Tell me this isn't !#$%ed up...

[TerranRich]

http://www.helpmybabylive.com/

I seriously hope this is some kind of cruel, heartless joke. Read through just the main page.

Apparently they won't give the baby up for adoption because the girlfriend can't bear to part with the baby once she's given birth, but if they don't raise $50,000, they'll apparently abort the baby. So they can't part with him/her, but they can end its existence?

I'm in the middle on the whole abortion debate, but this is just seriously beyond screwed up.

[Andail]

I find it pretty amusing. If it is a hoax, it's there to make people ask themselves some moral and ethic questions. Something tells me this is not a cheap trick to earn a quick buck.

After all, they are just, quite pragmatically, expressing a situation that many other people find themselves in. They simply state that while they don't exactly prefer to abort, they are in such a bad financial position that giving the kid a good start in life isn't possible. I think this, so far, is a good reason not to keep the child. If more people considered whether they'll be able to raise their future kids properly, the world would be less miserable.

They said they used birth control but things can screw up. It can happen to the best. And I can certainly see why she'd not prefer to give the child up for adoption.

It's quite an interesting moral dilemma. And it sure has generated a lot of hatred...

[TerranRich]

I was thinking about this earlier...anybody who's given them money deserves to have been scammed. Serves them right for (1) falling for it and/or (2) financing their idiocy.

[Meowster]

Seems like a fine idea to me. I say go for it.

[Evil]

If this works, I'm totally knocking my girlfriend up, and asking for $100,000.

[Nikolas]

From a fast browsing I find it quite awful...

They are holding a kidnapped child (their own) and demand 50,000$ or they'll kill the child. An interesting approach 

If it's not true then it's a brilliant scam!

[space boy]

Whether it's real or not, it certainly is unusual. My first reaction was similar to TerranRich's but after reading Andails post it does make sense(although not much). I've never encountered a similar situation.

But to be honest, I wouldn't donate anything to them. When it comes to money I don't trust anyone(thanks life). Especially people like that. They're anonymous and have no credentials. There isn't anything on the site that would make me believe those people. It could just aswell be a scam. Playing the "parents in difficult situation" card is a good way to get money from naive fools.

[LGM]

Right or wrong... This isn't any different than panhandling on the streets. Though if you think about it, this is also ransom (considering an unborn fetus is indeed legally a human being).

Moral dilemma indeed. This is a great downfall of the age of information. Since it's so easy to set up a website and hide behind it, providing an anonymity only thousands of dollars would've provided a mere decade earlier, one can bend the will of so many ignorant, naive, or foolish internet users... True or not, this tactic is ultimately sick, irresponsible, and a great sign of the loss of values, morals, and work ethic (actually earning what you receive) in today's society. I no doubt assume these people are American... Which makes me that much more ashamed, insulted, and ultimately disgusted to be associated with such people.

Whatever happened to dealing with life's problems no matter the circumstance? These people admit they are not destitute, and that they don't need $50,000 to raise a child. But without it, they'd rather just kill him and move on, without any remorse? That rings selfish and cruel to me. You can't justify that. Children can be raised with good values no matter how much their parents earn. It's just silly to think the child won't "turn out right" just because they can't eat out every night anymore.

If you can't be held accountable for the (unlikely with the right precautions) consequences, don't have sex. Simple as that. Abortion is one of many cop out, cure-all solutions popping up in the world. While it's nice to have an easy way out once in a while, it usually is never the best or right solution, either.

So so sad.

edit: And what's sadder is that people WILL donate. You can't play games with someone's life, and that's all this is. True or not, it's all a game to these people. And if they reach 50,000... I hope that one day they'll realize how horrible this really is, and they'll tell their child. He/She deserves to know how close they were to never existing.

[Gord10]

Heh. It is not funny at all if this is a joke, but it is so funny (in a tragicomical way) if this is serious.

Well, I am a supporter of the abortion, but this doesn't avoid making me hope this is a joke.

Anıther funny part is how they expose publish the e-mail addresses of the people who sends them hate mails.
http://www.helpmybabylive.com/hate.html 

[Jon]

It is slightly strange how these 'parents' definition of hate ranges from

you're an asshole! abort the baby and don't get rich off of it and the next time you
decide to fuck realize it might knock the bitch up again!

to

Please take the time to think about your decision and take responsibility
for your actions.  Remember, what goes around comes around.

Peace, love, and Light.

Laura

I'm against abortion as I feel that it is wrong to kill a child, if worst comes to worst then put the poor kid up for adoption, so that it can have a life.

[SpacePirateCaine]

It would take a lot of soul searching for me to muster up even the slightest inkling of sympathy for these people. If they're planning on aborting the baby without a big handout, they may as well just do it. What they're doing is asking people to pay them to have a child. Sure - I'd like people to pay me to have a baby, who wouldn't? Everybody likes free money, but so long as I'm not financially stable enough (and that's a lot of stability for me) to feel like I'm ready to take care of my own child, I see no diapers or papooses in the near future for me, regardless of how much money is donated in my direction.

I don't even think it amounts up to a moral debate - they should abort the baby if they aren't willing to have it without cash donations to back it and refuse to give it up for adoption if they don't abort. That's evidence enough to me that they don't actually want the baby in the first place, and with that kind of doubt and disinterest in your own baby (and even despite the creation of the website and any number of sob-story tactics, it is disinterest) you shouldn't be bringing a child into the world in the first place. I'm not against abortion, I even support it if that's the right choice for the prospective parents, which in this case, I think it is.

[Khris]

Do me a favor and put aside all morals for a second. Then those people are suddenly more like role-models, aren't they?
Imagine everybody in the same situation would do the same, some successfully, some not. In the end, people who can afford it helped poor parents raising their baby while couples who couldn't provide a financially safe environment for raising a child didn't have it.
Plus, a few charities received considerable money. Sounds pretty perfect to me.

And please, all the people who talk about "killing" the child, don't turn this into a debate about abortion. Abortion != killing, at least going by the law of the state the couple lives in (I assume, maybe they're going to do it elsewhere, doesn't matter anyway).

Still, it's probably a scam, and a pretty sophisticated one, I must say.
A controversial topic like this will generate incredible attention and bring tons of visitors to the site. If they indeed got $12,500 already, they'll very likely get the rest of it soon.

[Rui 'Trovatore' Pires]

The only difference between doing what they're doing and going begging on the streets (as opposed to finding a real solution, ye ken) is that THIS way they're sitting comfortably at home.

Zero sympathy here.

EDIT - Anyway, in their hate mail section they put up, side by side, both the incoherent and blatant offensive emails AND the perfectly sensible ones. If either matter as much to them, maybe they shouldn't have a child - I wonder whether they'd be able to educate him/her properly. (edit 2 - heh, pretty much what Jon said)

[Tuomas]

I think, that when you're in such a moral position as they "are", relating children to money, they shouldn't even consider getting a baby. It's not like it's an investment. I would never give these people money. God damnit, my mother didn't have 50 000 dollars when she gave birth to 5 children. Frankly the whole idea of balancing a human life and a pile of cash when making decisions that will have effect on peoples lives for as long as they live is utterly disgusting, and for that point, I wish they didn't have the baby. And the way they say they'll never tell the child? Like hiding that they were going to kill him/her if they didn't get money from strangers? I can't relate to such.

Also, what either makes them bad parents or a scam, who on earth calls their to-be-born baby *it*? Like a toy or a piece of metal. However, as a scam, it's bloody funny

[Layabout]

I think it's a great scam. Anyone who donates, deserves to lose their money. Although at least in their own little place, they blieve they are helping someone. Fantastic.

[Meowster]

It's not really that much different from getting an abortion because you can't afford a child. That's what they're doing, but they're also giving people the option to donate if they really care. I'm sure it's probably a scam or something, but the point is, people should stop getting so worked up about it. It's an abortion, they happen all the time when people can't afford to have kids.

Chill out. Unless you're totally anti-abortion, in which case focus your efforts on something a little more worthwhile instead of this one pointless website which isn't even very funny and probably is a hoax.

[ildu]

Why is everyone falling for the whole premise, even here? It's more than likely some dude who just made it all up to scam stupid people. As layabout said, it's a great, if a little obnoxious scam because it relates to peoples' sensibilities about the whole issue. I mean, even the google ads on the page are a dead giveaway.

I could start one like this if I were convinced that the donations wouldn't be traceable in anyway. Sadly, they are. The dude might get away with it scot-free, but there's always a chance of it coming back to bite his ass.

[mouthuvmine]

"Even here?" Haha. I think everyone here has said at one point in their post, "But I'm sure it's a hoax". While I'm 80% sure it's fake, the thought that it's for real is pretty scary. Yes, it's a cool idea, if you take it apart like KrisMUC did, and it's cool if anyone who donated feels better about themselves, but if it's for real, I HIGHLY doubt they'll keep the kid one way or the other. 50k is 50k, and a house and a car are STILL a house and a car. Why add another mouth to feed? Not my point of view, but it's a sacm either way I think : pregnant or not.

Crap.

[voh]

I honestly can't be bothered to care about this. I've tried to forming an opinion but I'm inadvertently distracted by flashy lights - a sure-fire way to know nothing about it fancies my interest 

[Andail]

Thanks for telling us that you don't have any interest in posting in this thread, Voh