Timkins,I read your article and yes there is very little treatment given to the mentally ill in gaol.There has to be a clear message of zero tolerance.There are probably many who have entertained these thoughts but never actually crossed the line. My arguement is that we have to have a message of zero tolerance so less do cross that line.A few strokes of the rattan cane might make it harder to cross.

Arjay,
I understand what you are saying, but I think that all child abuse has to be kept in mind. (EG do you think a parent should be beaten if they beat their children, or if they allow their children to smoke cigarettes at a young age etc)

However the issue of zero tolerance is important. A philosophy of zero tolerance was used in certain US cities with seemingly good effect at reducing crime, and was then used in some UK cities with no effect at all. The reason, the US cities had gang crime, and zero tolerance broke up the gangs, while the UK cities had few gangs. There are also thoughts that zero tolerance can be much misused. It can produce a type of police state, and can be used to persecute certain people. Males in the US have complained of being regularly questioned by police on the street, for just going to get a sandwich for their lunch break, and black males in particular were being constantly stopped and basically harassed by police in cities with a zero tolerance policy.

Overall I think that a loss of family creates untold harm within society. Attempts to fix up this harm latter often fail, or are seldom satisfactory.

Trying to get families working again (IE families that incorporate the natural mother and father) will stop many social problems. The safest place for a woman is to be with her husband, and the safest place for children is to be with their natural mother and father. That is the way it has always been in the past, and likely to be in the future.

Goodness gracious, I just made a highly generalised statement in my last post “The safest place for a woman is to be with her husband, and the safest place for children is to be with their natural mother and father.” I could be accused of carrying out what I have been accusing feminist of carrying out for decades. Perhaps I have read too much feminist literature in my research of feminism.

To clarify the matter, if one were to get a whole range of statistics relating to family and children, then the mean, mode and median of those statistics would most likely concur with the following:- “The safest place for a woman is to be with her husband, and the safest place for children is to be with their natural mother and father. “

Posted by BOAZ_David, Wednesday, February 16, 2005 1:12:03 PM

Col,
Passion is no substitute for clear thinking.
Can you tell me why an 'indecent act' is ok if ur married to a child ?
Is it less damaging ? is it damaging at all ?
Moral relativism.... sigh...
If the law doesn't have much of a clue.. maybe we need to look elsehwere and u already know where that is for me

David - I was not being passionate - I was being cold, hardnosed, pragmatic (call it whatever you like).

I am not sure where your comments about "indecent acts" or being "married to a child" are coming from or going to -

I see this very simply - those who abuse children forfeit their right to participate freely in society - now the only decision left is how do we curb them from "freely" mixing with human beings -
life imprisonment,
death penalty,
supervised parole,
electronic tracking devices -
why not make some suggestions -
Because, for sure, these predators do not change - they will re-offrend if given the slightest chance - they will rape babies and sodomise young children of either gender if left alone or unsupervised - so who are you going to defend - the predator or the child?

Col
my comments came straight from Victorian law. If u read closely my posts u would note that it is a 'quote'.
My point was, that the law is not helpful by suggesting u cannot perform an indecent act with a child UNLESS u are married to her!
So, this raises the question about the Law allowing indecent acts with children ur married to. Have a close read of the act.

You are defining child abuse based on 'community sentiment' and your own, which is commendable. But I've been digging and niggling at the issue to hopefully cause people to think more deeply about it and not base their feelings on 'current feelings of others', but rather have a clearer idea about what it is, based on Biblical principle.
If we just base our feelings on the current 'social mood', that can change under the pressure from vocal lobby groups. (as I've noticed from around the 60s till now)

It would be debateable as to whether or not things such as capital punishment actually reduce crime, but it is known that capital punishment can be misused. I think it was in Texas that the vast majority of people on death row were of Negro origin, while there are very few Negroes actually living in Texas.

The worse case is that child abuse becomes like domestic violence, where there are now so many contradictory statistics about domestic violence, that no one has any idea if it is a serious problem or not, or whether the rates of domestic violence are reducing or increaseing. Have you noticed how the money being spent on domestic violence prevention has dramatically increased, while the “reported” rates of domestic violence seem to be increasing also.

Within current domestic violence, there now not be any physical evidence or witnesses provided, just allegations that someone has made the other person feel “fearful”, and this is enough to have that other person charged. I see child sexual abuse going the same way if the situation reaches hysterical proportions. If the situation gets totally out of hand, then every male could be regarded as a potential paedophile, and treated that way accordingly.

In the past there have been attempts at stereotyping men with such things as “All men are rapists”, or “All men oppress women” etc. In these cases the word "some" has been replaced by the word "all", and I am concerned that there will be attempts to stereotype men as “All men a paedophiles”.