Smacking Children

Smacking Children

A culture of threat and violence harms children, and parents definition of "light" may vary when justifying an actual crime. Our children should not be political punchbags. The law should never condone "light smacks", but it does need to outlaw violence and foster a culture of non-violence.

Of course light smacks are relatively harmless to the child, but parental light smacks may condition the child that it is quite okay to hit their children. That appears to be the problem, now.

Experimentation on Prisoners

... see also

Human Rights vs Efficiency?

Being human is a basic right and the Law may not remove that right.

"Legal adventures" that stretch or challenge the Law as it is so may establish precidents that allows more erosion of the power of the word decreed by Government. Once nobody follows Law it becomes irrelevant and unenforceable. It may still exist to dumbfound future lawyers, but for the present a law seems rendered ineffective if it is constantly broken.

That may be a misapprehension. It takes the bringing of action to bring the law to the attention of the courts. Citizens have a right to protest, this can also be an effective way to bring about law changes, though requiring the intervention of an afflicted or converted politician. We can withdraw our labour and change things.

But who is going to go on strike or protest for the human rights of those behind bars who willingly enter a medical experiment? Considering the case of a New Zealander (not a prisoner, but the next best thing, a tourist) in London who was paid about five thousand dollars to try out a new drug that nearly killed him and has left him with cancer.

Would it have been less difficult for us to digest if that were a prisoner who was also being paid to be experimented upon?

Of course, if medical testing were always that dramatic, there would be no drugs. Most of the time, the test may not have a life threatening aspect to it. The prisoner is as (un)safe as any volunteer.

War on Terror

Plots about to unfold, involving foreign national based in foreign lands, little more than discussions about possible attack scenarios are now being busted by the US Authorities. Of course it is a good idea to prevent terrorism going ahead, but to get a conviction, there used to have to be a crime. Not just talking about it.

The actions of this US Adminstration include kidnapping sweeps of their enemy based on "intelligence" (perhaps the admissions of prisoners under some form of extreme torment), leading officials who do not question torture as a strategy and who also engage in imprisonment without trial of hundreds of foreign nationals. Either these acts are wrong, or international law is wrong.