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While this girl didn't deserve to die the night she was killed, I have to wonder just what the heck she was thinking about before each of the choices she made. What did the parents think when they permitted her to go? What did they prepare her for? Did they believe she'd be sunning or taking arts and crafts classes and drinking diet cokes? To have spent time and money planning a trip to an island where the drinking age is "legal," did that assuage any second thoughts in their minds? Because it was more of a "tourist brochure"-type destination, unlike crossing into Mexican cerveza & tequila territory, did that somehow make it much easier to send these graduates?

And after all this time, we are only now finding out that Miss Natalee *wasn't even* legal to drink in Aruba! Did the parents feel better knowing that their child was only going to be a few months shy of 18, rather than a few years here in the USA? For Pete's sake, she was still a child by definition, even on an island with looser drinking laws than the US.

I'd also like to learn more about the "chaperones" on this trip. I'm very curious to know where Natalee's was that night. Has anyone here heard anything about them? Did any of the chaperones consume *any* alcohol during the trip? Where were her friends? Were they prepared to be "adult-like" should a situation arise where one of the group was drunk and attempting to make life-changing decisions...especially with a threesome of the opposite sex in a foreign country?

This whole situation makes me sick. Sick-sick-sick. Things like this happen to parents who would rather be "friends" with their children/pretend adults rather than parent them as the Lord intended.

I am so, so sorry for this family and their loss and their grief. I am sorry for the decisions which led up to this; theirs, the chaperones' and all of her fellow graduates'. A week of playing adult, on an island which made it easier for these parents to give their blessings sure doesn't look quite as fun anymore, now does it? What kind of scrapbook does one buy to preserve memories like these?

Things like this happen to parents who would rather be "friends" with their children/pretend adults rather than parent them as the Lord intended.

With all due respect, I must disagree. Things like this can happen to anyone.

First of all she was 17 (?18). When I was 18, I ruled the world. I could vote. I could drink and I went on a cruise on my senior trip. This was in 1972.

But I am now 51 and age and experience have taught me how much I did not know then. Having raised 3 sons (one just 14, the other 2 24 and 26) I know how stupid/dumb/naive 18 year olds can be.

Some people, especially kids, know evil is out there, but the reality of that evil is abstract.

We all make bad choices. we all bear a responsibility for those choices. But many of those choices are a result of being human, rather than a character issue.

It is very appropriate to use this a a lesson for our children. When a kid dies as a result of carelessness on the road one would think it would be a trigger for his or her classmates to change their reckless behavior. It's not. More than likely, within a day or two, they will go back to the very behavior that puts them at such a risk. "It can't/won't happen to me." These lessons are lost on many in that age group, because they are in that age group.

Natalee bears no blame for what happened to her. Nor do her parents.