Media hysteria over child abduction case

This is an interesting story that has played out in Australia over the last few months.

Also see: Mother of daughters returned to Italy afraid to visit them

Excerpt:

'THE mother of four girls taken kicking and screaming from her side as part of an international custody battle has no immediate plans to fly to Italy to visit them, despite her daughters being ordered there by a judge.

Australian Federal Police officers took the girls from an undisclosed Sunshine Coast home on Wednesday night. One of the girls yelled "leave me" and another "no, you're going to hurt me".

At Brisbane International Airport, the emotional scenes continued as the girls, aged between nine and 15, struggled with AFP officers who were trying to escort them on a Dubai-bound plane en route to Italy. Their mother could be heard screaming, "I love you, baby."'

A quick recap of the story: parents separate in Italy and have shared custody. The mother (an Australian) takes the girls back to Australia on holiday, and then doesn't return. The father uses the legal system to force her return, and she has fought it ever since - up to and including hiding the children from police when she was ordered to return them.

What's interesting here is that although this piece has picked up on the hysteria of the case, it has failed to register that this is almost entirely because it's a case of children being separated from mum to go to dad. In other cases where the dad has absconded with the kids, the press (and the public) are outraged on behalf of the heart-broken mother and demand the instant arrest of the father and return of the children.

An interesting case indeed.