Well, it seems that Laura Dekker won’t be allowed to go ahead with her plans to break the record for the youngest ’round-the-world solo sailing trip.
The court ruled today in favor of Child Protection Services and Laura’s parents have lost custody for 2 months.
And her back-up plan of heading to New Zealand? Apparently authorities there say they won’t let her go either.
So, for now at least, I guess it’s be back-to-school time for Laura too.
Read more here.
I’m a little torn about this. Part of me thinks that her parents (hopefully) know her best and if they say she can go, then who am I to second-guess their judgement? Plus, if anybody wants to keep a child safe, it is (or should be) the parents, right? Then again, there are all sorts of horrible parents out there.
I don’t know.
Somebody made the comparison between this case and the case of parents who take their kids out of school to become olympic athletes - while the olympics are worth this kind of sacrifice, Laura’s parents have just lost custody because of their decision to allow Laura to follow her dream. Granted, olympic athletes aren’t necessarily spending their time all alone on the ocean - but then, what are they doing? I imagine they spend a whole lot of time travelling - with or without their parents - to various matches where they’re surrounded by constant and possibly quite damaging competition. If you offered me the choice, I might prefer the solo sail to becoming an olympic gymnast.
Somehow I don’t think that Laura will give up quite yet (though I imagine being taken from your parents’ custody could be pretty demoralizing)… so I’m still waiting to see what happens…
(Which is in itself is a little creepy - this story about a 213 year-old girl with a beautifully Big Dream that seems to be impossible has become something for people to chew on… we don’t know her, we don’t know her parents, we have no idea really about the circumstances of this case… and yet, everybody seems to want to pick a side and fight it out… I guess that’s what makes it interesting story (it’s easy to identify with)… but it also feels a little… predatory… yuck.)
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