I try not to judge the neighbours who heard and did nothing because ultimately sometimes people are scared to, I was living in a very rough area in my youth and did hear and see some things that I would absolutely report now but didn't then because I didn't want dog tit or worse shoved thru my letterbox. Plus some communities are just very, very distrustful of authority anyway, does anyone remember earlier this year when the police tried to remove some children from a family after safeguarding concerns and all the neighbours basically started rioting so they put the children back. This was in Leeds I think. So yeah sometimes you do turn a blind eye but it's often out of fear rather than not caring if you see what I mean?
I also get a bit uncomfortable when blame is displaced, it's like I was following the threads here on poor Arthur Labinjo Hughes and at one point there was more hate being shown for the hairdresser than the actual killers, it's like yes I agree it's a shame we no longer live in a society where kids are raised by a village but arguably we never did, Hindleyand Brady for example rarely had problems picking kids off the street and no one tried seriously to stop them? Mary Bell was able to kill two toddlers and that was in a really close knit community. Loads of people saw Jamie Bulger being walked off by Thomson and Venables and he was in clear distress and they did nothing, this was in Liverpool which is famed for its community spirit. I think the 'good old days' of communities looking after children have probably been hugely exaggerated or never really existed.
I just think that people who are determined to abuse and torture their children are devious, they will find a way to hide what they are doing and dissuade anyone from interfering, blaming bystanders is a bit of a hiding to nothing emo.
