320 Years of History
Gold Member
- Thread starter
- #21
Hard to argue with that.
I find both the sentence and the reasoning (and I deplore actually calling it as such) garbage. I don't really claim to know what sentence should have been handed down - the above was an example - but I do claim that there should have been some jail time. I do not believe that it 'might as well have been' as many people go through probation - even at 16 - without significant issues. Here he apparently was not able to but that does not excuse the lax treatment for someone that killed 4 other people.
I would also like to point out the true idiocy in handing down this sentence. The core argument here with 'affluenza' is that his parents gave him everything and insulated him from consequences. Because of that he was unable to determine right from wrong. Then what does the judge do in his sentencing because of that factor? He insulates him from the consequences of his actions! IOW, he continued the exact same process that led to the teen killing 4 individuals in the first place.
Red:
Well, that's good, for I am not entreating for much of an argument. LOL Discussion is all I'm looking for in this thread.
Blue:
Well, okay. I feel differently because the rates of recidivism are high enough that "many people" is so because of the size of our population, not because of the odds of miscreants successfully "keeping their noses clean" while on probation.
Green:
In no way am I opposed to the thematic implication of your remarks as goes the value of a living human's life.
Purple:
Well, isn't that what most if not all all parents do? At least if they can? It's certainly what I did for my kids. Granted they managed to behave responsibly enough so that they neither accidentally nor willfully harmed another person. That I "sheltered" them from certain negative consequences may be merely serendipitous insofar as I knew what "stupid-sh*t" they were entertaining at various points and was able and willing to stop them from doing it or able to direct adverse consequences of doing it away from them. Perhaps the fates just didn't smile on that boy's parents as they did on me?
Truly, in my mind, if there's anyone to have been held accountable for the boy's behavior, it's his parents. I certainly feel that by age 16, a child should have more responsibly and ethical structure in themselves that they don't kill other people. However, as minors, that they don't is nonetheless their parents' fault not theirs. At 18, it becomes the individual's fault. For better or worse, right or wrong, or somewhere on the spectrum between either of those two extremes, upon reaching majority, one is presumed "to know better" and with that presumption, short of being mentally abridged, there is nobody else to blame for one's misdeeds, at least the ones akin to major crimes.