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marfknox
SFN Die Hard
USA
3739 Posts |
 Posted - 08/10/2006 : 11:40:41
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http://www.humaniststudies.org/enews/?id=255&article=1
Seems the religious right has a major hand in this: quote:
Then there are the religious objections. The powerful evangelical ministry Focus on the Family has called on the U.S. government to de-ratify the CRC, calling it a danger to children, parents and national sovereignty. Focus' primary criticism is the vague, open-ended nature of the principle goals of the CRC. Focus states that because the principles are not explicitly defined, they can be used as tools to advance radical ideological agendas.
As an example Focus says that the "best interests of the child" are being interpreted as the obligation to provide psychological, legal and medical services to children -- including sex education and abortion -- without the consent of parents. Focus contends that the CRC treats parents not as a resource but a problem to be circumvented. Other religious organizations such as the Campaign Life Coalition and LifeSite concur.
This is just embarassing:
quote:
Until last year, the most significant contradiction between the CRC and U.S. law and practice was the juvenile death penalty. The CRC prohibits the use of the death penalty for offenses committed before the age of 18. Until 2005, when the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that juvenile executions were unconstitutional in Roprer v. Simmons, 22 states allowed executions of juvenile offenders.
Even more embarassing: When Bush was govenor of Texas he allowed 2 men who were 17 when they committed their crimes to be executed.
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"Too much certainty and clarity could lead to cruel intolerance" -Karen Armstrong
Check out my art store: http://www.marfknox.etsy.com
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Edited by - marfknox on 08/10/2006 11:53:00
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marfknox
SFN Die Hard
USA
3739 Posts |
Posted - 08/10/2006 : 11:51:14 [Permalink]
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OK, here's a whole article I wrote in 2000 about this topic that I think is relavent:
Bush`s death penalty view contradictory
by Martha Knox
Issue date: 3/3/00, published by The Lantern
In the United States today, a person must be 21 years of age to drink alcohol and 18 to vote, but people as young as 16 can be sentenced to death and 14-year-olds can be put in adult prison. Already 13 men, who were minors when they committed their crimes, have been executed since the reinstatement of the death penalty in 1976. Seven of these were in Texas and two happened under the administration of governor and presidential candidate George W. Bush.
Bush's official policy is that 17 is the proper age for the death penalty and that he will pardon only those who are innocent, not those were are repentant. However, Bush has contradicted himself by also stating that capital punishment is for criminals who are "beyond rehabilitation." Surely this cannot apply to minors or even very young adults. Bush's true feelings on the matter came clear when he mocked Karla Faye Tucker in an interview for Talk magazine. Tucker committed a double murder at age 19 and waited a decade on death row, where she experienced a religious conversion supported by the Christian Coalition and 700 Club. Bush, who in his campaign has made much of his own religious awakening at age 40, signed her death warrant. In the interview, Bush mocked Tucker pleading for her life, whimpering, "Please, don't kill me."
In adult prisons, juveniles are eight times more likely to commit suicide, five times more likely to be sexually assaulted and twice as likely to be assaulted by staff. Bush supports prison for juveniles who commit violent crimes, as do a significant portion of voters in this country. The popularity of sending children to prison has been increasing for years. Last summer, Rep. Bill McCollum introduced a bill which would lower the age to 13.
McCollum's bill would do more than that, though. It also calls for mandatory minimum sentences for children convicted of certain offenses, some of which would subject them to longer prison sentences than adults who commit the same crimes. The bill would allow federal prosecutors, rather than judges, the discretion to try children as adults. This has been attempted in Florida. The results in 1995 were that nearly as many juveniles were sent to adult court than in the entire rest of the nation. Black juveniles were 2.3 times more likely than whites to be referred to adult courts. Youths tried as adults committed new crimes twice as fast after their release as those handled in the juvenile system. Apparently, the only thing sending kids to prison does is make them better criminals.
So now, with juvenile violence rising in the U.S. since at least the mid-1980s, the question is: How and can we rehabilitate them? In 1971, a famous crime, dubbed "the crucifixion murder," occurred in San Francisco. Two brothers, ages 7 and 10, kicked and beat a toddler to death. The older one tied the baby to a cross in a naive attempt to bring him back to life. He says now that it was all he could think of. The older brother today has become a responsible citizen and family man. Unfortunately, his younger brother has lived a life of crime and substance abuse. Does this mean we should start putting 7-year-olds in prison?
The search for a solution is slow going, but producing some results. All the researchers advise intervention at the youngest age possible. Many even push it a step farther and advise community intervention programs for young and inexperienced new parents because poor parenting and neglect are proven to encourage violent behavior in children. Either way, rehabilitation and prevention sound a heck of a lot more effective than having 14-year-old boys sharing cells with hardened adult criminals. |
"Too much certainty and clarity could lead to cruel intolerance" -Karen Armstrong
Check out my art store: http://www.marfknox.etsy.com
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Gorgo
SFN Die Hard
USA
5310 Posts |
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H. Humbert
SFN Die Hard
USA
4574 Posts |
Posted - 08/10/2006 : 11:54:11 [Permalink]
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quote:
Originally posted by marfknox
Edited to add: how the fuck do I make a hyperlink??? I keep trying and failing with the little icon with the earth on it!
I always type the codes of my hyperlinks manually.
Just use "url" in brackets before and after the link, with a / in the second bracket before the letters. Like this: www.msn.com.
If it's a long link, you can hide it behind text by following this format where the parentheses stand for brackets: (url="www.msn.com")substitute text(/url).
Like this: substitute text.
Marf, click "reply" to this quote in order to see how I typed it all out originally.
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"A man is his own easiest dupe, for what he wishes to be true he generally believes to be true." --Demosthenes
"The first principle is that you must not fool yourself - and you are the easiest person to fool." --Richard P. Feynman
"Face facts with dignity." --found inside a fortune cookie |
| Edited by - H. Humbert on 08/10/2006 11:57:49 |
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marfknox
SFN Die Hard
USA
3739 Posts |
Posted - 08/10/2006 : 12:14:53 [Permalink]
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| Nevermind guys, the problem had nothing to do with SFN, but with the URL itself that I was attempting to link to. |
"Too much certainty and clarity could lead to cruel intolerance" -Karen Armstrong
Check out my art store: http://www.marfknox.etsy.com
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