Hardly a disorder so much as an empirical observation that people like them get away with everything.
This is a good argument for much more heavily taxing the rich: to save their children from the scourge of affluenza, and also to make the highways safer.
The insane part is where it crossed over from being an observation that they get away with everything and turned into an argument that he should also be allowed to get away with this thing; because the poor dear has always gotten away with everything in the past.
The obvservation, while unfortunate, is unimpeachable. The argument is insanity. Apropos of the caseâŚ
http://www.theonion.com/video/judge-rules-white-girl-will-be-tried-as-black-adul,18896/
Yes, exactly, you put that just right.
The thing is that they are right, it makes sense that the privileged rich white kids should be helped, not punished. What doesnât make sense is that the unprivileged who commit crimes should be punished, not helped.
Seconded. Restorative justice FTW!
Seems to me that someone must be at fault. Shouldnât the parents be held accountable for allowing their children to âsufferâ from affluenza? I mean. . . if a kid is beaten, kept in a closet, and only fed sporadically, the parents are charged with neglect. And if an owner allows a vicious dog to roam free he/she is charged with misdemeanor (or worse if the dog mauls someone), so if the kids are not at fault then clearly the parents are.
If affluenza is an allowable defense then it seems that any use of it would need to involve punishing the parents as well for creating this little monster. The little shit should be in jail, but assuming affluenza is considered an actual defense, how about a couple years of community service for all of them? And some punitive damages to reduce the likelyhood of reoffending.
To borrow from responses on imgur with regards to him âbeing let offâ
This is misleading. First, he was not facing a 20 year jail sentence, he was facing a 2 year jail sentence (juvenile exception inCalifornia penal code). The Judge was able to punish him more severely than what the prosecutors were asking. Second, there is no jury in Texan juvenile proceedings. So the defense attorneys didnât actually argue that the kid had âaffluenza.â Third, the parents were fined $450,000 per year for the next 10 years. Fourth, the kid is likely going to be sued in tort by the 4 families and will likely have to pay that verdict for the rest of his life. So he didnât âget off only with probation.â Basically the kid is fucked as much as he could be given the state of the laws as written. Also CA three-strikes rule can put him in jail for life later. - Skinny fat man
I realise no one has expressly said he was âlet offâ but the implications of the affluenza talk suggest it. I mean who can deny that there is a stereotype for rich spoiled brats not believing their actions have consequences? Afluenza is real, just as if you raised your kid to be racist they could be expected to be racist, or if they had a terrible childhood it is taken into account if they commit crimes. The question isnât whether he has a diminished ability to see consequences, but whether he should be treated differently due to it. Is affluenza a mitigating circumstance?
Does affluenza apply to vigilante killings? The word sounds more like a high priced anti depressant or Fox news trying to explain the outbreak of sickness in a poor community.
Itâs the moneyâs fault. Burn all the cash and assets. There, cured.
No, I would say âaffluenzaâ is absurd. Abuse or neglect, that is a different story. Children of the rich and poor can both suffer from them.
Based on what? Affluenza is the result of being spoiled. It is difficult to be spoiled to an extreme without the money to a) make problems go away b) have mummy and daddy be able yo buy their way out of problems. You dont like it because it is an excuse for the wealthy. Being brought up in bad neighbourhoods in struggling families and in other various scenarios significantly more common in poor families acts as mitigating circumstances. Those are acceptable but affluenza is made up? At least make an argument before you dismiss something as absurd
Yeah, it seems like quite the easy thing to fix, unlike many other social illsâŚ
Affluenza should - if weâre going to view it as anything except an absurd way for the rich to further avoid the rules imposed on the rest of us - be viewed as a variant of abuse and neglect, not as a separate âthing.â
Personally I see it as a real thing. I see it as on the spectrum somewhere between being taught to say thank you and being beaten for crying when hungry. (Yes it is a huge scale and yes some of it should be taken unto consideration). But that are treatment of those with it should be no different than our treatment of those who have been raised to be arseholes (then again I am not so lenient on anyone whose history has led them to wrong another).
I dunno ⌠âbeing an arseholeâ pretty much pre-supposes that youâre wronged someone, at least to some degree. Also, killing four people seems fairly high up on the scale of âwronging another.â
Having âtoo muchâ is not a disadvantage. Not having money is a disadvantage, it makes it more difficult for you to eat, live in a safe neighborhood, pay for school, and so on. If the child canât decipher right from wrong, then that is parental neglect to an extent. Being too affluent and not knowing right from wrong is the result of poor parenting or just being an asshole in spite of good parents. Whatâs next âassholenzaâ? No oneâs life is perfect, therefore no one should ever go to jail.
No. THEIR parents are to blame for setting it all up. Shame they are dead or we could punish the real culprits. Instead, we have to let everyone go.
