments and thoughts yet they are taken aback when people judge their boorish but loudly proclaimed behavior.

Eh?

I do see the ironies in the Kaufman story. It is reminiscent of the Amy’s Baking Company fiasco


http://eater.com/archives/2014/04/12/ki ... ompany.php


on ( Kitchen Nightmares) and the social media storm that followed it with Amy and her husband claiming that they were being attacked when they were on offense from the first second the whole thing began.

All peas in the same pod of social media self aggrandizers claiming victim status.

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If your mind is agitated you will find agitation everywhere. Where else will you find peace if not within you? __ Papaji

The thread isn't locked! And look, here we are respectfully disagreeing with one another! Pinch me!

Thanks for the link about those wacko restaurant owners. They're in a league of their own. Amazing that they are still in business!

Anything?? Aw shucks!

Hmm. Something like....Stories and articles about the misuse of social media.

Yes Amy and Samy are quite a pair. There were horrible things said online (face book and maybe twitter) and then they claimed that their account had been hacked and they never would have said such terrible things. There was a part 2 to Kitchen Nightmares and Amy and Samy were unrepentant and blamed Chef Ramsay and other people for the demise of their business.


Fascinating stuff.

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If your mind is agitated you will find agitation everywhere. Where else will you find peace if not within you? __ Papaji

https://shine.yahoo.com/love-sex/shocki ... 00091.html

I just think this qualifies to be here

Mom Shona Carter-Brooks took to Facebook to defend her and her husband Johnathan Brooks' controversial decision, stating that "The answer is we do what we want, when we want, as long as Jesus on our side everything worked out fine and gona [sic] continue to be fine" and the infant was "awake and well secured on my train.”

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If your mind is agitated you will find agitation everywhere. Where else will you find peace if not within you? __ Papaji

I just think this qualifies to be here

Mom Shona Carter-Brooks took to Facebook to defend her and her husband Johnathan Brooks' controversial decision, stating that "The answer is we do what we want, when we want, as long as Jesus on our side everything worked out fine and gona [sic] continue to be fine" and the infant was "awake and well secured on my train.”

Well, as long as Jesus is on their side!

Wonder if they posted the baby-dragging photo on FB first or judt doubled down on their ignorance by defending themselves there?

Well, as long as Jesus is on their side!

That struck me too, Eh isn't it "A child shall lead us" not "Drag your child about on your train?"

I posted a new crime in the crime section, it involves social media, but I thought more folks would see it in the crime section.

Anyhow 2 12 year olds stabbed another 12 year old girl 19 times to impress "slenderman" a fictional online horror figure.

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If your mind is agitated you will find agitation everywhere. Where else will you find peace if not within you? __ Papaji

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Ah the dreamers ride against the men of action
Oh see the men of action falling back