Teenaged drawing = terrorist offence

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http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/wor...istic-boy-charged-with-terrorist-offence.html

http://www.myfoxdc.com/dpp/news/aut...orist-threats-over-stick-figure-sketch-051310
http://www.myfoxatlanta.com/dpp/news/14-year-old-autistic-boy-charged-051210

http://americaswatchtower.com/2010/05/13/autistic-boy-charged-with-terrorism-for-a-drawing/

How have things gotten so bad that something so frivolous can be charged with such an offense?

look at the books of loads of kids in the UK, you will find doodles of people being killed, teachers and people they dont like often being the subject matter.
look at one of my books from when I was 10, and youll see a small comic strip where I grind up Mr Woodhouse (my teacher at the time) in a mincer and make burgers out of him.

ter·ror·ism
–noun
1. the use of violence and threats to intimidate or coerce, esp. for political purposes.
2. the state of fear and submission produced by terrorism or terrorization.
3. a terroristic method of governing or of resisting a government.

I really dont think this incident falls into the category of terrorism, instead of doing what teachers are supposed to do and talking to and working this autistic child they demand that he be charged for his doodle...

the USA is insane.

 

And an autistic kid at that! Yes, the US has gone mad. And, for the record, we had songs in my school.

On top of spagetti,
All covered with blood... *whistle*

Fun times for all. Some of the teachers even made some suggestions.

 

If I've said it once, I've said it a million times. Zero tolerance policies need to be abandoned and removed from the face of the Earth. It is a cop-out for school administrators who do not want to have to use common sense to make decisions that may get them into trouble later (i.e. lawsuits).

 

Zero tolerance policy are means to allow politicos to look 'tough on crime', which is apparently an American obsession. You need to be tough on everything - drugs, crime, terror, probably cookies and whatever else too - lest you want those attack ads (which ought to be banned) and your political competitors breathing down your neck. That is even more so once you have labelled politics as a wars on nouns - drugs, crime, terror. Hand in glove goes the militarisation of law enforcement. It doesn't matter whether it works, as long as the measures taken are 'tough', it's a war after all. It's an exercise in political masturbation if you ask me.

This case here would be ridiculous, wouldn't it be so disturbing. It's not just fear of litigation, and zero tolerance policies - it's that laws have been enacted by politicians posturing to be tough on everything, born of scares and panics, that defined terrorism down to include something like that. And an uncritical citizenry has allowed them to do that and get away with it - and there is the result: Scribbling fourteen year old autistic terrorists committing thought crimes. And that kind of makes sense: If a hand grenade is a weapon of mass destruction (as it contains more than four ounces of explosives), why shouldn't the scribblings of a fourteen year old autistic child be terrorism?

Beyond that, the charges mean that this is probably a federal crime, and that terrorism laws apply. In context of the current terror debate - does that mean this fourteen year old autistic child will have a right to counsel, will secret evidence be permitted, can he be stripped of his citizen rights, be tried for treason, be tortured and sent to a military commission on Guantanamo bay? Jut asking.

With such laws the American criminal justice system is a travesty, a practical joke, one that is on America that is.

 

I don't expect this to last long. I expect the prosecutor will, if not from simple common sense, at least from public pressure, cave in and drop all charges. The child will be sent home and an investigation will begin into what caused this. The school administration will likely loose jobs, but the laws and policies will continue unchanged. Until it happens again.

 

It's bad enough that the kid is in trouble over this (although perhaps some sort of minor disciplinary action is warranted), but how on earth does this qualify as a terrorist act? If this fits the definition, then so would any threat or implied threat of violence against another person.

 

I knew there wasomething wrong with you Sho! That reminds me of the movies "Eating Rauol" and "Ravenous". What toppings did you add to MR. Woodhouse anyway?

 

Glory, glory, hallelu-u-u-jah
Teacher hit me with a ru-u-u-la'
Met at the door
With a loaded forty-four
She didn't teach no more....

We sang that a school concert when I was in 5th grade. A few years ago a group of students were suspended from a local school for singing it at lunch.

 

hard to tell from my childish scribblings, but there was definately cheese