I have been following this case in the British press since it was first reported. Today was the last day of a three day sentencing hearing for the accused. To say I am shocked, saddened, and disgusted doesn't even begin to describe my emotions.
So much went wrong here. The parents, the social workers, the schools, the police. But ultimately I blame the socialist policies of the British Government under "NuLabour" where everyone (supposedly) lives in Nirvana.
No money? No problem, we'll pay you not to work.
No house? No problem, if you have a child, we'll give you a house.
Kids not behaving? No problem, we'll assign them a "Social Worker"
Kids breaking the law? No problem, we'll give them an ASBO
ASBO not working? No problem, we'll put them in our database
The authorities had 31 chances to avoid this outcome.
And they missed every one of them.
"a litany of failings by its social services"
ReplyDeleteIsn't that redundant?
Very disturbing story. I think your analysis spot on, Fay. Personal responsibility seems an alien concept anymore. And that goes for all involved in this story.
ReplyDeleteThese are monsters. Society needs to be protected from the whole "family".
ReplyDeleteThis is just gut-wrenching.
It's difficult to imagine two children, so small, perpetrating these horrible acts. Their parents should be locked up for life.
ReplyDeleteIt seems like our western civilization is broken in a basic and fundamental way, doesn't it?
There is no expectation for people to stand on their own two feet and take responsibility for themselves and their family. In Europe, and increasingly in North America, the gov't provides for people from cradle to grave. Everything is given, little is earned. How can a man have dignity, and a family have basic values and structure, if housing, food, clothes, healthcare, and spending money are all provided by the gov't?
Is it any wonder that these dependent families are breeding grounds for hatred, resentment, and abuse? Britain's attempts at social engineering are have chilling consequences, and from this story, it's easy to see who pays the ultimate price...the children.
I don't think that it's even no expectation of personal responsibility, I think that in demanding more reliance on the state for things we are also being denied opportunities for personal responsibility.
ReplyDeleteThink about it - how often in Britain are we now hearing about criminalizing spanking? And not just Britain, but in the US, as well.
Children with terrible parents used to be the responsibility of the collective community. People stepped up, because they understood no one else was going to. If someone else's father took after you because of something you did, it was no different than your own parents disciplining you (except that your own parents would probably discipline you again when you got home and it would be 10X worse). And on the other end of the spectrum, if someone's parents weren't feeding them, the community stepped up. You went to live with someone in the community rather than a foster home you'd never heard of before. There was continuity and there was community accountability both by adults and children who realized they would someday be adults in the same community.
Now if you try to correct another child, you get sued, you get prosecuted, you get your own parenting investigated. And I'm only talking about speech correction here! The government can't do the job right, but damned if they are going to allow people to do the job themselves.
I certainly don't think things were oh-so-wonderful in the "good old days", because there were problems. But we've created worse problems in trying to correct those problems, it seems to me.
Or maybe I'm just a frustrated parent trying to raise her children in this mess venting right now.
I remember the case in Michigan a few years ago, where the court was going to hold a boy's parents responsible for the boy's crimes. The parents then proceeded to tell the court what would happen if they did anything to try and punish the boy from the start – the parents would have ended up in jail. And now that the state has taken away all of power from the parents, the state then wants to hold the parents responsible.
ReplyDeleteI have heard several comedians do bits about when it was like when they grew up – they didn’t just have to worry about getting walloped when they got home if they did something wrong: the adults in the neighborhood were told by the parents to wallop their kids if they were seen doing something wrong.
We have come to the point where the perpetrators Are made out to be the victims, and the victims just happened to be unlucky or stupid to be in the position where they could get hurt.