Just came in from spending an hour or so playing with my granddaughter. She’s three and is convinced that playing with a garden hose is a great thing to do.
I have to admit that, in the grand scheme of things, messing around with a hose – with your granddaughter in charge of said hose, mind you – is precisely the most important thing that needs to be done on any given afternoon.
Like I said, my granddaughter’s three and she takes after her mother and grandmother in that she’s nothing short of a bubbly handful. She loves to sing and dance and can get me chuckling in about a heartbeat - even if I’m soaking wet.
She’s being raised to understand that having a smile on her face and a curiosity about everything is a good thing. We’re also doing our best to send her into life armed as best as she can be with self-confidence and hope. I guarantee that she’ll grow up secure in the knowledge that there are those around her who love her, who will dry her tears, who will chase away the hurt, and keep the bad things at bay.
The problem for those of us who have kids and grandkids, however, is that there may be situations wherein we need help on that last. That’s because there will be times when we’re not close by. Times when the kids are beyond our sight or momentarily alone. Times when, no matter how careful we are, bad things and bad people may be closer to them than we are.
Recently, there have been several national news stories involving kids being harmed or killed by the sick and twisted predators, perverts, and pedophiles out there who, basically, do nothing more on this planet than pilfer oxygen.
I have no clue as to what makes them want to do the things they do but, whatever it is, we need less of it and, much more specifically, fewer of them.
The most recent story concerns Brooke Bennett, a 12-year-old girl whose body was found after she’d been missing for a week. The prime suspect in the case is Michael Jacques, a convicted sex offender and the last person seen with her while she was still alive. He was also her uncle and had allegedly planned to initiate her into a “sex ring.” Read about him and marvel at what the term “human being” can occasionally encompass.
There have been many other cases wherein kids have been harmed by these monsters, but the one that stands out in my mind is the kidnapping, rape, and murder of 9-year-old Jessica Lunsford by another known sex offender named John Couey. That he’s still alive is nothing short of a mockery of a sane society.
What’s made me write about all of this is the recent ruling by the Supreme Court which held that “The death penalty is not a proportional punishment for the rape of a child.”
Not proportional for the rape of a child?
Admittedly, rape is not murder but (and this is one enormous “but”) what we’re talking about here is the brutalization of children - the youngest and most innocent members of our society. Though that child may one day recover from the physical trauma he or she endured, they will forever be scarred by the experience - should they live through it. The truly sad thing, however, is that we, as a society, often aid and abet the creatures who do these things.
We capture and then release them after they’ve “undergone therapy,” or have “completed” some program or other. We sometimes even grant them early release from their sentences because they’ve been “model prisoners” - as if not raping a child while in prison is the very definition of good behavior.
Sorry about the tone here, but my “sympathy meter” for such individuals reads zero. It got stuck there a long time and way too many kids ago.
You can choose to believe whatever you wish as regards the death penalty for these predators. I, however, will never lose a moment’s sleep should I hear that “Old Sparky” is being fired up (one would hope with an extra generator on line for more power) to send any and all of them to the hell they so rightfully deserve.
Not proportional for the rape of a child?
I’m typing this while watching my granddaughter play nearby and the only response I have to that thought (that can be printed) is this:
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