Irish Teen Falls Overboard; Natalee Holloway Disappears in Aruba: Parents Intervene too Late

By: Steve Yuhas

As Beth Twitty makes her way around to schools on a tour called "Save Yourself" where she tells young adults that they should travel in groups and allow international calls on their cell phones (we won’t debate the logic of her message) another family is going under the stress of losing their daughter.  This time the child is really a child and she was lost on the high seas after falling overboard from a cruise ship during a family vacation.

Lynsey O’Brien, 15, of Ireland fell off of the balcony of the Costa Magica after drinking aboard a cruise ship and her family is now offering a €205,000 reward for the return of her body.  A funeral has already been held and a memorial service was held by the ship, but the family wants the body in order to close a chapter in their lives that began as a joyful vacation and ended in another tragedy that could have been avoided if only parents intervened before it was too late.

Contrary to the Natalee Holloway affair O’Brien was really not an adult and should not have been served alcohol aboard the ship and her father, Paul, told the Irish Post, “My daughter would be here now if she hadn’t been served alcohol.”  He continued to take responsibility (at least partially) for what happened to his daughter, “I let my guard down once in my life and my child died.”

The government of Ireland has not taken up searching for the teen; she disappeared about 20 miles off of the Mexican coast and no fighter jets were flown from Europe to look for her.  Greta and Nancy have not traveled to the coastline to reconstruct the exact fall or to cast dispersions upon suspects and Lynsey’s mother has not appeared with cameras rolling at the home or work of the bartenders that served her daughter the alcohol that probably led to her death.

What an amazing contrast to the Holloway case.  Sure, Natalee Holloway was an American citizen, but judging from the emails that were allegedly received by the cable news shows – the whole world was concerned about Holloway.  I suppose nobody cares about the Irish girl who was a real victim of irresponsible adults.  What is so different about Lynsey?  Maybe Nancy and Greta think she deserved it because it was an accident or could it be that there is no international intrigue surrounding a family vacation.  Either way it does ring hollow considering the amount of coverage that has been given to a missing adult in Aruba compared to a missing teen from Ireland.

Last week as Dave Holloway’s publicists were busy sending out press releases about his upcoming book (I wonder how much money is changing hands at the Twitty/Holloway home) Beth Twitty was on her tour of schools to teach young adults how to remain safe during their spring break.  During that time the mainstream media all but ignored the revelations that Natalee Holloway was probably not murdered at all.

According to Beth Twitty she is “telling Natalee's story," but it appears from the police officials in Aruba that the story she is telling and the one that the police are putting together are two different versions.  Not since Clue was made into a movie with three different endings has a story been told so many different ways.

Gerold Dompig, deputy chief of police in Aruba and the man leading the investigation into the disappearance of Natalee Holloway, told CBS that he believes her death was caused by complications from drugs or alcohol.  Someone should tell that to the Beth Twitty because that is not the story they are telling and the rest of the Twitty/Holloway Boycott Aruba Followers simply dismissed his comments out of hand.  Damage control leapt into high gear and Beth began the talk show rounds to put the kibosh on the story and to do another round of talking about how little the Aruban authorities actually know.

I wonder who would know more – a woman touring the country talking to college and high school kids who was not in Aruba when her daughter went missing or the chief investigator of the case. 

I bet if Dompig went on CBS and said that van der Sloot or one of the Kalpoe brothers were guilty of killing her and that they were being taken into custody – the Twitty/Holloway support team would be talking about the wonders of Aruban justice.

Two families who do not know each other, but have one tragic similarity: they both lost their daughters to alcohol or drugs (or a combination of those and foul play), but it doesn’t matter because both of the girls are gone.  As tragic as their disappearances are it begs the question about what parents are doing to safeguard their children – before something bad happens to them.

Beth Twitty claimed to an audience at Ball State University that she thought she prepared her daughter for a vacation in a foreign country.  We know that whatever preparation she gave to Natalee Holloway it was not enough to keep a seemingly intelligent adult from drinking and meeting with and leaving a bar with at least one or maybe a couple of men that she did not know very well.  Twitty also said that what happened to Natalee could happen to any of them.  Not exactly.

Most women know not to leave a bar with men they don’t know – even if they are on vacation and in a foreign country.  Most young women have friends who would look for them before they went to bed on their last night on an exotic island with an early morning wake up call and I can honestly say that I cannot think of one woman growing up, either in my family or circle of friends, that would travel abroad and do what Natalee Holloway did.  That is not to say that if something sinister happened to her that she deserved it, but she certainly has some level of responsibility; as do her parents and the notion of one of them “preparing” other teens to travel is about as absurd as a pre-school teacher being tenured to teach physics.

At least Lynsey O’Brien’s father understands his responsibility in the tragic events that happened to his daughter and doesn’t try to deflect responsibility onto others.  He understands that by not watching over her that something heartbreaking happened to her and it doesn’t make it easier, but at least he is not making a fool out of himself by creating a media frenzy that did nothing except create resentment from those who can eventually find his daughter and return her home for burial.

The contrasts in the case are many, but the similarities enough to say that parents are not doing enough to prepare their children to do very much of anything; let alone go on vacations alone.  An adult woman ready for college painted as an angel goes off to a foreign country and now her mother is out talking about how other women can stay safe when she obviously failed with her own daughter’s preparation. 

A family in Ireland loses a daughter to the sea because she is served alcohol when her parents were not watching.  Why are parents waiting so long to take responsibility for their children and seemingly losing control of them so often?  Do Baby Boomers just make bad parents or is it just some of them?

Parenting has become an endeavor that happens only after a tragic event happens to a family.  Of course there are normal families out there where bad things will not befall their children because they are taught not to engage in behaviors that will put them in danger, but for those families that become involved in tragedy there is one thing that is clear: bad parenting leads to great loss.

Beth Twitty is the last person who should be talking about what happened to Natalee Holloway because she doesn’t know (and having been on a radio program with one of the “chaperones” who were not there to baby-sit, but were there to take the travelers to the hospital – his words) they don’t know either and her friends don’t know – so exactly what story is Twitty telling? 

We know she is not telling the version by the lead investigator because that would cause all of the hours of virtue on video to come into question and Greta and Nancy have spent too much time painting Natalee into an angel to allow that to happen.  What version is in her father’s new book?  I wonder if there will be a movie of the week any time soon.  G-d help us.

Now the O’Briens face their loss, but at least Lynsey’s father stood up and admitted that he turned his back and something terrible happened to his daughter.  To listen to Beth Twitty is to listen to a mother in denial about her own daughter and now she is talking to college students and high school kids about how to vacation?

It is time for parents, real parents, to step up to the plate and talk to their children and tell them what can happen if they do the wrong thing while they are on vacation.  And, to be on the safe side, should parents find out that Beth Twitty is coming to talk about how to be safe on vacation or break – keep your kid home that day or take a look inside to see how many parents really don’t care.  A packed house means that parents would allow someone who failed once to fail with their own child and that should make any parent stand up and have the “don’t get in cars with men you just met” talk.

Steve Yuhas is a columnist and radio talk show host on KOGO AM 600 and may be reached at www.steveyuhas.com or steve@steveyuhas.com