Wednesday, September 24, 2008

Bad math

With his new proposal to get tough on 14-year-old criminals, Harper's definitely clicked into something that resonates with his pitchfork and flaming torch-wielding base. Nobody seems to really care that a lot of kids make mistakes and do stupid things, and that wrecking their lives by sending them to hardcore prison probably won't result in a better citizen when it's all said and done.

It should be obvious to anyone with two halves to rub together why this is a bad idea, but it seems like a lot of people are okay with it -- "if you don't want to get gang-raped, don't do the crime" is the rationale. What I find curious is that most of these are the same people who were all in favour of raising the age of consent to 16.

So 14 is old enough to get gang-raped in prison, but not old enough to have consensual sex with a 21-year-old girl or boyfriend -- that sound about right? Because to me, something about this doesn't quite compute. But again, maybe it's just me.