A couple of years ago we covered a burglary case in the city of Davis. It was a case where the couple had split up. The male had some of his belongings at his ex-girlfriend’s place in Davis.
They had made arrangements for him to come by and get his belongings. This required an all-day trip down from Butte County. However, the ex-girlfriend never showed and he made the fateful decision to use the key under the door to enter and take his belongings and leave.
What ensued was burglary charges when the girlfriend claimed that he took some items that did not belong to him. I remember sitting in the courtroom, wondering why this case was even in the criminal justice system at all.
The jury must have agreed, as they acquitted the defendant. But I can clearly remember thinking to myself that there simply had to be a better way to do it.
I feel much the same in the case of Thaddeus Sonne, charged with rape in a case that is so convoluted it seems unlikely that 12 jurors will agreed to convict the young man of rape.
That is not to exonerate him from what has to be incredibly bad judgment. First, there was the drinking and then there was more drinking, and at the point when reasonable persons may believe they had had too much, both parties had even more.
The victim does not remember much of what happened, while the defendant claims that he had so much to drink, he had trouble obtaining and maintaining an erection, and by the time the police arrived, they had just started.
We still have three more days of evidence, but right now it’s difficult to know what took place and whether the female was really just embarrassed and began to say no when the police arrived and caught them partway through their public sex act – or whether she truly led the young man out the door and then decided she did not want to engage in public sex when she had her own significant other.
What is particularly interesting about this case for me is the number of people I have run into that know either the defendant or the victim.
What we have heard, both in court when the police had to explain away a portion of the recording that was cut off as the victim seemed to say that she did not want to pursue charges, and from people who knew her, is that in fact she seemed to feel like both sides made mistakes and that this did not belong in the criminal justice system, but she felt forced into it by heavy-handed tactics from the DA’s office.
On Monday, it became even more clear that this was probably not the best way to go about approaching the entire episode. At the city’s MLK event, Sujatha Baliga, a Senior Program Specialist at the National Council on Crime and Delinquency, where she assists communities in implementing restorative justice alternatives to juvenile detention and zero-tolerance school discipline policies, came to speak about restorative justice and alternatives to the strictly incarceration scenario as the sole means of punishment in the juvenile justice system.
She is fresh off an extraordinary effort that culmined in the New York Times story from early this year, “Can Forgiveness Play a Role in Criminal Justice?” The story told the story of Conor McBride, who was was convicted of shooting his girlfriend of three years when they were both 19.
The victim’s family ultimately would engage with Conor in a restorative justice process that culminated in a dialogue that took five hours in Conor’s jail in Tallahassee, Florida.
“As we worked together to fashion Conor’s sentence,” she said, the mother of the victim “looked Conor in the eye and said these words, ‘Conor now you have the burden of doing the good works of two people because Ann (the victim) would have done wonderful things with her life.’ “
“When Kate (the mother) said this, she was living Dr. King’s definition of justice,” Ms. Baliga said. “That justice is… ‘love correcting that which revolts against love.’ “
Conor would receive a twenty-year prison sentence. That sentence was followed by a term of parole that included the things the family of the victim needed to see in order for Conor to redeem himself.
“This was in lieu of mandatory life,” Ms. Baliga said. She said that the family was happy with this outcome, “although they would have preferred to see Conor do ten years – instead of twenty – that’s what they asked for. His second ten years would have been that time where he was doing acts within the community.”
“One of the things that they asked for that was so astounding was that he would really educate himself about teen dating violence and speak on stages with them in high schools across the state of Florida about what he had done, what he had learned, and what lessons he had for teenagers in difficult relationships,” she said.
A lot of people who read this story rejected this approach as soft on crime. But not only is he having to serve a good percentage of his life incarcerated, he needs to spend at least ten years of his life making up for his wrongdoing.
Imagine, if instead of a criminal trial, the victim and defendant in the Sonne case engaged in a restorative justice program.
Imagine if Mr. Sonne would have to go around the state with the victim and lecture college students on the dangers of heavy drinking and the consequences that drinking might have on people’s lives.
Imagine him, traveling around lecturing “take back the night” for other rape prevention groups, about similar issues.
Instead of going to prison, being punished for a specific period of time, or having the jury not be able to reach a guilty verdict and either hang or acquit him, he could be engaging in a dialogue with the female, understanding her concerns and how he may have unknowingly done her harm.
You see, what will happen in the current process is one of the parties will prevail in court. Mr. Sonne could be acquitted, in which case the fact that mistakes were made – regardless of whether they rise to the level of crime – will never be addressed. Or he will be convicted, and he will become a lifelong sex offender and serve a good amount of time in prison.
Neither of these outcomes appear to be just and neither one really helps society or the parties involved. There has to be a better way, and the process of restorative justice in cases like these might prove to be the answer.
As we know from Linda White’s account, not everyone, either on the side of the defense or the victim’s side, is suitable for this process. But for those it is suitable for, this might be the way forward to a better outcome for all involved.
—David M. Greenwald reporting
“…she felt forced into by heavy-handed tactics from the DA’s office.”
When my innocent friend was wrongfully accused, the police in Solano Co. (sorry I won’t state which town) called me twice at my place of employment in Sacramento. I told them I wanted to discuss the matter with a lawyer before I answered any questions. (I have several friends who are attorneys, retired attorneys, or have left the profession for other jobs. I had left them voice messages asking for their advice & was waiting for one of them to call me back.)The police officer’s response was,
“I understand but I’d sure hate to send Social Services out to your house to speak with your two children.” My stomach became a knot; I honestly couldn’t believe what I was hearing. I’ve never been arrested, and my dad was a cop for over 15 years. The police officer told me I should come to the police station asap for questioning. Of course then I was darned sure I had spoken to one of my lawyer friends before going to the station. Naievely, perhaps out of respect for my deceased father,and still trusting the police,I did not bring my lawyer friend with me to the police station. I won’t tell you the “heavy handed” techniques that were used on me, an innocent woman who was just being loyal to her friend. I’m writing the details of my visit to the police station in my memoir. Yes, absolutely, overly zealous, heavy handed techniques were used on me. I can only say, “Thank You, Dr. T., for your therapy sessions and for believing me. You really did make all the difference.” I also thank God for helping me through this ordeal. I lived in Davis when these “series of unfortunate events” transpired. That’s why I’m writing on this website.
As a woman and a feminist it is difficult to write about the subject of sexual assault. One question that I wonder when reading your article: did the woman ask Mr. Sonne to put on a condom? If he refused & continued, I think that is wrong behavior, even if both parties are intoxicated.
“…she felt forced into by heavy-handed tactics from the DA’s office.”
1. Is this her testimony in court? What did she say made the tactics “heavy-handed”?
2. Let’s not forget who the DA’s office is representing.
What she said in court is that she doesn’t remember anything. But she is telling people in the community the other apparently.
The justice system in our country is designed to be adversarial. When we introduce “He said, she said” issues into this system seldom is resolution achieved, for either the he or the she. The case that prompted this discussion is classic, and all too typical in sexual assaults.
Let’s ignore the particulars of the rape case except to cite it as illustrative of the futility of our system of justice. Instead why don’t we further pursue this intriguing notion of “restorative justice.”
I don’t like the title because “justice” means somebody to suffer, to lose. That puts us right back into the justice system with all its flaws. How about a title that has “resolution” as the operative term? It has more balance and feeling of understanding for all concerned.
Returning to the illustrative case, we have a female victim and the male suspect (who might be even the greater victim). Could it be possible to reach “resolution” of their differences from a source other than our criminal justice system? I’m absolutely convinced we can, with dramatic savings in time and costs for all concerned, including the public that pays for the criminal justice system to operate.
I conducted a highly unscientific and crude survey of complaints received by the Oakland Police Department many years ago. I found that about twenty percent of complaints received with suspects identified were of the “he said, she said” variety.
Picture an alternative system of “resolution” instead of “justice,” where we mediated complaints instead of sending them to the DA and courts. Imagine the almost incalculable cost reductions that would occur when our justice system has a case reduction of twenty percent!
It can be done, it needs to be done. But reform will NOT come from persons inside the criminal justice system; too many vested interests involved. Reform will come from where all social reform comes, from you.
“What she said in court is that she doesn’t remember anything. But she is telling people in the community the other apparently.”
“Apparently”?
Phil, restorative justice seems a way to improve our justice system by having a guilty person and the victim deal with the impacts of what, in fact, has been judged and punished as a criminal act. You proposal for a upfront, mediation alternative seems better, faster, cheaper.
But, how would you encourage, inspire or drag a rapist and the victim into a setting to engage? The innocent-until-proven-guilty rapist would see a benefit if the threat of prison dissolves without having to admit guilt. However, what attracts the victim to the party?
What crimes would you select for this treatment? Is there something about rape that makes it a suitable target? Is the usual he-said-she-said-ness the attraction? Or the level of seriousness of the act?
Would other types of assault fit, and what would be the maximum injury or other damage that would qualify? Does the concept of deterrence have any role?
Rape is rape. But there is a bigger consideration that is at the heart of the point of this Vanguard piece. In fact, that consideration is heart.
The consideration is that government is not a loving organization. Law enforcement and the criminal justice system are not loving organizations. They cannot be because love is subjective. It is also situational. It requires emotional connections and subjective analysis. It requires personal connections. If allowed it would be inherently unfair in application. And fairness is always the underlying motivation even as the suffocating number of rules we implement to prevent unfairness ensures unfairness. We continually legislate-away human discretion over fear of being treated unfairly. We legislate-away our ability to incorporate love.
We have a segment of society that continually looks to government for solutions to our social challenges. California government has enacted over 800 new laws for 2013. There are rules for everything, yet somehow there is always room for more rules.
So, our law enforcement and judicial just follow the rules. They are told what to do, when to do it, how to do it. They are sued in court and challenged in the media when they ignore the rules to try and do the right things.
In private business we know that rules equal bureaucracy. The more rules, the more talented bureaucratic will rise to positions of power. They supplant the talented creative people that would otherwise rise to the top. In private business we constantly work to optimize the rule book. We train our line workers and empower them to make decisions based on their own judgment and motivation to do the right things. We measure and reward these occurrences to encourage more of the same. We work against the tide of demand for fairness, and instead strive for optimization and excellence. We work to engage the heart.
I fink great irony in that it is generally the same people demanding more rules to live by, that also complain that our service providers don’t do the right things. When they don’t get the results they desire, they demand more rules. They are trapped in a downward spiral of continued inefficiency and ineffectiveness primarily because they are risk averse and fearful of unfairness. They frankly don’t trust the heart even as they opine for it.
The adage “what gets measured gets done” is absolutely true. If we want different results, then we need to ask what is being measured. We need to analyze the motivating factors for the people in the positions of decision power. We need to challenge who is in decisions power if they are not in a position to make good decisions. What results do we want to achieve? Cops and the DA have a large book of rules. The existence of these rules has attracted people that like to follow rules. The risks of attack from those that demand all the rules prevent the implementation of human discretion… it prevents the consideration of heart. It creates a cold, technocratic environment where love cannot exist as a contributing factor.
Justice itself is not a moral principle because it violates the code “to strive for a mutually good outcome for all stakeholders”. Justice is used as a second resort when the threat persists an no one knows how to reach a mutually good outcome.
The philosophy of Restoration follows the moral code. After the occurrence of a crime, the focus is not to punish the crime doer, but to repair the damage, and to prevent the same crime to occur again. The concept of punishment does not exist.
In the philosophy, a community would imprison a person when they know no better way to deal with the threat. Anyone could propose a better way to deal with the threat. The stakeholders include the victim, the victim’s family, the community at large, and the crime-doer.
The discussion and proposal process to figure out what course of action to repair the damage and to prevent further damage, while striving for a solution that everyone’s concern is met, is an implementation of Restorative Justice.
[quote]JustSaying:
But, how would you encourage, inspire or drag a rapist and the victim into a setting to engage? The innocent-until-proven-guilty rapist would see a benefit if the threat of prison dissolves without having to admit guilt.[/quote]
I see two key concerns in this statement:
Concern 1: The victim may not want restorative process
Concern 2: A rapist may want to lie and never admit guilt
On Concern 1:
This concern expresses two situations. 1) when the victim wants a restorative process, and 2) when the victim does not want a restorative process. Let first deal with the simpler situation.
When a victim actually wants a restorative process, community should allow/facilitate such a process to occur. Does our justice system allow such a process?
o Is the police ready not to press charges?
o Does the court system has a process to handle restorative process?
o Does the community allow the victim to choose restorative process (It is possible that the victim wants it, but the community forbids it because the community is more angry than the victim.)
Once we have confirmed that [i]If[/i] the victim wants a restorative process, the community would facilitate one, then we are ready to address the next case [i]when the victim does not want a restorative process[/i]. We will waste a lot of time if we address the second without first addressing the first because we will be trying to solve a compound problem without first solving a simpler case.
On Concern 2:
Restorative Justice is to repair and prevent damage. As such, it is a process that deals with threats to the community at large. During a restorative justice process, one of the key action is to size up the threat. Lying, by itself, is also a threat to the community.
In a justice system, no one is supposed to lie. This includes both the plaintiff and the defendant. Again, let’s parse the concern into smaller chucks and make sure that we not biting more than what we can handle.
Forget about rape or any “serious” crime. Let’s first talk about restorative process in the case of a quarrel. Uncle Sam’s vase fell and broke, Mary and John were both at the scene and touched the vase, but they both disagree on who was responsible for fixing the vase. How does a restorative process decide the responsibility?
Are we comfortable that a restorative process can deal with this simple case efficiently? If not, perhaps, we should first make sure we know how to handle this before we tackle the more complex problem with more at stake.
Phil – It means a great deal to see someone with your experience acknowledging the potential for restorative processes. Let me add a few comments to clarify some points about restorative justice (RJ) as it is being practiced in this country.
1. RJ is a “cover term” that refers to a number of different practices and interventions. It covers everything from “truth and reconciliation commissions” (South Africa), to victim offender conferencing as a diversion process (especially for juvenile non-violent offenders) to victim offender conferencing for very serious crimes when the conferencing may happen years after a conviction while an offender is in prison. The point is, RJ is a set of principles and processes that examine crime from the perspective of the harms it creates, the need for offenders to make things right, and the needs of victims to be part of the process (should they so choose).
2. It has been used for sex crimes but that is still somewhat rare because it is very tricky to bring victims together with perpetrators in such crimes. RJ practitioners reject that notion that victims can or should be compelled to face their offender. But this also explains why it has been most developed for non-violent/non-sex crimes.
3. In the case of Fresno County it WAS people from within the justice system, including a District Judge and the Police Department who have been instrumental in institutionalizing Rj for juvenile crimes. Police (in particular) in many locations seem very amenable to using these approaches.
4. Interestingly, in many places non-profit community groups are partnering with the legal system to actually conduct the mediation processes. They train and monitor practitioners who lead the victim/offender conferencing. This helps keep costs down and engages the community more deeply in the process.
5. Let’s not forget that RJ principles state that those harmed by crimes extend beyond the immediate victim to families and whole communities. This is why conferencing (again, especially for juvenile crimes) often includes family members and/or trusted individuals for both victims and offenders.
Rather than try to start using RJ for the most difficult cases (violent, sex crimes, etc.) why don’t we rather promote “baby steps” by using it in our schools and in juvenile crime cases? Many communities are dong this to great effect (again Fresno County is a key example). I am interested in meeting with anyone who would like to learn more about this and examine the possibilities. We have lots of resources to draw on in CA and beyond. Also, as I mentioned in another thread on this topic, I am happy to share free copies of an introductory text on RJ by one of the leading experts–Howard Zehr. Contact me at robbbike@me.com if you are interested in either talking more about RJ or getting the book.
Jeff Boone- I strongly agree with everything you wrote, except I do believe there is room for love, everywhere.
Robb Davis – Very thoughtful comments & I agree, except it breaks my heart to hear so many “he said, she said” sexual assault stories. I hope sexual assault can be included in R.J. sooner, rather than later.
[i]”She is fresh off an extraordinary effort that [b]culmined[/b] in the New York Times story …”[/i]
Culmined?
[i]”Conor would receive a twenty-year prison sentence. … A lot of people who read this story rejected this approach as soft on crime.”[/i]
Call me ‘soft on crime,’ but my view is that the longest prison sentence should be 5 years. If a person cannot learn his lesson after 5 years incarcerated, he can never learn it. If society cannot be satisfied with a 5-year punishment, it can never be satisfied.
During the time a person is incarcerated, we should be making every effort (through psychological counseling, drug rehab and job-skill training) to reform the inmate so he can, once released, become a productive member of society. We should also be liberal when it comes to parole/probation violations, where we don’t automatically re-incarcerate ex-cons who, without committing any new crimes, violate the terms of their release.
There are, of course, some terribly serious crimes for which prison is not appropriate, for which the prisoner deserves no chance to learn his lesson, and for which society should never welcome back the offender. Those are capital crimes and for them execution is called for.
If we wanted to, we could have a just death penalty/appeals process which resulted in death in less than 4 years*, after making sure the person had a fair trial and making sure the evidence of exculpability was fairly considered. It makes no sense to me to execute anyone 30 years after he was sentenced to die.
There are also psychotic crimes, where the offender is/was mentally ill and for that reason cannot learn from punishment and society cannot be safe from the offender once released. Those offenders need to be locked up indefinitely. But they belong in locked psychiatric institutions, not general pop. prisons.
————
*I think it took about 4 years to execute Tim McVeigh. Certainly he deserved that fate.
For the Vase example, this is want I think. It is not the only way to run a restorative process, I am sure it can be improved.
The process:
1) Get the basic context and facts of the incident
2) Get the stories from all stakeholders
3) Brainstorm the damage and identify the biggest damages
4) Brainstorm the threats and identify the biggest threats
5) Brainstorm the restorative measures and start acting with the least intrusive ones
6) Brainstorm the preventative measures and start acting with the least intrusive ones
The following is an imagination to show how this process proceeds.
1) The Context and Facts:
o The vase belongs to Uncle Sam.
o Uncle Sam brought the Vase last year for $100
o The vase is in stock, and is available for purchase for $120 at this moment.
o The vase was at Uncle Sam’s front yard.
o Mary and John were playing at the side walk outside Uncle Sam’s front yard
o They were playing tag.
2) Stories:
Mary’s story: John tagged her too hard. She fell on the vase and the vase broke.
John’s story: He did not see there was a vase. He thought Mary would dodge but she didn’t and he ran into her.
Uncle Sam’s story: He was inside the house but didn’t see what happened. He heard the noise and saw that the vase was broken. He checked that no one was hurt.
Mary adds: John is lying because there is no way he didn’t see the vase. John was being a jerk because he knew she can’t dodge at the position. She doesn’t want to play with John again if he wouldn’t admit fault.
John asserts: That he did not see the vase, and that Mary was being bad sport because he caught her. He wouldn’t want to play with her either.
3) List of damages:
o Relationship damage between John and Mary
o Reputation of John as a liar
o Reputation of Mary for being bad sport
o A decorative vase the Uncle Sam wants replenished
4) List of threats:
o That relationships will continue to break in similar fashion
o That kids could get hurt playing outside
o That John will be lying
o That Mary will be bad sport
o That John and/or Mary will continue to break things when they play
5) Restorative measures
o Ask John and Mary to re-confirm their commitments to be truthful and to be good sport. Remind everyone the honor of maintaining goodwill, and that the future belongs to them, it will their responsibilities to resolve conflicts involving themselves or others.
o Ask Mary what she thinks a person who is wrongly accused of lying should do, and how to tell the difference between someone who lies and someone who did not.
o Ask John what he thinks a person who is wrongly accused of having bad sport should do, and how to tell the difference.
o Ask for a volunteer to replace Uncle Sam’s vase
6) Preventative measures:
o Document the experience and the solution. Ask the community at large for inputs.
o Ask John what he wish that had happened so that Mary wouldn’t think that he was lying.
o Ask Mary what she wishes to have happened so that John wouldn’t think she was bad sport.
o Ask Uncle Sam if there is something he could do so that a situation like this wouldn’t happen again.
o Ask John and Mary how they would prevent from breaking things when they play. Remind them that if they can’t prevent themselves from breaking things while playing with their own proposal, the community might restrict their play
To refine the process is to imagine a case (with different facts and contexts) where the process would break, and then try to fix the process. When no one can think of a case that breaks the process, we can conclude that everyone did their best to make sure that it is robust. It is still possible that the a situation occurs and breaks the process, and when that happen we will fix it, just like how we have improved it all along.
Hello Robb, I am interested in restorative justice, but I don’t have time to read it. Is it possible for you to describe what content is in the text that is absent in our discussion?
[b]Prison in Norway[/b] – Do the crime, do the time… in an all-expense-paid resort-quality destination…
[img]http://www.cscdc.org/miscjeff/Norwayprison1.jpg[/img]
[img]http://www.cscdc.org/miscjeff/Norwayprison2.jpg[/img]
[img]http://www.cscdc.org/miscjeff/Norwayprison3.jpg[/img]
[img]http://www.cscdc.org/miscjeff/Norwayprison4.jpg[/img]
[img]http://www.cscdc.org/miscjeff/Norwayprison5.jpg[/img]
[img]http://www.cscdc.org/miscjeff/Norwayprison6.jpg[/img]
[img]http://www.cscdc.org/miscjeff/Norwayprison7.jpg[/img]
[quote]About a 100 Km south of Oslo, a state of-the-art prison considered by many the World’s most ‘luxurious’ has opened in June 2010, in a country already boasting criminal and rehabilitation systems of the highest standards.
Individual cells come with an en-suite bathroom, a flat-screen TV and various comforts. They measure 12 square meters and are divided up into units (10 to 12) which share a living room and kitchen, similarly to a students’ dormitory. The windows are not fitted with bars, but thick glass is used instead.
The prison – the second-largest in Norway – costs 165m Euro and accommodates 248 male inmates. Some 760,000 Euro were spent just on artworks, some of which commissioned to Norway’s most renowned street artist, Dolk.
The inmates can attend a vast range of formative courses at a official high school located inside the prison. Subjects can include languages, IT, science, catering, music, (there is even a professional sound studio) art and handicraft and several sports.
Norway’s unrepentant mass killer, Anders Behring Breivik, is now under arrest. And he should count himself lucky for – if entirely undeserving of – a penal system in that country that is among the cushiest in the world. There’s no capital punishment, and the longest jail term allowed is 21 years (a caveat: if a prisoner is deemed to still be a threat, his sentence can be extended in five-year blocks indefinitely, though it’s highly unlikely, according to Norwegian officials). In Norway, rehabilitation is the guiding principle, not punishment – a somewhat difficult notion to swallow given the gravity and callousness of his crimes. [/quote]
Now that it’s so difficult to get a job, Jeff, would it be better to volunteer for the U.S. armed services or head to Norway to commit a crime?
Re: Jeff
I think for your post about Norway’s prison, an important question to ask if the people in Norway is OK with it. If they are OK with it then it is not an issue for them.
[quote]Jeff Boone:
The adage “what gets measured gets done” is absolutely true. If we want different results, then we need to ask what is being measured. We need to analyze the motivating factors for the people in the positions of decision power. We need to challenge who is in decisions power if they are not in a position to make good decisions.[/quote]
I think this is correct. In process improvement, “What gets measured gets done…” is only half of the adage. The other half is, “… in the expense of what don’t get measured.”
An obvious strategy is to increase the number of metrics to account for all aspects. The cost is the overhead of having a lot of correct statistics, which includes the overhead of preventing cheating in the collection and presentation of data.
Another strategy is to map the process, and list all possible improvements in each step, or the process as a whole, and start working on each proposed improvement as long as they don’t pose any conflict with the system. This strategy bypass the need to define a complete set of metrics, the supervision overhead to avoid cheating, the psychological overhead of blame, and focus on acting out improvement measures.
I am not against metrics and statistics. I am just pointing out the consideration of cost and alternatives.
If you look at a bunch of factory workers and they are not motivated to improve the process to make their own work easier, we agree that we should look at the reasons for the lack of motivation and resolve that. The reasons are typically these:
1: I feel that my employer is not paying me enough. It is not fair, I don’t want to work hard.
2: I know exactly how to improve the process. But if I do that, my employer will realize that my position is not needed. I am afraid to laid off. Therefore I must inflate the importance and difficulty of my role to keep my job.
For the first reason, if the employer is not trying to exploit the employee, then the problem a lack of trust or transparency. To fix this, the employer can show how revenues are divided and show how it cares and address the needs of the employees.
For the second reason, the fear is the lack of upward mobility. Somehow the employee thinks that if he outdone his own position, he would get laid off instead of being promoted to work on a different position. To fix this the employer needs a clear vision of values that are yet to be harvested due to a lack of employees to work on them. When an employee realize that if they outdo their own position, they will get to work on something more interesting, they will take initiative to make those improvements. Sometimes these rationales are so obvious that an employer didn’t realize they have to explain it to the employees.
I have just realized something profound.
When I look at those pictures of Norway Prison, I don’t have any sense of jealousy. All I felt was that they seem happy and it makes me happy.
JB: [i]”Rape is rape.”[/i]
In my opinion, there are degrees of rape and rapists. Without having given this too much forethought, I would say there are four categories:
[b]Level 4. Consensual sexual relations.[/b] The obvious case involves a minor who is near the age of consent (say a 16-year-old girl) and an adult who is not too much older (say an 18-year-old boy). That may qualify as “statutory rape,” but it seems to me it is not a crime and does not merit punishment, unless for some reason the minor was mentally incapable of really consenting.
[b]Level 3. Circumstantial rape.[/b] Offenders in this category deserve punishment, more so if they caused very serious harm to their victims. But a circumstantial rapist is one who fully understands his crime, did not have any history of criminal behavior before the crime, is believed by mental health professionals to be capable of rehabilitation and once treated not likely to be a societal threat. The key is to remove the rapist from the circumstance, such as drug addiction or alcoholism, which was a large factor in the crime.
[b]Level 2. Psychotic rape.[/b] Offenders in this category, without antipsychotic medication, are incapable of understanding what they are doing due to clinical mental illness. These sorts of criminals need to be in locked psychiatric hospitals and forcibly drugged. They do not belong in society or in prison. If you ever meet someone who is psychotic, you will know it immediately. These are people with no guile, in great contrast to psychopaths.
[b]Level 1. Psychopathic rapists.[/b] These are not people with treatable mental illnesses like schizophrenia. They are capable of functioning in society and, at least on the surface, appear to be normal, even cunning. Yet they have psychopathy*. They lack a conscience. Serial rapists/murderers like Richard Allen Harris are psychopaths. Pedophilic men who lurk around children, kidnap and rape them are psychopaths. The man who raped and killed Sabrina Gonsalves and murdered John Riggins is a psychopath. These people cannot be rehabilitated. Serial offenders of this sort deserve to be executed for their crimes. They don’t belong in “corrections” or in society.
* Source ([url]http://www.fbi.gov/stats-services/publications/law-enforcement-bulletin/july-2012/psychopathy-an-important-forensic-concept-for-the-21st-century[/url]): [quote]Many psychopaths exhibit a profound lack of remorse for their aggressive actions, both violent and nonviolent, along with a corresponding lack of empathy for their victims. This central psychopathic concept enables them to act in a cold-blooded manner, using those around them as pawns to achieve goals and satisfy needs and desires, whether sexual, financial, physical, or emotional. Most psychopaths are grandiose, selfish sensation seekers who lack a moral compass—a conscience—and go through life taking what they want. They do not accept responsibility for their actions and find a way to shift the blame to someone or something else. [/quote]
I must add that 10 years ago, I believed that prison shouldn’t be comfortable. I don’t know what changed in these 10 years. If I could pin point it I would want to tell you.
Oh. I know what changed me.
I got to know someone who works with troubled minds. When she finds ones that are particularly disturbed, she would spend indefinite amount of time trying to help them. She is completely dedicated, never asked others to help her, and never felt contempt toward those who thought differently.
She has no hatred that originates from herself, yet she gets upset by those with hatred. I don’t think she deserves to be affected like this, but it is not her choice not to be affected. So I started helping her to resolve the problems. For some time I wonder whether I only care about others because I care about her.
But now I get a proof to myself that my care has nothing to do with her. I was happy without knowing why. It had become my nature to care. I was induced through her, but now I have it in myself.
In the overall time frame, I think this is when people have negative emotions and they don’t know how to deal with them, they get irritated when they learn about troubles others have. They develop the behavior that ask others to deal with their own issues.
When a person learns how to deal with their own emotions, they become emotionally ready to absorb the negative emotions of others and deal with them also. They don’t get irritated because they know how to handle them.
If we want a community that naturally accept restorative justice, part of the foundation is in emotional education. It is in the knowledge and techniques to deal with emotions such as anger, suspicion, and jealousy.
The basic form of jealousy is this:
You and your neighbor are working on separate farms and your neighbor finds a gold bar from his farm. At that point, if you feel that you dislike your neighbor because he got something he didn’t earn “fairly”, and you want to deny him of friendship, or make sure that you will charge him more for your produce so that you could get at least half the value of that gold bar, then you have the emotion of jealousy.
A typical cause of jealous is an ideology specifying that “happiness should only be a reward of hard-work”. When someone else becomes happy without hard-work, your ideology (your worldview) becomes threatened. If makes you hate the level of work you do because you didn’t get the same reward. But instead of blaming your working, your mind directs the hatred toward the person who got the extra reward so that you could keep liking what you do. When your mind fails to do so, you would become demotivated to do your own work.
A solution to jealousy is to adopt a different ideology of happiness, such as “Happiess is the feeling that comes when a person commits to good intentions.” In this ideology, a person is happy as long as they choose to do good. Every moment is a potential to be happy, and it is up to the person to choose it. In this ideology (this mental wiring that defines happiness), the person cannot feel jealousy because their happiness cannot be affected by external forces. If they tried to do good but hurt someone unintentionally, they can always do the right thing again and feel happy again. Happiness is not anchored in past actions, not anchored to future reward, but anchored in the present commitment.
[i]JB: “Rape is rape.”
Rich: In my opinion, there are degrees of rape and rapists. Without having given this too much forethought, I would say there are four categories:[/i]
I agree with your four categories. My statement was more abstract than granular. If you think about it, the statement speaks for itself. In other words, if it is not rape then it is not rape.
It either is, or it is not. If it is, then the rapist deserves punishment. It it is not, then there is no rapist and our criminal justice system should not be involved.
[i]I must add that 10 years ago, I believed that prison shouldn’t be comfortable.[/i]
I don’t have a problem with prison being uncomfortable, but I would prefer that we have classes of prisons where the most uncomfortable are reserved for the worst criminals that commit the worst crimes. I want them to suffer to some commensurate level of discomfort as a constant reminder of the social, mental, emotional and physical damage they caused others.
The main problem with the US prison system is the fact that prisoners have to be there with other prisoners. They in fact are all part of their own self-created hell. Certainly over-crowding exacerbates the miserable living circumstances, but if all the prisoners behaved civilly and treated each other with kindness and respect, time spent in US prisons would not be all that bad.
The convicts that I know talk about the terrible people they had to serve time with. They don’t complain about the guards or the food or the facilities or the healthcare. Norway is a much smaller country that is very racially and ethnically homogenous. I’m guessing that there is less tribal conflict in their prisons. US prisons are filled with a large percentage of genuinely nasty and violent young men. These are generally fatherless boys that joined gangs of other young men, and their creeds and principles required they learn to accept violence as part of their being. They do not possess even the basic level of civility, morality and caring that should be required for us to allow them to integrate back into free society. In my opinion, most of them are lost… they cannot be rehabilitated.
However, I would like to see a progressive prison system that challenges prisoners to advance in their civil and moral development on a path to possible freedom. I would like to see us implement a system similar to the US military where prisoners can earn stripes, medals and rank for achievement. Basically, I would like to see a system where convicts can work their way back from their mistakes.
Wow. I don’t think most Americans having living accomodations as nice as this Norwegian prison. Looks like a resort that middle–income Americans would like to be able to afford to take a vacation to.
Does the average Norwegian live as well as convicts in their prisons?
[i]”Norway is a much smaller country that is very racially and ethnically homogenous.”[/i]
That is true. Few countries are more homogenous than Norway. But that has been changing over the last 20 years. This comes from Wikipedia:
“At the beginning of 1992, immigrants and Norwegian-born to immigrant parents totalled 183,000 persons, or 4.3 per cent of Norway’s population. Twenty years later, at the beginning of 2012, these groups had risen to 655,000 persons or 13.1 per cent of the population.”
A friend of mine (an American who traveled there) told me immigrant women, particularly the Muslims, have lots of kids, while Norwegian women have 2 or less. So it’s not unlikely that Norway’s demographics will be very different in another 20 years.
[i]”I’m guessing that there is less tribal conflict in their prisons.”[/i]
I would expect that, too. However, it would not surprise me to know that the incarceration rate for non-ethnic Norwegians in Norway is much higher than it is for Norwegian ethnics. If that is the case, then they probably have birds-of-a-feather flocking in there prisons the way we have in most places where various colors of people live.
[quote]These people cannot be rehabilitated. Serial offenders of this sort deserve to be executed for their crimes. They don’t belong in “corrections” or in society.
[/quote]
I become very, very uncomfortable when anyone decides that they know that others deserve execution.
I have a professional interest in abortion, not because I have every performed an elective abortion, but because I stand strongly in favor of a woman’s ability to decide what medical procedures should be done on her body. You may not see the relationship, however, over the years, I have read many, many times articles by those who have decided that since abortion is in their eyes murder of the innocent, that these murderers are evil beyond redemption and should be executed.
I believe in a very basic principle. Human beings are not perfect, or unanimous in our beliefs about what actions should result in execution. So Rich, why should your idea of whose actions are so heinous that they deserve execution take precedence over those who would kill anyone ( including myself) who has ever performed an abortion, even when the mother’s life was clearly in the balance ?
[i]”Human beings are not perfect, or unanimous in our beliefs about what actions should result in execution.”[/i]
Unanimity is not necessary. If it were, then no one ever could be punished for any crime.
As to human perfection, that is a given. Were men angels, we would not need government at all (so said James Madison).
[i]”Why should [b]your idea[/b] of whose actions are so heinous that they deserve execution take precedence over those who would kill anyone (including myself) who has ever performed an abortion, even when the mother’s life was clearly in the balance?”[/i]
Are you asking me if anti-abortion extremists should have the right to extrajudiciously murder you? Is that a serious question?
As to “my idea,” what counts ultimately is what the people, the legislature, the courts, etc. decide. It’s not so important what “my idea” of justice is unless the people, the legislature and so on agree.
I know you think executing even the most heinous criminals, even a Hitler, a Himmler or a Goebbels, is unjustified. As I have told you before, I feel your call for caging a human being for 40, 60, even 80 years if the inmate lives long enough, all with no possibility of parole, with no intention of “corrections,” is unjust. But, apparently, a majority agrees more with you than with me, because far, far more heinous criminals in the U.S. are sentenced to life than those actually killed for their crimes.
The weakest argument of those who oppose executing heinous criminals is the notion that because there is a small chance that someone who is actually innocent might be executed–even though no truly exculpatory evidence has been produced for anyone who has been executed since reinstatement–no one should ever receive the death penalty. This belief stems from a transverse guilt, whereby all of “the people” would be guilty for having taken the life of one innocent person.
But there is a hole in this logic. If we fail to pour unlimited funds into every murder investigation and every prosecution, then there exists a decent chance that some truly guilty murderers will not be convicted. In fact, many murderers are not convicted. And free, many of those murderers will kill innocent people–folks every bit as innocent as the one person you are so worried about in the death chamber. Why were they let free? Why did another innocent person die at their hands? Government policy.
If you use your transverse morality argument, we are all guilty of killing that next innocent person, who would have lived, but for our choice to not pour unlimited funds into every investigation and every prosecution.
We also take risks any time we let any violent criminal out of prison. We take chances as a result of government policies that innocents might be killed by simply allowing most freedoms. If your ultimate purpose is to make sure that government policy should never lead to the death of an innocent, you should be calling for a lot more restrictions on personal liberty. I am sure in communist countries, where no one is free, they have much less homicide.
It seems to me the logical extension of your notion that we should never allow an innocent to die is itself unjust.
Re: Jeff
I also don’t have a problem with prison being uncomfortable. For me, the main consideration is not the intentional comfort of prison to punish criminals, but that of affordability. The comfort should simply reflect the priority of resources among all public services. When there is no scarcity in resource, and no one has any concern otherwise, then there is no reason why a prison can’t be comfortable.
One of the concerns you posed, is that if prison is not uncomfortable, then people would have no motivation to change. This concern expresses the goal of effective moral education. And I agree that society should strive to have an effective moral education.
What is your definition of moral?
My definition of moral is the spontaneous preference of mutual happiness.
In this definition, when a person does not do bad because they fear the punishment, the person is only thinking at a logical level, not at a moral level. One could claim that punishment would help teach moral by serving as a mental or physical reminder such as in this case:
a) Someone is caught stealing. The community beats him up, so that the next time he thinks about stealing, he would also remember the pain of getting beat up, and remember that stealing is wrong.
The point of the punishment is to etch a wiring in the offender’s brain to remind them of moral principles. The community did not punish the criminal out of hatred. Physical pain is the mean to attach that reminder.
If we consider punishment as a mean to remind people to do good, how about jewelry? It could be a symbol that non-criminals would also wear, like the cross in Christianity. For the sake of patriotism it could be a US flag pin. For the sake of global goodwill it could be a globe pin.
Personally I would prefer bunny ears as the symbol, because moral is not a “serious” concept. Moral is an innocent concept.
If moral is an innocent concept, to teach moral is to teach how to live an innocent life that harms no one.
It is the understanding that:
o People aren’t trying to hurt you
o You don’t need to hurt anyone
Innocent people want to give criminals group hugs.
For dangerous psychopaths that attacks anyone on sight, innocent people would want to group hug their holding cell.
What do you feel when you hug on a holding cell?
“I feel that there their mind is very damaged, and I don’t know how to fix it. I want to tell him that I want to fix it. I wish that through my mind could connect with his mind inside, so that I can see what is going on. Perhaps that is a trapped consciousness in that mind to be saved. If I am lucky, I can find it.”
[i]” In fact, many murderers are not convicted.”[/i]
I just looked [b]this ([url]http://www.tcpalm.com/news/2010/may/21/percentage-killings-go-unsolved-has-risen-alarming/[/url])[/b] up: [quote]Every year in America, 6,000 killers get away with murder. The percentage of homicides that go unsolved in the United States has risen alarmingly even as the homicide rate has fallen to levels last seen in the 1960s. Despite dramatic improvements in DNA analysis and forensic science, police fail to make an arrest in more than one-third of all homicides. National clearance rates for murder and manslaughter have fallen from about 90 percent in the 1960s to below 65 percent in recent years. The majority of homicides now go unsolved at dozens of big-city police departments, according to a Scripps Howard News Service study of crime records provided by the FBI. … Nearly 185,000 killings went unsolved [u]from 1980 to 2008.[/u]
[b]–Thomas Hargrove, Scripps Howard News Service, May 21, 2010[/b][/quote]
[quote]Are you asking me if anti-abortion extremists should have the right to extrajudiciously murder you? Is that a serious question?
[/quote]
It would not be a serious question if that were to have been what I was asking. However, that wasn’t the question. If enough people felt that abortion was the murder of innocents, and enough Supreme Court justices agreed to overturn Roe v Wade, then what would stop them from passing laws that convicted and sentenced doctors who performed abortion, even done to save the life of the mother, from being executed under the law ? That was my question. As you have pointed out, I am by principle, opposed to human beings deciding who lives and who dies. For me It is wrong for the individual murderer, and it is equally wrong for a group of 12 jurors.
As I have posted before, I do not believe that life in prison is more human than the death penalty. However, I do recognize that some permanent means of protecting society from the permanently dangerous individual is warranted. I have also posted my proposed solution to this problem. Let the convict that is judged to be too dangerous to ever be freed decide for themselves which they prefer.
Allow them to choose life in prison, or a pain free way of ending their own life. Society would be protected either way without sinking to the level of taking the life of another human being.
On the topic of death sentence, I don’t have a dogmatic judgement that there should never be a death sentence, because I cannot imagine what kind of criminal is possible and how dangerous a criminal can be. My main concerns would be security and affordability.
For security, my main concern would be the people who have to handle the criminal. If no prison guard don’t feel safe keeping the criminal alive, then I have these choices:
a) Ask to be a prison guard myself
b) Let the criminal be executed
I cannot force others to accept the risk. I think that is immoral.
For affordability, my main concern is the opportunity cost. If people are not willing to pay for keeping the criminal alive, I have these choices:
a) Pay for it myself
b) Let the criminal be executed
I think it is immoral to force others to use their resources to pay for my believes.
These judgement depends on the ability of society to secure and afford prisoners. These abilities changes depending methodologies, technologies, and resources.
One condition where I would prefer execution is when the criminal is suffering pain himself and no one knows how to stop that pain or no one can afford to stop that pain. There could be cases where one cannot communicate with the criminal to ask if the criminal wants to die.
[i]If enough people felt that abortion was the murder of innocents, and enough Supreme Court justices agreed to overturn Roe v Wade, then what would stop them from passing laws that convicted and sentenced doctors who performed abortion, even done to save the life of the mother, from being executed under the law ? That was my question.[/i]
Nothing. A few states already have trigger laws that would criminalize abortion automatically upon the overturning of Roe v Wade. At least one, Louisiana, would provide for the prosecution of doctors who perform abortions and anyone who aids them. Current provision of that law is up to ten years in prison, and $100,000 fines. I believe South Dakota has a similar law.
[quote]If enough people felt that abortion was the murder of innocents, and enough Supreme Court justices agreed to overturn Roe v Wade, then what would stop them from passing laws that convicted and sentenced doctors who performed abortion, even done to save the life of the mother, from being executed under the law ?[/quote]
I think the concern in this statement is not obvious. Suppose a law is passed so that it is illegal to have abortion in California, and anyone who assists the abortion will be executed, what is the moral thing to do?
a) The woman wants an abortion because there is a concern. Identify what that concern is and see if it can be addressed without abortion.
b) People who oppose abortion because they have some concerns. Find out what those are and see if the can be addressed so that abortion is okay.
c) Find out why the woman is pregnant and find a way to reduce the chance of that.
d) Assist women who want to leave California to relocate to a different state.
e) …?
For (b), suppose the opposition explains that abortion is immoral, and their concern is that God’s will is violated. What are some ways to address this?
1) Ask them for God’s accepted way of settling disputes and see if some alternative settlement
2) Confirm whether God has specified believers to have the authority to execute fellow people, and how that differs in the context for a pregnant woman to choose an abortion
3) Ask them for God’s acceptable way for them to deal with non-believers to see if the law simply does not apply to non-believers.
4) Confirm whether God’s will include a way for a wrong-doer to make up for their wrong doing instead of being executed by fellow believers.
5) Confirm if God’s will is misinterpreted
6) Confirm whether the religion is true
I believe that your suggestion — that it is possible to argue rationally with someone whose argument is founded on ‘God’s will’ — is destined to fail.
Re: Don
I understand. But it is better to see it fail than assume that it will fail. When it fails, then there is a record that a rational discussion as a resolution is offered, but rejected or was inconclusive. That is a necessary condition before the conflict can be ethically escalate beyond rational discussion.
If I just assume that they would reject it, then I am not exercising my goodwill and I am opening a vulnerability for them to accuse me of using excessive force. So it is part of the protocol to offer it, and see it fail, so that the truth can be protected.
Normally I don’t respond to an initial post, finding that topics often drift onto tangential or irrelevant matters. This topic is no exception. I’ve already contacted Norwegian officials and booked myself into their gated community for my next vacation.
I have enormous respect for Robb Davis and his views, and other valid points have been raised on the “process” of implementation for this notion of an alternative approach to our criminal justice system.
On how we would implement an alternative justice scenario, it would be necessary to seek state legislation, with assured oppositions from powerful vested interests. The opposition would be presented in sanctimonious phrasings of equal justice and such, but this is just a disguise for the real reason, economic self-interest. The criminal justice system is a cash-cow for tens of thousands of people, and they are organized well. That said, the public sentiment and frustration is now strong enough to overcome this opposition, I believe.
Procedurally, we could restrict the justice alternative to certain classes of misdemeanors, and perhaps a few non-assault felonies. Selection would be with the approval of all vested interests, including the DA, attorney of record, victim and alleged suspect(s).
The list of criminal disputes could be expanded and strengthened based on the proven success in this pilot program effort.
[quote]I think the concern in this statement is not obvious. Suppose a law is passed so that it is illegal to have abortion in California, and anyone who assists the abortion will be executed, what is the moral thing to do?
[quote]
Edgar, while I usually very much appreciate your reasoned approach to the issues that we discuss in this forum, I think that your assertion “the concern in this statement is not obvious” may be a reflection of you not having followed this issue over a period of years. Your subsequent statement would also imply that you are not aware that virtually every point that you have made has been addressed repetitively.
Basically what you have is a group of people who believe that based on their religious beliefs, they are entirely and solely in possession of the truth. Their believe is that everyone else’s beliefs are incorrect.
For the true believer, there is no other belief system than their own. So since their beliefs are God given,
if my beliefs differ, then they must be either in error, or evil, or both. I have spent the past 30 years seeing their arguments and asking the questions you suggested and for the strongest believers, there is no compromise and there is no alternative. Your paradigm simply does not apply to those who would deny an abortion even to the woman who will ( note I did not say might) but who will die without it. If I am wrong, and you see a way to solve this problem with your paradigm, please explain to me how that might look.
And Don, I realize this is significantly off topic, so feel free to move to Bulletin Board if desired.
Oops, sorry for the error of putting my entire post in quotes.
It is a bit ironic medwoman that you demand a woman’s right to terminate a developing life, but reject a right for society to terminate a killer… claiming I think that he hasn’t had enough opportunity to develop. I find that a very interesting contrast of moral views.
Sorry for being off-topic.
On the issue of anti-abortion, I admit that I am ignorant for the exact reason that I had not been following it for 30 years. As far as I understand, there is no dogmatic reason why a woman who faces a certain concern [i]must[/i] have an abortion. The reasons are circumstantial. When we oppose anti-abortion just because we feel that freedom is infringed, we could lose sight of the possibilities that the same concerns could be address in another way.
For example:
o Is it ok for a woman to transfer the embryo to another woman? Is it sensible that a religious woman devoted to saving life would volunteer to be a surrogate mother? Then nuns can have virgin birth. What about if a woman who already had a child wants to donate her embryo to another woman so that the other woman could also enjoy childbirth?
o Is it sensible that a religious group that is anti-abortion is also actively doing research on safe pregnancy and childbirth? And addressing the concerns a woman has that makes her want to have an abortion? By doing so, they are also saving lives.
o It is possible to rank the reasons to have an abortion on a moral scale? On a moral basis of mutual good, the reasons would be ranked roughly like this:
1) Because the unborn is killing the pregnant woman right now and the woman will die before there is childbirth
2) Because there is no known medical procedure to let the unborn be born and be alive without also killing the mother.
3) Because there is a high chance that the mother will die during childbirth
4) Because the unborn has a fatal development defect, such as having no heart or no head, and there is no known medical process to keep the newborn alive after childbirth to justify the risk of giving birth.
5) Because the unborn carries the genes that will make it a violent psychopath, and there is no known medical process to change that.
6) Because the family cannot afford to have another child. If he is born, someone else in the family will starve to death
7) Because the woman wants to donate the unborn to the medical research of an artificial womb, which has already been shown to work with non human species.
8) Because the unborn has a non-fatal development defect, such as having no arms, that the woman think would make the newborn unhappy to live, even though she could financial afford to have that child still
9) Because the woman wants to stay in her career without a child, even though she could financially afford to have a child
10) Because the woman didn’t like the race or sex of the child
11) Because the woman wants to sell the unborn to research on cosmetics
12) Because the woman never considered that the unborn could be some sort of life
I think it is worthwhile to confirm whether a person who support anti-abortion rejects abortion for all of these reasons. If so, I think it is important to document the exact reasons and see if there is any internal conflict in the doctrine to see if there is an misinterpretation of the doctrine.
Sometimes people opposes an idea because they are only thinking of one scenario. Perhaps they would agree that for some scenarios it would be okay. I won’t know until I ask. And people’s perspective could change, so even if I asked last year, it is reasonable to ask again.
It would be good to have someone who is anti-abortion to come to the discussion. So that we could limit the scope.
(Cont.)
Whenever I show a list like the above, I think it is necessary for me to declare my own judgement. Because if I don’t do it, I am not fairly protecting the other posters from unilateral rhetorical attack. It is part of discussion ethics to declare what you believe when you ask others what they believe. So that if you disagree with them, they also have something they can disagree with you.
Sorry for long post.
Personally I think 12 is immoral. I think it is immoral for a woman to have an abortion and never consider that the view that it is terminating a life. However, my action is not to forbid them from not having an abortion, but to simply bring up the concept. If the woman had heard that concept, then I don’t have any justification for further action.
If you look at it this way, when someone says they are “anti-abortion”, there are these specifics details.
1) What moral code do they claim to follow
2) Where they draw the line for different scenarios
3) What would they do when someone crosses the line
According to you, the person you disagree with has these specifics:
1) Moral Code: God’s Doctrine
2) Judgement: All 12 cases are immoral
3) Action: Execution to all who assists abortion in those 12 cases.
Now we just need to find the person you disagree with and have them endorse this explicitly. Then the stakeholder is realized, and we are justified to spend additional time to assess the damage. Note that even in these wording, we need to have an actual stakeholder to discuss the particular meaning of “assist”, because we need to figure out if the they meant:
a) The doctor who performs abortion in the state
b) The transportation provider who transports pregnant woman out of state to have an abortion
c) The bus driver who saw a pregnant woman traveling out of state, and did not report the incident to authorities on suspicion that the woman wants an abortion
d) The store owner who sees a pregnant woman buying a metal cloth hanger and didn’t report the incident
e) A customer who sees a store that sells metal cloth hanger and didn’t report the store
f) An internet surface provider that does not block websites on self-induced abortion methods
g) A casual web-surfer who saw a post or a blog that talks about how to get an abortion without report that to authorities
h) A person who buys a product manufacture by a company that also supports abortion out of state
i) …
Because the possibilities expand exponentially, and wildly affects the effect of the policy, it is better to find an actual stakeholder join the discussion. If the definition of “assistance” is limited to (a), while (b) is allowed, then the effect is just the transportation cost and potential lost revenue to doctors could have performed the abortion.
Meds, just want to let you know I’ve read your responses. I’m too busy today to argue this. We won’t convince each other, anyhow.
[quote]It is a bit ironic medwoman that you demand a woman’s right to terminate a developing life, but reject a right for society to terminate a killer… claiming I think that he hasn’t had enough opportunity to develop. I find that a very interesting contrast of moral views.[/quote]
If is interesting to me that you think that I am demanding anything at all. Where in anything that I have written do you think that I have made that “demand”? What I do think is that pregnancy is a unique state in which the state itself is not always compatible with the life of the mother. Because pregnancy is a natural process, people frequently make the mistake of thinking that it is always a benign process for the woman, but this is not true. Even in our times and with our advanced medical technology, women can and do die of pregnancy related conditions. If you do not believe this, you have probably not had the experience of having had a 16 year old patient die, inexplicably, of hemorrhage within 12 hours of giving birth as I have. I do not feel that it is up to you, or me, or anyone else to judge whether or not a woman should be forced to continue a condition that is potentially life threatening to her.
Secondly, you once again have made an argument that I have never made, and put it forward as though it were my claim. My opposition to the death penalty is not based on the presence or absence of development, but rather on my belief that the reason that we abhor murder as a society is that we do not believe that men have the right to kill one another. With this principle, I completely agree. And I would take it further, I do not believe that people in the collective have any more moral right to terminate a human life than a single human does. What the death penalty does is to state that might ( that of the state) makes right. I do not believe that state sanctioned taking of human life has any more moral validity than did the taking of life by say for example ” the KKK” or any gang that decides that a member of a rival gang must die.
Rifs
For me, this is all about the conversation and the sharing of ideas…..not about convincing.
Edgar
[quote]As far as I understand, there is no dogmatic reason why a woman who faces a certain concern must have an abortion.[/quote]
Do you feel that same way about the woman whose life is endangered by the pregnancy ?
Re: medwoman
When a woman whose life is endangered by the pregnancy, theoretically the options include these:
a) Destroy the unborn inside the woman’s womb (what we normally call abortion)
b) Let the unborn be transferred to another womb
c) Figure out what the condition is and treat it so that the pregnancy no longer endangers the woman’s life
Whether these options are available depends on the medical technological level. If only option (a) is available for a situation, then we chose it for a [b]pragmatic[/b] reason. If all options are available, but because of some dogma that society follows, only (a) is deemed to be moral, then we are choosing it for a [b]dogmatic[/b] reason.
When I say I don’t know a dogmatic reason why a woman who faces a certain concern must have an abortion, I was trying to express this meaning.
Edgar
Thanks for the clarification. One of the problems that exists is that of your theoretical possibilities, only two are within our current capabilities. There is no such thing yet as fetal transfer from one woman to another. This leaves us with only two possibilities, abortion, or management of the underlying medical condition. Unfortunately, the second is not always possible. However, there are significant numbers of our population, either because they do not have a degree of medical sophistication to know that it is not always possible to save both mother and baby, or because their religious beliefs cause them to value the life of the unborn over that of the mother, would block the only option available to some women.
So I agree with you that there are no dogmatic reasons that a woman must have an abortion. It is equally true that for many women who do not adhere to the religious beliefs of the majority, there are no dogmatic reasons not to have an abortion.