Excessive sentences?

[EliB]

What I mean is what I say: It does diminish me to use terms of abuse for others.  End of.  Abuse is abuse whether it's done by a righteous person or a bad person. Isn't it? Name calling reflects on the speaker not the criminal - and keeps the bitterness and bad feeling alive in the heart of the speaker and of what use is that?  It's the message of the Gospel to look at our own hearts isn't it?     It doesn't in any way condone criminal and offensive behaviour but it at least clears the decks towards a way of thinking about how to deal with the threat or aftermath of violence or crime with a level head.

It's not good to hear you say that what I really mean is something other than I say.  That doesn't make sense to me.  I say what I say in good faith.   I don't say one thing and mean another, I really don't.  In any case, as you say yourself, that you think what I really mean is that we shouldn't be so judgemental, that in a way follows directly from the first part of the above.  The reason for not being judgemental is that it prevents us from seeing the situation critically. It brings in emotional reasoning.  Judgmentalism clouds the issue.  It gets us nowhere. 

JJ, I'm really sorry if I offended you in appearing as though I was changing or trying to tell you what you "really" meant! What I was trying to do was clarify in MY head what you were saying...and I did that in a cac-handed way - I apologise!

"These people" were acting like human beings, by definition, because they are human beings.  Human beings behave in all sorts of ways for various reasons.  So it seems about time to accept this and see how it can be dealt with for the benefit of society, all of society, not just the people who have the brains and education and good fortune to be self aware and self reliant.

I get that "these people" were behaving like human beings just by dint of them BEING human....but it's not enough to say they were acting like that for "various reasons"....WHY oh WHY since all this rioting broke out having there been endless people trying to JUSTIFY why they were acting as though we lived in a totally lawless country! It MIGHT to have been to try and find a way of preventing this from ever happening again - but it APPEARED to be an endless queue of people trying to make excuses for the poor wee souls!

Personally, I'm quite ok about my calling them "scum" because IMO that's what they are! I don't feel it dimishes me to call them that. I know how I behave towards others and I'm happy with that! Brains, education and good fortune don't come into this. There were plenty of folk falling into each of these categories appearing in court on various charges connected to the riots! It's basic right from wrong and basic human respect for people who HAVE earned it, by being decent law-abiding citizens of this country! And these people were out to destroy them (and succeeded in various cases!).....for NO reason....in my book, that makes them "scum"!!

[JJ]

Hey Eli I wasn't offended, just pointing out my stance - no need to apologise.

Of course there is a reason for anybody doing anything from going to the fridge for milk to tapping fingers on a shop counter - finding the reason is not the same as justifying it at all.  I'm not making that connection.  There's a reason why people commit offences isn't there? And I suppose one's desire is that those offences are not committed again.   

[ecuworrier]

Crap.

Attitudes like that are fueling disorder in this country!

Sadly JJ Ihave no respect for you as Admin, and therefore will cancel my membership of this forum.

hmmm that little exchange has been lingering for me... i mean the bit before that....  i was thinking about adults and children and dunno ... is it authorithy? respect for authority i was thinking also of the whole law and order thing as well ... which pretty much functions along the lines exhibited by floopower as she kindly described for us..

me i keep leaning towards a broader framework on this.... and one that says that the stick method is one of many ways of dealing with things ... and it risks boxing into a corner....   i am particularly interested inthe view as well that a bitov punishment is futile though perhaps that's just a persaonal reflection of the method that was refered to....

i tis an interesting one .... at what point do we decide to go with the 'punisher' if we have not been before...   and why...  is it we incur a blinding life changing flash of enlightenment?  or is it for who knows what reason finally our body broke!

what authority does ythe punisher havebeyond punish,ment?  is that a good motivational model for behaviour in society suffer the consequences or else... when to any sane person it is obvious that sme folks ge t consequneces and others do not and anyhows... the punisher is a hypocrite on some level...  me having run a variety of punishments that did nothing but to leave me pretty resentful and suspicioousof adults ever having the capacity to behavein sane andsensible ways but then hey just look around you...  the bit that bothers me about this is the social negotiations that go on that give consequences to folks who don't play apart in those negotiationsbut bear the consequences most of the time...  i cna see there is something almost sensible about the do as i say cos ... i am bigger than you ... ormor authority than you....  but when we set out rules in those macho tendencies we back ourselves into a corner cos .... help we do not know what we are gonna say or do if our powerplay all goes wrong!....  i think that quite often one of the problems here is that we ourselvesare doin or not doin out of fear.... of consequence andi think that's a pretty poor reason to do or not to do anything... afterall is it not true tjhat some folks will risk consequences out of more immediate sense of fear... others cos they see whether they can get away with it or not.....  others still cos they didn't understandthe rules or did not see the point of hte rules for that particualr consequence or even that kind of person....  hey man i make tyhe rules so i can't break them by rights innit...

i like to think there is something more tangible more strong in the forming of behavioures and attitudes... though i see a place for consequence dunno that i want to play the role of hangman though ... on the contrary hey i know i do not

GOD BLESS!

Peace and Love,

[AndrewF]

Eli & JJ - perhaps the compromise would be to say they were acting like 'scum', rather than that they are scum? - after all, we do not know them - they might be perfectly nice law-abiding citizens with a high moral standard most of the time, but just have had one thing too many go wrong that day (and yes, I agree it is unlikely but that does not make it impossible!)
as one commentator pointed out, what is the difference between a yoof seeing a flat-screen TV on the other side of a broken sheet of glass & helping himself to it; and a politician falsely claiming for one (which happened in at least one case)? Yet one will get 4 years and the other a slap on the wrist...
Sentences have indeed become disproportionate to each-other when (as Eli says) rapists get a shorter sentence. However a return to the Victorian concept of justice will help no-one (even if it could get past human rights legislation). the Community justice and Restorative Justice programmes do need revision and expansion, as they are more effective even now than prison for short-term sentences.
I think some sort of compulsory community service for everyone (with the option of it being in the forces possibly - but certainly only as an option) could well have some legs, if properly organised, but as with all such things, the devil is in the detail.