Child attacker receives award

From time to time I click on teachers posts, something I shouldn't do. This time the source was hidden.

The spinelessness that's common to such threads causes me to alternate between blind fury at what teachers are teaching our children, and absolute dispair at how we allowed such amoral wimps to get such a stranglehold on our children.

Homeschooled kids are our only hope. Most of the rest are being taught to nothing of value. Your posts are just another in an endless stream of confirmations.

Spinelessness?

I have fought for my country. Twenty two years in uniform serving to protect our democratic way of life, including service in combat. And once I left the Navy, I decided to become a teacher because I was so deeply, deeply worried about what was wrong with our schools and wanted to help fix them.

I am not amoral. I am a very moral person, in fact, an officer and a gentleman required by sworn oath to at all times, in all ways uphold a very high standard of morality and behaviour. And I do this in the classroom, and I insist on it from my students.

You do not know me. You have no idea what I stand for.

I utterly CONDEMN what this woman did at the age of nineteen and I do not think for one moment that she should be anywhere near children. I would have no problem with her being in prison as I think her crimes in 1973 would have justified life imprisonment.

But I am also a rational, thinking human being who isn't stupid enough to think that a person is always going to be the same person at the age of fifty two as they were at the age of nineteen. People can change, and this woman does seem to have changed.

I think homeschooling is a wonderful thing as it happens for parents who are able to do it. But not all parents can or will, and their kids need an education as well. I'm a teacher to help provide that. I teach in one of Australia's top private schools and work to help create moral, upstanding, dedicated, hardworking citizens for our society.

I think that is worth doing.

And I don't ever give up on a kid, whatever he does. They're not yet grown. They can always be helped. They can always change.

I haven't lost one yet.

People do change, so what? There are millions of examples of that kind of change. Good for her, and Godspeed.

But an award?

You're conflicted over this woman recieving an award? Just as this woman changed and rehibilitated her life, it looks looks like you've allowed your moral compass to influenced by something evil.

I notice that never once during your 'conflict' have you referenced the victim.

There is something I call 'moral instinict'. You know, the instant response to evil. This is such an easy call, that it isn't even a call to those with a moral compass.

No, I not conflicted about the woman receiving an award. I didn't write the headline, I just posted the article under the headline it was published under. The award to me, has nothing really to do with this.

What I am conflicted about is what I said in my first post:

But as a teacher, I'm aware that any finding of guilt connected to a serious assault on a child would disqualify me from teaching for ever, in the interests of protecting kids.

Why is this woman treated differently from a teacher? She's working with kids, and kids who are probably a lot more vulnerable than my students.

If this woman was a teacher, she would be utterly unable to work with children. The rules for teachers here are absolutely ironclad - any finding of guilt of an assault offence involving a child and you cannot work as a teacher.

I can't see why this woman who is working with kids in another capacity isn't subject to the same rules. I think she should be, and therefore should not be working with these kids.

But at the same time, if she is is actually doing some good, if she is helping the people she is working with, it does create a conflict for me.

The award is irrelevant. I haven't referred once to the award in all my writing (up until this one). It just happens to be in the headline, which I did not write.

And you are very foolish and deceived by the society in which you live, to hang onto that kind of believe system, my friend. YOU are the problem with this country, and with the justice system, made up of juror members who do not respond in human form to evil.

First of all, I don't live in your country.

Second of all, if you want teachers who believe teenagers who commit crimes are beyond help, I pity you. We are not talking about mature adults here with mature judgement. We're talking about kids who haven't got there yet. We can't save all of them. We can save some of them. I've seen it happen.

You are NOT a good teacher, if you think there would ever be any kind of excuse or rehabilitation deserving of such a wicked, despicable crime against the innocent. Too bad you would have a totally different view if the victim was your own child or grandchild.

When people have abused kids I care about, I have taken action to have those people punished and stopped. I'd have had to step in to stop kids being seriously abused and I could have happily killed the scum responsible at the time. I'm not soft on child abuse, and I think those who abuse children should be punished. But I wasn't involved in the decision as to whether or not this woman was punished.

Nope, I wouldn't want you ever teaching my kids anything. There really IS a difference between good and evil, right and wrong. You, my friend, probably blur that line in other areas of your life as well.

I know there's a difference between good and evil. I've seen evil first hand. I wonder how many murdered kids you've held in your arms. I just wonder.

But a person can change. And if the 'Him' in your user name means anything at all to you, you should know that. That woman should have never seen the light of the day the rest of her natural life, after commiting that crime. She gave up her right to her own freedom the moment she chose to cut up that precious little girl.

but you're missing the point, yet again. The point is whether she can "change". Anyone who knows of God's redemptive work knows that is absolutely possible. But that still does not remove the consequence, and her forfeiting her right to live a free life in society. do you really think a 19 year old person can't make rational decisions? That's pretty insulting. In THIS country, that is an adult, and it's old enough to know what she did was wicked and perverse.

Should she be given another opportunity to live in a free society? Absolutely not. And should she be rewarded for anything she's done since? Of course not. That's absurd.

And by the way....I have adopted four battered, abused, neglected and violated siblings whose life of shame and degradation would turn your stomach. I live with the results of evil done to my children every day.

No 2nd chances for evil perpertrated against children.

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.