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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsWhat Does It Say About America That We Jail Teens for Having Sex or Being Late to School?
http://www.alternet.org/story/155747/what_does_it_say_about_america_that_we_jail_teens_for_having_sex_or_being_late_to_school_/_310x220
Last week, the country was riveted by the story of young Diane Tran, a high school junior age 17, who was tossed in jail for a night because she was missing too much school.
The reason her case attracted so much attention? Tran missed those days of school--or arrived late--due to exhaustion. She worked two jobs to help support her siblings. Her parents had split and moved out of town. She became, in essence, a poster-girl for both the recession and for the criminalization of youth. Even those local newscasters expected to be dispassionate were moved to say their "hearts went out" to this girl.
One of Tran's employers is a wedding planning business, which she assists and whose owners house her with her parents out of town. The other is a full-time job at a dry cleaning store. Her third job, then, is going to school, where she is enrolled in several AP and honors classes, but missed 18 days. After a previous warning, a judge decided that a night in jail would teach her a lesson. He didn't see why people were kicking up such a fuss. "A little stay in the jail for one night is not a death sentence," the judge told the same local news channel.
But then thousands of people around the world read the headline variations on "honors student goes to jail" and began expressing their support--with their voices and their wallets, signing a petition and contributing to a fund for Tran.
At last, the judge in the case agreed to dismiss the contempt charges he had leveled at Tran. News sources reported that with paperwork, she can have her record expunged.
midnight
(26,624 posts)KG
(28,753 posts)RKP5637
(67,112 posts)going away and we have more narrowed freedom and rights every day. Yes, we have the most imprisoned number of people, conduct the most wars and kill the greatest number of people. Very telling.
liberalnationalist
(170 posts)more and more of a facist police state day by day...but somehow this fact does not bother half the people watching to much tv.
Initech
(100,104 posts)Private prison corporations and juvenile detention centers are the symptom of a truly sick society and nowhere on earth should they be legal.
DainBramaged
(39,191 posts)assholes both
randome
(34,845 posts)It says nothing about America. The responsibility rests squarely on the shoulders of the two people you mentioned. They should be held accountable.
JoeyT
(6,785 posts)Last I checked judges and principals aren't picked randomly from the population.
The former was either elected or appointed and the latter was hired. I'd guess the judge is probably elected. The "Tough on crime" bullshit usually plays well in elections. What's a huge statement about America is if this judge is elected, he'll probably be reelected.
dotymed
(5,610 posts)and 25% of the worlds prisoners, it speaks volumes about our freedoms.
sky imager
(36 posts)RKP5637
(67,112 posts)Iliyah
(25,111 posts)of the country.
treestar
(82,383 posts)We look at everything as needing punishment and require perfection.
randome
(34,845 posts)treestar
(82,383 posts)It's either a person broke the law or not and people refuse to recognize that it's not always a clear line. Somehow a law in Texas allows jail for not going to school and no one thought of this type of circumstance - it was just assumed it would be a misbehaving kid just refusing to go and having a lark outside the school - lack of imagination and either/or thinking, exactly.
liberalnationalist
(170 posts)are purient and puritanical at the same time....talk about "doublethink" because we are living in the era...there is no excuse for it, but its here, and it looks as if it is here to stay unless we have some sort of mass awakening
freshwest
(53,661 posts)craigmatic
(4,510 posts)sabrina 1
(62,325 posts)else. It's not a new concept, trading in human beings, it's a new way to go about it.
Our exploding prison population is a shameful tribute to the system we now live under. And testimony to the apathy of the American people, making them easy targets for the scam artists who run the scam normally referred to as 'Capitalism'.
All 'isms' eventually fail. I liked the original concept of what this country was aspiring to be. But it was taken over and not without the assistance of the people themselves who were lured by the promises of wealth and power, without asking the questions about what it would cost, in terms of human rights.
malaise
(269,187 posts)It says someone is getting real rich off these youngsters.
RKP5637
(67,112 posts)care about people in the US anymore by many of TPTB. Only what makes money counts in USA, Inc. What a shame. As another poster said, "America is circling the drain."
ManyShadesOf
(639 posts)Posteritatis
(18,807 posts)ManyShadesOf
(639 posts)hughee99
(16,113 posts)how people can go to jail (or maybe be let off "light" with a caning and no jail time) in many countries for very minor offenses, or even for no reason at all, but that's not really the point.
Instead, lets take a very specific and rather unique situation and use it to characterize the whole country. That's a lot more fun. The fact that this case attracted so much attention is proof that it's NOT the norm, and you should probably be cautious about trying to draw general conclusions about America from it, or you are likely to be wrong.
AJTheMan
(288 posts)I find it absurd that if someone is 18 and they have a girlfriend or boyfriend who is 16, they will go to jail and be forever labeled a sex offender. I've heard stories of people who, after leaving jail, cannot find jobs because of that label. I just think it's dumb that teens are going to jail for this.