Meara
Well-Known Member
- Joined
- Nov 10, 2013
- Messages
- 512
- Reaction score
- 344
Originally Posted by Meara
Here's our exchange upthread at #358:
<snip>
SS
I don't know why people think that there is no possibility she got [the pineapple] herself. My kids go in the fridge and get things all the time without me knowing.
M
I believe people tend to discount the possibility because both parents do in their 1998 statements. John says he didn't think JBR could open the walk-in fridge door. Patsy says no, JBR wouldn't have gotten the pineapple herself.
(BBM)
So what's odd is that, to get the pineapple herself, JBR would have had to get it from the fridge, and neither parent supported that theory.
SS
Because they didn't think she would. That does not mean she didn't. I think my kids wouldn't do a lot of things on their own and then one day they do.
Because they didn't think she would. That does not mean she didn't.
True. But it's highly improbable. JBR has never opened the walk-in fridge before, but on Christmas night, the night of the day when she's been up since the crack of dawn, when she is so exhausted that she falls asleep on the ride home, doesn't awaken when she's carried up to bed and has her clothing changed - this is the night she suddenly gets up and all by herself for the first time goes downstairs, opens the fridge, gets the pineapple, gets the milk or cream, gets a bowl, serves herself, puts the rest of the pineapple and milk/cream back in the fridge, and eats at a glass top table, all without leaving a drop of milk/cream or juice, or waking anyone, and apparently without eating any of the milk or cream, either? What are the odds? And that's what we have to work with, probability, because no one knows absolutely. Even without the parents' statements, it is completely reasonable to say the odds against are quite high, certainly greater than 50%. In short, not bloody likely.
I think my kids wouldn't do a lot of things on their own and then one day they do.
You are saying, in effect, that your experience with your children makes you a better judge of what JBR might have done than her own parents were. Well, okay, maybe. But, since personal experience doesn't automatically rise to the level of a universal principle, you'd need to demonstrate how your experience and the Ramsey's are comparable. Did you and the Ramseys supervise your 6 1/2 year old daughters the same way? Did your 61/2 year old daughter ever surprise you by being able to open a walk-in fridge by herself, or by accomplishing a task requiring similar manual strength and dexterity? Did you have a 6 1/2 year old daughter who did things in the middle of the night that you didn't think she'd do, without waking anyone? Without connections of this kind established, this works as opinion only, not as an argument. If it's only opinion, well and good. If you want to argue the point, I'm afraid it's up to you to make your case, not for others to disprove it.