I was wondering what your input was on this tragic story in out local newspaper.

I have mixed feelings. Some people are yelling for the art store to be held responsible as they had been warned....and that was my first reaction. However, it turns out they had been cited only for having it impeding the walkway.....not that it was considered unsafe.

The daycare provider side of me rolled my eyes at comments that the 2 year old "wanted to climb on it". Since when do 2 year old's have to be allowed to do whatever they want? I know that there is NO way, I would let my toddler climb on a statue on display outside a gallery. I don't care how "inviting" it was.

My heart aches for this couple. Losing a child is THE most awful thing I can think of.

Do you think they are partially responsible, or the store...or both? Is the world supposed to be completely child-proof? Should they sue the gallery?

I will be watching to see what happens. Folks here are divided on responsibility. Maybe it can be chalked up to an awful accident and nothing more...no need to place blame?

Anyway you look at it, a little one lost his life which is tragic.

http://www.ksl.com/?sid=30242730&nid...s_cid=topstory

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It is tragic. But, parents watch your kids and set limits. Plain and simple. The world is full of unsafe situations for children and it is up to the adults in their lives to watch out for them.

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Exactly.

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I had something similar happen to me.
I live near a very famous thoroughbred race track and a few years ago they put these horse statues through the town. We were out one night and I tripped and fell into one. It toppled over thankfully no one was hurt (does my pride count?! ) but I do think they should have better secured the statue. After people started stealing them they did

I DO see both sides, but frankly, if a two year old could topple it that easily, imagine what a grown person falling or accidentally leaning against it would do. Or a strong gust of wind, etc. Businesses should be securing items they place in front of their establishment for *everyones* safety.

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This happened near my home so it's been all over the news and my Facebook. So terribly sad. I don't know that I really blame the parents, it was in an area that the store wasn't supposed to have things for this reason. Fisherman's Wharf if a HUGE tourist attraction and has a TON of foot traffic. All store items area supposed to be behind a blue taped line they designated. This statue was outside the blue line and barely visible from inside the store. Sure it's beautiful but you would think a 6' metal statue would withstand a 30lb child standing on it. It was also backed against a wall in a corner which prevented it from falling anywhere BUT towards the child.
As the mom of a 2yr old I could see that happening so fast you don't even have time to stop it. You're probably embarrassed and worried about the damage you may be responsible for. Even if the parents are to blame for not stopping the accident to begin with, the statue should have been somewhere else and secured to withstand an earthquake or someone bumping into it.

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I think the statue should have been secured down. Yes, parents need to watch their children, but that statue could have fallen on anyone if it had been bumped into by an adult. We aren't all as graceful as ballerinas

Kelly

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Like everyone has said, this is a very tragic accident.

I have mixed feelings about this as well.
The beginning of the article says the child wrapped his arms and legs around it, meaning he was hanging on it like a fire pole, but the father says " he stepped with one foot on the base and it fell over."
So my feelings depend on which is more accurate.
I cannot imagine losing my child in any way and I can not begin to understand how these parents are feeling.
So if the article is correct, there is no way in hell my kid would have been allowed to climb on the statue like a jungle gym. That company did not have their artistic work out on the sidewalk for people to let their kid climb on and ruin.
I do not at anytime allow my child to climb on anything that is not to be climbed on. From the time they could crawl, they were not to crawl on "pretties", or anything that is not meant to be climbed on. Even at amusement parks, they are not allowed to climb on the gates/raiings in line. I think it is absolutely ridiculous to let your kids climb any where they want. Companies do not put things up just to have joe blow and their dog all climbing around and ruining it, putting gum on it drawing etc. Sorry but in my opinion most parents suck. I will not be one of those lazy parents that do not give boundaries for their kids to follow. We respect other peoples property. We go up the ladder and down the slide. We do not climb up the slide.

Before everyone thinks my kids don't get to have any fun. They do get to have fun and be kids, but if my kid is climbing up the slide and another kids is going down and my kid gets thrown off and lands on rock and dies from head trauma, I do not want the guilt that I was a lazy parent and didn't teach my kid how to use things the way they are meant to be used, so their death is my own fault on top of the sadness of losing my child.

Now if the dad's statement is true, no he shouldn't have let his kid stand on the base, but the gallery should not have such an unstable piece of art out in the public where small children have easy access to it. They should keep that kind of stuff in the gallery, probably where small children are not even allowed.

These are my opinions only and either way I am still so sad for the family.

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I agree the statue should have been better secured. At least to withstand a 200lb adult leaning on it. However, I would not have allowed my two year old to climb on it. There have prob been hundreds of folks who had their picture taken in front of it! So sad

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Sorry I meant we do not go up the slide

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It should have been secured. They're in San Francisco for god's sake, there are earthquakes all the time. If it's in the public arena, not in a museum or something, it should not be able to fall over.

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Some years back there was an art piece in a person's front yard that fell over and killed a kid when the elementary age kid climbed on it. Parents sued and won.
To me, that kid had no business being in someone else's yard. And the lawsuit? What if some kid decided to eat a poisonous plant from my yard? Lots of things in gardens are poisonous. They should be able to sue me then, when their kid had no business being in my yard?
The tragedy and the legality are two separate issues, if you ask me.

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If the child was on the statue, then it's the parent's fault. The company should charge the parents for the damage done to the statue and they should be charged in the death of their child.

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I completely agree that if the incident happens on private property where the reasonable assumption is the person should not have been there, they should not be allowed to sue. If I trespass on someone's property and fall and break my leg, I should not be allowed to sue.

But for me, the fact this was out on display in a public area makes a difference. The child should NOT have been on it - though I wonder what this means - since there is conflicting stories about how much he was "on" it and how it fell, KWIM?

What I also want to point out is that many of these statues are meant to have some public interaction - that's why they are right on the sidewalk - granted people shouldn't be climbing on them...but they are usually encouraging people to stand next to them to take pictures, etc.

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I do agree. And in these days of liability and blame being placed for every incident, any business should be aware of the risk and take steps to mitigate it.

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The article says that this business was warned specifically about this statue and chose to leave it unsecured there anyway.
Like Queen pointed out, this is San Francisco. Earthquakes are common. It should have been more secure than to allow a two year old to topple it.

Yes, the kid shouldn't have been allowed to climb on it, but we're talking about a two year old. Split second accidents happen. This poor family is dealing with enough pain without having to worry about being charged themselves.

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a 40 lb. toddler should not be able to bring down a big statue in an open outdoor area. Yes parents need to attend to their children, but I probably would have let my child go up and "hug" that giant dolphin for a picture too - you would expect something like that to be secured to the ground. Now if there were ropes around it and it said do not touch, etc. that would be different but it sounds like this was out there for the public's enjoyment and it was not safe. If a small toddler could bring it down like that imagine what a 175 lb. adult could have done - imagine tripping or backing into it and it falling and killing someone else - would you be accused of murder???

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I honestly can't even type what I want to say to you because I would probably be banned from this forum. That is such an ignorant and narrow point of view.

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Exactly. If anyone will be charged it will be the store, not the parents. I imagine there will be a big payout from that insurance company. Even it the parents shouldn't have let the child climb on it, it shouldn't have been there and should have been secured if it was outside. If a 2yr old could pull it down it could have been stolen, knocked down, fell on a passerby during an earthquake... And we don't really have earthquakes "all the time" but we are prone to them and homes and buildings have to have earthquake retrofitting done and measures taken to prevent injury in an earthquake. Why does my home daycare have to have earthquake fall protection but a business with thousands of visitors a day doesn't?

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You obviously disagree with how Wednesday sees this issue, but that doesn't mean she's not allowed to express her opinion here. I've seen many things said on here that make me go but that doesn't mean THEIR point of view is ignorant and narrow... it does mean that if I allow myself to get all worked up about something I don't agree with and refuse to accept that others have different opinions then I'M the one with the ignorant and narrow point of view.


With that said, I can see what Wednesday's trying to say. The statue should have been secured, but the child never should have been climbing on it, either.

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No, you really do. It's just that a lot of them aren't big enough for you to detect. Who knows how big they need to be to topple a statue?

http://earthquaketrack.com/v/sf/recent

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It doesn't mean that it's not.

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She was quoting permanent vacation (unless Wednesday and permanatvacation are the same person and I've missed that )

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Perceiving someone else's point of view as being ignorant and narrow is rather ignorant and narrow in and of itself

oh good gravy oops!

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So when I hear someone be racist or sexist, I'm narrow minded for not respecting their opinion? See, I respect everyone's right to an opinion, but I absolutely do not have to respect stupid opinions and reserve the right to say so.

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Which is why I refrained from expressing MY real true hearted opinion. If I let that out that would be getting worked up and allowing someone else's opinion to effect me. It's the keyboard courage of so many who voice their "opinion" which has no validity when it's just blablabla... But would she actually say that to the parents given the chance? Highly unlikely.

I purposely wrote exactly what I did to AVOID comments like yours. I didn't say she can't share her opinion, I stated I disagree with it to the point that I can't even say on "here" how I feel. I didn't say she couldn't share her opinion or shouldn't. I simply disagree. That's part of life.

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Perhaps I didn't explain myself properly. Here's another comment of mine that you can pick apart:

You have every right to tell another person that you disagree with their point of view. But you can do so with kindness and respect. Yeah, even the ones who are racist and sexist... you can express your difference in opinion with respect. If you choose not to, that's on you.

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That is entirely different from what you said.

No, sorry, that's "lady, pearl clutching" talk. First, no one here was disrespectful but even if they were, we are in no way beholden to express respect for someone that's clearly just wrong/and or ignorant. Abusive and mean are entirely different things. No one here has even come close to crossing that line.

One of the things I hate the most in the world is people who change the argument from what is being discussed, to "your're hurting my feelings, so now you're wrong and your opinion is invalid". It's a logical fallacy known as "ad hominem".

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I'm sorry I went OT.

BUT I never said ANYONE'S opinion was wrong. In fact, the whole point of what I'm trying to say (it baffles me that you're not comprehending this) is that even when we don't agree with someone we don't have to go all "you're lucky I'm holding back because what I really want to say will get me banned" (not a direct quote) or "I don't agree therefore your opinion is ignorant and narrow minded" (again, not a direct quote) or "I get to say whatever I want just because I feel that another's opinion is stupid" (yet again, not directly quoted). What you're accusing me of doing in the bolded above is EXACTLY what I was trying to say in my previous posts!

Also, you are completely correct in stating that you are not required to be respectful. But I am of the opinion that there are far better ways of saying "That is such an ignorant and narrow point of view." (direct quote)

Anyway, I'm done. I've said what I wanted to say about the subject, heard your opinion, responded to said opinion, and now I'm done.

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And what I'm trying to say is that you need to stop trying to censor what other people say. We're all grown-ups here and should all know how to deal with honest criticism.

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I have to agree. I don't always agree with all of what queen has to say but honestly this is the root of the problem. I was being WAY nicer than I wanted to be. Like hugely nicer. And I didn't say she's lucky I'm holding back and while you did say not verbatim that comment and what I said are hugely different.
A 2yr old died. Period. The parents weren't letting him play in the ocean alone and he drowned, they were walking down a street on vacation. This business had already been warned. If a child died at daycare and the provider had been warned of this risk before and was clearly breaking the rules to begin with how would you feel? That it's the parents fault for not knowing?

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Yes, I would say it straight to the parents and in the same general situation have a couple of times. No, I haven't seen a child die from their misbehaving actions. But I have seen them do things like run wild in a restaurant, get hurt, and the parents throw a fit at the manager about it being the company's fault that the table cut the kid. I bold-faced announced that they had been letting their kid run around all wild and HE ran into the table! It was HIS fault! Not the table's. I've had times at different stores when some kid gets wild, gets himself/herself hurt and the parents start ranting about the item that was in the kid's way that hurt the kid and I always inform the parent what truly happened. That no one else fell over the item/got hurt by the item, but since they were not watching the child, or were allowing the child to be wild, their child hurt themselves. I have also, a few times, told my neighbors' kids' parents what really happened to their child. When a dog finally had enough of a kid throwing rocks at him and poking sticks through the fence at him, and the dog started lunging at the kid trying to attack him through the fence, the kid ran home and told his mother about the dog trying to attack him. He of course left out that he was harassing the dog. The mother went to the dog's house hollering about how she's going to have the dog taken care of. I caught her before she got to the dog's house and told her all about how her son was throwing rocks and trying to poke the dog with sticks. Instead of 'taking care of the dog', she started going off on her kid. There have been a handful of times when I have seen one kid harassing another and the second kid finally stand up for him/herself either physically or verbally. The mean kid's mother/father would try to go off on the nice kid or nice kid's parents for that kid cussing out/threatening/or hitting their kid. Each time, I have told both sets of parents what I saw. My younger daughter got into God knows how many fights in middle school. Some, she was defending herself, others, she had started crap with someone. In each case, I told the Vice-Principal (we always worked with the Vice-Principal) and the other parents the entire story as I know it whether my child was in the right or not. Some of the things I knew from overhearing my child and her friends talking, some my daughter had told me herself, some I had seen on Twitter/Facebook, some I had witnessed at the mall/movies/etc. If I had seen or knew of my child starting crap with someone else, I would call the Vice-Principal myself and tell them what my daughter had been doing/saying/threatening to/about the other child. I did that to get the Vice-Principal to help me stop her before she actually got physical with someone or it escalated more than it already had.

Oh yes, I have no problem standing up for the person/company that I believe to be in the right. Often, my personal children tell me to leave it alone, keep out of their business, that I'm going to get myself beat up/killed, that I'm going to get them (my personal children) jumped by the older child of the parent that I am telling them about their misbehaved kid. But I keep putting my nose in their business. One of these days, I'm probably going to get myself shot, but until then, I will continue to let people know who did what right/wrong and who deserved to get punished, needed to be put in their place by their peers, etc. I was raised to have strong morals and I can't bring myself to see something wrong happen to someone/a company and blindly walk on past.

In the case of the boy and the statue that this thread is about, if the child was on the statue at all, I fully believe it's the child/parent's fault. And yes, if I had been there and witnessed the child on the statue and then seen it fall on the child, I would have informed the parents and whoever was involved (store manager, police, ambulance crew, whoever) that the child was on the statue. It wasn't that the statue simply fell over. The child being on it made it fall over. It was the child's fault that the statue fell over and it was the parent's fault (for not monitoring the child properly) that their child was able to get on the statue.

I absolutely can not stand it when a child misbehaves and the parents try to blame/sue the company for the child getting themselves hurt!

Now, if they were just walking past the statue, and no one touched it at all, and it simply fell over onto the child, then it would have been the company's fault for not securing the statue. But in this case, the statue fell over BECAUSE the child did something to it (stood on it, climbed on it, whatever he did). The child had no business being on the statue at all.

If a child goes to the clothing store and pulls on the clothes on the clothing rack and the rack falls on the kid and kills the kid, is it the store's fault? NO! It's the child's fault for pulling on the clothes on the rack and the parents' fault for not keeping the child from doing so.

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Well, this took an unexpected turn...

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It’s tragic for the little boy and all those who loved him.

I think equal responsibility should be placed on the art gallery and the parents. The parents should’ve not allowed they’re child to be on the stature due to his age. As an adult, I’ve stood near statures or my older children have stepped on or sat on a stature for a picture.

The art gallery because if they are going to display an art piece of the size it should be secure.

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I agree with equal responsibility. The gallery should have known the statue would be a kid magnet and taken precautions. And the parents should have known the statue would be a kid magnet and also taken precautions to keep their child off of it.

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The difference between liability is that parents don't carry general liability insurance. This business does. The statue being there was a liability and they were warned previously about its danger and chose to do nothing. This wasn't inside the gallery so anyone walking by has access to it and I believe it's technically on city property, not private.
I don't see a 2yr old just being naughty and climbing on it as much as admiring it like 2yr olds do while sight-seeing and it falling over on him. A 30lb child shouldn't be able to pull something over like that. The business holds more liability IMO after being warned. There was no note saying no climbing or touching either. And really, having been here myself numerous times I just can't imagine this business being so naive to think they don't need to secure it. Just blocks away people are flipping smart cars on their sides and crashing cars into glass store fronts to steal things. Either they move it in and out every day and it's not as heavy as it appears to be or it's pretty heavy and stays there 24/7. Ultimately, by law, and not opinion, I believe the business will be held liable and the family won't. In this day and age we have to protect ourselves. We hold insurance for this exact reason because businesses (like ourselves) have to prevent accidents, we can't expect others to do so.

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We have to protect ourselves because others have stopped taking personal responsibility for their own actions.

Because people are so quick to blame others and not look at their own actions as having played a role in whatever, is exactly why our country is so sue happy about everything.

It's kind of like the chicken or the egg. Which comes first..kwim?

FWIW~ My comment has NOTHING to do with this story...I just made it in reference to what TwinKristi was saying.

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I agree with you, but unfortunately it's just the way things are now. Look at how we have to push for prepayment because so many providers get stiffed after working and not getting paid. An injury alone I could see the parents having more blame but for this statue to have the ability to kill a small child it should have been secured or moved elsewhere. Most parents don't bring their children in an art gallery so you really limit the liability to adults and many KNOW kids shouldn't climb or even touch something inside a gallery. But when it's on the street and accessible to every person out on the street (which some days are literally thousands) there should at the very least be a sign that says no touching/climbing which would then release them of liability in this case.

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I hesitate to form an opinion regarding fault in stories like this. All we hear is what the media reports, and we all know how that is. The fact that we live in an extremely litigious society really bothers me. I think it is a sign of a much larger problem, and a sad commentary on the times we are living in. It's not fair to come out with guns blazing at anybody because sometimes people are greedy liars who will take any opportunity to make a buck. Not that the parents in this story are those people, but because of people like that I will not be sitting here judging anybody based on what the media says. It's just sad and I pray for that family.

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Why is it the only thing that sticks in my head is the 20,000 they are raising for the child's funeral. WOW things cost a lot more than they do around here.

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Accountability/responsibility..... Too many people rationalize the "reason why" they did something or explain why someone "made them do it!" We live in a "no fault" society and sadly, depending on the judge, so does the court system.

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Don’t know where they live. Where my brother died and was buried, funeral expenses were about $13,000 - $14,000.

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They're from Utah but out here in northern CA so add to this the transfer of his body. So it could easily be $20k+

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Yes! And somewhere along the way, common sense flew right out the window. Who needs common sense when the court system can just come in and straighten up the mess?

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