Look, I'm glad they found the kid

[pegkerr]

But don't you wonder a little a bit about a) our culture and b) this kid's upbringing when you realize that he wasn't found for four days because he was purposely avoiding the searchers because he had been told never to talk to strangers? I mean, come on, the kid's eleven years old! Don't you think he should have better judgment at this point than to think, "Hmmm . . . break the no-talking-to-strangers rule . . . die in the wilderness . . . boy, tough choice there. . ."

Good lord, I hope Fiona at age 12 would have more sense.

Comments

[copperwise.livejournal.com]

"The Hawkinses said Brennan didn’t remember much and they don’t plan push him to talk about his four days in the woods. “It’s going to take a while to get everything out,” Toby Hawkins said. “This is how he approaches all situations.”

They described the boy as socially immature, but not mentally disabled."

[moony]

I know a pair of kids who are similar in nature - socially, they are not mature at all. They are NOT, technically, developmentally disabled, but their emotional development is severely compromised (they are adopted, victims of the typical Romanian orphanage). Going on five, one is barely able to speak and is still not trained, where the other one can communicate but does not respond to discipline and cannot discern right from wrong. Both do not register physical pain and have no measure of their own strength. It is feasible to me that this boy could be similar, which would explain why he was able to survive, and why he is being what most adults would call pig-headed about telling people what happened. He may not even realise that what happened to him was a dangerous, bad thing. He may not have any concept of what he's done, what's going on around him. Most kids like that are almost entirely self-contained.

Interesting story, nonetheless.

[prunesnprisms.livejournal.com]

Yeah, and would you go on national media and tell god and everyone your kid was slow?

[copperwise.livejournal.com]

LOL. I'm sure one would rather not, you're right!

But given the nature of these searches one of the first things authorities will need to know is if the kid is disabled or has any special circumstances. And that does get released to the press. So if this kid were actually functionally disabled, the headlines would have been trumpeting lost mentally challenged Scout the whole time.

[prunesnprisms.livejournal.com]

Well, maybe the kid is a jackass.

[em-h.livejournal.com]

Given the phrase "socially immature", another possibility that comes to my mind -- and of course it's only a possibility, I know nothing of this child or his family -- is undiagnosed Asperger's Syndrome, which could account for an excessively literal understanding of the "don't talk to strangers" rule. Asperger's kids can have real difficulty understanding that rules have exceptions, even if they're of normal intelligence and an age when kids can usually easily grasp that.

[prunesnprisms.livejournal.com]

And there you have it:

The parents said they do not plan to push Brennan for answers about his time in the woods and referred reporters to Christensen. The couple said their son was born prematurely and described him as immature and a little slow, although not mentally disabled.

from http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2005/06/23/national/main703669_page2.shtml

Which actually counts as going onto national news and saying that your kid is slow.