Monday, November 16th, 2009
Jonathan Turley criticizes the leniency courts grant to parents who neglect to obtain medical attention for their kids for religious beliefs versus those who neglect their children for other reasons. I agree with him. Seems like there are First and Fourteenth Amendment issues, here.
Dog bed.
This is one brave Russian cop.
Ah, the 80s. Look for brief Alan Thicke appearance at the end.
Just under a million dollars in stimulus money headed to two drug task forces in Alabama. Because more jailed drug offenders is just what Alabama’s economy needs.
The only thing surprising about this is how many people seem to be surprised by it.
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on Monday, November 16th, 2009 at 11:07 am by Radley Balko
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TheAgitator.com
Wait a sec. That dog built that himself?
Frankly, the leniency that courts give to parents who abuse their children is shocking enough. I was once told by a judge that parents can do whatever they want to their children as, “long as they don’t bleed.” Quite the standard to apply for child abuse.
If only faith healers could trust god a little bit more before they have kids. I haven’t read a bible in quite some time but I seem to recall that Jesus also fed the hungry in a few places. If they took those quotes as literally we might not have this issue.
MikeZ – don’t forget in Genesis where G-d says “I have given you all the seed and herb bearing plants for you to use.” The Lord wants us to have and use marijuana. Hopefully Christians will start realizing this.
Hey, cut the House some slack. It’s tough enough trying to please the lobbyists without adding the confusion of having to cater to the voting public on top of it.
So rogue cops in Russia go to prison while rogue cops in the US get paid vacations. Good to know.
Let’s compare faith based neglect resulting in accidental death to accidental deaths at the hands of law enforcement. Just following procedures. An investigation has shown everyone acted in proper accordance with policies set forth by their government/god. You can’t find us guilty, because our strict interpretations of the government/god’s does not allow for common sense.
that was not the 80s I participated in!
In modern Russia whistle blows you.
MG, that’s nothing. How about this one.
The funny/sad thing is the number of people that would look at the Russian cop story and say “wow, that’s crazy they get away with that”, and would the very next minute be on US newspaper websites, blogs, etc saying Politicians/Citizen review boards, etc are too hard on US cops. They have a hard job. The victims should have known better or deserved what the cops did to them.
Many of those examples given for corru-tion, murder, etc are no different than what happens in the US. However, US Cops are “good” guys therefore they don’t do “evil” things. The mental disconnect people can perform always amazes when it comes to this stuff.
Those are all nothing. Take a gander at Prosperity Christians or Prosperity Gospel coming out of a lot of the Megachurches. Talk about twisting Jesus’ teachings. If you thought Jesus didn’t like the moneychangers in temple, I can just imagine his reaction to the Prosperity Christianity.
Again. the cognitive dissonance these people can maintain always amazes me.
MG: I’d love to see where you found that in the bible.
Prosperity Gospel runs right into one big problem: the quote about “for the love of money being the root of all evil”. Which I believe most of us could agree on no matter where you congregate on sunday…
I loves me my Devo.
In the past 25 years, hundreds of children are believed to have died in the United States after faith-healing parents forbade medical attention to end their sickness or protect their lives.
Hypothetically, on one hand, we have a parent who, acting according to his own fervent beliefs, thoughtfully determines a course of action for his child that he believes to be in that child’s best interest. On the other we have a parent who beats his child to death or neglects to provide even the most minimal of care. Do they deserve the same punishment?
I don’t like the idea of the state being the senior parent in every household because the expansion of powers is without limit. We’re talking about hundreds of deaths in the last quarter century. I’d be willing to bet that there were thousands children’s deaths over that time frame that could be attributed to decisions of the parents. And after you enact laws to cover all those instances, you will still have children dying because of bad decisions on the part of parents.
If we are going to prosecute these cases at all, I don’t see anything wrong with punishing the parent whose actions derive from sheer meanness or laziness more than the parent who honestly thought he was doing what was right.
Hell, we live in a country where you can’t go through a day without a public or media display of praying to god to intervene to alter a the outcome of an event. We claim god’s authority in war and, with great ceremony, call on him to accompany our troops as they face death in battle. How can we then declare that doing that very thing (and really believing it!) is a crime? I mean aside from the fact that it’s “for the children”?
Change!
I think the three guys from the 80’s, are also leading the rights to marry your domestic partner movement in CA right now.
#15 | Dave Krueger |
That is truly one of the best responses I have ever had the pleasure to read. Thank you.
Dave, I’m sorry, you’re wrong.
I am probably much more radicalized in my support of religious freedom than most people. I would actually heartily endorse religious practices involving self-mutilation or suicide. If anyone wants to bring back the worship of Attis, I’ll be right there sticking up for them.
But only as long as everyone involved is legally consenting and capable of consent. Infants can’t do that. I would no more recognize the right of parents to deny their children medical care using the First Amendment as a shield than I would acknowledge the right of parents to immolate their infants to sacrifice them to Baal using the First Amendment as a shield. You can believe whatever nonsense you want, but if your child dies because you think Jesus will treat his meningitis, you should go to the big house, as far as I am concerned.
The equal protection amendments are really tricky, as we’re discovering in a lot of different areas.
Another is schools. If I make a law saying that kids can’t wear nose rings to school, or hats, or necklaces, I’m infringing on the religious beliefs of quite a few prominent religions (Sikhs, Jews, and Christians). So according to the first amendment, those laws are unconstitutional. Also unconstitutional are laws that grant special exceptions to those religions. That’s giving special rights to a particular person or group based on their religion. Also intolerable in a free society. It’s like passing an income tax law with a special exception for Jews because their religion forbids the paying of taxes on income.
The constitution is thought of as an, if not infallible, at least consistent document.
#13 | Saint Zero |
it’s in Genesis 29
Might it be possible to add to the list of links that pre-warnings are attached to those that connect to NYT premium sites?
Thanks, Don
“In the past 25 years, hundreds of children are believed to have died in the United States after faith-healing parents forbade medical attention to end their sickness or protect their lives.”
I’m curious, how many kids die in the hands of the state each year in comparison?
I’d disagree with you Dave. I don’t think your hypotheticals are equal cases here. Reading the article abuses due to neglect is treated more harshly than abuses due to religion as well.
I would agree with you that somebody who beats thier kid to death deserves more punishment than somebody who for religious reasons lets thier child die. That example is clearly a case of some intentional homicide vs a reckless indiference and is already treated differently under the law. That isn’t the issue though.
The issue is separating reckless indiference. The article referenced a parent who recieved 6mos in jail for letting their kid run around in a dirty diaper. This was the same sentance as for the death due to diabetes with a religious excuse. In one instance the kid is still alive, the other is dead. This seems like the kind of sentancing disparity that is the issue.
I’d maintain that why you do something should never even come up in a criminal trial. Unless your presenting some form of incompetence defense it just isn’t relevant.
Relatively sure the 80s clip was the inspiration for Ace and Gary of the “Ambiguously Gay Duo” fame.
I have to agree with MikeZ on disagreeing with Dave. It’s a question of murder versus depraved indifference.
There needs to be some sort of Lemon Test where religion & child rearing are concerned. As Sam (#2) pointed out, religion is also used as a rationalization for some pretty heinous child abuse.
Locally, we have the Hannah Overton case – she’s doing life without parole because she thought punishing her special needs child by forcing him to eat powdered cayenne peppers was a suitable punishment. The idea to do that comes from Lisa Whelchel’s books Creative Correction (Ms. Whelchel played “Blair” on the 80s sitcom “Facts of Life”, the theme song which was written by Alan Thicke – look at me, I just connected to of the Morning Links in one fell swoop!).
If you do a Google search on Creative Correction, you’ll find that it’s really nothing more than a guide on how to abuse children without leaving physical scars. If someone were to write the same book with the title, “An Atheist’s Guide to Child-Rearing”, there would be riots in the street, but when you wrap even the most offensive ideas under the concept of religion, it’s somehow respectable.
There are secular reasons for withholding a child’s medical care, none of them very convincing. “God told me to” isn’t very convincing, either, but it’s given a pass most of the time.
I’m not sure there actually needs to be a lemon test for these cases. Certainly it seems like it can be tricky, to decide what is criminal neglect and just poor choices, but I don’t see where any lemon test is called for.
If your 11 mo old baby has a giant cyst growing on his neck and you don’t bring him to the doctors until he dies. It is a criminal act. I don’t see that it matters that you didn’t bring them because you were high on crack or high on God.
I hadn’t seen the Hannah Overton case though nice reference.
If a parent honestly and truly believes in their religion, and their religion believes that children may fly, and that parent drops the child off a building, resulting in the child’s death, was it in the parent’s right? Science has told us that the child would be severely injured or killed if they are dropped, but the religious belief is held that it isn’t so.
We then write off the parent as a zealot and lock them up. So, why is medical care different? Science has told us the child would die if treatment A isn’t completed, so it seems the analogy is true.
I just cannot separate the two scenarios.
I agree, although I’m scared to think we might end up giving them a reduced sentance in that case. Seems like if we wait until the kid actually dies there isn’t much of an issue here. The defendant believed god would cure the kid. Obviously the defendant was mistaken and now has to pay the consequence. Even the religious nuts shouldn’t have a problem with that. Even if they use the well God must have wanted her to die excuse, then we can always counter well God being all-knowing knew the consequence of your inaction is a lifetime in prison and he must want that too.
The trickier situation is preventing the death in the first place.
Also from Turley’s blog, this case perfectly exemplifies how religion excuses some extremely offensive acts.
That’s why I brought up the Lemon Test. I can’t think of a compelling secular argument for a grown man to put an infant’s penis in his mouth; there is, on the other hand, a religious reason for doing so.
Russian cop: why don’t we see this more often from cops anywhere on the planet? We know corruption happens with any police force, since the system is set up in such a way that it encourages corruption due to no meaningful oversight and virtual immunity. Since we don’t have a lot of cops screaming from the high heavens like this guy, the only correct assumption one can make is that there are close to 0 cops with integrity and character, and would rather collect a paycheck so they shut up.
Is prison really the place for someone who honestly and truly believes their children can fly? Also, if you incarcerate people who toss their kids off a building, do you think it will result in an increase in people doing that?
Oops. Last line of my last post should be:
Also, if you don’t incarcerate people who toss their kids off a building, do you think it will result in an increase in people doing that?
In other words, is incarceration really going to be a deterrent for someone who so strongly believes their kids can fly that he throws them off a building?
“Is prison really the place for someone who honestly and truly believes their children can fly”
Technically I believe you are correct. This seems to meet the requirements for an insanity defense assuming they are willing to go that route. However it isn’t the kind of ‘temporary insanity’ where you’ll be walking home next week. Going back to the real situation it seems to imply the whole congregation is insane and they should immediately be locked up to prevent harm to themselves or others. Is that a better solution?
“Also, if you don’t incarcerate people who toss their kids off a building, do you think it will result in an increase in people doing that?”
For kids off buildings, no because its an extreme hypothetical. For the real issue certainly I think there would be a deterrant factor. This isn’t the case where Jonny Biblethumper came to his belief on his own, his whole congregation is right there behind him with the same beliefs.
It’s a monumental good thing.
Thanks for ear candy and the eye pain.
One more subtle, but extremely 80’s, thing I noticed about the aerobics videos: if you look at most of the women, the skin tone of their legs is somewhat different from their arms and faces.
That’s right… they’re wearing pantyhose while exercising.
I propose a law specifying that jail sentences may be shortened if God files a motion to do so with the court. That way the faith-healing parents can spend their jail terms praying for leniency. Which, as they argue, is just as good as actually leniency.
I used a hypothetical specifically to generalize my response rather than just focusing on the particular cases at hand.
I have no problem punishing reckless indifference, nor do I have a problem prosecuting those who would merely use religion as a excuse after the fact. But, we live a country that makes a national pastime of claiming fate to be god’s will and celebrating a miracle anytime someone survives anything from a natural disaster to a car crash. We have national leaders who claim to talk to god and are guided by their faith in matters of national importance where thousands of lives hang in the balance.
In a country that has “In God We Trust” emblazoned on it’s money, it is an act of supreme hypocrisy to throw someone in prison for actually trusting in god.
“In a country that has “In God We Trust” emblazoned on it’s money, it is an act of supreme hypocrisy to throw someone in prison for actually trusting in god.”
Perhaps, but I would say the answer to that is the old cliche, Two wrongs don’t make a right. I personally disagree with the “In God We Trust” on our money and for that matter “under god” at the end of the pledge of allegance. However my disagreement is not nearly enough to complain about it. If it makes a bunch of religous people happy to put “In God, we trust” on our money I just don’t care that much. If it makes religious people happy to allow thier children to suffer and die, well that is completely at the other end of the scale and does seem like an issue worth fighting for.
Now I’m not advocating anything that says we take all children away households that have strong faith-healing beliefs. The reason for the separation of church in state is so we don’t have thought police. This does seem to cut both ways. I don’t think its right to pre-emptively judge someone on thier thoughts. I just would ask that the outcomes of various choices be treated equally. If kid dies from an easily cured medical condition it just doesn’t matter why. If anything the faith healers deserve MORE blame than the lazy parents. The lazy parents didn’t even notice the fatal cyst on thier kids forehead, while the faith healers saw it and intentionally did ‘nothing’.