Month: January 2011

Young Offenders should be given a second chance. Do you agree?

In the world of today, the young are subjected to all sorts of influences, be it positive or negative. Friends, television programmes, movies and games inoculate the young with trends, attitudes and thinking. With the mind of the young still undergoing development, such influence affects their actions, and the fact that much of the content of the media consists of violence and crime, it is inevitable that the young commit offences. In recent times, the number of young offenders is on the rise and punishment is employed to reduce crime by young people. Should young offenders be given a second chance? I believe so for the most part.

First of all, these young offenders– first-time offenders no less– are but young individuals aged thirteen to nineteen. Their minds are still undergoing development and are not very capable of rational thinking. As such, they more than likely did not mean to commit their first crime. If they understood the situation and consequences, things will be very different. A study by the American Youth Foundation shows that at least two-thirds of all young first-time offenders committed their crime simply because they were either not thinking clearly, subjected to peer pressure or being unaware that it is a crime, to begin with; reasons displaying a lack of rational thinking. It is unjust to punish one when one was not thinking rationally or did not mean to commit the offence in the first place. It is the same as subjecting chastisement to a toddler for flaunting vulgarities. Simply put, it is not fair. Therefore, young offenders should be given a second chance as they are not very capable of rational thinking since their minds are still developing and it is unfair to punish them.

Secondly, by punishing them when their minds are still undergoing development, a scar will be etched into their minds. In this way, we are forcing them to link the committing of offences to pain and suffering. These methods are barbaric. We can not possibly employ methods we use on beasts of burden to young people. For instance, we whip horses to run faster and beat cows that leave the boundary designated by the farmer. These animals feel the pain and link their so-called “wrongdoings” to the abovementioned pain. Treating animals like this is bad enough; to do the same to a fellow human is reprehensible. Instead of punishing them on their first offence, counselling should be employed. Not only will they be fully aware of their crime and learn from it, but it is also humane. Therefore, young offenders should be given a second chance and not be blindly punished simply because they broke a law.

Thirdly, young offenders should be given a second chance as it is their first offence. By punishing them, we are refusing their right to fully comprehend the severity of their crime. By doing so, they are simply suffering although they do not know why, potentially leading them to a repeat offence, or even leading them to be recalcitrant offenders. The whole point of punishment is to prevent young offenders from repeating their crime. If the young offenders repeat their crime, the purpose of punishment is defeated. A study done by the Juvenile Court in Britain has shown that at least three-quarters of repeat offenders committed their crime a second time as they were punished on their first offence and were not entirely clear why thus spurring them to repeat the same offence a second time. Indeed, it is ludicrous to punish young offenders on their first offence. Instead, counselling should be employed as mentioned above. Only then will the young offender be completely aware of their wrongdoings and prevent history from repeating itself. Therefore, young offenders should be granted a second chance as punishing them on their first offence proves to be an ineffective way of preventing them from repeating their offence.

Still, it is not logical to let them be scot-free on their first offence. It really depends on the offence. Exonerating a teenage boy for committing murder is exorbitant. Therefore, they can only be granted a second chance if their crime is minor enough to warrant a chance, such as stealing or shoplifting. However, since most of the first-time offences are minor, it is logical to grant young offenders a second chance in general. Statistics by the Singapore Police Force shows that at least 2% of all crimes committed by young people are severe enough to warrant severe punishment, such as manslaughter or murder. Therefore, since such a small percentage of crimes committed by young people are severe, second chances should be granted to the first time, young offenders.

In conclusion, I believe that young offenders should be given a second chance for the most part as their minds are still undergoing development which undermines their ability to think rationally, it is their first offence, most of the crimes are minor, to begin with, it is only moral to use humane methods and it is their right to be fully aware of their crime and punishing them on their first offence is unjust. This second chance should be coupled with counselling so that they may be fully aware of the severity of their crime and prevent a repeat in history.

Progress is Good. Discuss

Progress — the word commonly employed to describe improvements and advancement with regard to the passage of time, invoking positive connotations. Yet is what we typically call progress all that good— for us and the world at large?

The passing of recent centuries, most notably the nineteenth to twentieth, has been described as steps forward for mankind. One would frequently come across commentators talking about the “progress” we humans have made since the 20th century. Indeed, we have been pushing the frontiers of science, making huge break-throughs in innovations and understanding. Average life expectancy globally is and has been on the uptrend with the advent of modern medical science. Previously hugely dangerous and potentially fatal child-birth has been conquered by knowledge gains in gynaecology and measures developed to counter the myriad of hazards. Innovative mechanisation of mundane and repetitive tasks like production lines have been turned over to more efficient robots. Judging by these yardsticks, no doubt we have progressed positively over the years.

Yet, on the other hand, the same period saw the exponential increase in military capabilities. We went from fighting localised contained wars into dreaming of global annihilation. From shooting muskets round by round on horseback in the Napoleonic Wars, we have “progressed” into mowing down advancing waves of each other with machine guns while hiding in the trenches of World War I. World War II saw the spreading of destruction from the battlefield into the population at large through indiscriminate allied airborne bombing runs. The Cold War brought about winds of change bearing nuclear bombs. Opposing sides began threatening each other with the ability to destroy each other’s half of the planet with a rain of nuclear detonations. In light of all these, militaries continue to use “progress” to describe the upgrading of their capabilities when all that does is to spur each other into acquiring progressively deadlier weaponry to keep up. How exactly is this “progress” beneficial?

On the political front, leaders who make little or no change to the status quo are described as conservative, even regressive — as opposed to leaders who make sweeping changes and supposedly help the nation progress. No doubt some positive quantum shifts have been made with regards to women rights and their roles in society. Yet more often than not, progress described as beneficial and introduced by “progressive” politicians are nothing more than policy oscillations between political leaders. Take the Woman’s Charter in Singapore for an example. In Singapore’s formative years, women typically took a back seat to males and the Woman’s Charter was hailed as a huge progressive step in the right direction for woman rights. Yet progress now is defined by the rolling back of certain parts of the Woman’s Charter and implementing the rolling-out of a “Man’s Charter” to enshrine gender equality. As such, how does a person even begin to ascertain the benefits of progress in the political sense when it is nothing more than skin-deep policy vacillations to suit voter sentiments of the moment?

Perhaps one can ask about the global economy – surely, we must have progressed in that aspect? No doubt average incomes and wealth worldwide have generally increased and by western standards, the standard of living has increased too. Yet absolute figures do not tell the whole story. Much of the world is labouring under the umbrella of capitalism despite its inherent imbalances. Capitalism generally rewards the person with the most resources at his disposal, leading the rich to get richer and the poor to get comparatively poorer as the gap widens. This is akin to letting the sprinter who jumps the gun and emerges first to win. In addition, who is to say that leading simple carefree lives by subsistence farming and living off the land, having shorter life expectancies as compared to leading a longer modern life of consumerism, makes a person any less well off? Thus, how exactly can such progress be said to be beneficial, if it can even be called progress in the first place?

Progress, as we know it today, is based upon the western world’s ideas of advancement and can hardly be described as universal. However, going by that yardstick, it is beneficial only in certain aspects where it is ambiguous at best for the rest. In this light, we should be more discriminating in areas for advancement and not progress for progress’ sake; rather, we should weigh the consequences of each advancement to allow the world to benefit from progress together.