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Source: (consider it)
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Thread: Is there any part of Texas "Justice" That is Not Fucked up?
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lilBuddha
Shipmate
# 14333
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Posted
A Texas teenager who killed 4 people, whilst driving intoxicated received probation. The defense which allowed for the lower sentence was affluenza. In short, he was raised to believe being wealthy meant him to be free from consequence.
The State Attorney General is attempting to find a way to challenge this ruling.
It is more than fair to say a poor person whose family never let them feel the consequences of their actions would not receive the same leniency.
[ 14. December 2013, 06:14: Message edited by: lilBuddha ]
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I put on my rockin' shoes in the morning
Hallellou, hallellou
Posts: 17627 | From: the round earth's imagined corners | Registered: Dec 2008
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Timothy the Obscure
Mostly Friendly
# 292
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Posted
There's a very robust body of research showing that rich people are less empathic and less ethical than the general population. But I don't think it qualifies as a "mental disease or defect" that would remove criminal responsibility. I'm not big on draconian punishment, but if the kid had been Black or Hispanic and poor, he would have been charged with involuntary manslaughter, tried as an adult, and given at least 10 years. Justice it ain't.
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When you think of the long and gloomy history of man, you will find more hideous crimes have been committed in the name of obedience than have ever been committed in the name of rebellion.
- C. P. Snow
Posts: 6114 | From: PDX | Registered: May 2001
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Tortuf
Ship's fisherman
# 3784
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Posted
It's the new reality. I've got mine, everyone else can go f*ck themselves.
And there are people voting for the tools who do this kind of stuff.
Posts: 6963 | From: The Venice of the South | Registered: Dec 2002
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deano
princess
# 12063
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Timothy the Obscure:
There's a very robust body of research showing that rich people are less empathic and less ethical than the general population.
Can I assume you will be posting references to this body of research so we can all judge its robustness?
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"The moral high ground is slowly being bombed to oblivion. " - Supermatelot
Posts: 2118 | From: Chesterfield | Registered: Nov 2006
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Adeodatus
Shipmate
# 4992
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Posted
I've heard it said that Texas has the best justice money can buy.
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"What is broken, repair with gold."
Posts: 9779 | From: Manchester | Registered: Sep 2003
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Sioni Sais
Shipmate
# 5713
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by deano:
quote:
Originally posted by Timothy the Obscure:
There's a very robust body of research showing that rich people are less empathic and less ethical than the general population.
Can I assume you will be posting references to this body of research so we can all judge its robustness?
Anecdotes and personal experience are hardly evidence but growing up on RAF bases in the sixties and seventies I always found that if ones misadventures and pranks also involved children of commissioned officers, that too was a get out of jail free card. My brothers had exactly the same experiences in the nineteen fifties.
Anyway, the psychologist who used the term "Affluenza" now regrets doing so, "I wish I hadn't used that term. Everyone seems to have hooked onto it. We used to call these people spoiled brats.”
btw, this is Hell. Find your own evidence or refutation.
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"He isn't Doctor Who, he's The Doctor"
(Paul Sinha, BBC)
Posts: 24276 | From: Newport, Wales | Registered: Apr 2004
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Amanda B. Reckondwythe
Dressed for Church
# 5521
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by lilBuddha:
It is more than fair to say a poor person whose family never let them feel the consequences of their actions would not receive the same leniency.
Spot on! That's why we force ourselves to say that such people will get their just punishment in the afterlife. If only we knew for sure!
Where's the Old Testament God when we need him so badly?
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"I take prayer too seriously to use it as an excuse for avoiding work and responsibility." -- The Revd Martin Luther King Jr.
Posts: 10542 | From: The Great Southwest | Registered: Feb 2004
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no prophet's flag is set so...
Proceed to see sea
# 15560
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Posted
Given that "affluenza" is not an accepted diagnosis - check whatever version of the DSM or ICD - this may result a professional review of the professional making the claim in court. It probably should.
But then, don't Americans have some laws to protect movie stars and other celebrities? Justice is certainly uneven everywhere.
[ 14. December 2013, 16:13: Message edited by: no prophet ]
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Out of this nettle, danger, we pluck this flower, safety.
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Posts: 11498 | From: Treaty 6 territory in the nonexistant Province of Buffalo, Canada ↄ⃝' | Registered: Mar 2010
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Martin60
Shipmate
# 368
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Posted
At least in Saudi the wealthy pay blood money.
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Love wins
Posts: 17586 | From: Never Dobunni after all. Corieltauvi after all. Just moved to the capital. | Registered: Jun 2001
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Lamb Chopped
Ship's kebab
# 5528
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Posted
The thing I don't understand is why, if the problem is lack of consequences in earlier life, the person should therefore be spared facing the consequences now. ![[Disappointed]](graemlins/disappointed.gif)
Even if you bought into this whole sob story, surely discipline is better late than never.
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Er, this is what I've been up to (book).
Oh, that you would rend the heavens and come down!
Posts: 20059 | From: off in left field somewhere | Registered: Feb 2004
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Mockingale
Shipmate
# 16599
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by lilBuddha:
A Texas teenager who killed 4 people, whilst driving intoxicated received probation. The defense which allowed for the lower sentence was affluenza. In short, he was raised to believe being wealthy meant him to be free from consequence.
If the Lord saw fit to have this upstanding citizen go to jail, He would have made him poor.
Posts: 679 | From: Connectilando | Registered: Aug 2011
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Timothy the Obscure
Mostly Friendly
# 292
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by deano:
quote:
Originally posted by Timothy the Obscure:
There's a very robust body of research showing that rich people are less empathic and less ethical than the general population.
Can I assume you will be posting references to this body of research so we can all judge its robustness?
Here's a summary of some of it. Here's a bit more. Other studies show that people driving expensive cars are more likely to violate traffic laws and do things like cut off pedestrians in crosswalks than people driving economy cars. Analog studies show that even giving people the (very artificial) sense of being wealthy or privileged in a game situation makes them more likely to violate the rules. And there is the well-known fact that the poor give more, proportionally, to charity than the rich.
Somebody said something about the root of all evil...
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When you think of the long and gloomy history of man, you will find more hideous crimes have been committed in the name of obedience than have ever been committed in the name of rebellion.
- C. P. Snow
Posts: 6114 | From: PDX | Registered: May 2001
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Sioni Sais
Shipmate
# 5713
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard:
At least in Saudi the wealthy pay blood money.
Whereas in America they pay taxes. Oh no, wait a minute .....
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"He isn't Doctor Who, he's The Doctor"
(Paul Sinha, BBC)
Posts: 24276 | From: Newport, Wales | Registered: Apr 2004
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Marvin the Martian
Interplanetary
# 4360
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Timothy the Obscure:
Other studies show that people driving expensive cars are more likely to violate traffic laws and do things like cut off pedestrians in crosswalks than people driving economy cars.
Rich people can easily afford to get a few bumps and dents fixed, but poor people can't. That will naturally lead to the poor people taking more care in order to avoid getting their car bumped or dented in the first place.
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Hail Gallaxhar
Posts: 30100 | From: Adrift on a sea of surreality | Registered: Apr 2003
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jbohn
Shipmate
# 8753
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Lamb Chopped:
The thing I don't understand is why, if the problem is lack of consequences in earlier life, the person should therefore be spared facing the consequences now.
Even if you bought into this whole sob story, surely discipline is better late than never.
If the issue is the brat's upbringing, why not go to the source?
I think this occasionally when I encounter an exceptionally ill-behaved young person: "Poor kid. Someone ought to spank his parents."
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We are punished by our sins, not for them.
--Elbert Hubbard
Posts: 989 | From: East of Eden, west of St. Paul | Registered: Nov 2004
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Penny S
Shipmate
# 14768
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Posted
When I heard about this on the radio, someone used the term "sense of entitlement". Last heard used by some of our "elite" of the lower orders fancying they had some right or other.
Posts: 5833 | Registered: May 2009
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Callan
Shipmate
# 525
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Marvin the Martian:
quote:
Originally posted by Timothy the Obscure:
Other studies show that people driving expensive cars are more likely to violate traffic laws and do things like cut off pedestrians in crosswalks than people driving economy cars.
Rich people can easily afford to get a few bumps and dents fixed, but poor people can't. That will naturally lead to the poor people taking more care in order to avoid getting their car bumped or dented in the first place.
Last week I was driving my daughter down a country road, after dark in the sort of fog that stops you seeing your hand in front of your face and some chancer in a BMW clearly felt that my 30mph was some sort of affront to his masculinity and blared past me at about twice that speed despite the insufficient visibility and the twistyness of the road.
The state of the car wasn't my first concern. She was sat in the back prattling on about how school had gone. Nor was it my second concern. I was peering into the gloom and wondering when it would let up. The bloke in the beamer, on the other hand, seemed mostly concerned with the assertion of his ego. I suspect that is really the distinction between the rich and the rest of us.
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How easy it would be to live in England, if only one did not love her. - G.K. Chesterton
Posts: 9757 | From: Citizen of the World | Registered: Jun 2001
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orfeo
Ship's Musical Counterpoint
# 13878
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Posted
Affluenza is fundamentallly the belief that the world revolves around oneself.
It isn't cured by confirming that belief over and over.
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Technology has brought us all closer together. Turns out a lot of the people you meet as a result are complete idiots.
Posts: 18173 | From: Under | Registered: Jul 2008
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Marvin the Martian
Interplanetary
# 4360
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by orfeo:
Affluenza is fundamentallly the belief that the world revolves around oneself.
If that's the case, then there's no correlation between affluenza rates and prosperity.
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Hail Gallaxhar
Posts: 30100 | From: Adrift on a sea of surreality | Registered: Apr 2003
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Moo
Ship's tough old bird
# 107
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by orfeo:
Affluenza is fundamentallly the belief that the world revolves around oneself.
It isn't cured by confirming that belief over and over.
I think that is narcissism, and I think that you don't have to be affluent to believe that you are entitled to whatever you want.
Moo
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See you later, alligator.
Posts: 20365 | From: Alleghany Mountains of Virginia | Registered: May 2001
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Porridge
Shipmate
# 15405
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Posted
I think affluenza is the belief that your wealth innoculates you from potential threats to your social staus. Thus, you're free to insult people or groups whose approval you can buy, or whose disapproval can be muffled by their dependence on your largesse.
One of my nieces attended a posh private school in my town. Some of the students there are from fabulously wealthy families, with "staff" and multiple palatial residences (my niece is not one of this number).
Over a short holiday, I invited her to stay with me, and she brought two friends, one of whom comes from a wealthy family with a Recognizable Name and More Money Than Is Good For Him. On entering my place, he removed his coat and dropped it on the floor.
"Please hang that up," I told him. He rounded on me, and I could see in his furious expression that he'd momentarily forgotten where he was and who he was among; he was about to tell me I was fired, or something along those lines.
He recovered just in time. Perhaps he caught the stunned looks on his friends' faces, realizing just in time he couldn't fire either his friend's aunt or his hostess, and picked up his coat, and hung it on the coat tree. The weekend had one or two other moments like that, but went reasonably well otherwise.
The friendship didn't survive the school year, though.
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Spiggott: Everything I've ever told you is a lie, including that.
Moon: Including what?
Spiggott: That everything I've ever told you is a lie.
Moon: That's not true!
Posts: 3925 | From: Upper right corner | Registered: Jan 2010
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mousethief
Ship's Thieving Rodent
# 953
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Moo:
quote:
Originally posted by orfeo:
Affluenza is fundamentallly the belief that the world revolves around oneself.
It isn't cured by confirming that belief over and over.
I think that is narcissism, and I think that you don't have to be affluent to believe that you are entitled to whatever you want.
But it helps a LOT. Because the wealthy can often get whatever they want, so there's no pulling up short. The not so wealthy are schooled constantly in not getting what they want, so it takes a special kind of sociopathy to keep up that belief.
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This is the last sig I'll ever write for you...
Posts: 63536 | From: Washington | Registered: Jul 2001
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Clint Boggis
Shipmate
# 633
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Posted
It's not just wealth, position or power which make someone an utter shit, greed can too. I'm reminded of the The Third Man where Harry Lime on a Ferris wheel in post-war Vienna defends his actions in supplying fake Penicillin leading to the deaths of a number of children:-
Holly: Have you ever seen any of your victims?
Harry: Victims? Don't be melodramatic. [gestures to people far below] Tell me. Would you really feel any pity if one of those dots stopped moving forever? If I offered you twenty thousand pounds for every dot that stopped, would you really, old man, tell me to keep my money, or would you calculate how many dots you could afford to spare? Free of income tax, old man. Free of income tax - the only way you can save money nowadays.
Posts: 1505 | From: south coast | Registered: Jun 2001
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