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We are obliged to act on atrocities : Comments
By Gideon Boas, published 2/11/2009Why is there no outrage about war criminals living among us?
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Take the case of the self admitted paedophile Roman Polanski in the US/Switzerland focus right now - a lot of Americans, from a certain perspective, now say it's all OK now since time has passed and anyway it's the victim's problem (Whoopie Goldberg / Gore Vidal) Others insist he be punished as an example to all, that regardless of time, a crime is a crime.
So in a similar way, the war criminals that you see are just older people to others who basically cannot be bothered, or who think their other features over ride their crimes.
Sad, but that's the way things seem to go. (mind you locally, paedophiles seem to be hunted and harassed regardless of time spent in jail or time since their crimes were committed - but Polanski, who is a paedophile, who pleaded guilty then fled from the US, seems to escape that tag and treatment with some groups - it shocks me how this can be so)
It comes down to how much and how hard the victims themselves want to persue the perpetrators, I'm guessing.
Some of the Jewish community, e.g. Simon Weisenthall, relentlessly hunted down the people who did them wrong, no one else did.
So if you want to expose or bring to justice war criminals in Australia - you'll have to do it, or someone with an axe to grind has too.
We don't have agencies who will add to their list of things to do, bring to justice various war criminals from various countries, unless they trip over them they will not persue them. There is no reward or thanks and it is not how they are measured for payrise or promotion in our systems.