What drives your average teenager to carry a knife? Experts believe that the fear of being stabbed or attacked comes top of the list. What causes this fear? Well apparently if the media make it known that there are a lot of people out there carrying knives and stabbing people, you would naturally want your own knife for protection.
So we have a vicious circle. A few kids get stabbed and the media report it. This causes more kids to carry knives and more kids get stabbed. This goes on and on until the circle is broken. So how do we break the circle? Well for one thing we can ignore the rubbish the government have dreamt up. Wishy washy, lefty liberal ideas have had more than the fair chance in this country, and they have failed.
Kids need to know that you are more likely to get stabbed if you carry a knife. Stop and search needs to be increased and random lockdowns of schools for searches should be brought in. There needs to be a real deterrent, not some extreme sentence that makes a good political sound bite, but which will never be implemented. If anyone under sixteen is caught with a knife they should receive an automatic, zero tolerance 3 month sentence (first offence). Anyone over sixteen should get an automatic 6 month sentence, unless they can prove the knife is required for their occupation (first offence). The sentence should be automatically doubled for any re-offence.
It's wishy washy liberalism that has got us in this sad position. It's time we went back to discipline, respect and morality.
UPDATE: Dave has left a comment on this post and you won't believe what the government have thought up to tackle youth crime.
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6 comments:
I'm sorry Steve, but you are not thinking clealy. If an attack with a knife, or a firearm, or any other instrument, results in death, and there are no mitigating factors such as self-defence, that is murder. If a person is found guilty of murder, notwithstanding age, the sentance of the court should be death. It's quite simple, and would reduce the incidence of knife crime, gun crime, whatever crime at a stroke, especially if the criminals mates were forced to stand there and watch him/her be topped!
Mike, I only said if they were searched and found to be carrying a knife, not using one.
Wishy washy liberalism has got us into many holes, this being just one of them.
Carrying a knife is not necessarily an indication of criminal intent and does not justify additional powers of stop and search by 'The Police', nor does it warrant custodial sentences for those found to be doing so.
We live in a society in which, thanks to sensational news headlines and subsequent ill thought-out legislation, we are now so frightened of 'weapons' that a man came close to being shot by over-excited armed police officers simply because a neurotic woman thought his iPod was a gun. Weapons are harmless until they are used and it is the improper use of them that should be punished. Threatening to lock up those found to be carrying weapons that could be used improperly for a few months, in non-existent prison cells, is pointless.
Many responsible people own knives and guns without ever threatening or harming anyone. Those who threaten others with weapons might be dissuaded from doing so again by flogging the hide off them, for a first offence, and promising exponentially increasing punishments for subsequent offences. Such a course might prevent those sad little bastards who think that flashing a knife is the action of a man from becoming killers, without criminalising those who have no intention of ever harming anyone.
Such a course requires, of course, a sense of purpose and a good deal of resolve, and considerably more moral and political courage than is evident in those who hope to use the mainstream political parties as a route to the gold-plated sinecure that is a seat in the House of Commons.
I could never vote for the re-introduction of the death penalty but I'd vote now, were it possible, for vicious corporal punishment as a means of breaking 'hardened' little thugs and I'll certainly consider voting for any party that makes a binding commitment to introduce the same. That will never be The Conservative and Unionist Party, which is led by a man who sees himself as the natural heir to Tony Blair, don't forget.
Mr Gruff,
A year ago I would have been in total agreement with you. When I was a kid we all carried knives, but there was a difference - we had no intention of using them on anyone else. They were boy’s toys. Now kids carry knives for protection or with the intention of using them if they get into a fight. I will concede this point: maybe there should be an age limit of 18 to own a knife. No solution is going to be perfect, but I do believe that kids should be stopped from carrying them.
Yes but-
look what the police are going to do to combat it-
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1035287/With-knife-crime-rife-police-unveil-secret-weapon-Top-Trumps-cards-themselves.html
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