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August 11, 2003
Fruitcake anyone?
[Rant Warning: What follows is personal opinion and it make be considered offensive by some viewers. The management urge all readers to take a deep breath, count to 10 and find some another article if they feel themselves getting hot under the collar. NOT RECOMMENDED FOR YOUNGER READERS.]
Looks like I spoke too soon when it comes to the debate between Paul and Jivha. The debate arose over the appropriate punishment for the Indonesian fruitcake who has now been convicted of being the mastermind behind the Bali bombings (which killed about 200 people, some Australians, some other nationalities, some locals including muslims).
The largest national grouping of victims was Australia and it appears that Australians were at least partially the intended target (although some of the evidence suggests that fruitcake & co could not tell the difference between an Australian and an American). Both the prime minister and the leader of the opposition have effectively stated that the punishment is up to the Indonesians as the crime was committed on Indonesian soil by an Indonesian national. They have both declined asking for clemency. The leader (is he still the leader this week?) of the (almost completely non-existent) australian democrats has called on the Indonesian government to commute the sentence to life imprisonment. This has been mirrored by others who generally fall into three categories: (a) those who want to "forgive" the crime; (b) those who fear it will spawn more similar crimes and (c) other fruitcakes who would like a precedent to be set before they proceed with similar activities.
It is worth noticing that the fruitcake has now agreed to his lawyers appealing the sentence which suggests that someone has pointed out this to him.
I want to take a back seat for a moment and consider the question in terms of the way Heinlein did in the book Starship Troopers (this was completely ignored in the film). There are two choices for Senior Fruitcake. Either he is incurably insane or he is not. Take your pick. If he can kill 200 people without remorse even though many share his faith and religion then he is, by social definition, insane. This may be a correctable condition via therapy, drugs, remedial education, threat, punishment or whatever. Let us start with the assumption that it is correctable. That means we could invest lots of time and money in his rehabilitation. Note that this is not a casual crime, an off-the-cuff crime, a once-only crime. This was planned down to the last cold blooded detail so the rehabilitation will take lots of time and/or money or both. We are assuming that this will, eventually, work. Fruitcake realises what he has done. Truly realises it. Grasps it in full. Groks the act and the consequences and the fact that repatriation will never be possible. He will then commit suicide because of the realisation of the depths to which he has fallen. Heinlein is arguing that anything less than suicide at this point would indicate that rehabilitation has not yet worked. True rehabilitation will result in despair.
What about the alternative. What if he cannot be "cured" regardless of the time and/or money invested in rehabilitation. Then the problem becomes one of collective responsibility. He is not human - he has proven that already - he is no more than a wild animal (otherwise we could rehabilitate him). If he is not confined in a cage for life he will do it again and next time he will be blameless. It will be our fault for allowing him the opportunity to repeat the performance when we knew he was not capable of self-restraint.
Heinlein also addresses the question of deterrence. Does putting fruitcake to death act as a deterrent? Yesterday some old chook, was waffling on the radio about how it would not stop the same thing happening again. With all due respect it does provide exactly that guarantee. Killing this fruitcake will absolutely prevent THIS fruitcake from doing it again. Other fruitcakes are a different story but note the Darwinian solution at work. I expect that we will run out of mass-murdering fruitcakes at some point in time.
Think seriously about those points for a moment. You do not have to accept it verbatim and tehre are some flaws in the logic but the fundamental point is this - if you want fruitcake to live - are you prepared to personally accept responsibility for it not happening again?
No liberal namby pamby excuses here. Put your name on the line. You know what he is capable of doing. You know he has no regrets. You know he will do it again if he can. Will you, personally, bear the responsibility of ensuring that it does not happen again? I am very serious here.
Lets imagine his sentence is commuted because YOU asked for it. He escapes and does it again in a crowded place like Sydney. My wife or my children are killed. Do you know who I will blame? YOU! Unlike Mr Fruitcake, I would not turn into a suicide bomber or blow up a hotel. I would come after YOU personally. YOU decided to let him live. YOU overrode the rules of the country that convicted him. YOU took the responsibility on yourself and YOU will pay.
Posted by Ozguru at August 11, 2003 12:08 PM
Comments
Posted by: Jivha at August 11, 2003 12:08 PM
Posted by: ozguru at August 11, 2003 12:08 PM
Posted by: Paul Jané at August 11, 2003 12:08 PM
Posted by: Gday Mate - Archive at August 11, 2003 12:08 PM
