Whips, for the record I'm not in the 100% nurture camp, I believe wholeheartedly that it's a bit of both.
Yup, when a dog attacks someone chances are they'll be put down...because no one will want to take the chance again. I can see why many people don't want to take the chance with these kids. However, the difference is (prepares to be lynched) we place a far higher value on the life of a human than that of a dog.
If they were over 18, they'd still be a damaged product of their upbringing. However, I think there would be less chance of being able to reshape their thought processes.
Certainly, not all people can be cured. But I don't think that that in itself is reason enough not to try.
Fast forward three or four years. The victims of the attack have gone off the rails. They're found to have tortured and killed their neighbours pet rabbit.
Imagine your feelings. Would you be crying out for them to be put behind bars? Would you be hoping they would get some help? Saying that they had been damaged by their experiences? Blaming their attackers?
Now, rewind by the same time period. There are two young boys going off the rails. Low level criminality...and then you see the circumstances their young minds are being formed in. They are receiving no moral guidance. They are being horrifically neglected. They are learning that normal is violence and abuse. I would imagine that the reaction of most would be that these children needed removing from that situation, and given help to reshape their minds.
But no-one does that. Social services and whoever else is involved don't protect these children as they should. Day by day, the children's upbringing is reinforcing in their minds that wrong is right.
I would imagine, again, that most of us would be baying for social services to protect these children, and prosecute the parents.
In time, these children commit an horrific crime.
At that point, suddenly, they cross the line from "victims" to "devils."
These kids really didn't stand a chance. Unless we are categorically stating that no-one, not one single person, has ever been helped by psyc intervention, then there is a chance that one or both of them might just have their minds reshaped.
Imagine a dog who has been mistreated. He's become aggressive as a result, and turns up at a dogs home emaciated and snarly. How many of us want to see the dog well fed, and an attempt made at retraining, compared to how many want to see it put in a kennel for the rest of it's days and given food through the bars?
Surely the humane thing to do in both cases is to try.
Trying doesn't have to be at the expense of protecting society.
God forbid that the victims currently in our minds also cross that line between victim and monster...
:giggle: @ Dory (I can call you Dory, can't I? Nice blue fish & all that...)
Whips, I thought I was hiding behind the lamppost...it would have to be a very odd shape. :eeek:
Carry on hanging on Suze- every day is progress.
Wahaaay, if there's one thing more tempting than the P word, it's the R word! I'll bring some more Vin Rouge...oh, and some chocolate :rascal:
I jokingly call someone on here something similar- although "predator" simply isn't a strong enough word, so I call her a "sexual veloceraptor" :giggle:
I'm about as English as you can get. My family has been traced back gazillions of years, and it would appear no one shagged anyone without a staffs accent.
I am not a christian.
Why should the fact that I just happened to be born into a country where christianity was the dominant religion have a bearing on my life?
...and from there...
a third generation Pakistani is born in the UK. Why should it have any bearing on his?
I have done, many times. I then had an epiphany-and I don't anymore. It was always unfulfilling. Even if the sex scored 6-6 in terms of technical merit, and there were more orgasms than your average really naff porn stars convention, there was always something lacking.
Some utterly fantastic news about a couple of sorely missed former forumites.
:bounce: :bounce:
Penis plugs: the revenge of the woman who's been given one too many smear tests by a bloke...
I actually had tears in my eyes earlier. :shock: - and I don't do blubbering.
Think very heavy steel item coming down, guillotine like, on fingertip...the language would have shocked a sailor.
How many calories are in an arsehole? :confused2: