Bleeding heart liberals

"Amnesty International has called for the US to stop sentencing juveniles to life in prison without parole.
More than 2,500 adults are in US jails for crimes committed as a child - under current rules they will never be freed.
In its new report, Amnesty says the practice is incompatible with the basic principles of juvenile justice.
The US and Somalia are the only two countries not to have ratified a UN convention that bans life in jail without parole for under-18 year olds."

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-15956225

Originally Posted by zahratustra
More than 2,500 adults are in US jails for crimes committed as a child - under current rules they will never be freed.

That's factually incorrect. In order to get a life sentence, the criminal must be tried as an adult. Thus, regardless of physical age, in the eyes of the law the crime was not committed by a child. Now, you could argue whether the practice of trying certain minors as adults is proper, but that is not what Amnesty International complained about. But, as usual, they're far too busy saving the world to worry about inconvenient truths.

It should be noted that I had nothing to do with the thread title.

Originally Posted by dteowner
That's factually incorrect. In order to get a life sentence, the criminal must be tried as an adult. Thus, regardless of physical age, in the eyes of the law the crime was not committed by a child. Now, you could argue whether the practice of trying certain minors as adults is proper, but that is not what Amnesty International complained about.

I'd say that's exactly what they complained about:

Originally Posted by zahratustra
In its new report, Amnesty says the practice is incompatible with the basic principles of juvenile justice.
The US and Somalia are the only two countries not to have ratified a UN convention that bans life in jail without parole for under-18 year olds."

"You're sending juveniles to life in jail!"
"Yeah, well, we treat them as adults!"
"…that's the problem!"

Übereil

You commit the crime, you do the time!! Why should age enter into this? That's arbitrary and discriminatory.

Originally Posted by Ubereil
I'd say that's exactly what they complained about:



"You're sending juveniles to life in jail!"
"Yeah, well, we treat them as adults!"
"…that's the problem!"

Übereil

I'd ask you to actually read, both the line directly from Amnesty that I quoted, as well as my comments since you appear to have done a fine job of ignoring them. In fact, let's go off your summary sentences. Your error is in line 2. We do not treat them as adults. For legal purposes they are adults. The distinction between juvenile and adult is a legal construct anyway, so it's no great challenge to comprehend that there's a flexible dividing line.

I am studying child psychology atm. Teenagers are a mess.

Nothing a little good old fashioned discipline couldn't fix!!

Originally Posted by Corwin
Nothing a little good old fashioned discipline couldn't fix!!

Yeah, cold showers and corporal punishment. Are you on mothballs diet Corwin?

Originally Posted by dteowner
We do not treat them as adults. For legal purposes they are adults.

You and Somalia. Feeling all cozy is such an exclusive club?

Z, You obviously know NOTHING about Discipline; your view is mediaeval!!

It's the "old fashioned" bit which gave you away. And I do know ALL about discipline. My father liked to practice it on both me and my mother.

Under a certain age the parents should be locked up along with them! Good lord I'm getting old and grumpy.

Originally Posted by zahratustra
It's the "old fashioned" bit which gave you away. And I do know ALL about discipline. My father liked to practice it on both me and my mother.

Based on the way you said that, I'd say you're mistakenly equating discipline and abuse. Two different animals, there.

Precisely, I had discipline with my kids, but it didn't involve physical abuse. As I said, you really have NO idea what discipline is all about!!

Originally Posted by Corwin
Nothing a little good old fashioned discipline couldn't fix!!

To the contrary. In fact, I read a paper on parental-control yesterday that studied how increased control lead to less control. Turns out that the more a parent believes they are in control, the less control they have, simply thanks to the child being less honest. Older research on the same subject are skewed since it asks the parents, not the child.

Originally Posted by Corwin
You commit the crime, you do the time!!

Well, in order for criminals to be blameable it needs to be so that they do the crime despite knowing they shouldn't. The thing is, if they knew better, why would they do the crime? The only reasonable explanation is that they don't, and thus they're not blameable for comitting the crime.

And treating non-adults as having the same agency as adults? Why not put wolves in jail if they attack some farmer's sheep while we're at it?

Originally Posted by dteowner
For legal purposes they are adults.

That means that, legally, you treat them as adults.

Originally Posted by dteowner
The distinction between juvenile and adult is a legal construct anyway, so it's no great challenge to comprehend that there's a flexible dividing line.

There is. But if that was a reasonable defence you wouldn't be able to blame anyone for anything. Genocide? No, we call it mercy killing, ergo it's ok.

Übereil

Kohlberg's stages of moral development:

1. Pre-conventional stage (children)
a) I get punished if I do (obedience, punishment)
b) I get rewarded if I do (self-serving)

2. Conventional stage (teenagers, most adults)
a) I get respect if I behave this way (conformity)
b) Laws are neccessary for a society to work (necessity of authority)

3. Postconventional stage (moral philosophy)
a) The Social contract. The greatest good for the greatest amount of people.
b) How can a functional society be built? Universal ethic principles.

Isn't Kohlberg the guy who assumes contractualism is the highest order of moral development?

Übereil

Originally Posted by Ubereil
Well, in order for criminals to be blameable it needs to be so that they do the crime despite knowing they shouldn't. The thing is, if they knew better, why would they do the crime? The only reasonable explanation is that they don't, and thus they're not blameable for comitting the crime.

So 100% of criminals were simply ignorant of the (il)legality of their actions? Seriously?!? You actually wrote that?!?

Originally Posted by Ubereil
And treating non-adults as having the same agency as adults? Why not put wolves in jail if they attack some farmer's sheep while we're at it?

You do know that we have a seperate juvenile system that handles the vast majority of cases involving people under the age of 18, right? So the "sheep", as you so lovingly refer to young criminals, are kept seperate from the "wolves". In the unusual cases where someone under 18 gets tried as an adult, I can promise you that there are no "sheep". The prosecution has to justify moving the trial out of the juvenile system. Generally, that's reserved for extremely violent crimes. Don't see too many "sheep" committing murder and such.

Originally Posted by Ubereil
There is. But if that was a reasonable defence you wouldn't be able to blame anyone for anything. Genocide? No, we call it mercy killing, ergo it's ok.

Or we might call it winning a war, for example. There's some fancy latin for extrapolating a point to ridiculous extremes—maybe you can get JemyM to supply it for you.

http://topics.mlive.com/tag/michigan…les/index.html

Our local news ran a series about this early last month. Our state is the highest in the country next to Pennsylvania in convicting kids for life. It's a pretty good read. I wasn't able to see many of those convicted having much to say about their victims.
Most just say they did their time and should be out and miss their lives. When will their nightmare end? Well, the victim's families never get their loved ones back.
One boy shot some random guy driving by and chalked it all up to being "immature"
Some of these murders are just so horrible that I don't see another solution other than mandatory life.

Originally Posted by Ubereil
Isn't Kohlberg the guy who assumes contractualism is the highest order of moral development?

No. Contractualism is the 5th stage.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O7pQJ0ptjk0