Telling his family he was going to school, he rode his razor scooter to his local train station, from where he travelled to the airport and, using a self-service check-in terminal, boarded a flight for Perth, then another for Indonesia....There’s no emotion to feel what we felt....
Discovering he was in Bali, his mother, Emma, flew there to collect him. Emma said the boy doesn’t like hearing the word “no”. “Shocked, disgusted, there’s no emotion to feel what we felt when we found he left overseas,” she told...
How could such a smart boy have such a stupid mother? I hypothesize that intelligence is not hereditary, and the condition of having a stupid mother encourages the development of one's own ideas, schemes, and skills.
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Stupid mother and high IQ son. Is that Possible. Wonder what the Airfare was on same day flight.
I had a friend in middle management with AT&T, who was also very involved in a part time sales business with his wife. They learned of their high school daughter's pregnancy when she had the baby. They were all living together the entire time.
"I hypothesize that intelligence is not hereditary, and the condition of having a stupid mother encourages the development of one's own ideas, schemes, and skills."
That depends. If he got his passport from the maternal grandmother, there goes that hypothesis.
It's not really that the child does not like hearing "No." It's that mom and dad don't like dealing with the child's reaction when they want to say "No."
I thought “free-range” children are being encouraged. Why didn’t she just leave him there?
Jaltcoh is an imaginative and independent thinker.
Kids do the darndest things.
"There’s no emotion to feel what we felt....
How could such a smart boy have such a stupid mother?"
You're going to diagnose her as stupid on the basis of one silly sentence which may or may not be quoted correctly? Then I guess you may as well diagnose him as some kind of genius because he can use a credit card. He's easily in the top 96% of the population.
Something doesn't seem quite right here. When my wife travels internationally with the kids, we need to get a notarized letter authorizing her to take the kids out of the country without me.
I read this post just after watching the video of Jordan Peterson explaining to Bill Mahr why parents shouldn't let their kids behave in ways that would make their parents dislike them. Obviously, the parents needed to hear Peterson's lesson a few years ago.
There’s no emotion to feel what we felt....
How could such a smart boy have such a stupid mother?
What makes the kid smart? Is being not mindful of consequences "smart"?
And how does one arrive at "stupid," as opposed to "shocked," and perhaps not having the calm, presence of mind to say what she probably meant:
"I can't find the words to express the emotions we felt." I could imagine there was a massive host of emotions.
How can you raise a child so willing to selfishly ignore all the rules. Let's see:
"I want to go to Bali and have fun." Parent: No, .
Child response: ignore parents, steal money for his self-gratification, and damn the consequences.
Here are some emotions I would have:
"You stole money from me."
"I was worried sick something had happened to you."
"How can I raise you."
"Am I now going to be considered an unfit parent."
"What's he going to be like 4 years from now, and how much more pain am I going to have to endure."
"All this media attention, and I can't sort out these emotions."
Concluding this mother is stupid from a single statement is on the order of saying the president is unfit because he misspelled a word in a tweet.
"I want to go to Bali and have fun." Parent: No, .
Should read:
"I want to go to Bali and have fun." Parent: No, (reasons).
I hypothesize that intelligence is not hereditary
Science says otherwise.
When my oldest boy was five, he threw a piece of firewood at the neighbor’s kid when we were at his place for a bbq. As I was dragging him up the stairs by his shirt collar, he screamed at the top of his voice that he was going to hire an attorney and sue me for child abuse. I laughed and told him go ahead, that he would lose. This was 25 years ago. Now the little SOB would probably win. BTW, he is the one who introduced me to this blog and he just got married here in WI Sat. Thank goodness the weather turned!
Where's the indication the kid is smart or the mother is dumb?
It is a common conceit among the highly-educated to judge people who are less articulate as unintelligent.
Well.
He is grounded.
He is SOOOOOOO....grounded.
how did you miss this on Guardian
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2009/jan/05/german-children-elope-mika-annabel
@Althouse: You need to cut the mom a little slack. Remember, she's Australian, so English isn't her first language. What she said probably makes perfect sense in her native Austrian.
Unlikely she's "stupid / low IQ (or G)", but quite likely living in her own delusions. Like most smart folk, she knows how to tell untruths to herself so she believes them. Likely the father has different delusions.
Lots of emotions, including Pride in child's ability (how many non-Harry Potter 12 years are as independent?), Embarrassment that he would do it, Fear for safety, Relief due to safety, etc.
Running away seems a reasonable thing to do, maybe even at a younger age, to avoid big parent fights. The boy should be encouraged to read more, especially Sci-Fi.
It's only about 2800 miles from Perth to Bali.
"I hypothesize that intelligence is not hereditary."
Your hypothesis was refuted before you hypothesized.
“Where's the indication the kid is smart or the mother is dumb?”
I agree. How can one make such a judgment based on one sentence? Maybe the mother was flustered and not expressing herself clearly. We humans are so hard on each other.
I think she probably meant, "there is no name for the emotion we felt." Now, a more intelligent person may have been able to come up with a name or list of names for the various emotions they were feeling on the fly in response to the reporter's question, but under the circumstances it seems unduly harsh to criticize her as unintelligent based solely on her choice of words here.
Also there is little evidence to support the child's supposed intelligence- crafty or wily, resourceful, reckless, yes. One could argue in fact his actions display the opposite of intelligence - at the very least they demonstrate a heedlessness toward the potential consequences of one's actions.
There was a 9-year-old who did something similar on a domestic flight in the US a year or two ago. He basically tailgated a big family during the boarding process. It was played as a vaguely comical story at the time, but the follow-up made clear that he was running away from a rotten home life. It wouldn't surprise me if that's at work here too, and that the real story is more like "he doesn't like it when we say no -- so then we smack the crap out of him."
"Something doesn't seem quite right here. When my wife travels internationally with the kids, we need to get a notarized letter authorizing her to take the kids out of the country without me.'
That is a US rule - we had to do the same thing with the kids several times when they weren't travelling with both of us. But Australia is different.
Australians are used to kids travelling alone internationally. They are great travelers, adventurous and cool about it. If you show up at some out-of-the-way place, and there is another foreigner there, odds are its an Australian.
"Stowaway to the Moon" was one of my favorite TV movies as a kid.
Glad some kids still have the spirit.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stowaway_to_the_Moon_(film)
Jordan Peterson warns against the Devouring Mother, don't know if it's an Ouroboros or not.
Unknown said...
I think she probably meant, "there is no name for the emotion we felt." Now, a more intelligent person may have been able to come up with a name or list of names for the various emotions they were feeling on the fly in response to the reporter's question,
An intelligent person understands that reporters are weasels, and aren't with your time or effort.
Sorry, Althouse, but you went off the deep on on this one
Contact the Army. This is exactly the kind of go-getter I want on our EM-50 project.
Australasian kids are frequently citizens of the world who have neither the time nor the inclination to carry protest signs and whine in public. My youngest son, raised in New Zealand, skipped seventh form, aced his bursaries, and took off when just 17 for his OE (overseas experience) with passport and a Lufthansa “Around the World” ticket in hand. He picked apples to earn the money.
He has been in 40, or so, countries and currently lives and works in Africa. Much of his work has been in civil war-torn South Sudan which is number one in the Fragile State Index, having displaced Somalia. Although there is no Second Amendment in South Sudan, “assault-like” weapons, usually AK-47s, are fairly common (sarc alert). He is not, however, considering organizing a “March For Our Lives” (another sarc alert).
Ann Althouse said...I hypothesize that intelligence is not hereditary...
Sam Harris says you're wrong.
Drago,
"This is exactly the kind of go-getter I want on our EM-50 project."
Thanks, General. I needed that.
Here's what mom really wanted to say: "There’s no emotion to say what we felt like doing to the little sonofabitch that wouldn't have put us in jail." -- Smart mom.
If she had instilled a healthy degree of fear in the little bastard this would not have happened.
Like most of these snot nosed little princes he needed a smack in the puss to teach him that world isn't fair and he is not in charge.
By his parents or the nuns at school.
Otherwise he is going to turn out as a worthless piece of millennial shit.
Oso Negro said...
It is a common conceit among the highly-educated to judge people who are less articulate as unintelligent.
4/23/18, 11:43 AM
Words fail to describe my emotions whenever exposed to the public display of this fallacious notion in action. Not only are the non-talkers putatively "less intelligent," it seems that transitively, they are the talkers' lawful prey.
I've always thought that people like Ann should be beaten with rods until they learn better. Not just until they apologize, but until they mean it.
Ann doesn't hesitate to call a woman "stupid" because she was shocked and disgusted that her son lied to her, stole her credit card and ran away to do what she had forbidden him to do.
Not sure whether Ann is a parent, but she doesn't seem to consider that the woman might have been worried and anxious about her missing son, and then angry when he turned up having done what he did.
On the other hand, we do know that Ann believes the President to be a subtle thinker, a brilliant humorist, and an honest man.
That's Ann, leaving her readers in little suspense about what she considers to be a high-powered intelligence at work.
“Ann doesn't hesitate to call a woman "stupid" because she was shocked and disgusted that her son lied to her, stole her credit card and ran away to do what she had forbidden him to do.”
I think Althouse considered her stupid because she didn’t express herself succinctly and contradicted herself in the same sentence, something Trump has done on multiple occasions, but who knows, he may have been kidding.
“On the other hand, we do know that Ann believes the President to be a subtle thinker, a brilliant humorist, and an honest man.”
Sure does appear that way, however we may not be intelligent enough to appreciate or recognize Trump’s humor.
“That's Ann, leaving her readers in little suspense about what she considers to be a high-powered intelligence at work.”
One woman’s opinion, doesn’t mean it’s well founded.
Could it be that she was still in shock and has other mental disorders that cause her to jumble her words and be less careful? I think she meant to say "no description for the emotion she felt", but not being a prepared public speaker discussing a routine event, she became frazzled and said the equivalent of confefe.
I say mental disorder, because I believe their may be a speaking version of dyslexia, but I never really studied it other than considering the possibility. It would present itself when the speaker has the sentence fully formed in their mind yet speak it wrong.
@Althouse: You need to cut the mom a little slack. Remember, she's Australian, so English isn't her first language. What she said probably makes perfect sense in her native Austrian.
Jesus wept, that is beautiful. Thank you.
None of my kids have turned 12.
HOWEVER, if one of them swipes our credit card and gets on a plane to Bali...I'm not gonna be happy.
12 is old enough to know better. This is not a three-year-old getting into the smart phone and purchasing 40$ worth of "smurf berries" for a computer game. Yes, this happened to a friend.
Yeah, I am with...well, most of the posters. When I read that, I immediately understood what she meant, which was not what she articulated.
You consider her stupid. I consider that the little bastard violated essentially every boundary of trust and respect that a kid could do, short of filming his parents having sex and putting it on the net (And I wouldn't put it past the little shit to try that to finance his next scheme)
Being willing to betray someone utterly for personal gain is not some signifier of intelligence...well...maybe to a lawyer it is.
For the rest of us, the kid used a credit card and got a pass port. He boarded a plane and he probably looks big for his age. I could have passed for 15 at 12 myself.
So the family gets locks on the bedrooms, a security system which goes off if ANYONE is up at night, he gets to wear a GPS tracker, and all keys, money and phones are locked up for probably years.
Nor would I give him a single dollar for his education. The Australian Bar Association is probably already taking up a collection for a scholarship for such a prodigy.
I get it now. Because the woman didn't say "there's no word to describe the emotion we felt," that's why Ann thinks she is stupid.
Most truly smart people have the integrity and the humility to know what they don't know, and hardly any of them go around calling other people stupid. Giving expression to such thoughts says more about the speaker than the subject.
Jesus wept, is right.
I knew an older teen who spent $400 for phone sex charges in the 90's (before internet porn).
His life sucked but he was an idiot to do that. At least HE could work to pay it back.
I don't know I would have been in a hurry to get him. Let him be stuck in some Indonesian Halfway Home to stew.
“Most truly smart people have the integrity and the humility to know what they don't know, and hardly any of them go around calling other people stupid. Giving expression to such thoughts says more about the speaker than the subject.”
John Pickering,
This condescending attitude regarding intelligence and the unique way people may express themselves is one I’ve run across several times in these comments sections. It’s a special sort of pretentious assholery.
"HOWEVER, if one of them swipes our credit card and gets on a plane to Bali...I'm not gonna be happy. "
Hmmm.
This would be a sign of either complete amorality or the first inkling that you are raising a great man. Great men do not respect rules, and take great risks. They are very likely to upset their parents.
Those sort of people also destroy Republics.
See Julius Caesar, Marius, Sulla, Obama, Clintons (any of them).
They think they are doing something clever violating trust and norms and common culture...and then when the rubber hits the road and they once again need to call on those norms...they are gone.
So no one can call Trump on fidelity. No one can call Trump on crassness. No one can whine if a Republican Supermajority obliterates the Great Society on a partisan vote. Bipartisanship and caring about the other guy is dead.
This kid is a symptom of the media norms he is sipping up.
This Pickering character is one of yours Inga.
You are soulmates. He has the same attitude that you and your girl Hillary have about the rest of us deplorables.
It just be like looking in the mirror.
If I were his parent I'd be pretty pissed off, but at the same time I'd be impressed with his resourcefulness.
I hope he got laid. Those Bali girls on the Internet destroy your willpower.
That's Ann, leaving her readers in little suspense about what she considers to be a high-powered intelligence at work.
Followed by:
Most truly smart people have the integrity and the humility to know what they don't know, and hardly any of them go around calling other people stupid.
... and I bet he doesn't even realize what he just did.
This condescending attitude regarding intelligence and the unique way people may express themselves is one I’ve run across several times in these comments sections. It’s a special sort of pretentious assholery. - Inga
You. A long, long look into a mirror.
Some assembly required.
Bali is a wonderful place. I've spent a lot of time there. While exotic, one must remember that it's not that long a flight from Australia
Why does the grandmother have the passport? Why did she give it to him? This could be 2nd generation bad parenting.
Condemn the sin, not the sinner. I think there's a difference between pointing out what seems to evince poor thinking, and in calling the weak thinker stupid. If Ann had left it at describing the mother's act, rather than insulting her personally, that would be OK. I like to point out weakness or confusion in Ann's thinking from time to time, but it isn't because I think she's stupid. I think she encourages that sort of analysis, and she deserves credit for that, and I give it to her.
I admit that I once said of one of Ann's readers that he "advertises his ignorance with every click of his keyboard," but even then, I'd argue that it was his words and thoughts I objected to, not his character or his intelligence.
Is that a distinction with a difference, Mr. Jim?
Inga: "This condescending attitude regarding intelligence and the unique way people may express themselves is one I’ve run across several times in these comments sections."
Timely self-reflection.
Kid is now hero in school.
quite different future from kid who got killed yesterday.
“Timely self-reflection.”
You should try it.
And as Miles Vorkosigan says
"It is simpler to ask for forgiveness than wait for permission"
Nobody expects the Urban Assault Vehicle!
JaimeRoberto said...
If I were his parent I'd be pretty pissed off, but at the same time I'd be impressed with his resourcefulness.
There would definitely be a talk about responsibility.
The kid would also have some mandatory training to do. In addition to earning back the money to pay for the trip they would be learning about self defense and land navigation among other things.
That kind of talent can't be wasted.
“‘This condescending attitude regarding intelligence and the unique way people may express themselves is one I’ve run across several times in these comments sections. It’s a special sort of pretentious assholery.’ - Inga”
Our pastor was speaking about liberals and conservatives reacting to the admonitions from Jesus. In particular he spoke of liberal resistance to the admonition in Matt. 5:22: “... But I say to you that everyone who is angry with his brother will be liable to judgment; whoever insults his brother will be liable to the council ....”
The inferential liberal reaction to that one is: “I can’t accept that! Condescending anger is my hobby.”
Sorry, Inga. Psychological projection will not offer salvation.
Psychological projection will not offer salvation.”
Indeed. But God’s grace will.
FIDO said...
Those sort of people also destroy Republics.
See Julius Caesar, Marius, Sulla, Obama, Clintons (any of them).
They think they are doing something clever violating trust and norms and common culture...and then when the rubber hits the road and they once again need to call on those norms...they are gone."
We are talking about a 12 year old here. I don't think this stunt required a great deal of intelligence (although the kid might indeed be smart). He's rebellious, self-absorbed, selfish and in bad need of an ass-kicking. (Of course, nowadays that will not happen.) In other words, he's a kid. I am happy for your parents if you were all model adolescents who always took your parents' feelings and wishes into consideration. I didn't, although if I had pulled a stunt like this, I would still be grounded. I grew up with kids who were horrible brats at age 12 - like my kid brother, for instance - and are now decent adults and good people. And they weren't brats because their parents were over-permissive, but because they were headstrong and thoughtless at that age. News flash: a 12 year old can be a handful.
There is no way of telling what sort of parents the kid has based on a brief newspaper story.
And I agree that judging the woman's intelligence on the basis of one sentence is being unnecessarily harsh.
Inga said...
‘“Psychological projection will not offer salvation.”
Indeed. But God’s grace will.’
Not to the godless or the unrepentant.
“Not to the godless or the unrepentant.”
So who is godless? Who is unrepentant? Who are you to judge? Who are we to judge who is stupid? A bad parent? Not one among us is without sin, not I, not you.
John 8:7
“When they kept on questioning him, he straightened up and said to them, “Let any one of you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone at her.”
Sure its tricky to quote scripture, since the whole passage Matt 5:20 to 48 is Jesus saying the new standards will be better than the old, rules about murder, divorce, adultery and so on, and ends, regarding the Lord:
For he causes the sun to rise on bad men as well as good, and his rain to fall on honest and dishonest men alike.
matt 5:45
Thus concludes the benediction.
What a bitchy post.
Amen, brother.
I am stating that when one rejoices in 'mavericks' to 'don't play by no rules', one is in fact inviting anarchists into one's midst.
Yes, he's a 12 year old. I get that. But that person said 'Great Men' don't live by rules...like Ivan the Terrible...Like Stalin...Like that guy who shipped infected blankets to Siberian Americans...
Sorry the point was so subtle that celebrating 'not putting up with agreed upon rules' has a rather stark social cost.
How does one tell Americans that having an affair or getting a business hummer is wrong when we had Bill Clinton get away with it? Stormy Daniels is a tempest in a D cup.
Two things:
1.) Australians, based on my knowledge, seem to be a bit more 'free range' than folks here. Kudos to the kid for thinking of getting out and travelling, rather than spending Several hundred / even thousands of dollars frittering it away on iPhone apps, which is what happened with an antipodeal friend's kid.
2.) Some Americans might be a bit slower on the uptake than others, re: the "Free Range" thing. When my younger brother went AWOL the second time from the Navy, he holed up in a Red Roof In by his base ... and charged it on my mother's credit card. His locale was figured out by the next billing cycle. Those of us who still talk to him (he's doing life, no parole in a very beautiful part of the country), whenever he's been moved, ask him if his accomodations surpass the Red Roof Inn's.
Why did the mother come get him?
Why not the father?
When my oldest boy was five, he threw a piece of firewood at the neighbor’s kid when we were at his place for a bbq. As I was dragging him up the stairs by his shirt collar, he screamed at the top of his voice that he was going to hire an attorney and sue me for child abuse. I laughed and told him go ahead, that he would lose. This was 25 years ago. Now the little SOB would probably win. BTW, he is the one who introduced me to this blog and he just got married here in WI Sat. Thank goodness the weather turned!
We made it quite clear to said child when said child was young that if said child started that crap said child would be removed from the household by protective services and placed in foster care where bad things could happen.
And as Miles Vorkosigan says
"It is simpler to ask for forgiveness than wait for permission"
Miles only looks like he's 12 years old.
"No one can whine if a Republican Supermajority obliterates the Great Society on a partisan vote. Bipartisanship and caring about the other guy is dead."
What was a good society getting better was obliterated by the Great Society. The Great Society is a zombie. It should be destroyed as soon as possible. "Caring about the other guy" by pointing guns at and threatening caging of another guy is not caring about the other guy, but something else.
Inga:
You are quoting John Pickering? Is this the same person as, ".....the first federal official to be removed from office upon conviction by impeachment; the charges by Congress were for drunkenness and unlawful rulings....?" - [sarc]
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