If you live in California and read the title of this post, you probably know what I'm talking about. If you live in the United States, you probably also have a good idea of what I'm talking about.

I'm talking about a recent rash of child kidnappings, many of them in California. It seems like statewide alerts are being issued nearly every day, and I think I've already gotten used to them. I'm not saying that we should just ignore the fact that so many children go missing every day, but I think I'm wondering why it's such a hot topic right now. I'm also wondering how long it will last before something else becomes the hottest topic.

Something similar happened with the disappearance of Chandra Levy, a graduate student from California who was working in Washington, D.C. She disappeared without a trace, and it became a huge story, because she was apparently involved with a married politician from California. It ultimately made him lose the next political race, and the remains of her body were recently found, two years after she disappeared. At the time of her disappearance, there were some reports and statistics compiled about other missing women, and there were a lot of them. Chandra Levy got the spotlight, but others disappeared under mysterious circumstances, too.

And then there's the story of Elizabeth Smart, a blonde-haired, blue-eyed girl from a wealthy Utah family. She was abducted from her bedroom, and that story was on every newscast and newspaper and news Web site for ages. At the same time, a little girl was abducted from the South, and her disappearance was largely overlooked. (As if to emphasize that, I don't remember her name, or where she was from.) Last I heard, neither one had been found.

So this morning I looked at the news, and there was an alert about a California girl allegedly abducted by her mother who has mental issues. This is the second time in a week that California has issued alerts for kidnappings that seem to be done by parents. If the state begins broadcasting every parental abduction, we're going to be flooded with missing children reports. And you know what's going to happen? People are going to get used to it, just as they did with the missing children pictures that once appeared on the backs of milk cartons. I was talking to a police sergeant about it a couple weeks ago, and he thinks the alert system California is now using will cease to be effective. False and/or frequent alerts will make it become just another everyday occurrence. I think he's probably right. I said at the time that once they start broadcasting every parental kidnapping (usually done because of custody battles; I almost saw such a thing firsthand), it's all over.

I'm not sure where I'm going with this, but I guess I'm just frustrated. I'm frustrated that alerts about missing kids are going to stop being effective. I'm frustrated that people are kidnapping children in the first place. And I'm frustrated that so many people have so many custody battles that become played out in the news.

Ellmyruh