Should Crimes That Were Committed Many Years Ago Simply Be Forgotten?

  
   Should crimes that were committed many years ago simply be forgotten? Crimes had meant actions that breach the laws prescribed by the state and the usefulness of punishing the offenders extends beyond just seeking valid justices for the victims. It is necessary for social control and deters future violations. A justice system ensures through punishing the offenders, the society is constantly reminded of the due consequences for their own actions.  If leniency should be shown to crimes because they had committed many years ago, then the consideration for the laws would be about manipulating the justice system instead of building civil and just societies. I wouldn’t want my children to grow up in a world which encourage amoral cynics to get away scot-free from hurting others to get ahead.  However, I do believe in second chances and agreed that certain clemency should be shown to remorse offenders whom were evenly punished for their crimes.

   This is surely a familiar tale; a boy thief was apprehended for stealing medicine for his ailing mother. His mother was dying, he was poor and desperation had resort him to steal. Should the boy be punished without mercy in accordance to the state law which was supposed to be impartial and equal to all? Or should he be forgiven because he was just trying to save his mother? The judicious procedure of crime and punishment will be much complex if fought on moral intuitions, that’s how courtrooms have become an impersonal assembly line in melting swift deserts a la ‘an eye for an eye’ logic. The downside of such linear equating of justice is the impersonal authority that sees both the perpetrators and the victims as objects of discrimination. And its adversarial combat in the process ironically host more antagonistic postures. Most of the time the victims would cared more about participating in the criminal justice of their offenders than maximizing punishment. They want to confront their offenders, understand how the crimes have happened and guilt the offenders on how the crimes have affected them. They want the offenders to walk in their shoes and realized the grievousness of their crimes which no amount of jail time could offer as a better punishment.

   Although seeking forgiveness is social ritual, a feat that all of us would attempt in the course of our lives, however have little or no place in the modern criminal justice system. Forgiveness has no bearing on the wrongfulness of crime committed or on the social expectation of retribution. When one commits a crime against another, it is personal until he is apprehended by law. Then his personal debt to the victim would become a debt to the society. Therefore showing mercy would undermine the equal treatment thus prohibiting deterrence. Paying dues through law orientated punishment such as prison sentences and remorseful about the committed crimes could earn social mercy and sometimes forgiveness from the victims and their families. Forgiveness doesn’t only benefit remorse offenders, granting it allow the victims to recover self esteems, lose bottled emotions such as anger, shame or rage, restore a sense of control and move on with their lives. Forgiveness detaches the offenders from their crimes, allowing them reintegrate into the society and working for their second chance at life.

   There are of course instances of brutal crimes that even with long rehabilitation in prison that society cannot come to reconcile. They were often murderers, rapists and serial pedophiles; and in the recent light of Austrian monster Josef Fritzl who imprisoned his own daughter in a cellar for twenty four years, fathered her seven children and was linked to a murder was a horrific example of brutal offender. Heavy offenders showed no remorse and little or no signs of rehabilitation would likely to repeat their offences in the future. While leniency should render to rehabilitated offenders with caution, those who commit capital felonies or multiple offenders should be punished heavily by the state without mercy.

   On a larger scale there are war crimes that involve genocide of millions of lives, violation of human rights, ethnic cleansing and torture, should they simply be forgotten because they happened generations ago? Take the brutal invasion of the Japanese in Southeast Asia during World War Two for instance, it had became merely a lesson in a chapter in history classes with their atrocities now dramatized in mainstream fiction. It would seem that our generation had clearly forgiven the race that brought to the region ‘Railway Of Death’, ‘Comfort Women’ or ‘Nanjing Massacre’ had embraced the Japanese culture, culinary, music and fashion passionately. What had caused the death of millions has become a yawn in an afternoon history class and will be forgotten if measures were not prescribed to remember it. Why is there a need to remember such crimes at all? Wouldn’t it be fitter if they are forgotten, erased from the memories so that the victims will not be haunt by them and feuded countries could mend their ties and cooperate for better economical success? Because the human race despite its ingeniousness is a much fallible one. As if combating the loss of human lives through natural disasters are not enough, Man had to conjure disasters such as wars and violent political upheavals that claimed even more lives. They need constant reminders from their own bloody history on how to progress more carefully and peacefully. They need to domesticate their selfish bloodlust with education of the values of life through historical experiences.  As philosopher George Santayana said, ‘Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.’  

   Conclusively in my opinion, I think that when just deserts were melted out and criminals had paid their dues, it is ideally that both offenders and victims would want to move on with their lives and forget the crimes eventually. Just like the boy thief who stole medicine for his mother, we are all not saints and could one day break the law, perhaps in a moment of folly, desperation or against our own wills. It would be nice if a chance at redeeming ourselves could be extended after our punishments. The society could be merciful towards remorseful offenders by not damning them with criminal records and offers a second chance in life. If a society could not forgive and work to reintegrate ex-offenders, they would most likely return to a life of crime simply because it is the only way to survive. Russian novelist Dostoevsky had once said, ‘The degree of civilization in a society can be judged by entering its prisons.’, but I would like to add that it can be judged equally by how it treats its reformed offenders. We should forgive the wrongdoers if they are genuine in their rehabilitation and value a second chance at life, however we should not simply forget the crimes, no matter how trivial or how long it has been because like  Danish philosopher Kierkegaard had said, ‘Life can only be understood backwards; but it must be lived forwards.’

'Population Explosion Is Far More Feared Than A Nuclear Explosion?'

   All human fears, from stuff as microscopic as germs to titanic event like the end of the world. Fear can paralyze us to cease functioning as a person, or it can drive us to overcome it, bringing out the best of our human struggle against our inner adversity. During the span of the decades, there has been fear mongering on global crisis such as the overpopulation and the threat of a nuclear attack. While world leaders like the United States and the United Kingdom have policed the stability of international politics suggested that a nuclear war is unlikely to happen soon, the staggering growth of the human population is multiplying at such alarming rate that it is happening even as we speak! So, is population explosion far more feared than a nuclear explosion?

   The rationality of our fear is usually exacerbated by our mass media experiences. For instances, movies like ‘The Sum Of All Fears’ and ‘The Peacemaker’ presented a horrific threat of a nuclear warfare. Popular science fiction also soothsay the apocalypse following an atomic carnage in ‘Dr Strangelove’ and ‘Akira’. These imaginative portrayals of a nuclear attack fuel the fear of the audience with descriptive mental pictures of radiation burns and agonizing deaths. I was especially struck with the grotesque tale of Hiroshima bombing in the Japanese manga ‘Barefoot Gen’ where defenseless children were left in the wake of the aftermath to survive amidst death and destruction.

   Our historic memories in World War Two where nuclear bombs were dispatched over the Japanese cities had shown us that the threat is indeed real. Images of real survivors relating the tale of the bombing had us reminded that had it been a different time, it could be us instead. And that possibility is not very difficult to materialize give the on going atomic arms’ race in our world now. The victory with superiority in nuclear warfare of the Second World War not only had propelled the United States to a superpower nation, but also encouraged the rest of the world to follow suit if they want to survive the next world war. Current world leaders are struggling to arm themselves more powerful and destructive nuclear war machines. We had witnessed in daily news of how Iran, North Korea, Pakistan, India and China fighting in place to match nuclear capability to that of the United States. The Cuban Missile Crisis has also presented that the threat of a nuclear war is indeed very imminent.

   In contrast, the danger of overpopulation doesn’t appeal to us instinctively like the perils of a nuclear explosion. There are no grisly scenarios illustrating great destruction in loss to fire and radiation. However, population explosion has reasons to be feared in the long run. Pessimistic economists had forecast that soon the world food supply could no longer match the exploding human population’s demands. Such rapid growth will stripped the Earth’s resources and affect humans’ well being as well. Our increase dependence in energy will render us to cut down more trees and mine for more resources. Such vicious cycle will lead to further deforestation, the loss of species and pollution of severe magnitude. Populous countries like China and India now face water deficits. Severe examples would be the malnutrition and hunger leading to death of millions of children in Africa.

   Overcrowding harms the environment by putting more pressure to accommodate our existence. The upsurge in population while not taking measures to ration our exploitation on Nature pollutes the Earth by altering the atmosphere composition, contaminated water supplies and even changes meteorological processes like El Nino, La Nina effects. Ex United States’ vice-president now turned environmental activist Al Gore has his fair share of criticism in the inspiring documentary ‘An Inconvenient Truth’ explored how we had damage our planet beyond damage. And it is easy to amplify those damages with population explosion. Do we really want to leave a planet of filth and full of overcrowding to our own children, a bill that no one could ever repay?

   Perhaps some might find it hard to relate to the environmental and resource issues mentioned above as they might seemed like problems that would happen in underdeveloped countries or far ahead in a distant future. But the ground zero of the population explosion is actually the cities. Overcrowding often occurs in the cities where people gathered to work the economy; it deprived them of privacy, stressed their well beings with noise and air pollutions, and suffocated them during rush hours and holidays. There were simply too much people to be around with! It can injure mental health and cause problems like anxiety, panic attacks, depression, thus impairing their social functions. Overcrowding also leads to high unemployment rates, inequality and illiteracy should the population becomes too much to organize. Poverty and crimes could also add on to the mounting social problems that a population explosion has.

   However, optimistic economists had suggested that overpopulation should not have to be a menace as illustrated above if global cooperation and individual responsibilities are made to control population. Well distribution of resources across the world, the use of contraceptives and birth schemes are examples that can keep the troubles of overpopulation in check.

   In conclusion, while population explosion could affect billions of livelihoods in the long run, a nuclear explosion is far more feared than it. Vivid images of a nuclear holocaust from both fiction dramatization and historic memories of a nuclear warfare struck a more imminent threat compared to theoretical catastrophes of a population implosion in the future.   

Why marry?

Why marry?

   I’m twenty five years old, I have a stable job and in a steady relationship for four years. I am ripe for marriage.  It has become obvious that no matter how long I can wait, marriage is the next stage of progression in my life. But is it necessary for people to marry?

   Marriage is often included in the grand scheme of the process of human living. It is a stage of maturation in adulthood where one leaves the comfort of his or her family to create a family of their own.  Traditionally, getting married goes beyond just the lovers. It had meant fulfilling a critical parental duty to see their offspring starting their own family. Being married at the coming of age is also important for social acceptance. One can’t help to wonder and even doubt the character of the individual if he or she remained a bachelor or spinster.  Being married and having children satisfy both heredity and social expectations. However living up to those traditional roles often assumed that being a mother and a wife is enough for the female gender. Women usually have to give up their careers for the sake of their family. In such contemporary times, women held higher offices than before and even run for the position of world leaders. Hence the context and roles of marriage must evolve to cater gender equity, and traditional expectations must be reviewed for its practicality for otherwise marriage will become a form of burden for ambitious career women.

   Companionship is vital when one age. Nobody wish to die alone. Having a spouse to care of one another in ailments and loneliness is an ultimate happiness that a couple could attain from their marriage vows. But living together has its downside too. After the initial honeymoon period, most couple faces domestic troubles like invasion of personal space and freedom or having to put up with one another’s household quirks.  Spouses also have to endure the difficulties of staying with demanding in-laws. Sometimes, should the love between a married couple go wayward and domestic violence can happen. The home they had purchased with gay anticipation that they are going to spend their lives together in happiness turn to a jailhouse where the spouse suffers in silence and misery.

   Marrying the spouse of your children and providing a home environment to nurture them is morally and socially expected from the society. Even though it is not so much a taboo now than before that single parents are discouraged, it is still essential for a child to grow up in a home where there is fraternal and maternal love. Being in a healthy marriage sets an example to offspring that they can one day have a blissful family of their own too. However not all marriages have happy endings. A well intended home can be ruined by domestic abuses, extra marital affairs and financial troubles. Often, naïve children are affected badly. Witnessing their role models argue and fight constantly damage the young minds emotionally, mentally and sometimes physically. They can grow up to be incapable of forming healthy relationships with others or even entangled in unresolved emotional or psychological issues like anxiety or inferiority complex that will hinder their functions to society.

   Then why get married when there are obviously many implications not only limited to self but affecting others as well? Accepting the responsibilities of marriage is accepting enormous burdens of finance, fidelity and parenting stressors. It can be overwhelming for newly weds. Although it would seems like a grand idea to just date forever. But as we had examined, marriage is not solely a personal affair between two people but it involves our parents and our children and even the society as well. Perhaps in near future we would dispose of the customary expectations of marriage and abolish its legislation altogether. People will still marry because it is innate in human instinct to want to be with their loved ones, to mature as adults welcoming the challenges of marriage and parenting and to pass on their wisdom to their lovechild, thus sealing the circulatory human experience of existence. To make marriages work, couples would have to be prepared mentally and emotionally to spend their lives with one another. They should have consider their compatibility in decision making, their willingness to compromise to one another and their level of resilience in times of troubles prior in committing to each other. They should also identify sources of support should marriage becomes too overwhelming. Some of the best supporting networks can be our parents, our friends and even spiritual support from churches. Cohabiting before marriage also helps the couple to be prepared for their shared lives ahead.

     In conclusion, marriage can be just a certificate to bind two people in the eyes of laws or it can be the greatest testimonial of the love between a man and a woman. It should be thoroughly considered by lovers before saying ‘I Do!’ on the altar. It should never be decided on impulsion as regrets and dissatisfaction in marriage often occur when the couples are not ready. There will be many challenges in the long road of marriage; therefore it is quintessentially for couples to examine the properties of their love so that it can stand up to the storm of married life.