Since there has been a rash of stories in the news of people abusing children lately, there have been a few posts around the blogosphere of people venting their rage against the people accused of performing these crimes, and the crimes themselves. The anger that is being displayed is absolutely justified and the punishments that have been suggested are apt. In a post by my Blog-Daughter Sarah, she asked the question:
How can we keep this from ever happening again?, and I have the answer to it.
We Can't. Does that mean that we shouldn't try? Hell No! But people have to realize that there's no definitive "Do this and it will work" solution to this problem. It has been my observation that due to the diverse and complex nature of the human animal, we will always wind up turning out people that have something wired wrong, and they will do these kinds of acts. It's unnavoidable.
We must be ever vigilant for the monsters that would harm our children, and punishment for the ones that we catch must be swift and severe (in hopes that we can deter future monsters from acting on their unholy urges). We can't ever believe that this problem is solved, because human nature won't allow it to be. We still have mass-murderers, rapists, bank robbors, purse-snatchers, armed-robbers, etc. The list can go on for day's. We aren't able to fix any of these people's abherrent behavior's, so we won't be able to fix child abuser's either. I don't like it, but it is what it is.
Watch out for your babies, folks. These people are out there, and they're always gonna be.
Posted by Johnny - Oh at March 20, 2005 01:05 PMAin't that the sad truth. Damn. Just Damn.
I am more focused on the punishment, not so much because I actually believe it will stop deter future acts, but because they flippin' deserve it. I'm a firm believer that for every action is a reaction. Cause and effect. They should be punished/destroyed because it is what they deserve. Period.
Posted by: Tammi at March 21, 2005 12:38 AMI'm more worried about the "Liberal" reaction of people who will think that this resolution (or law) or that one will "fix" the problem. These are the same types of folks that think that by putting a bumper sticker on their car, or attending a march on the local green, that the problem is fixed.
I believe that that is the essential difference between current Conservatives vs. current Liberals.
Posted by: Johnny - Oh at March 21, 2005 01:07 AMPunishment doesn't deter future crime.
It only prevents the convicted from acting again.
Prevention is good enough for me.
Just remember to empty the clip.
Posted by: Harvey at March 21, 2005 02:00 PMSally and I debate this kind of thing quite often. I think it simply boils down to that we are better at detecting this kind of thing now than we were one hundred years ago. The numbers of people doing it probably haven't risen all that much, it's just we know what to look out for now.
These people are sick. Period. And no amount of therapy will take away their urge to do this. Punishment won't make it go away (look at the numbers that re-offend within weeks of getting out again) so what do we do with them? If a person has an urge strong enough to act on it do you think any level of punishment will act as a deterrant? Nope. Even in US states with the death penalty people still commit murder (admitedly, never again once convicted).
I have no idea what to do with people like that. Anyone with kids or nieces or nephews would worry.
Posted by: Alex at March 22, 2005 03:47 PMI read this and just had to comment to Alex's comment. Johnny-Oh is my brother so he can verify. Because I thought I was very good at detecting the perverts of our world. I found I was very, very wrong. After being married for 10 years I found I had been married to one of those animals. He was messing with precious babies. Needless to say it was a horrible nightmare and I blamed myself at first. After all, I SHOULD have seen the signs but I didn't. I made it 2 weeks after finding out then called the authorities to help me retrieve my belongs and get out. (I was becoming physically ill in that short amount of time from living in such an environment.) Needless, to say he didn't know what hit him, I divorced him and have since remarried. As far as I know the only thing that's happened to him is that he was being watched closely. (not enough evidence, blah, blah blah.) My only peace is that I let his sister who's children were very young know. The only other peace of mind I have is that he'll get his in the end. Sorry, it's kind of deep but I just had to make my point. As a society I think we are only more aware. Alex you are right, we can only worry, and care enough to try to recognize the signs from our babies and teach them. The rest is beyond our control.
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Posted by: wola at March 27, 2005 11:00 AM