"Thanks"?

So, this worthless bag of skin decides to sexually assault his daughter 10 - 12 times and keep graphic child pornography. Her step-brother thankfully called the police and had the man arrested, thus ending what would have no doubt been a long career of traumatic abuse for the poor girl.

(Don't get me started on his drop-in-the-bucket sentence of 4 years, 10 months....)

Still, in the kindness of her heart, the girl loves her Dad. She pleads with the judge not to sentence him to jail but- thankfully- the scales of justice are held by a grown woman and not a teenage girl. How does the father respond to the words of the daughter he sexually assaulted?

She asked provincial court Judge Cheryl Daniel to sentence her father to house arrest. "Just please don't put him in jail. It's hurting my mom, my sister and I."

The girl's father was also present. After listening to her, he nodded, wiped away tears and said, "Thanks."

Thanks!? How about, "Honey, the things I did to you are so terrible that jail time is a walk in the park compared with the treatment I should have received."

He could have also followed it off with, "Good thing I live in Canada, the land where rapists and sex offenders get slaps on their wrists rather than lashes on their backs."

To infuriate yourself even more, read the full story here.

Terrified

I posted a reply recently to R. Christopher Edey's blog about the nuclear bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. It seems my position on the matter of terrorism was misunderstood, thus prompting the writing of this post.

First and foremost, nowhere in my reply does it state that I do not support the bombing of other countries. I merely asked a question to the author and compared his later remarks to US president GW Bush. Truth be told, I rather strongly support the use of armed force.

And despite what my remarks were taken to represent, we are always in a position to judge. I can't do everything at once so I necessarily have to decide which action I will take, under what circumstances I will take it in, and how I will go about the enaction. In all instances, we judge.

Let's use a recent story as our example. There is a story today in cbc.ca about a Muslim cleric being banned entry back into Britain on the basis of past associations with 'terrorist' thoughts, words, actions, and teachings. The Brits think he's harmful to their nation because of his beliefs and so seek to remove him from their land. Is this not a more peaceful act than, say, putting him in jail?

From your interpretation of my words, you believe I would be angered with the Brit's decision because we are unfit to judge his opinion, his stance, or his beliefs. "We should make conversation, not bombs," I'd supposedly say (while hugging a tree and a baby seal). Not at all.

As with the Japanese military efforts in the Second World War, the so-called 'terrorist' attempts today conflict with the societal goals and standards of life that we come to value in the West. No more, no less. Did innocent civilians deserve to have their lives taken because the members of the Manhattan Project deemed it to be a calculated risk associated with ending the war? No. Did the texture of the globe- on both an environmental and a societal level- deserve to be forever changed because of the Bomb? No. But was it necessary? Now, that's different.

The unleashed bomb was so unquestionably powerful that it terrified the enemy forces into (almost) immediate submission. Two conflicting groups of people could not come to a peaceful resolution of problems and so entered into global warfare. When one side- it doesn't matter which- decides first to engage in violence, the other must necessarily follow suit. And in a physical battle, one side must always win at the cost of the other; it is a zero-sum game.

Vile aggression, barbarity and ruin? In our standards, yes. It is our right to make that judgement. Does our judgement supersede theirs (who, it can be assumed, do not think themselves vilely aggressive, barbarous, and ruining civilization)? Not in the slightest.

But still the fact remains: violence or the threat of violence is a reality both sides are accustomed to. And in that race there can be only one victor.

The Muslim cleric, if judged as he has been, should be sentenced to death under British law. Not because we believe he's wrong but because he conflicts with and seeks to supplant what we believe is right. If the two sides could co-exist, either peacefully or through distance, this wouldn't be a problem. That sadly isn't the case.

So now, as R. Christopher Edey rightly suggests, we must decide only if we want to keep or lost our current system of values. Thankfully the history of Hiroshima and Nagasaki has reduced the limits both sides are willing to take in order to achieve their mutually separate and conflicting goals.

Do the math

From this morning's cbc.ca article on Canada's involvement in the war overseas, straight from the mouth of Maj.-Gen. Andrew Leslie:

Every time you kill an angry young man overseas, you're creating 15 more who will come after you," he said.

Um, I'm no mathmatician or anything but doesn't that sound a bit counter-productive? One step forward fifteen steps back?

But I suppose killing continuously is still a lot easier than understanding continuously....

"Honey, I tried to throw you out once. Sorry."

*Probation for girl who left newborn in trash*

Can you imagine the child's surprise when he grows up, picks up a newspaper (or reads a blog...), and finds out that his mother tried to throw him out with the trash once? Me thinks he'd not be buying any more Mother's day cards....

Call me crazy but that's attempted murder. Sure she's young, sure she's dumb (she put her crying newborn into a garbage can), and sure she comes from a not-so-wonderful home of domestic abuse. But none of those reasons can excuse her from the attempted killing of her newborn son.

I'm shocked- no appauled- they let her keep the baby. As far as I'm concerned all she got was a slap on the wrist. She requires home-schooling because, let's face it, the community at large would love to give her a slap in the face.

Sabine H.

So, there's this 39-year old woman being referred to as "Sabine H." in Germany who's accused of killing her 9 babies. This story abounds with idiocies, so bear with me. First of all, the babies are believed to have been killed between 1988 and 1999, an eleven year period. Using some quick math, that's a child every 1.1 years, or about four months between pregnancies.

But get this: she was unable to tell investigators anything about either the births or the deaths of the children.

"Regarding the dead children three to nine, she said she couldn't remember how the killings took place because when the birth contractions began, she had drunk a considerable amount of alcohol," Bargenda said.

But the saddest part is yet to come. Of the four children Sabine has decided not yet to kill, one is only 18 months old. This is quite obviously a case of a woman who desperately needed some reproductive education. Since she failed to receive it, the responsibility of her children fall on the shoulders of the community.

One can only hope that the three living children between the ages of 18 and 20 will do more than complete the cycle started by their parents.

I hate the news.

NB: What should happen to the mother? See the post below....