She's a witch! Burn her!

Further to this ...

I hope to God this is just a publicity stunt:

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - California's octuplets mom, already jobless and receiving food stamps, has gone into hiding with her six older children because of death threats, her spokesman said on Wednesday.

Nadya Suleman, 33, has come under mounting public ridicule for expanding her already large family via fertility treatments that led to the January 26 birth of six boys and two girls at a Los Angeles-area hospital.

That criticism has mushroomed as it was reported that she was divorced, living with her parents, unemployed for several years, receiving disability checks for three of her children -- one of whom is autistic -- and collecting nearly $500 a month in food stamps.

She acknowledged those circumstances in a series of NBC television interviews but insisted in a segment aired on Tuesday on "Dateline NBC" that she was "not living off any taxpayer money" and that assistance she now receives is temporary.

The broadcast drew the highest "Dateline" ratings since a 2007 interview with Britain's Prince William and Prince Harry.

<SNIP>

For the past few days, Suleman and her six older children, ages 2 to 7, have moved into "what we are referring to as an undisclosed location," said Michael Furtney, a public relations consultant working for the family. The Web site RadarOnline.com reported the family was staying at a hotel.

Furtney said Suleman and the PR firm have been deluged with hostile telephone and email messages in recent days, some of them containing threats of violence and death.

"The bulk of them just rail against her being, as they would refer to her, as a person who's taking advantage of the system, and they just go from there," Furtney said.

He also acknowledged that the hostile messages have so far outnumbered the well-wishes, but added, "the positive notes are beginning to catch up with the not so positive ones."

Some have been directed to a new Suleman family Web site that solicits private donations to help support them.

You know, with all the problems the US faces, specifically with respect to the economy, it is interesting to me that the one receiving death threats is a woman. Sure, she's obviously milking the system. But she isn't lining up for some multi-billion dollar bail-out.

I wonder how many death threats the overpaid, high-living CEOs of companies and banks that badly stumbled, costing thousands of jobs, received?

I wonder how many people can name even one?

Anybody?

Comments

[hysperia]

The people issuing these threats are deeply concerned about the children. Yeah, right, so concerned they want to kill their mother.

[Aurelia]

I don't think that there are any threats at all. The PR guy made that up, IMO. Frankly, the only threat I can believe, is the one LA Children's Aid will be making against her.

I don't know if you linked to it, but the radaronline story had pictures of the squalid hovel they were all living in, and this is no longer about her reproductive choices. Her parenting is utterly incompetent. There was dirt and old food and piles of dirty clothes. Children, especially preemies, cannot live with that kind of infection risk. The hospital can't allow them to be discharged into that living situation.

I hate this case. I support her right to make her own reproductive choices, even though other infertiles are going to suffer hideous consequences because of her. We're being judged and slammed, and trashed by the public even though none of us would ever take the risks she took. Same for women who are single moms by choice, and women who live on welfare or food stamps.

The parenting choices are a whole 'nother thing. I grew up in poverty, but filth like that isn't about poverty, it's about neglect and incompetence. I hope children's aid does intervene in some way, perhaps sending her some helpers or making her go to parenting classes. She needs something!

[neko]

I don't know about the CEO's, but I can say for certain that Nadya Suleman is a witch. I know this because she turned me into a newt... but I got better.

My co-workers and I were looking at Ms. Suleman's site yesterday. I wonder how she scraped together the funds to pay for the site creation and to reserve the URL. She doesn't strike me as a web designer and someone put a bit of time into the creation of the colourful, baby-infused begging cup.

That being said, the death threats are sad. I can understand people's frustration. California is nearly bankrupt, the economy is in the toilet, jobless rates soar and it looks like the taxpayer is going to have to foot the bill for Ms. Suleman's unbridled desire to procreate. But that frustration shouldn't be taken out on the Suleman family, no matter how insane the situation seems to be.

[mozo]

Death threats? I can understand strong diapproval of her selfish excess but, unless she's planning to subject hte kids to some form of survivor game show I don't see the need to threaten her life. There's a lot of anger in Americastan. Unfortunately the media propels our attention to diversions more often than truly newsworthy stories and people therefore have started attaching more emotion in those directions. The fact the Alex Rodriguez took steroids is not, to my mind, so important as the fact that he is paid $27 million a year to play a game.

[Adam]

Death threats? Doubt it.

And you can imagine some CEOs got death threats, for sure. I would imagine the head of the CAW got a handful at least, and the head of GM's Canada sector.
The AIG people after the US population learned they spent $100,000's of taxpayer money on a "bailout-party"...they probably got a good few.

[Sebastian Stoker]

Look how the negative reaction to Suleman is juxtaposed to the acceptance of all the "right to life" game playing and the extreme Christian rights practices of polygamy and mass child-production. It seems pretty obvious that the United States is a very conflicted nation.

Then there is the tussle over Prop 8 in California, the atrocious gap between the real and idealized size of American women, and the crumbling of the economy of a nation whose raison d'etre was to shop 'til you drop. All the while, we see examples that the American people are incapable of, or failing to, sort out their morals and ideals and apply them practically to the pressing issues of the day. And the corporate media dangles people like Suleman - as misguided and silly as they may be - before the public like strings before kittens, in an attempt to distract from what are becoming moral or physical life and death matters (e.g. the approaching world-wide economic depression).

Anarchy approaches, making The Handmaids Tale seems all the more prophetic.

[The Stygian and his Shemitish Dogs]

"Anarchy approaches, making The Handmaids Tale seems all the more prophetic."

Sebastian

Out of date, I'm afraid. Try Robert Ferrigno's Assassin series for a much more likely outcome. And it's quite possible that people would flee from it to Atwood's Gilead.

"the extreme Christian rights practices of polygamy" in remote areas on a restricted level far out in the country

what about the ones much closer, and within, the big cities

I suppose there is a funny side to the way some people refuse to see the T-Rex in the living room (elephants don't really cover it).

[Dominique Millette]

All those extreme fetus-loving right-wingers should pitch in and send her food and diapers because they are responsible for this. I don't see them stepping up to the plate here! Where are these people when confronted with the consequences of their actions??

It's her business to have kids. This said, she should not get welfare. It isn't like she had kids by accident, or lost her job after getting pregnant. She did this on purpose so she should pay for it. If she can't, doesn't get the donations she needs and the kids go hungry, they should be placed in foster care. That's what society does for everyone else.

There's no need for any stupid threats, just for common sense.

[Kit]

"There's no need for any stupid threats, just for common sense."

Unfortunately it was not common sense that brought about this entire situation. For it to suddenly appear now seems very unlikely, especially if some people feel that the best way to solve the problem is with death threats.

Seriously? What could killing her actually solve? At the very least you'd think it would cause *more* spending of taxpayers money (ie. finding the murderer, the ensuing trial and incarceration, etc. all in addition to the still-present monetary issue of how to care for these children). I don't blame people for being upset, but this is a bit of a stretch.