Intolerant Justice. The London Riots Part Three

part one     part two   

If we think back just a month, the most common phrase coming from the lips of the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom was "second chance."

"...but I believe in giving people a second chance..."

"I decided to give him a second chance," David Cameron said about his former close advisor and press officer Andy Coulson on July 8, 2011, explaining his judicial philosophy, "with a single, often repeated phrase" (in the words of the Guardian).

Wanted? Looting of £7,000 from House of
Commons expenses fund. You might look for
him around No. 10 Downing Street.

And there is no reason to doubt the Prime Minister's sincerity. He himself had chosen to give himself "a second chance" rather than resigning when he was caught pocketing £20,000 he had no right to take in the "expenses scandal" of 2009 (as a young man Mr. Cameron escaped punishment for smashing a shop window... apparently no one drove a truck around with his photos on it... so this might be Cameron's "third chance"). And in Cameron's cabinet, his Secretary of State for Education Michael Gove is in his "second chance" after taking £7,000 he was not entitled to, and Jeremy Hunt, the Secretary of State for Culture, Olympics, Media, and Sport, also in his "second chance" after stealing £22,000 and then agreeing to give back half of that.

Even Cameron's favourite cop, Bill Bratton, late of the LAPD, is on - at least - his "second chance," having resigned after just two years as New York's Police Commissioner in 1996 for accepting outside income, and trips and gifts from corporations, which public employees are not permitted to accept. (This makes him perfect, in many ways, for this Tory cabinet.)

But, oh, times change... or maybe, lawbreakers get less wealthy and even less white, and just 36 days letter, in an interview with the Telegraph, Mr. Cameron sounds quite different:

"He pledges to support “zero tolerance” — a tough system of policing first popularised in the US which sees even minor offences prosecuted vigorously to send out the message that no form of law-breaking will be tolerated.

'“I will be saying much more about that because I think it is true,” Mr Cameron says. “We haven’t talked the language of zero tolerance enough but the message is getting through."' 

"Zero Tolerance." It is truly hard to imagine that any reasonably raised human would utter this phrase when not speaking of, say, rape, murder, child molestation - behaviors of that kind of extreme immorality. And yet, it has been a favorite term, this month, of the British Prime Minister, and over a lot of years, that ex-Los Angeles Police Chief, ex-New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani, and way too many school administrators. Which is odd, because we are supposed to be tolerant societies.

"Constitutionally," in quotes because it is notoriously tough to pin down British constitutional law, the Anglo world believes in tolerant justice. Courtrooms have been filled, forever, with "guilty with an explanation," "affirmative defenses," "jury nullification," and people set free because of government/police misconduct in criminal investigations and prosecutions. We often let juries pick between higher and lesser charges, say, burglary and trespassing, or murder and manslaughter. And there is a centuries long tradition of judges sentencing those convicted based on a whole range of information about the defendant, the crime, the victims, the circumstances.

We developed these strategies because almost nothing about human behavior is 'black and white.' It makes a difference if you murder your abusive husband or kill your spouse for money. It makes a difference if you bring a knife to school because you are terrified, or if you bring a knife to school to terrify others.

Yet, this week, the Prime Minister continues to see intolerant justice as the model. "David Cameron," noted the Guardian, "who last week promised severe punishments for rioters, saying he hoped courts would use "exemplary" sentences to deter future riots, praised the sentencing decisions, which have included two jailed for four years each for inciting riots on Facebook – riots that never took place – and one person sent to prison for six months for stealing £3.50 worth of water. Asked about the Facebook case, the prime minister said: "They decided in that court to send a tough message and I think it's very good that courts are able to do that."'

And this echoes the pathetic "we're too stupid to make rational decisions" arguments from right-wing think tanks a decade ago. "More zero-tolerance policies run amok?" asked Manhattan Institute scholar Kay S. Hymowitz in 2001, when many schools were rushing to adopt "zero tolerance discipline," "It doesn't seem like it. Jeanne Milstein, child advocate for the State of Connecticut, says that her office had received many reports about "out of control" tots hitting, biting and throwing things in inner-city and suburban schools. Though there's little solid data, Kristie Kauerz, an official at the Education Commission of the States, claims that there's enough anecdotal evidence to conclude that a growing number of unmanageable babes is now a nationwide trend. In the end, zero tolerance may be more symptom than cure for the uneasy disciplinary climate of our schools. Certainly it's no final answer to out-of-control 5-year-olds or revenge-crazed teenagers. But as the threats continue and the bombs and guns appear, it's all we've got."

"Anecdotal evidence," "out-of-control 5-year-olds," "revenge-crazed teenagers," "slow-motion moral collapse," "Children without fathers. Schools without discipline. Reward without effort. Crime without punishment. Rights without responsibilities. Communities without control." It sure does sound might dangerous out there. If we don't have "zero tolerance" "the bombs and [the] guns appear," or the riots will come to your street next.

But, of course, here is the problem. "Zero Tolerance" does not work. Policing based on it does not work. Schools which use it as a discipline system do not solve their problems. If you enter '"Zero Tolerance" education" into Google Scholar you will find scores of pages of studies detailing these facts. If you dig into Bill Bratton's short tenure at the NYPD you will probably find that the introduction of more than 5,000 extra police officers - paid for by the Clinton Administration - during Bratton's tenure (plus another 5,000 additional cops in the next three years), and an improving New York City economy, surely had more impact on crime rates than the Giuliani/Bratton system of arresting black kids for loitering and violating their constitutional rights with illegal searches.

What intolerant justice does is teach people that there is no justice at all. Students learn that justice systems are unfair and cannot be trusted. Their own schools teach them that government and those in power aren't smart enough to figure things out logically.

What intolerant justice does is teach those at the bottom of society's hierarchy that they have no stake in that society, that they are not apart of it in any way. You think people didn't respect the British government and its traditions back in July? Wait till they see the way this kid was treated for steal a £3.50 case of water while Cameron's friend Andy Coulson got his "second chance."

One of our jobs, in education or in political leadership, is to bring people in, to let them understand why it benefits all of us if they join our society, if they share our community with us. "Zero Tolerance," intolerance, tells kids, tells everyone, just the opposite.

If anyone is sending that message, they should stop now.

- Ira Socol

Raising amoral children... The London Riots Part One

I'll begin by saying that, in some ways, once a cop, always a cop. I watch the scenes in London, in Birmingham, in Liverpool and I want to go find a uniform and go after people with so little regard for their neighbors, their communities, their families. I imagine myself helping to at least compare photographs and identifying those so that they can be hauled out of their homes and brought to court.

And as I do this, I wonder. Hell, most animals are born with community sensibilities. I've spent a bunch of this year watching the eagles in Decorah, Iowa raise their children. I've watched my dog keep careful watch over our grand-nephew as he sleeps. I've watched swans negotiate territory on a frozen winter lake. So I cannot imagine - perhaps because I am not a Calvinist - that people are born bad. Somehow, they are made bad. They are taught to be bad.

"You've got to be carefully taught."

This week Nathaniel Tapley wrote, "Dear Mr. & Mrs. Cameron, Why did you never take the time to teach your child basic morality?" And in doing so, he taps into the basic, essential question of our time. How have we raised so many who are completely amoral? And he taps into the essential facts, since the 1980s the Anglo-Saxon world in particular, has revelled in amoral leadership. We have created a nightmare which is now just beginning to unfold.


For, argue all you might, but I felt exactly the same watching the riots unfold as I did watching Rebekah Brooks and James Murdoch in front of Parliament, as I did watching Republicans in the US Congress during the "Debt Limit" debate, as I have watching American Governors Scott Walker, Rick Snyder, Rick Scott, and Chris Christie perform "their jobs." In each case I stare at the television or computer and ask, "On what planet were such venal people raised?" "How does any human reach even adolescence not knowing anything of the difference between right and wrong?"

Is there a difference between the ways of stealing from the poor to enrich yourself and your friends... even if you don't need anything you took? Is Michael Gove, the UK's Minister for Education, less culpable for stealing £7,000 than any looter smashing a shop window? Is Michigan Governor Rick Snyder, shutting off housing support for the poor so that Dow Chemical can pay less taxes really any different than the rioter setting fire to a home? Is US House Majority Leader Eric Cantor, as he cuts health benefits for children (which will inevitably cause deaths), any different than the Audi driving morons who ran over three men in Birmingham last night?

Well, those elected leaders will not have gotten their own hands dirty in their vicious, amoral acts, but otherwise... ?

It is a rare leader, who other than late in life and wondering if the tales of Hell are true, will admit to moral equivalency. "LeMay said, "If we'd lost the war, we'd all have been prosecuted as war criminals," said former US Secretary of Defense and World War II bombing planner Robert McNamara in Errol Morris's film The Fog of War. "And I think he's right. He, and I'd say I, were behaving as war criminals. LeMay recognized that what he was doing would be thought immoral if his side had lost. But what makes it immoral if you lose and not immoral if you win?"

"We chose to burn hundreds of thousands of men, women, and children."

What makes it immoral if you're poor but not if you're rich? Would be the version of that question to be asked today.

Michael White in the Guardian: "What we are seeing here, by general consent, is an urban underclass with little or no sense of a stake in society, few ties to their local communities or, very probably, to each other in their feral, fragmented families. "Darren, where did you get those three new bikes?" "Shurrup, mum, I'm listening to me new iPhone."

"Liberals can legitimately point to their marginalisation in the workforce and at school (some of these kids can barely speak proper English), in part the consequences of globalising economic forces and the evaporation of low-skilled jobs.

"Social conservatives can point to the collapse of family and discipline, happily unaware that capitalism can be pretty devastating to all but the strongest families, both in terms of depressed wage rates and raised expectations."

My US Representative, Bill Huizenga,
consistently votes against the best
interests of his district because he gets
his pay offs from Wall Street.

"...with little or no sense of a stake in society, few ties to their local communities or, very probably, to each other in their feral, fragmented families." This is true of an underclass, especially in America and the United Kingdom which have, via tax and social spending structures since the arrival of Reagan and Thatcher, shut the door on social mobility. But it is also a very true description of our American and British corporations, and those who run them, as well as the politicians who lead both nations. No member of the "Tea Party," or even the Republican Party as a whole, worries about local support or local contributions or even local campaign workers. If they vote the right way their campaign coffers will be filled by the Koch Brothers and NewsCorp and other super-rich groups, which will also make their television ads for them, and pay for their vacations and homes in Washington, and will guarantee them jobs if they happen to find themselves unelected. They indeed have, "few ties to their local communities," and their only "stake in society" is to profit from it.

What if we look at corporations, HSBC, one of the UK's biggest banks, just announced both greatly improved profits and the lay offs of over 30,000 employees. "...few ties to their local communities or, very probably, to each other." Michigan's Governor Rick Snyder, took over the Gateway Computer Corporation, fired all the workers, sold the name to a Taiwanese competitor, and pockets a hundred million or so for his efforts. "...with little or no sense of a stake in society." We need not look far to find a thousand more examples.

And all we had to do was to watch NewsCorp executive after NewsCorp executive throw their friends and associates under very large Routemaster buses, or see David Cameron's dismissive response to his own party's Mayor of London, to understand, "or, very probably, to each other in their feral, fragmented families."

All this, which our societies in their rush for wealth at all costs have allowed to happen to those born both rich and poor, simply sets the stage, however. Humans do not grow naturally to attack their own, this is taught.

It is taught to children, rich and poor by "role models," from parents up to priests, presidents, and prime ministers, who demonstrate that it is not only "all right" to abuse others, but personally profitable. It is all right, say many a wealthy parent, to cut off aid to the poor so our family can save a buck or a quid a week in taxes. It is all right, say too many poor parents, to take advantage of others because we are taken advantage of. It is all right, says the American Catholic Church, to ask our members to vote based on abortion and not health care for children. It is all right, say many American church ministers, for people to abuse Christ's words to get our support. It is all right, school leaders say, to forge and fake test results so we can get higher personal bonuses - and our Secretary of Education sees that as no big deal. It is all right, say British members of Parliament for us to lie and steal thousands of pounds as long as we apologize for it. It is all right, say too many rabbis, for the Israeli government to abuse Palestinians because Jews were once abused. It is all right, say many in homes, churches, schools, and newsrooms across the US and UK if innocents die in Iraq and Afghanistan because, "we were attacked, and we must be made safe." It is all right, say our "left wing" Presidents and Prime Ministers, if we do not stand up vigorously for what is right, because "politics is only about what is possible."

Where, oh where, might our children get the wrong idea?

NewsCorp: "We only do completely illegal things within the law."

After watching the absurdness of the US government during the "debt limit" debate, I suggested on Twitter that we make John F. Kennedy's book Profiles in Couragerequired reading in our schools this year.

I suggest it because it is about time that our schools begin to teach a counter-narrative to the past 30 years. That we begin to help students learn that humans are social animals, and that the health of the human community is dependent on the health of all those who are in that community. That we begin to help students understand that no human survives alone, or pulls themselves up by their bootstraps, but that we are all interdependent, and that we all have benefitted, and continue to benefit, enormously from the efforts of all those who have come before, and who live beside us.

But more than that, we have to begin to help our children understand that morality is not something chanted on a Sunday morning, but rather something courageously lived. That just as someone in David Cameron's cabinet, or the Republican caucus in Washington, needs to have the guts to act in the best interests of humanity, someone in each of those groups of rioters in London needed to have the guts to say "no."

And we have to begin to raise the next generation to believe that courage has rewards beyond a lobbyists job till retirement, a bigger vacation home, or a new pair of trainers...

This is work we must begin.

- Ira Socol