Subtitles section Play video Print subtitles Hi this is Tutor Nick P and this is lesson 242. Today we're going to cover the difference between kidnap and abduct. Yeah I sometimes hear people say they're synonymous and to a point they're correct. That both of them mean that somebody's taken illegally and somebody is taken by force usually against their will. Well that's mostly around where it stops though. There are clear differences when it is much more likely we'll use either the word kidnapped or abduct. All right. So let's cover this. Let's look at the note here. If someone is kidnapped, they are taken illegally and by force usually the kidnapper will hold a person to make a demand. So this is one of the key parts about if we are more likely to use the word kidnap. Usually the kidnapper contacts the family or contacts somebody with the demand. In that case you're more likely to use the word kidnap. So to make a demand, especially a ransom. So if they're asking for money that's a ransom. This will usually fall into the kidnapping category. This is the one that the public knows probably more than any others. You know, maybe some bad guys stalk out some rich family take their child and then ask for money. This would going to the kidnapping category. Definitely. All right. So and then they ask for ransom. We say from the victim's family. So it could be from the personal family, or possibly from their company. I don't know if you remember, it's about ten years ago now. There was a movie called, "Proof of life " with Meg Ryan and Russell Crowe. Where he worked in a South American country and some guerrillas took the husband and they thought well he worked for this rich company that they would pay up the money. And then well that part didn't work out, but that would be a good example of where they might do it and make the demand from the company. Because they think the company's rich, and the company will come up with the money. So that would have been an example of that. Or government. Yeah. We see this all the time. I remember when was it around 2004, 2005. Around that time when supposedly the Taliban I think - one of the Filipino workers and they were making demands from the Philippine government to try to release him. Again this would go under kidnapping. So if they contact you, they make demands then it's usually kidnapping. So it could be for money is the big one, or some other political requests, like if they were asking the Philippines to stop helping in that effort. Or if you know maybe that maybe they want to free, like this one says. To free a political prisoner. So let's continue here. Sometimes a kidnapper will make a political demand. such as requesting to set a political prisoner free. I've seen this one in a lot of movies sometimes. Where the group especially if one of their own got kidnapped they kidnapped this one and they want them to set that one free before they set this one free. So this is another situation that would definitely go under kidnapping. Let's continue. Let's take a look at abducted. If someone is abducted, he or she is also taken illegally and by force. However with abductions most of the time no demands are made. They don't even usually contact you. They have no interest in contacting you. Abductors will usually keep quiet about the crime. They just kind of want to disappear with the person. They usually have motives in which they don't plan to return the victim. So if they don't want to return the victim, it's more likely going to fall into the abduction category. So we're more likely going to use the word abduct in these cases. And so let's look here. Here are cases where we are more likely to use abduction. All right. Let's look at the first one here. If someone is taken to become a sex slave, we have heard of this. Yeah. Maybe some pretty girl, She get sold it to prostitution. She gets on drugs. They get her on drugs and she could never get out. That would be for a sex slave or sold into any type of slavery. It could be you know, sweatshops. You know, little children and things like that. This is also more likely to fall into abductions. Harems. I remember many many years ago there was a movie called "Harem" and the actress was Natasha Kinski . Where they took her , and sold her to some Saudi Arabian and rich Prince. Here she just became part of the harem. She just disappeared there. So that would be an abduction They're not contacting anybody. They're not making any demands. They want the person. Okay also "Taken" the movie "Taken" more recently, with Liam Neeson . I think they made about two or three of them. Where supposedly they first abducted his daughter. They weren't planning on returning her. you know it was only you know, the movie of course Liam Neeson used to be like ex-CIA. So he was able to hunt them down in the movie. I don't know if he'd be that lucky in real life , but that's that's more likely to be called abduction. Okay. Let's continue here. If someone is taken away to be a murder victim in a cult sacrifice. Yeah. We don't like to talk about this one too much, but there are some satanic cults out there that might actually have some sort of ceremony and they actually really kill somebody in it. In this case that person is usually abducted. Unfortunately more often than not, it might be a child. So that's why sometimes we hear about in the u.s. how many children disappear every year it would be very scary to think that you know a certain percentage of them might be going in this area. So or there's also a lot of pedophile rings where they kidnap the small children also for another type of sex slavery too but sex slavery for children. These would definitely also go under abductions. Okay. Let's continue. If a woman could not have her, or did not have not have a baby on her own, and it drives her crazy enough to take someone else's child. That would go under abduction. She doesn't contact anybody she just really wants a child. Luckily there's not that many cases like this, but we have heard of a few in the past. Good. If a parent is likely to lose a custody battle and runs away, especially to another country illegally. This would also be an abduction. So they still they don't want to give up their child and maybe they're going to lose custody. I don't know how serious it is. You know, a lot of times even when there are divorces there is, usually they get visiting rights. But in this case, I don't know maybe for some reason they won't or whatever the case is they just decide to run away with the child. You sometimes hear about cases like this where governments are kind of arguing about it. You know especially if one of the parents is from a different country and they run to their country with the child that is legally their child. But technically, they weren't supposed to leave. There was a custody court case going on and they they just abducted the child and left with him. That would most likely go under abduction more than kidnap. Even though , you have to be careful because there's also some technical rules in some some governments and States about what they call kidnapping and abduction. And sometimes they can vary slightly. So you got to be a little careful about that. But most of the time when we're just talking about it in general. You probably still can call this an abduction. Okay. Let's continue. In sci-fi movies, science fiction or some people claimed in real life, to be taken by aliens for experimentation or another reason. Yeah. So we never hear. Just like they said. Nobody ever says aliens kidnapped. They always abduct. Yeah we never hear about aliens calling somebody up and asking for ransom or making some demands. So we are much more likely to use the word abduct than kidnap in this sort of situation. Anyway I hope, I hope it clarifies it.You know there could be a little bit of overlap between these words, but what I explained is probably most true. There are certain situations where kidnap is more likely to be used and there's other situations where abduct is more likely to be used. Anyway I hope you got it. I hope it was informative. Thank you for your time. Bye-bye.
B1 US kidnap abduction kidnapping abducted kidnapped child English Tutor Nick P Lesson (242) The Difference Between Kidnap and Abduct 19 0 anitawu12 posted on 2019/08/11 More Share Save Report Video vocabulary