Yes, the banning of the juvenile death penalty was...

[Lady Sidhe]

Originally Posted by lookout123

or maybe this is just another symptom of our ever-increasing population combined with our ever-decreasing sense of accountability.

more and more people, living closer and closer together, with a larger and larger sense of entitlement with no fear repurcussion. you've got a couple of generations of "don't let anyone tell you what to do - think for yourself"* ingrained into the kids and BLAMMO! more and stupider sh*t happens.

* this is not to suggest we should raise nonthinking subservient clones, but rather that individualism and selfcenteredness can be taken too far.

I agree on this. My whole point is accountability, more so than the death penalty itself. No one ever has to take responsibility anymore, because it's always someone or something ele's fault that they do the things they do. As long as we keep blaming everyone and everything except the person who committed an act, then there will be the opinion that punishment does not work. How can it work when people have been brought up to believe that nothing is their fault, and hence, they don't deserve punishment?

I'm the first to swat my daughter's bottom when she does something I've told her not to do repeatedly. That's punishment. It's deserved punishment, and it's also a deterrant to her doing it again in the future. It's not my fault that she committed a forbidden act; often, she knows that she's not supposed to do it, because she'll look at me while she's doing it, with that, "hmm...are you going to stop me?" look. I don't give her a punishment that's overly severe for the act. I rarely have to do more than slap her hand or swat her bottom. She cries for a minute, but it's more for effect, and she knows then that sticking one's finger in the light socket is forbidden.


And as to Wolf's comment on the cartoons *grin*...perhaps it was said in a joking manner, but whenever someone slams today's movies as the source of violence in people, especially children, I generally make the point that the movies are more realistic in re consequences than the cartoons are. Ol' Wiley E. Coyote gets blown up, smooshed, etc., and always comes back. When the Terminator blows you away, you're gone for good. Now which one shows consequences in a more realistic way? Hm? Hm? HM?




Sidhe