Natalee Holloway: A Thought Piece

Well, it's alleged to be, as it is from the American Thinker. An otherwise fine blog. But in reality they are only now taking the time to pontificate on the one subtext to this story which is the most obvious - and was five months ago. The story has moved well beyond this now for any thinking person following it. Unfortunately, when it comes to the media, too few are.

How is it, I ask you, that millions of American parents became convinced that it was normal and healthy to treat their kids like pagan princes and princesses, indulging their licentious desires and hedonistic impulses?  And make no mistake about it, this isn’t Beaver Cleaver and these students don’t journey to paradise to play pin-the-tail-on-the-donkey or bobbing-for-apples . . . it’s more like the forbidden apple.

Let’s be blunt, one way a daughter could frame this is, “Hey, Mom and Dad, can I go to Cancun for spring break (or to celebrate, or some other occasion)?”  But translated that often means, “Hey, Mom and Dad, can I go to Cancun, where I’ll most likely have sex with some libidinous boy you don’t know from Adam – maybe even with lots of boys – drink, smoke, and perhaps even do drugs?”  That sounds crazy but is, in essence, accurate.  Crazier still is that the parents’ answer is often “yes.”

Comments

[Carolyn]

Our senior was taken on school buses with a sack lunch. We visited various historical sites in our local area. Everyone went and we all had a good time. Guess what year??? 1970. Ha, ha, things certainly have changed and not for the better.

[dianne]

Think what you want of Natalee's parents but it doesn't change the fact that Natalee went missing in Aurba and someone high up is covering up what happen to her.

You don't have to agree on how Beth is raising her child. Instead look at how this case is being handled by the country of Aruba.

These post are all bashing Beth on how she is rasing her daughter. Natalee could not have been the hoe you make her out to be with a FULL SCHOLARSHIP to College. Give me a break, the kid was on the DANCE TEAM, a STRAIGHT A student. You don't get that giving blow jobs. She was a good kid who had a close relationship with her mother.

Who cares what things were like when you were young. Stop living in the past, things change. We give our children the things we could not have when we were young.

[MtnDiva]

I agree 100% w/ Dianne. From day one of this case, NH didn't strike me as a big partying slut. Just b/c she drank in Aruba does not make her a bad kid, just maybe one who made bad judgement that night just like the other students who were there with her. And to Rick, my parents were considered some of the more strict in my school. They believed that letting me go off and explore other countries was a way to show me the world and gain a little worldly experience. My trip to Europe was with my grandmother and my church so not exactly a trip to do drugs and get drunk a lot. My parents and the THOUSANDS of other parents who do allow their children to not be so sheltered are no different than the Beth Twittys of the world. Rick I am SO happy for you that you were a strict dad who made your daughters boyfriends come and meet them at the house. I'm sure they grew up to be fine individuals. All I'm saying is that my parents didn't shelter me from the world and I'm no less a better person than your virginal daughters.

[KeesVanZandt]

If they like had tv shows like "spuiten en slikken" in the US the kids maybe wouldnt explode into vileness. In the end its all about 2 things:

-Information about drugs and sex (in schools and on tv to teach them what is normal and what isnt)
-You cannot protect a child forever so you have to GRADUALLY expose them to the outside dangers not all at once when their 18 like NH.

[RICK]

isanah: What you stated is far from being a welfare mama. There are situations where the government provides for people in difficulty, and I totally endorse it. Travel through the southern states in 1960, before Rte. 95 and you see poor, really poor people living in shacks with non-sanitary conditions and your heart goes out to them. Institute "The Great Society" and fine, OK, we'll help out. It isn't long after that, students from rich families are getting food stamps etc. So what happens? A new economic society is formed, called welfare, which over the forty year period perpetuates itself. Who pays for this? We all do. You know the rest of the story! Pique, instead of peak would have been a better choice. Don't worry about it.

[Rick]

mtndiva: First of all, I never pretended to be stupid enough to pretend to know when my girls lost their virginity. We did however TRY to convince them to wait for someone very special, someone worth making a life with. As opposed to girls who throw it out of both pants legs to be popular. My kids were not sheltered and did travel. Apparently you don't understand the difference between going to some island alone to get drunk and leave a bar with 3 men you barely know with going to Europe with GRANDMA. Unless of course you ditched granny in Amsterdam to go do your own thing.
I'm sorry you are so defensive about this. It suggests guilt on several levels. Point is none of you spoiled little darlings and few of your parents has a clue about the evil in the world because you chose to stick your head in the clouds.

[MtnDva]

I have BEEN to CANCUN UNCHAPERONED in college and the only crime I committed was drinking before I was 21 WHICH WAS LEGAL THERE. I saw LOTS of girls who were normally not the wild types get VERY crazy there but that was because it was vacation.
I chose not to be one of those girls who went off with random guys and had sex with them. ALL I was saying in my post is that my parents did not raise me EXACTLY as you chose to raise yours (and I think the way you raised yours is fine--YOUR PEROGOTIVE AND OPINION) AND I TURNED OUT TO BE FINE. I was not a slut, not into drugs, graduated from college and continued to have a very productive life. ALL I AM SAYING, my dear Rick, is that you don't have to shelter your children from things and not allow them to experience things in order for them to not screw up the rest of their lives. ALL you can do as a parent is teach them well and hope that they make the right decisions and even THEN it can backfire. I'm just saying, LAY OFF those parents that have made these decisions. There are probably MILLIONS of teens out there who have been on these trips and came out unscathed. Get over yourself.

[Carolyn]

I don't think Beth is a bad parent. The best thing that can happen now, is that Natalee comes home alive. If anything good can come out of this is that parents stand up to their children and let them know that the main-stream media (WB, Girls Gone Wild, MTV, and the 3 major networks) are nothing but "trash" and that good people don't watch it, and if they do, they do not take it seriously.

[hockeygirl]

"EVIDENCE" consists of testimony, facts, documents and physical evidence. For example: 3 boys seen driving vic away from bar= fact (evidence); vic seen stumbling drunk when left bar and got in car = fact & (witness) testimony (evidence); 3 boys drive vic to beach and one boy kisses vic on beach = (admission) testimony (evidence); 3 boys are last to have seen, and been with, vic while alive=fact (evidence); admission and/or confession of suspect that 3 boys all had sex with vic that same night=(admission) testimony (evidence); vic never heard from or seen again after having left bar with boys = fact (evidence).
Of course, if a body were recovered, we would probably also have physical evidence such as semen (3 types? ), DNA (ditto), abrasions and bruises, possible cracking of the skull with a blunt object and/or subhematoma, possible stab wounds etc.

All these types of evidence,THAT ARE ALREADY ESTABLISHED, are valid and admissible in a criminal trial for kidnapping, battery, rape,and possibly murder. (You might want to research the case of the mother and son currently in prison for murdering their wealthy landlord--the point? There was never any body found.) Further, testimony by third party witnesses as to vic's (Natalee's) physical and mental state of mind (i.e. too drunk to walk properly, let alone be able to knowlingly give valid consent) is also "evidence" and admissible.

Let's have a recap:
(1) Forcibly taking physical control of vic w/o vic's consent or moving or transporting vic without vic's consent = kidnapping. Also, refusing to allow vic to leave after initial consent-but change of mind-kidnapping. (Note that kidnapping does not require transport of the vic; meremy holding vic in a locked room with no escape=kidnapping.)
(2) Forcibly detaining, or restraining, vic (w/o consent) so that vic is not free to leave = kidnapping
(3) Consent must be SPOKEN OR WRITTEN and must be freely, knowingly and voluntarily given by the vic, w/o the use of drugs, alcohol, force, coercion, intimidation ("Who would believe you against us? "My dad is a judge...")threats, or abuse (or threats of abuse to vic or vic's family or threats to sully girl's reputation as a "Goody Two Shoes").
(4) Consent only applies to acts/matters that have been consented to within bounds of agreed time frame; i.e."I will have sex with you" does not mean "I will have sex with your friends too" or "I will have sex with you for as long as you want, as many times as you want, any way you want...etc."
(5) Any change in environment, location, specifics, persons involved, number of persons involved, acts or matters outside of or in addition to subject matter of the "first consent", or FRAUD (i.e. "It will just be us baby-and I won't go all the way" etc.), void the prior consent in its entirety, and may, in addition, = additional crimes if acted upon.
(6) Consent, once given, and even after given, may be revoked at option of the vic, at any time and at any place without reason or explanation (i.e. vic can "change her mind") and any such revocation voids the prior "consent" as of that moment.
(7) Once a person intentionally puts another person in a knowingly dangerous situation or leaves a vic in a knowingly unsafe location, that person will be liable for any harm that vic suffers as a result of that abandonment (i.e. vic left naked on cold beach after being raped and subsequently dies from exposure = rape AND murder).

In applying this law to the Boys' action/inaction, let's see what we can come up with:
(1) According to numerous witnesses and the boys, Nat was stumbling drunk as she left Carlos & Charlie's
(2) Joran admits to taking Nat to beach and to "kissing" her
(3) Deepak claims they all had sex with her
(4) Joran claims he left her at beach
(5) Natalee never seen/heard from again.

Some initial points:
(1) If Nat was stumbling drunk in beginning outside bar, Q as to whether she gave legal consent, or could have-as to getting in car, as to driving to beach and not hotel, as to driving to beach and not Joran's house (or vice-versa)
(2) Even if Nat "sober enough" to consent to get in car and/or drive to beach, did she also consent to "making out" with Joran? With other 2 watching and/or there? Did she agree to kissing but nothing more? Did Joran tell her he wanted nothing more? And, even more troubling, did Joran tell Natalee that only he would "make out" with her?

Even though we only have THEIR side(s) of the story, part of that story involves Deepak's admission that alll 3 had sex with Natalee, which raises some very troubling questions:

(1) If we believe the suspects' position that Nat was lucid and could and did give legal consent to get in car and/or go to beach, don't we also have to believe that Nat could and did give legal consent to having sex with all three of the boys?? (In order to find Deepak credible.) and
(2) If we believe the boys' story that Nat was lucid at the beach, we must also believe that absent more liquor or drugs administered at the beach, Natalee made a knowing and consensual decision to have sex with three different boys. It seems to me that this is really where the boys' lies break down. Nat supposedly had expressesd some level of interest in Joran on previous occasions; there is NO EVIDENCE of her ever having expressed such interest in the two Kalpoe brothers or any type of interest in boys like the Kalpoes. And the reason is obvious-they weren't her type! Joran was tall, white, clean cut, athletic, smart, cosmopolitan; the Kalpoe Bros. were dark, small and somewhat "gangsta" looking.
Even if Nat was sober enough to willingly consent to getting in that car, even if she was sober enough to willingly consent to being driven to the beach, even if she was sober enough to have willingly consented to "making out" with Joran on the beach-and possibly even to "going all the way" WITH JORAN- there is NO WAY that she would have then willingly consented to being slobbered over, groped, pulled at and f----d by two boys that she had no interest in, probably looked down on and never would have even had as friends; they were not at her level physically, economically or academically. The ONLY way "all of ...[the boys would have] had sex with Natalee" would have been if Joran and one of the brothers held her down while the other raped her OR if she had been unconscious due to a date rape drug or severe intoxication rendering her powerless to defend herself. The Kalpoe brothers are scrawny, sweaty, swarthy, sleezy, low-lifes that Natalee wouldn't have looked twice at or given the time of day to. To suggest that she would have willingly consented while sober and lucid to making love with either of them is outrageous, absurd and defies common sense.

Can anyone still logically believe that the boys "did nothing?" That Paulus did nothing? Hmmm, ever hear of obstruction of justice? Destruction of evidence. Do you know what happens to American lawyers that counsel anyone to hide or destroy evidence? They are disbarred. Let's hope that the Beth Bashers and JoranDP Fan Club out there feels that way when they see their mother, sister, daughter, cousin or girlfriend/wife, half-naked, bloody and lifeless at the morgue after getting a ride home from 3 men that "did nothing wrong."