Apparently, having only 5% of the world’s population but 25% of the world’s prisoners isn’t a high enough incarceration rate for America. As such, some states are looking for ways to imprison more of its citizens for non-violent offenses. In this case, I refer to a bill advancing in Florida’s state Senate that would make “bullying” a crime, including “cyber-bullying” online. The bill is a reaction to the tragic suicide of 12-year old Rebecca Sedwick, who took her own life after suffering harassment from her peers.
As tragic as Rebecca’s death is, who hasn’t suffered the harassment of offensive and insensitive people in their lives? No one. This is particularly bad amongst juveniles, but even in the adult world you are bound to cross paths with some raging sociopath at one point or another. Unfortunately, this is simply a fact of life and a sad reflection of our state of consciousness. It is not something that can ever be legislated away with the stroke of a pen.
The only thing this will do is further increase an already bloated and absurd domestic prison population (in 2012 police made an arrest every 2 seconds), as well as provide the context to stifle free speech. After all, defining what constitutes criminal “bullying” or “cyber-bullying” will be extraordinarily difficult and will open the doors to criminalizing all sorts of free speech. While the intention may be noble, this sounds like an absolutely horrible idea.
From Think Progress:
A Florida bill advanced in the Senate this week to make bullying a crime, including cyber-bullying online. The new offenses criminalize a range of “harassing” behavior, both in-person and on the Internet. And a second conviction would send perpetrators to jail for a year, criminalizing what is primarily a problem among youths.
The bill comes in response to concerns of escalating bullying, especially cyberbulling, and is named for 12-year-old Rebecca Sedwick, who committed suicide in September 2013, after two teen peers allegedly harassed her over her dating of a particular boy. While Rebecca’s case did not involve LGBT harassment, bullying has been a particular concern among LGBT youth.
The bill establishes that someone who “willfully, maliciously, and repeatedly harasses or cyberbullies another person commits the offense of bullying” — a misdemeanor — and that those who engage in such harassment accompanied by a threat are guilty of a third-degree felony.
A felony for bullying? Seems way overboard…
The proposal moves to criminalize more youth behavior, even as Florida has made efforts to move away from a trend of criminalizing school misbehavior and giving kids an early introduction to the criminal system in what is known as the “school-to-prison pipeline.” Saddling kids with arrests, suspensions, and particularly juvenile detention for misbehavior has found to only exacerbate later behavior, and increase the likelihood that they will later commit other crimes.
Florida, where the bill passed a Senate committee this week, has been known over the past few years for arresting more students than any other state, for violations that include trespassing at their own school.
Go Florida.
Full article here.
In Liberty,
Michael Krieger
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Absolutely. Bullying often involves violence or the threat of violence. It’s about time that this form of torture many young people have to endure in government schools is finally addressed. Kids are sent to school to learn, not to fend for themselves like Roman gladiators.
Bullying does have criteria, and it is a form of violence, and the justice system exists to keep regular schmoes from going all “Columbine” when they find they have no recourse.
Please list the criteria for which “bullying” should land a young student in prison for a year?
Whatever happened to expulsion from school? I’d say that is far more reasonable than a year in prison.
They expelled people from my high school, not put them in jail.
Michael Krieger
Way to change the question, a sure sign of denial, and evidence that even you know you’re off base.
Was changing the question an _honest_ mistake, or are you in fact incapable of actually opening your mind in order to learn _established legal criteria_ without also demanding that sentence be pronounced, too?
Or let me put the question back upon you: which amount of jail time do YOU think would have prevented the bullying that drove the perps in Columbine to such desperate ends?
No, that game is for liars and fools – which are you?
Why don’t you do it righ, now that you’ve received some blunt feedback about your BS, retract your sleight-of-mouth, and ask an _honest_ question?
I’ll wait….
You don’t have to wait. No jail time. You can’t preemptively know which bullying will lead to horrific things and which will not. “Bullying” amongst youth has been part of the human experience since we lived in caves, and I am in no case in favor of jail time as a punishment for bullying. Bad things happen.
So now answer my question, what specific bullying actions would you deem appropriate to jail a youth for year for “bullying?”
You seem to be a very angry person. I’m sorry that you can’t use a normal tone when posting comments on a blog. Take a deep breath pal.
I’ll wait…
I’m glad you have your mind made up.
That must explain why you read my criticism of your BS as anger, as people with anger management problems frequently do, instead of retracting your Obvious Bullshit and displaying some honest curiosity about something that isn’t hard to learn on your own.
Clearly, you don’t actually WANT to learn the criteria, as evidenced by your dodging my criticism and mounting baseless personal attacks (which, incidentally, is one of the criteria. Well done!)
I’m afraid “because we are cavemen” isn’t actually a valid defense, or rape and murder would both be legal.
Do you have a *rational* response to my points, or are you truly incapable of transcending you neanderthal genes?
Well let’s see. You used all caps in your response, which is the way to yell when typing. That’s an angry gesture.
You also implied I am either a “liar or a fool,” rather than having a discussion. More anger.
Now, I answer your question and you don’t answer mine. Which isn’t surprising, because you are a troll with nothing better to do in life than get angry at other people’s blogs spout nonsense. But keep it going, I love having a lot of comments on my posts.
“As such, some states are looking for ways to imprison more of its citizens for non-violent offenses. ”
Bullying is violent. Did you notice that your premise got destroyed, and you got angry about it?
Rather than talking smack about your critic, AKA shadow-projecting, why not just fix the false claim?
How is bullying violent? Please explain that statement.
Because it infringes on the free will of the target.
I guess I’d just assumed that someone writing about liberty would know what comprises it. I wonder what else you write about despite being pretty ignorant of the details….
Ok, so assuming some sort of bullying infringes on free-will, that is violent?
Merriam-Webster:
vi·o·lent adjective \-lənt\
: using or involving the use of physical force to cause harm or damage to someone or something : showing violence
: caused by physical force or violence
: trying to physically attack someone because of anger
Which dictionary do you use?
Root of the word: violate.
From your own source:
“vi·o·late
transitive verb \ˈvī-ə-ˌlāt\
: to take away, interfere with, or ignore (something, such as a person’s rights or privacy) in an unfair or illegal way
: to abuse or show disrespect for (something, such as a holy place) usually by damaging it”
“Rights” means “free will” since a right is something you don’t need permission to do.
Likewise, bullying is defined as displaying a pattern of aggressive and remorseless DISRESPECT, as per the definition which you’ve now indicated, by your retreat into semantic bullshit, that you consider authoritative.
ProTip for next time: Dictionaries FOLLOW usage, they don’t decide it. Someone who was actually free would know the difference…or perhaps you never learned about the link between freedom of language and freedom of thought, having managing to overlook dozens of authors from Orwell to Hayek who wrote on precisely that topic.
But lets not insult your intelligence by pretending that you honestly care about the criteria, and your willful ignorance of the topic of your screed – someone who WANTED to make sure their article wasn’t full of bullshit would take a valid criticism at face value, instead of trying to psychoanalyze the critic, aka, going into denial in the face of a criticism they couldn’t answer (which is what causes smart people to check their premises.)
“F”
“In this case, I refer to a bill advancing in Florida’s state Senate that would make “bullying” a crime, including “cyber-bullying” online. ”
There are accepted legal criteria which means your “quotes” were in fact “scare quotes” or “dismissive BS” proving only that you don’t really know what you’re talking about.
Who is angry? The one pointing out your BS, or the one mounting personal attacks and presenting impotent demands in response to that perfectly valid and polite critique?
Go on; make up some more shit about me, aka shadow-project. I’m sure everyone is DYING to learn all about your inner demons, as a side-benefit of learning that you can’t cope with rational criticism.
You are the best commentator that I have ever had. Not only are you exposing yourself to all my readers by not answering my question when I answered yours, but you are giving me more comments and page views. You are expending a lot of energy on a “liar” or a “fool” which is great for me. Let’s carry on then!
I didn’t ask a question, I presented a valid critique of your BS, which you have yet to refute.
You are the one who presented personal attacks instead of addressing the points raised.
Google ‘shadow projection’ so you know what you tell everyone about yourself when you make things up about people.
You are the best man! Thanks for all the comments. Can’t wait for more. I’ll wait…
So, no, you don’t have a *rational* response.
You ‘love’ having comments, but you attack someone who offers valuable feedback on your article?
Why don’t I believe you? (Hint; is it because you haven’t bullshitted enough, yet?)
So, no, you don’t have a *rational* response.
You ‘love’ having comments, but you attack someone who offers valuable feedback on your article?
Why don’t I believe you? (Hint; is it because you haven’t bullshitted enough, yet?)