Everybody Panic!

Barry Lovell has had a spat with the missus and gone out with his kid! Call out the cops! Maybe the SWAT team! Tell the BBC! Make sure the whole world knows because Barry's obviously off his rocker and can't be trusted!

What is it with the world today? Fathers just can't be trusted, not so far as you can throw us. We're dangerous, we're evil, who knows what we'll get up to next. The slightest toe over a line and we're to be hounded into the ground. And just exactly who is defining where that line is anyway and why does it keep moving closer to our toes?

The cops want us to know that Barry isn't in trouble and his actions aren't "calculated", but the BBC want us to know that the missus, Emma, says her "heart is being ripped out". Drama! Tragedy! The world ends at teatime!

What if she'd buggered off with the kid? Would we be putting out all-points alerts, hearing about it on the national news? Like hell we would. Well, unless she were a drug addict who left hospital with her premature baby presumably in search of a hit, and even then, once found, we'd just usher her back into hospital, the poor dear. Would we be hearing about the father and how his heart was torn out? In my dreams.

What do we suppose will happen to Barry once he comes home? A pat on the back and all is forgiven? Yeah, sure.

Why all the fuss? Because we all know what happens when fathers leave with the kid after a fight with the missus. The media have made sure that we all know for sure that it inevitably ends in tragedy. That is the unstated expectation, the media can almost be seen salivating, the cops go loopy. It's a guilty pleasure, we all know what's going on. Barry's chances of having a normal relationship with his kid are almost negligible if Emma decides he shouldn't, especially now. He's handed her his balls, no matter what he does. It doesn't take much to imagine what he might be going through, and it takes even less to imagine how he might react, especially if he's pressured hard enough. Let's all watch as closely as we can and see if he does.

If he does, he's easy to condemn, and if he doesn't he'll be easy to forget, meantime it's fun to join in the torment.

The cops say "The response from the public has been fantastic". I bet it has, everyone wants to be a knight in shining amour saving a child in obvious mortal danger from nasty, evil dad for the poor defenseless, weeping mom. (She's notably pretty, I wonder if the public would be so "fantastic" if she had a face like the back end of a horse?)

In case you think anything gruesome might have happened already, Barry and his kid have been spotted three times since they took off, only two days ago.

Why are they even considered to be missing yet?

Everyone's all worried because he didn't take nappies or baby food. This isn't the bloody arctic folks! England has actual shops that sell things like baby food and nappies! They have cash machines (he's used one) and credit cards and all kinds of modern, trendy things.

What did they argue about? Money. Now that's downright scary, don't you think? Who knows what that might mean? Let's all imagine the worst.

Good grief, calm down everyone. Give Barry a chance to call home without having to face down a perfect media storm. Apply some basic psychology, and I don't mean trying to pull on his heartstrings with a hysterical mom giving a press conference which is only going to scare him all the more, knowing that the public is now squarely on her side and will be completely deaf to his.

Update: you can all stop panicking now. They found them. Safe and well. Of course, they arrested Barry, "on suspicion of child neglect" whatever the hell that means. "On suspicion of not actually having done anything illegal, you, you father, you!" more like. Morons.

Oh, sorry, you like panicking. Sorry. Go right ahead then. Don't mind me.

Morons.


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