My Aug. 30 Advocate, because of its various pieces and my reactions to them, showed me what an aging, opinionated person I am. But that acknowledgement encourages me to read my paper more devotedly.
I am repeatedly aghast that so many articles are published with typos and/or what I perceive to be careless grammar. Could I write better? Yes, I think I could, but I am without the pressures of editors and deadlines.
With a recent paper, I growled loudly at the piece by Michelle Stirling-Anosh on our inability to mourn and strongly wanted to offer a counter opinion. But a fine article by Rick Zemanek, — No justice in mandatory sentence — on Aug. 30, demands kudos.
Zemanek obviously used much effort and time to compose a near-brilliant contribution.
Like the writer, I, too, have had similar reflections on our awkwardly-constructed Canadian legal system, particularly in how we treat sexual offenders.
Some offenders, if not most, are errantly labeled “predators” when in fact they present no proven risk whatsoever to anyone. Such individuals in one example, are commonly routed out when they seek repairs on their personal computer from a retail electronics store. Such stores will browse your hard drive when not necessary, in order to find any images legally offensive; then your machine is automatically reported to local police. From that point on, an individual is guilty until proven innocent.
As anyone can grasp, legislating guilt in terms of black and white is impossible. Just imagine the identical sentences being given every soul who has taken a life. That would be ludicrous and far, far from just.
If I could pontificate for a moment, I wonder if the most difficult laws to justify or fairly enforce are those which deal with morality? Should there be matters of immorality, sin or spiritual wrongdoing which deserve treatment for a man’s soul rather than the dogma of law alone?
Unless we become involved with treatment and committed to understand the allegorical elements of law, I doubt that legislators will ever inject fairness in “Justice for mandatory sentencing.”
Thanks Rick Zemanek for very fine piece of writing.
James Pettit
Red Deer