Destinations
February 9th, 2010 | Author: RandR
DISCLAIMER: The discussion after the summary of the recent investigation which is ongoing in San Antonio is merely speculation for fiction ideas. I am in no way advocating what I contemplate for real life.
Some of you may know about the missing baby case that’s garnered a lot of news attention in San Antonio for several weeks now. Apparently, the baby’s mother came here on a bus with the baby from Arizona shortly before Christmas. At some point, she allegedly text messaged the father that she’d killed the baby and put him in a dumpster. The San Antonio police have apparently been trying to determine if a private adoption was involved or if the mother’s text was credible. For several weeks, a specific area of the local landfill has been roped off in case they determined it was a homicide instead of a missing baby. This week, they declared the case a homicide and will begin searching the landfill for his body.
None of this is pleasant, funny, or good in any way. However, a response to a posted news story on Facebook shifted my mind into horrible directions. A comment in response to a comment about why authorities haven’t looked in the landfill sooner, caught my eye. In part, it read, “Since SA is known for child killing then they should have looked sooner.”
I know the author of that comment would never have intended the thought it prompted in me, but it got me to wondering, we have all sorts of destination locations for various activities. People go to Las Vegas, Reno, Atlantic City, or Biloxi for gambling. It’s a destination. People go to Rio or Cozumel or various tropical locations for winter beaches or nightlife. Again, a destination. The Vegas wedding is a common destination.
Are there really destinations for child killing? Are some environments more child killing-friendly than others? How do you find out about them? Probably not on the Chamber of Commerce website. What if there were a culture out there somewhere where this behavior was acceptable, and they advertised for your business? But more importantly, in a fictional world, if such a place existed, how would you structure the story to make it salable?
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4 Responses to “Destinations”
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This would be a little disturbing if I hadn’t had an idea for a story in which the MC causes disasters with some telepathic ability she doesn’t know she has. I came to me the day the Space Shuttle Columbia blew up. I lived in Texas, and I was in Texas when the Challenger blew up, too, and my first thought was, “Oh, crap, maybe it’s me!” I bounced the idea off a couple people, and I was the only one who thought it sounded cool.
Maybe you could frame the concept in a murder mystery (think Tess Gerritsen or James Patterson, maybe). I can’t imagine that it would be publicly known, but a clandestine group could work. It could operate like an internet pedophile ring.
That’s a fascinating idea, EJ. I guess we’re both pretty good with creepy ideas.
Apparently, San Antonio is known for underground adoptions, which is potentially creepy, too.
Hmm, child murder and underground adoptions. Those combined with your proximity to the Mexican border sounds like a huge pedophile ring to me.
There’s been a lot of that discussed in the news, too. It’s not a subject I’d really care to write about, but for seamy, sordid material, it’s boundless.