Time Immortal

A 21 month conditional sentence with primarily house arrest — or dorm arrest, where he can still drink, party and such (unless refraining from any manner of drugs is one of the ‘onerous, numerous conditions’) — is a joke. Especially since they were adults at the time; it was not only rape-without-consent but rape-of-a-child and being-party-to-a-crime the last of which, in the case of murder, automatically increases the severity of the charge, or at least it used to do so.

I just do not get how sparing the victim from testifying — by pleading guilty (there may be some honour there, unless of course it was part of a plea bargain to this ridiculous sentence, then it is simply selfish) — makes the criminals worthy of a lesser sentence. I would say the only time a rapist should get some sort of leniency is if they, shortly after the crime and without broadcasting it and likely getting lawyered up after charges, voluntarily confess of their own accord. For any crime, voluntary confession to police should be the only reason for reduced sentences, other than other cooperation with police to catch a bigger net of criminals — although the benefits should be markedly greater for voluntarism than for cooperation once caught. Not that voluntarily confessing should land one a joke sentence like this one, but if, say, a rapist turns himself in after Church on Sunday for a rape committed early Saturday morning in which the victim can not identify the rapist, perhaps a shorter sentence of 7-10 years in jail as opposed to a 15-20 year jail term would be appropriate.

But bodily mutilation? State-sponsored/mandated bodily alteration permanently changes the criminal so that they can not have a normal life even after a conversion experience to an upstanding, moral life, say by conversion to the one true Religion of Catholicism while in jail. And that is a heavy price to pay for what might be a one time mistake, and then a mistake largely facilitated by current culture where parents know or control or care little about their semi-adult children. More on this later.

As for the true sickos who actually have a deranged psyche, removal of penis and testicles will not necesarily remove the urges and they will do with hands or stubby arms the same violations, and the Church has said that modern societies should not have to use capital punishment, and after a certain point, removing hands an such makes them permanent wards of the state who can not even, say, do prison labour to help pay for their incarceration.

As to parents — I have recently learned that children in a Catholic parish youth group are using hard drugs including meth and some of the students in that high school are prostituting themselves out between end of school and when parents return home. These are underage children who are most likely prostituting themselves out to males over 18 — I will not call them “adults” or “men” as they deserve neither title. Some teachers and the parents must be either oblivious or purposefully not wanting to recognize the emotional, physical and spiritual harm befalling their children and hiding behind ‘mood swings of adolescence’ to sleep at night. Add the scourge of pornography, which has ensnared even many Catholics who desire to be good, and we are in a heap of trouble. I have heard of a co-worker who, while still in high school and/or just graduated (but still under 18), has been stoned to the point of waking up being gang-raped. The depth of this problem is truly terrifying and the piss-poor sentences handed out only serve not to deter further criminal activity.

I have heard there is an old adage that society can only be controlled by cops and/or conscience. But that really boils down to conscience because if the cops have no conscience, they can not make up for the lack of personal conscience whereas strong personal consciences can make up for a dearth of cops. But how are we to instil conscience when certain practices are not to be discussed as they may interfere with particular..cough…Muslim and other primitive tribal practices…cough…cultral practices, all of which are ‘equally valuable’ or some other politically correct bull-skubula. Or when other PC B.S. says we are haters of women when we respect the entire woman, including her fertility? Or when we respect the transcendent tendency of humanity to aspire to something beyond the “four F’s” of feeding, fighting, fleeing and…fertility promotion…and that such aspiration is the human ideal, not the four F’s which makes us little different from animals, neglecting what the Greeks called our rational souls. It is a plague of gnosticism and manichaeism which either deifies or nullifies the body as something to be gloried in or abused (and which the Church is, wrongly, accused of doing with its pronouncements on sex) and as such sacrifices our embodied existence for a disembodied — “as long as we agree to it, it is okay” mentality where the true repercussions of actions are not fully realized or appreciated, to the detriment of our society.

Boy, that was a somewhat disjointed rant.

Update: Welcome, Steynians!