An article on the BBC dated 3/13/09, http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/7926263.stm, never made it to US newswire.
In the past two years, 6,000 children have disappeared from one region of India alone. One region. Caylee Anthony disappeared, a single child, and she was all over the news for months. Her mother is still in the news as her trial nears, yet 6000 missing children in another country don't make the media here. The police in India say most of the children missing probably eloped. Excuse me? I wasn't aware a six-year-old could "elope." The article reads like a horrible Indiana Jones Temple of Doom thing: where are they all going? Who's taking them, and why doesn't anyone seem to give a damn at all? I noted the missing are predominantly poor children: because their parents don't have enough clout with law enforcement to make a big enough fuss? Or because a poor family has working parents, working children, and no one to watch out for the smallest members 24/7?
6,000 children in 2 years. That's 250 every month. 250 elementary schoolers vanishing into thin air. I wonder what sort of attention that would get in the US, the UK, France?
In Saudi Arabia girls can be promised into marriage at any age, although their much-older "husbands" are supposed to wait until puberty to consummate. Consummate: there's another word right up there with elope. Most girls hit puberty at about 12: is that the proper age to "consummate" their marriage with a 40 year old man?
In California a man was arrested for SELLING HIS DAUGHTER into marriage to pay a debt. he doesn't understand what the big deal is: in his home country it's normal behavior.
Things are bad in the world these days, there's no denying it: economy is slipping toward oblivion, people are losing jobs, homes, vacations, bonuses, cars, THINGS. And while Americans are up in arms over AIG bonuses being stolen out of the taxpayers' pockets, 6,000 children missing are classified as foolish kids who eloped by their own police force.
Where's the attention? Where's the outrage?
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