http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/apeurope_story.asp?category=1103&slug=France%20Pedophilia%20Trial&dpfrom=1

Wtf.

Oh...god.

That's...wow. That's just wrong.

I'm speechless.

I don't know about anyone else,... but I think public executions should be brought back for these sick s.o.b's
Absolutely horrific

Yeah, my housemate doing a french degree told me about this (they have to keep up with the french news).

Apparently the abuse was usually fed from the eldest down: ie the grandparents of families abused their children, who in turn abused their own - but sometimes the grandparents were even abusing their own grandchildren, and from the tone of the article, children from thier grandchildren's generation in at least one more family.

One of the main highlights of the case will be not what's to be done with them (the article documents likely sentences), but as to how this could have gone unnoticed for so long (about 15 years in the article) without being reported.

It's frightening.

I'm never a fan of the death penalty, I personally think it would be too quick for these people, whom I think need time to reflect on the severity of their crimes. The point of custodial sentencing is rehabilitation, not revenge, no matter how much we feel we deserve it.

Babies?

Hopefully French prisons are like American prisons in the sense of local inmate attitude towards sexual criminals.

That's like...
wow...

Absolutely isck.


Yeah I guess I agree about the whole "take care of them" thing.

God I hope so.

I deplore perpetrators of sexual crimes, especially pedophilia. Its just plain disgusting taking advantage of people (again, esp children) for sexual pleasure. *picks up taser*

Then you're no better than they are.

If you are thinking they getting passed around like a joint, that's not what normally happens to them. What happens usually involves a shank or a blunt object. Sexual predators, especially child molestors, are ostricized by the rest of the prison community and are usually subject to being pushed into fights if the community ever finds out what they are in for.

Stop talking before you make me get myself banned. Seriously.

I hope these people pay for their crimes, tenfold. And I'm thinking along the lines of what Keiran was thinking. God this is just disgusting.

WTF?

People are products of two things: their nature (genetics) and how they were nurtured (environment). Punishment serves two purposes: to deter others from perpetrating the act, and to some extent change the criminals behavior via changed environment. Punishment does NOT exist in society to solely inflict pain/suffering/discomfort for the sake of "repaying" the criminal for what they have done. Society does not carry out revenge, as much as some wish it were so.

The feeling of the need for retribution is just silly. It really accomplishes nothing. Wanting them publicly executed and/or abused in prison solely because they are "bad people" isn't right. Meh, basically just seconding what Martyn said mostly about punishment being for rehabilitation and all that jazz.

Um, the English and American justice system and sending people to prison had 5 main motivators. Deterence(to motivate both the person and everyone else to not do the act), reparation(repair the damage the person did to society), rehabilitation(correct the behavior), incapacitation(prevent the person from continuing their actions even if only for awhile), and retribution(pure revenge). Even though the corrections system has shifted a bit towards rehabilitation the last decades, retribution is still a very powerful motivator. However, the difference between the retribution the state inflicts and the one I was hinting at are different because the state inflicts retribution by stripping people of their freedoms and caging them up. Mine was corporal(sp?) retribution.

A lot of things people do is silly.

Thankfully, that's why we aren't beings of logic.

I think #5 is a tad bit up in the air. #4 isn't really part of "punishment" as so far as what happens to them (i.e. execution and the whole lot). Reparation is there if actual funds were involved, but someone spending time in jail actually uses money. I fail to see how someone spending time in jail gives anything back to society.

Anyway, I wasn't talking about specific US justice either; I never mentioned a country. Revenge/payback isn't really a defendable reason to inflict any punishment. So two of those are pretty much null. The third, meh, whatever.