For once, my old home state of Louisiana is about to be on the cutting edge of an issue. Who knew?
In July, a new law will take effect that will require all registered sex offenders in the state to indicate their status on Facebook and other forms of social media. While this might sound draconian and unfair to civil libertarians, I believe the state is doing exactly the right thing to protect its children.
This isn't an easy question to answer, whether sex offenders should be required to identify themselves on social media. A very strong argument could be made that the law is unconstitutional because it amounts to double jeopardy. Under this argument, once a sex offender pays his debt to society, he should be free to carry on with his life, not be continually penalized because of one past mistake. Under most circumstances, I would find myself firmly in this camp. I do believe criminals can be successfully rehabilitated, and I believe once most criminals are out of prison, they are entitled to a second chance to become a productive member of society. Not this time.
The problem with sex offenders is that they don't get better. Sex crimes -- rape and pedophilia -- aren't like other crimes. They aren't motivated by financial gain. They aren't crimes of passion. Sex crimes are cold and calculating. They are motivated by one thing -- power. Pedophiles especially are mentally ill. Simply locking them away isn't enough. Without the proper intervention and intensive therapy, they are almost guaranteed to re-offend upon their release. Numerous studies have proven it.
Requiring registered sex offenders to reveal themselves on social media might sound like unfair double jeopardy. It might seem like we're preventing the offender from being able to move forward with his life. But the fact is, lots of kids use Facebook every day (despite a prohibition against minors having accounts). Today's busy parents don't always have time to closely monitor their kids' online activity. So anything the state can do to make that important job easier is welcome.
Friday, June 22, 2012
Friday, June 15, 2012
And now, for something completely different
This is usually a strictly political blog, about strictly political issues. Every once in awhile, though, I like to address topics that stray from that strict template, things that make me stop and think. This is one of those times. This morning, I was on my friend Jason Tippitt's blog, "State of Formation," which addresses contemporary religious issues from a humanist perspective. On it, he asked the question, "If I could give my 12-year-old self advice based on what I've learned about life so far, what would I tell him?" That's an intriguing question, and one I thought I might attempt to answer. So what advice would I give my 12-year-old self if I had the chance?
1. Life ISN'T fair: This is probably the single hardest lesson each of us has to learn for ourselves. I remember my father telling me as a child that if I worked hard and made good decisions, good things would come to me. He was right, to a point. Good things come to those who work hard and do the right things. But it's also true that bad things happen to good people, sometimes for no apparent reason. Our parents die unexpectedly. We're laid off from our job after years of loyal service with the same company. Our spouses and friends hurt us. Sometimes marriages end, despite our best efforts. Is any of this fair? No. But these things are part of life. The sooner we accept this basic truth, the sooner we can begin the healing process and move forward.
When bad things happen, it's very easy to succumb to the temptation to curl up and pull the proverbial covers over our head. But the truth is, it's how we respond to life's road blocks that determines what kind of person we really are. Quitting never accomplishes anything. It doesn't solve the problem, and it only hurts us in the end. Life can be painful, but if we take it one minute, one second, at a time and stay focused on moving forward, we are almost guaranteed to find something better on the other side of the problem.
2. When it comes to choosing a career, follow your dreams and do something that makes you happy: Your average working career is about 30 years, and it's getting longer every day. That's a long time to be doing something you hate. Never allow anyone to talk you out of your dream. When I graduated from high school, I wanted to major in music, with a concentration in vocal performance. Unfortunately, my father didn't like that choice, and he told me that he wouldn't pay for me to get my degree if I pursued that major. Lacking any other means for paying for college myself, I reluctantly chose something else. I love journalism, but I've always wondered what might have happened if I had pursued my first dream.
When it comes to choosing a career, remember that money and position aren't everything. They're not even the most important thing. I've known too many people who have advanced in their careers to the point that they're not even doing the things they love most anymore, those things that made them want that career in the first place. Stick with doing those things you love, and you'll always find happiness.
3. Choose your friends carefully: What is a friend? A friend is someone who loves you and accepts you for who YOU are, not who they wish you were. A friend is someone you can share with. Someone you can laugh with. Someone you can cry with. A friend is someone who is there for you, in good times and bad. A friend is someone who will tell you what you NEED to hear, not just what you WANT to hear. A friend always has your best interest at heart.
A friend will never try to change who you are to suit their own needs. A friend will never pressure you to do something dangerous, or something you know to be wrong. If you're friends with someone who does either of these things, guess what? They're not your friend.
4. Don't be afraid to open yourself up to love: Love is truly a double-edged sword. As wonderful as it feels to be in love for the first time, it also can be devastating if the relationship doesn't work out. That kind of pain is just part of life. Don't give up on love after your first failure. As much as it hurts initially, it will get better if you just keep focused on the future. Remember that God never intended for us to be alone. He created someone for everyone, and you can find that person, if only you're patient. When you find that love, don't be afraid to love with your whole heart and soul. It's a huge risk making yourself vulnerable to someone like that. But the rewards are totally worth it.
5. Don't judge someone based on their appearance. Judge them based on their actions: In other words, don't pass judgment on someone until you "walk a mile in their shoes," as the old saying goes. Keep an open mind and get to know someone before passing judgment. You'll often find friends in the most unlikely of places, and you might learn some things, to boot. Bottom line here is, "Treat others as you would like to be treated." If you keep this as your guiding principle, you can't go wrong.
1. Life ISN'T fair: This is probably the single hardest lesson each of us has to learn for ourselves. I remember my father telling me as a child that if I worked hard and made good decisions, good things would come to me. He was right, to a point. Good things come to those who work hard and do the right things. But it's also true that bad things happen to good people, sometimes for no apparent reason. Our parents die unexpectedly. We're laid off from our job after years of loyal service with the same company. Our spouses and friends hurt us. Sometimes marriages end, despite our best efforts. Is any of this fair? No. But these things are part of life. The sooner we accept this basic truth, the sooner we can begin the healing process and move forward.
When bad things happen, it's very easy to succumb to the temptation to curl up and pull the proverbial covers over our head. But the truth is, it's how we respond to life's road blocks that determines what kind of person we really are. Quitting never accomplishes anything. It doesn't solve the problem, and it only hurts us in the end. Life can be painful, but if we take it one minute, one second, at a time and stay focused on moving forward, we are almost guaranteed to find something better on the other side of the problem.
2. When it comes to choosing a career, follow your dreams and do something that makes you happy: Your average working career is about 30 years, and it's getting longer every day. That's a long time to be doing something you hate. Never allow anyone to talk you out of your dream. When I graduated from high school, I wanted to major in music, with a concentration in vocal performance. Unfortunately, my father didn't like that choice, and he told me that he wouldn't pay for me to get my degree if I pursued that major. Lacking any other means for paying for college myself, I reluctantly chose something else. I love journalism, but I've always wondered what might have happened if I had pursued my first dream.
When it comes to choosing a career, remember that money and position aren't everything. They're not even the most important thing. I've known too many people who have advanced in their careers to the point that they're not even doing the things they love most anymore, those things that made them want that career in the first place. Stick with doing those things you love, and you'll always find happiness.
3. Choose your friends carefully: What is a friend? A friend is someone who loves you and accepts you for who YOU are, not who they wish you were. A friend is someone you can share with. Someone you can laugh with. Someone you can cry with. A friend is someone who is there for you, in good times and bad. A friend is someone who will tell you what you NEED to hear, not just what you WANT to hear. A friend always has your best interest at heart.
A friend will never try to change who you are to suit their own needs. A friend will never pressure you to do something dangerous, or something you know to be wrong. If you're friends with someone who does either of these things, guess what? They're not your friend.
4. Don't be afraid to open yourself up to love: Love is truly a double-edged sword. As wonderful as it feels to be in love for the first time, it also can be devastating if the relationship doesn't work out. That kind of pain is just part of life. Don't give up on love after your first failure. As much as it hurts initially, it will get better if you just keep focused on the future. Remember that God never intended for us to be alone. He created someone for everyone, and you can find that person, if only you're patient. When you find that love, don't be afraid to love with your whole heart and soul. It's a huge risk making yourself vulnerable to someone like that. But the rewards are totally worth it.
5. Don't judge someone based on their appearance. Judge them based on their actions: In other words, don't pass judgment on someone until you "walk a mile in their shoes," as the old saying goes. Keep an open mind and get to know someone before passing judgment. You'll often find friends in the most unlikely of places, and you might learn some things, to boot. Bottom line here is, "Treat others as you would like to be treated." If you keep this as your guiding principle, you can't go wrong.
Thursday, June 7, 2012
A new take on an age-old issue
Every so often, I like to do a Google check on myself to see what I can find. As a former journalist, it's always interesting to see where my old columns have ended up. Earlier this week, I did such a check, and discovered, much to my amusement and disgust, that at least one column, written in 2008, was picked up by a white-supremacist Web site.
The column in question was in response to an attempted assassination plot against then-presidential candidate Barack Obama by two Neo-Nazi skinheads. One skinhead was from Bells, Tenn., just one county over from my former hometown of Jackson. The other, from West Helena, Ark. At the time, I was attempting to discern what could cause two otherwise quiet, respectful youths (by all accounts from their friends and family) to develop such hate for other races. Like any good journalist, I was attempting to mine what lessons I could from the failed plot.
It's been almost four years since that column first appeared in The Jackson Sun. And after re-reading it (along with the hilarious editorial comments added by the forum poster), I decided to revisit the issue of what exactly goes into creating a racist.
I have always believed that humans are innately good. They aren't born evil. Evil and hatred are learned behaviors. So evil and hatred are taught at a parent's knee from a very early age. What a parent believes, a child is likely to reflect, to adopt as his or her own belief.
Another reason people adopt racist philosophies is because of the very human need to belong. Many racists (but not all) come from broken homes. They're angry. They believe the world has turned its back on them and that they're being unfairly kept from succeeding. So, instead of picking themselves up and working hard to change their situation, they gravitate to other angry people who share their beliefs. They are seduced by people, and groups, that offer easy answers. "It's not your fault your life hasn't worked out the way your want it," they are told. "Blame the (insert racial or ethnic group here.) It's all THEIR fault." By joining with these people and groups, the nascent racist is able to relieve him or herself of any personal responsibility for the state of their life. They are able to feel a sense of belonging, a sense of family, they might otherwise be missing.
Here's the thing, though. That sense of family and belonging is based on a lie. Groups such as the Ku Klux Klan, the Aryan Brotherhood and the Supreme White Alliance (the group our two skinheads belonged to) aren't based on love and acceptance (the two things our nascent racist is seeking). They are founded on the principles of hatred and exclusivity.
These groups aren't Christian, no matter how they like to present themselves. Here's a dose of reality. Jesus was NOT white, blond-haired and blue-eyed. He was Middle-Eastern, meaning he was olive-skinned. In reality, he was closer to black than white.
Jesus never preached hatred toward our fellow man. Read the Gospels, and you'll find that he often associated with, even ate with, sinners and social outcasts. He healed lepers. When he left the disciples to return to heaven, he told his followers to "Go ye therefore and make disciples of ALL men" (Matthew 28). How does any of that fit into the racist's view of a "white, Christian America?" It doesn't.
The bottom line is, racists are created, not born. It's up to this generation to teach the next not to hate. Parents, teach your children to look at others with colorblind eyes. Teach them to judge others based not on their skin color or ethnicity, but on the "content of their character," to quote Dr. King. Teach your children to take responsibility for their own lives and their own successes or failures. Racism is the easy way out, the coward's way out. Life isn't easy or fair. The sooner we teach our children that simple fact and give them the tools to succeed, the sooner America can live up to its full potential and become what it was always meant to be: a land of opportunity for everyone who cares to dream and to work hard to achieve it.
The column in question was in response to an attempted assassination plot against then-presidential candidate Barack Obama by two Neo-Nazi skinheads. One skinhead was from Bells, Tenn., just one county over from my former hometown of Jackson. The other, from West Helena, Ark. At the time, I was attempting to discern what could cause two otherwise quiet, respectful youths (by all accounts from their friends and family) to develop such hate for other races. Like any good journalist, I was attempting to mine what lessons I could from the failed plot.
It's been almost four years since that column first appeared in The Jackson Sun. And after re-reading it (along with the hilarious editorial comments added by the forum poster), I decided to revisit the issue of what exactly goes into creating a racist.
I have always believed that humans are innately good. They aren't born evil. Evil and hatred are learned behaviors. So evil and hatred are taught at a parent's knee from a very early age. What a parent believes, a child is likely to reflect, to adopt as his or her own belief.
Another reason people adopt racist philosophies is because of the very human need to belong. Many racists (but not all) come from broken homes. They're angry. They believe the world has turned its back on them and that they're being unfairly kept from succeeding. So, instead of picking themselves up and working hard to change their situation, they gravitate to other angry people who share their beliefs. They are seduced by people, and groups, that offer easy answers. "It's not your fault your life hasn't worked out the way your want it," they are told. "Blame the (insert racial or ethnic group here.) It's all THEIR fault." By joining with these people and groups, the nascent racist is able to relieve him or herself of any personal responsibility for the state of their life. They are able to feel a sense of belonging, a sense of family, they might otherwise be missing.
Here's the thing, though. That sense of family and belonging is based on a lie. Groups such as the Ku Klux Klan, the Aryan Brotherhood and the Supreme White Alliance (the group our two skinheads belonged to) aren't based on love and acceptance (the two things our nascent racist is seeking). They are founded on the principles of hatred and exclusivity.
These groups aren't Christian, no matter how they like to present themselves. Here's a dose of reality. Jesus was NOT white, blond-haired and blue-eyed. He was Middle-Eastern, meaning he was olive-skinned. In reality, he was closer to black than white.
Jesus never preached hatred toward our fellow man. Read the Gospels, and you'll find that he often associated with, even ate with, sinners and social outcasts. He healed lepers. When he left the disciples to return to heaven, he told his followers to "Go ye therefore and make disciples of ALL men" (Matthew 28). How does any of that fit into the racist's view of a "white, Christian America?" It doesn't.
The bottom line is, racists are created, not born. It's up to this generation to teach the next not to hate. Parents, teach your children to look at others with colorblind eyes. Teach them to judge others based not on their skin color or ethnicity, but on the "content of their character," to quote Dr. King. Teach your children to take responsibility for their own lives and their own successes or failures. Racism is the easy way out, the coward's way out. Life isn't easy or fair. The sooner we teach our children that simple fact and give them the tools to succeed, the sooner America can live up to its full potential and become what it was always meant to be: a land of opportunity for everyone who cares to dream and to work hard to achieve it.
Wednesday, June 6, 2012
A day we can't afford to forget
Today marks the 68th anniversary of the Allied invasion of Normandy during World War II. Commonly remembered as "D-Day," the Allied victory here spelled the beginning of the end for the Nazis. Less than a year later, on May 8, 1945, Germany surrendered, putting an end to the European portion of the war. Japan surrendered just three months later, following the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
In the decades following the end of World War II, certain dates have become famous. Each year, veterans from that war stop to remember Dec. 7, 1941, which marks the Japanese bombing of Pearl Harbor, the singular event that finally brought America into the war. They also pause to remember today with great pomp and ceremony, and they call on this, and future, generations never to forget the importance of these increasingly distant anniversaries.
The pleas to remember these days are much more than the simple reminisces of aging veterans from America's "Greatest Generation." These aging warriors are right that we shouldn't forget about these important days in our nation's history. We can't afford to.
To forget about D-Day, to relegate it to just another footnote in our history, would be the ultimate slap in the face to those veterans who died in the invasion. And it would be a slap in the face to those who survived.
D-Day was, and remains, the single largest amphibious invasion the world has ever seen. More than 160,000 Allied troops participated, and more than 10,000 died in the effort. What they accomplished with Operation Overlord changed the course of the war by breaking the back of the Nazi regime. Ultimately, what they accomplished changed the course of world history. That sacrifice, and that accomplishment, deserves to be remembered.
Forgetting D-Day means forgetting those hard-fought lessons taught by the war. World War II let us see, perhaps for the first time in modern history, the face of pure evil in Adolph Hitler. It taught us that we cannot afford to simply turn away from that evil. No matter how heinous, it must be confronted and ultimately dealt with. And it illustrated, in horrific terms through Hitler's concentration camps, the ultimate result of bigotry and hatred when left unchecked.
Thousands of Americans fought and died so that we might learn those harsh realities, and we shouldn't let that sacrifice be in vain. Today, we should stop and reflect on those lessons learned more than a half century ago. We should find a veteran (of any war) and say "thank you" for their willingness to sacrifice to keep our nation free. And we should take the time to begin teaching the next generation those important lessons that the "Greatest Generation" has taught us.
In the decades following the end of World War II, certain dates have become famous. Each year, veterans from that war stop to remember Dec. 7, 1941, which marks the Japanese bombing of Pearl Harbor, the singular event that finally brought America into the war. They also pause to remember today with great pomp and ceremony, and they call on this, and future, generations never to forget the importance of these increasingly distant anniversaries.
The pleas to remember these days are much more than the simple reminisces of aging veterans from America's "Greatest Generation." These aging warriors are right that we shouldn't forget about these important days in our nation's history. We can't afford to.
To forget about D-Day, to relegate it to just another footnote in our history, would be the ultimate slap in the face to those veterans who died in the invasion. And it would be a slap in the face to those who survived.
D-Day was, and remains, the single largest amphibious invasion the world has ever seen. More than 160,000 Allied troops participated, and more than 10,000 died in the effort. What they accomplished with Operation Overlord changed the course of the war by breaking the back of the Nazi regime. Ultimately, what they accomplished changed the course of world history. That sacrifice, and that accomplishment, deserves to be remembered.
Forgetting D-Day means forgetting those hard-fought lessons taught by the war. World War II let us see, perhaps for the first time in modern history, the face of pure evil in Adolph Hitler. It taught us that we cannot afford to simply turn away from that evil. No matter how heinous, it must be confronted and ultimately dealt with. And it illustrated, in horrific terms through Hitler's concentration camps, the ultimate result of bigotry and hatred when left unchecked.
Thousands of Americans fought and died so that we might learn those harsh realities, and we shouldn't let that sacrifice be in vain. Today, we should stop and reflect on those lessons learned more than a half century ago. We should find a veteran (of any war) and say "thank you" for their willingness to sacrifice to keep our nation free. And we should take the time to begin teaching the next generation those important lessons that the "Greatest Generation" has taught us.
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