quote:The bizarre baby, however, died after half an hour of its birth
So... were they parading the baby around the streets before it died... or after..?
I notice the story makes no mention if the baby was a boy or a girl. I guess because it was so abnormal looking, they figured they'd better stick with "it."
Purple--Peeples ees cray-zee!--Iguana
-------------------- They just don't make crazed, beserk robots like they used to. --Sheen Estevez, Jimmy Neutron, Boy Genius
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Richard W
Ding Dong! Merrily on High Definition TV
posted
If you look at the picture more carefully it's quite clear it was a boy...
I have no particular opinion on its reality - it doesn't "look real" to me but that's hardly convincing evidence. And if it was a model, why would they be parading it through the streets? I imagine that must be after its death, if it was ever alive.
(edit) I think a lot of people refer to babies as "it" anyway. I tend to, certainly.
Posts: 8725 | From: Ipswich - the UK's 9th Best Place to Sleep! | Registered: Feb 2000
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posted
This topic should really have a NFBSK tag in the subject line.
I'm not quite shocked by the picture of the baby but more at the second picture of them putting the baby in a cooking pot and parading him through town.
Posts: 32 | From: Toronto | Registered: Sep 2004
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Richard W
Ding Dong! Merrily on High Definition TV
posted
Looks more like a washbasin to me, but yes, the pictures are slightly gruesome. (And contain a dead baby.)
Posts: 8725 | From: Ipswich - the UK's 9th Best Place to Sleep! | Registered: Feb 2000
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Also - I'm assuming this site is legit (apparently it's for the American University of Beirut? I found it through Google), but it looks a lot like the baby in the OP:
-------------------- "...and if you take cranberries and stew them like applesauce they taste much more like prunes than rhubarb does." ~~Groucho Marx~~ Posts: 392 | From: Virginia | Registered: Oct 2005
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posted
What was really bizarre was the picture of them parading the baby around in the wash basin. (Looks more like a wash basin to me too.)
Are there no cultural taboos for parading the dead down the street in Nepal? And why is an anecephaic baby such bizarre news? It's tragic for the parents.
posted
They don't seem to regard it as a real human. The article actually referred to the poor little fellow as "the 'baby'" thus implying that it was not a real baby.
-------------------- Officially Heartless Posts: 3065 | From: The Montgomery County of the West Coast- Berkeley, CA | Registered: Nov 2005
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posted
That poor kid. Even his father didn't sound upset in the article. I wonder how the baby's mother feels.
-------------------- A Viennese fellow is walking along the Karntner Strasse and notices a banana peel lying in his path. "Alas," he sighs, "now I must slip and fall down!" Posts: 506 | From: Missouri | Registered: Dec 2005
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posted
I added the NFBSK tag to the subject line as requested...
I guess what struck me as odd looking (and made me think this wasn't real) is the fact that the mouth looks "molded" - there doesn't seem to be any opening - the lips look "fused", as they would if this was a molded sculpture (am I making sense?)
If this is real, I feel bad for my original posting where I call it a "thing" Posts: 96 | From: Saint Louis, MO | Registered: Apr 2004
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quote:Originally posted by Richard W: If you look at the picture more carefully it's quite clear it was a boy...
Right you are... I admit, I hadn't looked closely enough.
-------------------- They just don't make crazed, beserk robots like they used to. --Sheen Estevez, Jimmy Neutron, Boy Genius
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posted
I'm terribly squeemish... just how "NFBSK" are we talking? I'm horribly curious to see it, but I'd rather be prepared for what I'll see.
-------------------- "I saw weird stuff in that place last night. Weird, strange, sick, twisted, eerie, godless, EVIL stuff... and I want in."- Homer Simpson Posts: 2161 | From: Delaware | Registered: Aug 2005
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quote:Originally posted by Nocturnal Goddess: The Bittersweet: I'm terribly squeemish... just how "NFBSK" are we talking? I'm horribly curious to see it, but I'd rather be prepared for what I'll see.
It made me quite sad and it's kind of icky- the child is certainly deformed, but not obviously dead or in pain or bleeding.
-------------------- Officially Heartless Posts: 3065 | From: The Montgomery County of the West Coast- Berkeley, CA | Registered: Nov 2005
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posted
I find is sad and strange that they paraded the baby through the streets. I would have thought that the doctors would have prevented that, that the parents would be protesting (maybe they did), and that the crowd, after peering at the dull outside of a hospital would have eventually dispersed. How very sad.
-------------------- "How do you make chocolate? You take dark chocolate, you mix it with white milk, and it becomes a delicious drink. That is the chocolate I am talking about." --Ray Nagin Posts: 1325 | From: Missouri | Registered: Sep 2005
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quote:Originally posted by Nocturnal Goddess: The Bittersweet: I'm terribly squeemish... just how "NFBSK" are we talking? I'm horribly curious to see it, but I'd rather be prepared for what I'll see.
As far as NFBSK...
The eyes are bulging out in the first photo, and looking directly at the camera, and the face is slack with the mouth open. At first i thought it looked like a really realistic muppet, with the large eyes. there's no gore, just sad and creepy.
-------------------- “We live in a society of victimization, where people are much more comfortable being victimized than actually standing up for themselves.” - Marilyn Manson "Well, end more, your not ending enough!" - MST3K Posts: 259 | From: Texas | Registered: Nov 2005
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posted
It sure looks like a rigid sculpture sitting up like that, not floppy like a real baby would be.
Posts: 326 | From: Hawaii | Registered: Jul 2005
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quote:Originally posted by PallasAthena: I find is sad and strange that they paraded the baby through the streets. I would have thought that the doctors would have prevented that, that the parents would be protesting (maybe they did), and that the crowd, after peering at the dull outside of a hospital would have eventually dispersed. How very sad.
It seems as if one of the parent's was pretty emotionally detached. And it doesn't surprise me that they paraded it through the streets. Humans love an oddity (i.e. freak shows, rotten.com). I find it interesting that the overall appearance of the scene was that of the corpse being enshrined.
-------------------- So many spankings! It feels so good! But at the same time, I don't care about meeting your family! - I'mNotDedalus: Posts: 3216 | From: Denver, CO | Registered: Dec 2005
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quote: It was taken to the hospital after its death.
And then given to the onlookers so they could parade with it? Real or not, it makes me sad to hear that the father feels no remorse for him, and that the people felt the need to dance around in the streets with him.
Posts: 71 | From: Texas | Registered: Mar 2006
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posted
Nepali people, especially those in the more rural areas as this appears to be, are generally rather superstitious. I wonder if they wanted to see it because they thought the baby was some kind of sign or omen? Or maybe they were just curious. It sounds weird to us that they would parade the baby around, but how much different is it from this thread that posts a link where we can all see it? Are we that much different?
Sure, this is more orderly and somewhat detached, but the curiosity factor is basically the same.
-------------------- This used to be the life, but I don't need another one. MyBandwagon Posts: 3254 | From: small town Texas | Registered: Jan 2004
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posted
Nocturnal Goddess: There are two photos. The first photo is an up close shot of the baby sitting in a round vessel (sauce pan, wash basin, etc.) The baby is naked, has no neck and his opened eyes are exceptionally large for his skull. The lips look normal while the nose and nostrils are a bit larger than a normal newborn infant. The eyes and eyelids are bulged out; like how a frog's eyes are... or a Matt Groening cartoon character. In fact, if you were to cover the picture with your hand and look at it from the nose up, it would probably look like a bullfrog. The baby's legs are slightly stained with what looks like blood (probably from childbirth?). The baby is sitting almost upright in the vessel with his legs crossed. His right arm is across his lap while his left arm appears to be beside and behind him; as if he was casually reclining.
The second photo is of a man holding the vessel up into the air (with the baby in it) and behind him is a large crowd of people; following him.
Posts: 32 | From: Toronto | Registered: Sep 2004
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quote: It was taken to the hospital after its death.
And then given to the onlookers so they could parade with it? Real or not, it makes me sad to hear that the father feels no remorse for him, and that the people felt the need to dance around in the streets with him.
Why? We still have travelling exhibits of curiosities, and one in Denver right now that consists of real, flayed, preserved corpses.
The infant is dead. The father seems to take that in course. Perhaps having the child wasn't something that was particularly anticipated or desired.
The people are at least forward and honest in their curiosity. We, as a culture, are made feel guilty about our fascination with such things, when it's perfectly understandable to be curious.
(ETA: This reminds me of the "Jesus" in Flannery O'Connor's Wise Blood. Deformed infant corpse becomes object of worship.)
-------------------- So many spankings! It feels so good! But at the same time, I don't care about meeting your family! - I'mNotDedalus: Posts: 3216 | From: Denver, CO | Registered: Dec 2005
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posted
Maybe its a cultural way to honor the baby, to show the child to the village, despite what it looks like or health?
-------------------- “We live in a society of victimization, where people are much more comfortable being victimized than actually standing up for themselves.” - Marilyn Manson "Well, end more, your not ending enough!" - MST3K Posts: 259 | From: Texas | Registered: Nov 2005
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posted
Having the crowd around the baby like that, although not natural in our society, made sense to me. The entire village probably knew about this oddly formed baby. It's a small village and people talk. They all wanted to see it. Since the parents were walking it to the hospital, a crowd gathered.
Honestly, I completely understand the father's emotional detachment. We pretend not to have this capacity, but it's engrained in our culture as well -- we've just had enough food for long enough that we haven't had to exercise the character trait. The practice of exposure (infanticide, where you simply abandon a baby you can't care for by the side of the road) is thousands of years old.
Chances are, one of your (remote, probably) ancestors left a perfectly healthy baby out to die because the family didn't have enough food. Babies with obvious defects, those who didn't seem as if they would thrive, were also frequently exposed. There just was no reason to invest energy into them. People buttoned up their feelings, at least at that point, and appreciated what they had.
At least this family walked the baby to the hospital and, since it's obvious that the baby would never thrive, this man (the father) is moving on and cherishing what he has.
Posts: 955 | From: Dallas, TX | Registered: Jul 2004
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posted
Swollen_ostrich, while I agree that this is probably a real example of a baby with anencephaly, it did remind me of some of the works by this artist.
-------------------- Too broke to pay attention Posts: 452 | From: Omaha, NE | Registered: Aug 2005
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quote:Originally posted by Anyte: Swollen_ostrich, while I agree that this is probably a real example of a baby with anencephaly, it did remind me of some of the works by this artist.
Yep, that's the one - and yes, I now believe this is/was a real infant as well.
If you look at the reader comments on the original link, there is a link to a medical discussion board where they have a thread going about the original article, and their opinion is the same as here - anencephaly.
Posts: 96 | From: Saint Louis, MO | Registered: Apr 2004
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quote: Anencephaly is a congenital malformation that occurs in approximately one in one thousand pregnancies.
That's seems really high to me. I didn't have time to look further into it yet but I'm hoping someone can save me some time and tell me that's a misprint.
quote:Originally posted by Alyssa098: That's seems really high to me. I didn't have time to look further into it yet but I'm hoping someone can save me some time and tell me that's a misprint.
Well, there are some differences between what is on that page and the information from the Wikipedia entry on Anencephaly.
From the link posted earlier;
quote: Most infants with anencephaly will be born still. A small percentage(30-33%) will be born alive and will live for a few moments to a few days. A rare few have lived for several months.
quote: In the United States, approximately 1,000 to 2,000 babies are born with anencephaly each year. Female babies are more likely to be affected by the disorder. About 95% of women who learn that they will have an anencephalic baby choose to have an abortion. Of the remaining 5%, about 55% are stillborn.
quote: Anencephaly is a congenital malformation that occurs in approximately one in one thousand pregnancies.
That's seems really high to me. I didn't have time to look further into it yet but I'm hoping someone can save me some time and tell me that's a misprint.
Alyssa098
I think it's actually a misquote. From another page:
quote:Is known as a neural tube defect. One of the most common occurring in about 1 out of every 1000 pregnancies.
Now, this is worded badly, but I believe it means that neural tube defects occur in 1 of 1000 pregnancies. Neural tube defects are extremely common, but they encompass a whole series of different disorders, ranging from just a portion of the spine being malformed (spina bifida) to the entire brain being missing.
The wikipedia on neural tube defects says that the incidence is about 2.6 in 1000.
Posts: 98 | From: Omaha, NE | Registered: Apr 2005
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This website (http://aprilfools.urgo.org/) lists April Fool's jokes, and includes as #25 this baby's pictures on Ogrish (http://www.ogrish.com/archives/bizarre_baby_born_in_nepal_Mar_31_2006.html).
I suspect it's the April fools website's mistake - I'm still on the 'real' side.
UPDATE: Wikipedia now says it was mistakenly reported as a hoax...
Posts: 3 | From: Hong Kong | Registered: Mar 2006
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quote:Originally posted by spasm: UPDATE: Wikipedia now says it was mistakenly reported as a hoax...
Sometimes, you really can't trust Wikipedia because all the info is voluntarily submitted by the users and in some cases, submitted without verification or fact-checking.
Posts: 32 | From: Toronto | Registered: Sep 2004
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quote:Originally posted by spasm: UPDATE: Wikipedia now says it was mistakenly reported as a hoax...
Sometimes, you really can't trust Wikipedia because all the info is voluntarily submitted by the users and in some cases, submitted without verification or fact-checking.
I was partially responsible for that, though.
In the wee hours of April 1, DH decided to look at the Wikipedia list of pranks. I spotted the baby in the list of hoaxes, and promptly started ranting about it, a little bit more loudly than I should have at 2 in the morning. That started DH in on a bit of an edit-war, him (and one or two others, I'm sure) attempting to remove it and others putting it back, until the "mistaken hoax" category was created.
And yes, this thread was the starting point for my rant. I brought it up on my screen and gesticulated at it wildly a few times.
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