The Guardian’s Ben Smee does well to fortify his bleeding heart credentials in decrying the practice of locking up minors between crimes.
It’s true enough that it’s pretty sad we have no alternative to locking up juvenile criminals, and yet I’ve heard no feasible alternative. These kids boast about the crimes they will and have committed on social media. Like it’s a competition.
They steal cars, drive them so dangerously that people get killed, rob houses, and kill the occupants if they stumble on the burglary, and then thumb their noses at the ‘justice’ system, which they know to have not even a remote connection to justice.
Maybe these little pricks do this because the punishment they can count on is no worse than the laughably rhetorical stake they have in their societies, the complete lack of control they have over their own lives, or the casual brutality they may be exposed to by parents, guardians and peers.
Whatever the reasons, it seems pretty certain they just aren’t afraid to run into someone inevitably tougher and meaner than they are, the way it was for us oldsters. If you defend yourself against juvenile criminals, the Queensland Police will lock you away. Because it’s easier than actually stopping youth crime.
In the meantime, though, it’s a bit rich for Smee to attempt to take a moral high ground without covering all the available alternatives. The implication of what he writes is to just let these little pricks run riot.
It’s always easy to find someone who will point the finger and offer up inflammatory quotes. It’s a bit harder to investigate and find out how world’s best practice works, and what realistic options are available under the circumstances.
Everything else is like lazy flatulence offered as a sermon from a comfortable armchair somewhere far away from the crimes and tears.
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