I want equality with women - jail her for life

[Grumfutock]

Kermit power said:

Grumfutock said:

This was local to me, she had 17 previous convictions for violent assault. UNBELIEVABLE!!!!!!!!!!!!

Yes it is a level playing field. No womAn arent getting let off. Oh and all men are bds. Pass the bean please.

Anyone can find individual cases to support any argument they wish to make.

Can you come up with any statistical evidence to support your belief that women receive more lenient sentencing than men once the rights of dependent children have been taken into account?

Why bother, you would only dismiss it because it was put together by a man!

My quote above was a barbed reply to a part of this discussion from yesterday.

[don4l]

Here are a few links that shed a bit more light on the case.

http://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/news/local-news/foxba...

http://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/incoming/killer-mum-d...

http://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/news/scottish-news/ki...



The jury only took 30 minutes to find her guilty.

She was driving just inches behind him for 28 metres. This suggests that she was using the car to try to frighten him into getting out of her way.

It wasn't a narrow street. He3re is the Google Streetview (hopefully?) https://maps.google.co.uk/maps?q=Foxbar,+Paisley,+...

It certainly looks like she could have driven around him.

On balance, I think that driving just inches behind someone for 28 metres is not careless, it is bloody dangerous.

She got off very lightly, IMHO.

[Kermit power]

Grumfutock said:

Kermit power said:

Grumfutock said:

This was local to me, she had 17 previous convictions for violent assault. UNBELIEVABLE!!!!!!!!!!!!

Yes it is a level playing field. No womAn arent getting let off. Oh and all men are bds. Pass the bean please.

Anyone can find individual cases to support any argument they wish to make.

Can you come up with any statistical evidence to support your belief that women receive more lenient sentencing than men once the rights of dependent children have been taken into account?

Why bother, you would only dismiss it because it was put together by a man!

My quote above was a barbed reply to a part of this discussion from yesterday.

By that logic, I'd have to dismiss all my own arguments too, given that they've been put together by a man, wouldn't I?

Frankly I couldn't give a toss about sexual equality, but I do find myself cursed with an almost uncontrollable urge to try and dismantle knee-jerk Daily Wail style arguments such as this one.

I notice that so far, none of the proponents of women being treated overly leniently have passed any comment on my belief that they've failed to take into account the impact of the rights of dependent children on sentencing decisions, for example.

[Grumfutock]

Kermit power said:

By that logic, I'd have to dismiss all my own arguments too, given that they've been put together by a man, wouldn't I?

Frankly I couldn't give a toss about sexual equality, but I do find myself cursed with an almost uncontrollable urge to try and dismantle knee-jerk Daily Wail style arguments such as this one.

I notice that so far, none of the proponents of women being treated overly leniently have passed any comment on my belief that they've failed to take into account the impact of the rights of dependent children on sentencing decisions, for example.

So we cease to punish the guilty because she has kids? Great idea, I shall go and kill my wife immediately!

[Kermit power]

Grumfutock said:

So we cease to punish the guilty because she has kids? Great idea, I shall go and kill my wife immediately!

No, we try to avoid punishing kids if we possibly can.

Assume you're a judge passing sentence on someone with sentencing guidelines of, let's say, three months inside of 200 hours community service. The person you're sentencing is a single parent with kids of 9 & 6. The reports you have from social services and the like tell you that they are doing an acceptable job of raising their kids, and there are no concerns for their wellbeing.

If you sentence the person to community service, then they continue looking after their own kids.

If you jail the person, then their kids get taken into care, with all the emotional impact that will have on the children, to say nothing of the extra costs to the taxpayer.

Do you really think it makes sense for the kids or for society as a whole (given that kids going into care are less likely to become decent future contributors to society themselves in later life) to jail the parent regardless?

Of course there are some offences for which only a custodial sentence is ever going to be appropriate, but there are plenty which just sit on the cusp.

This isn't a "let's favour the women" thing either. The same process would be applied to a single father. It just happens to be that there are far more single mothers in our society than there are single fathers.

[Kermit power]

Grumfutock said:

So we cease to punish the guilty because she has kids? Great idea, I shall go and kill my wife immediately!

No, we try to avoid punishing kids if we possibly can.

Assume you're a judge passing sentence on someone with sentencing guidelines of, let's say, three months inside of 200 hours community service. The person you're sentencing is a single parent with kids of 9 & 6. The reports you have from social services and the like tell you that they are doing an acceptable job of raising their kids, and there are no concerns for their wellbeing.

If you sentence the person to community service, then they continue looking after their own kids.

If you jail the person, then their kids get taken into care, with all the emotional impact that will have on the children, to say nothing of the extra costs to the taxpayer.

Do you really think it makes sense for the kids or for society as a whole (given that kids going into care are less likely to become decent future contributors to society themselves in later life) to jail the parent regardless?

Of course there are some offences for which only a custodial sentence is ever going to be appropriate, but there are plenty which just sit on the cusp.

This isn't a "let's favour the women" thing either. The same process would be applied to a single father. It just happens to be that there are far more single mothers in our society than there are single fathers.

[Grumfutock]

Sorry but I totally disagree. Your method, in that situation, removes all consequence of action as well as the rights of the victim.

In my opinion it is exactly this sort of liberal thinking that is at the route of the demise of society and the erosion of moral values and courage.

[handpaper]

Kermit power said:

I notice that so far, none of the proponents of [the theory that] women [are] being treated overly leniently have passed any comment on my belief that they've failed to take into account the impact of the rights of dependent children on sentencing decisions, for example.

It would be interesting to investigate this, perhaps by examining only the sentences of women without dependents. Whether enough information is available to make this possible I don't know - does anyone know whether transcripts or similar exist which would tell us if a sentence was mitigated due to the possible impact on dependents? If so, these cases could be eliminated to leave a direct comparison.

In any case, I don't think allowing a woman to 'plead her belly' for a crime that has nothing to do with supporting dependents is a healthy thing to do. A shoplifter pleading in mitigation that she was doing it to feed her kids perhaps deserves some sympathy; likewise a wife who makes a premeditated attack on a violent or abusive father.
But where the crime is for personal gain, or out of spite or stupidity, do we want to be demonstrating to children that motherhood is a 'get out of jail free card'?

[Kermit power]

Grumfutock said:

Sorry but I totally disagree. Your method, in that situation, removes all consequence of action as well as the rights of the victim.

Firstly, it's not "my" method. It's HMG's method for complying with Article 8 of the Human Rights act.

Secondly, it doesn't remove all consequence of action. It is merely a consideration that is made - along with various others such as if/when the defendant pleads guilty, remorse shown, etc, etc, - when determining sentencing. It's never going to keep a rapist or murderer out of prison, but if the judge is in the range of considering either a custodial or non-custodial sentence anyway, it might well be the thing that swings the balance.

Grumfutock said:

In my opinion it is exactly this sort of liberal thinking that is at the route of the demise of society and the erosion of moral values and courage.

Your language suggests you're getting too emotional about the whole thing.

Firstly, I'd say that the "demise of society and the erosion of moral values and courage" is largely poppycock created by the rose-tinted spectacles of Daily Wail journalists and their ilk. Just look at the number of kids who got deported to Australia for stealing a loaf of bread or whatever in the Victorian era. The fact that there were so many examples of low-level crime to be punished in the first place suggests that the demise of society and erosion of moral values was in full flood back then, and it also suggests that the massively more Draconian punishments back then did nothing to actually stop others from committing the same crimes anyway.

Secondly, if you look at it completely dispassionately, it makes absolutely no sense to automatically go for the jail option where kids are involved, and it's only an emotional knee-jerk reaction to suggest otherwise.

If you send a single parent to prison, then unless there are relatives around to look after the kids, those kids are going to have to be taken into care.

According to this report from the Prison Reform Trust, in 2011, fewer than 1% of children in the UK were in care, but up to half of offenders in Young Offenders' Institutions have at some point been in care. Even if you think that the PRT have massaged the statistics a bit to support their agenda, that's a startling statistic. Even if only 25% of offenders had been through the care system compared to 1% of the general population, it would be startling.

So, every time you take the hard line of saying "that mother must go to jail because society is collapsing", you're actually accelerating the collapse of society. You're creating another one, two, three or however many kids with a much greater chance of becoming offenders in the future.

Do you really want your pound of flesh so much that you think accelerating the demise of society by increasing the probability of criminal behaviour in the next generation is a price worth paying? I don't, and I'm not a bleeding heart Liberal. I'm a right wing pragmatist who would rather not pay even more tax to support a system which is just going to compound the problem generation after generation.

[Kermit power]

handpaper said:

In any case, I don't think allowing a woman to 'plead her belly' for a crime that has nothing to do with supporting dependents is a healthy thing to do. A shoplifter pleading in mitigation that she was doing it to feed her kids perhaps deserves some sympathy; likewise a wife who makes a premeditated attack on a violent or abusive father.
But where the crime is for personal gain, or out of spite or stupidity, do we want to be demonstrating to children that motherhood is a 'get out of jail free card'?

My heart agrees with you, but my head says that the statistics on the increased probability of kids turning into criminals if they've been through care, then we should give it some serious thought.

[Grumfutock]

Kermit power said:

Your language suggests you're getting too emotional about the whole thing.

Firstly, I'd say that the "demise of society and the erosion of moral values and courage" is largely poppycock created by the rose-tinted spectacles of Daily Wail journalists and their ilk. Just look at the number of kids who got deported to Australia for stealing a loaf of bread or whatever in the Victorian era. The fact that there were so many examples of low-level crime to be punished in the first place suggests that the demise of society and erosion of moral values was in full flood back then, and it also suggests that the massively more Draconian punishments back then did nothing to actually stop others from committing the same crimes anyway.

Secondly, if you look at it completely dispassionately, it makes absolutely no sense to automatically go for the jail option where kids are involved, and it's only an emotional knee-jerk reaction to suggest otherwise.

If you send a single parent to prison, then unless there are relatives around to look after the kids, those kids are going to have to be taken into care.

According to this report from the Prison Reform Trust, in 2011, fewer than 1% of children in the UK were in care, but up to half of offenders in Young Offenders' Institutions have at some point been in care. Even if you think that the PRT have massaged the statistics a bit to support their agenda, that's a startling statistic. Even if only 25% of offenders had been through the care system compared to 1% of the general population, it would be startling.

So, every time you take the hard line of saying "that mother must go to jail because society is collapsing", you're actually accelerating the collapse of society. You're creating another one, two, three or however many kids with a much greater chance of becoming offenders in the future.

Do you really want your pound of flesh so much that you think accelerating the demise of society by increasing the probability of criminal behaviour in the next generation is a price worth paying? I don't, and I'm not a bleeding heart Liberal. I'm a right wing pragmatist who would rather not pay even more tax to support a system which is just going to compound the problem generation after generation.

Your burning and passionate dislike for the 'daily wail' is rather worrying. My I suggest you avoid reading or referencing it, this may keep you calmer and lower your blood pressure, this will keep you fit and allow you to attend more anti hunting and anti banker tree hugging events.

[paranoid airbag]

Kermit power said:

Grumfutock said:

In my opinion it is exactly this sort of liberal thinking that is at the route of the demise of society and the erosion of moral values and courage.

Firstly, I'd say that the "demise of society and the erosion of moral values and courage" is largely poppycock

This is enough really.

Read some damned history. People have always said that since society became a thing.

It is utterly meaningless.

[Kermit power]

Grumfutock said:

Your burning and passionate dislike for the 'daily wail' is rather worrying. My I suggest you avoid reading or referencing it, this may keep you calmer and lower your blood pressure, this will keep you fit and allow you to attend more anti hunting and anti banker tree hugging events.

See, you're still being massively emotional about this. I'm not remotely left wing, but I try to look at things dispassionately and figure out what's in my best interests.

Hunting? It's never had any sort of negative impact on me, and the local hunt near my parents gives out free mince pies and stuff before their boxing day hunt, so I'm perfectly happy with them staying around.

Bankers? Regardless of recent headlines, they've created massively more wealth for this country than they've lost over the years, which means my own taxes, whilst still far too high, are lower than they might otherwise have been, so I've got nothing against bankers.

The fact that you equate the notion of taking kids into consideration before jailing a parent with loony left hand-wringers rather than looking at the increased propensity to criminality for kids who've been in care and deciding whether or not that makes sense just underpins further my belief that you're speaking out of irrational emotion rather than logical argument.

Bottom line - I want to pay (a lot) less tax than I do, and I'd rather the justice system prioritised churning out fewer people likely to burgle my house in the future rather than unbendingly claiming its pound of flesh just to satisfy the likes of you, even though doing so does nothing to decrease crime at the best of times, and actually increases it if it results in kids going into care who otherwise wouldn't.

[anonymous-user]

Pigeonholing someone into the "left / right" because of a specific view does little to add quality to the debate.

It's quite possible women are given relatively lighter sentences for the same crimes. On the other hand, the crime-types that make up the majority of custodial sentences are mostly committed by men e.g. violent crime.

[Grumfutock]

Kermit power said:

See, you're still being massively emotional about this. I'm not remotely left wing, but I try to look at things dispassionately and figure out what's in my best interests.

Thank you for being able to detect my emotions. The hippie commune is that way sir.

[Kermit power]

Grumfutock said:

Kermit power said:

See, you're still being massively emotional about this. I'm not remotely left wing, but I try to look at things dispassionately and figure out what's in my best interests.

Thank you for being able to detect my emotions. The hippie commune is that way sir.

I'll take that to mean that you're either unwilling or unable to provide a rational response to my views, shall I?

Clearly no point discussing it further with you then. I shall just have to hope that my viewpoint prevails in real life, as I really don't fancy the increase in crime a decade or two down the line that your approach would bring us.

[ikarl]

Whilst I appreciate the sentiments about children and taking the easier option for sentencing, I find it very difficult to fully appreciate that point when she is responsible for the father's death.

Specifically talking about this case, because I do not have the time right now to try and find others like it, I think the fact she had children should have been completely put to the side. Yes the child/children have lost one parent already, however, surely that makes the crime worse, no?

[Kermit power]

ikarl said:

Whilst I appreciate the sentiments about children and taking the easier option for sentencing, I find it very difficult to fully appreciate that point when she is responsible for the father's death.

Specifically talking about this case, because I do not have the time right now to try and find others like it, I think the fact she had children should have been completely put to the side. Yes the child/children have lost one parent already, however, surely that makes the crime worse, no?

In this particular case, I don't think it applies at all, as I think the son is over 18 anyway, but the whole gist of the thing was "oh look, some woman got a sentence I think is too lenient in one case, so that means all women get sentenced leniently".

[Grumfutock]

Kermit power said:

I'll take that to mean that you're either unwilling or unable to provide a rational response to my views, shall I?

Clearly no point discussing it further with you then. I shall just have to hope that my viewpoint prevails in real life, as I really don't fancy the increase in crime a decade or two down the line that your approach would bring us.

May I recommend a diet of falafel and lentals, very acceptable in the commune sir.

[Kermit power]

Grumfutock said:

Kermit power said:

I'll take that to mean that you're either unwilling or unable to provide a rational response to my views, shall I?

Clearly no point discussing it further with you then. I shall just have to hope that my viewpoint prevails in real life, as I really don't fancy the increase in crime a decade or two down the line that your approach would bring us.

May I recommend a diet of falafel and lentals, very acceptable in the commune sir.

Gosh, what a towering intellect!

It's really rather pitiful to see someone so completely incapable of rationally defending their views.