When did the Law become our parents?
Why aren’t parents protecting their children?
Why do the powers-that-be feel it’s their job to protect everyone’s children?
I’m not talking about situations when the Law needs to intervene in criminal acts against children—physical violence in public spaces, kidnapping, physical abuse, and other such crimes.
What those questions relate to is the Importuning Law; specifically, importuning on a telecommunications device—soliciting sex on a computer from an underage person…
If you like to twist your mind around legalese here’s Ohio’s Importuning Law.
The most startling part of the law is where it says the “offender” is guilty “…whether or not the offender knows the age of the other person.”
This seems to mean that someone could be in an Internet chat room, believing the other person is 21 years old, and, if they’re only 14, the “offender” is guilty of a felony…
Sound twisted to you?
Also, police are permitted to pose as underage persons and entrap “offenders”. This has been challenged in court.
There are a great variety of opinions surrounding these situations. One example is on waspohio.org.
Here are those questions again, in a slightly different order:
When did the Law become our parents?
Why do the powers-that-be feel it’s their job to protect everyone’s children?
Why aren’t parents protecting their children?
I’d love to have your comments and I hope the comment section becomes a riot of conversation!
Spiritual Quote:
“…it should be recognized that the ultimate solution to the problems of humanity lies not in penalties and punishments, but rather in spiritual education and illumination. ‘Abdu’l-Bahá has written:
“It is incumbent upon human society to expend all its forces on the education of the people, and to copiously water men’s hearts with the sacred streams that pour down from the Realm of the All-Merciful, and to teach them the manners of Heaven and spiritual ways of life, until every member of the community of man will be schooled, refined, and exalted to such a degree of perfection that the very committing of a shameful act will seem in itself the direst infliction and most agonizing of punishments, and man will fly in terror and seek refuge in his God from the very idea of crime, as something far harsher and more grievous than the punishment assigned to it.”
The Universal House of Justice, 1992, Violence and Sexual Abuse of Women and Children
And, in a more detailed format:
1. In addition to academic education, the child shall be entitled to receive guidance training and education designed to promote his social, spiritual and moral development and well-being. 2. The fundamental objectives of such guidance, training and education shall be: a. To promote the harmonious development of the personality of the child and the realization of his full potential; b. To protect the child by developing his ability to resist outside influences or pressures likely to lead him into lawlessness or delinquency, or into practices injurious to his physical or mental health or to his social, spiritual or moral well-being; c. To prepare the child to exercise the rights and undertake the responsibilities of adult life in a manner consistent both with his own well-being and with the well-being of others; d. To foster in the child a respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms and an attitude of understanding, respect and friendship towards all people, regardless of race, sex, class, colour, nationality, ethnic origin, religion or belief. e. To foster in the child an awareness of and a desire to promote the principles of universal peace and brotherhood proclaimed in the Charter of the United Nations. 3. The States Parties to the present Convention, bearing in mind that, in accordance with article 8, the primary responsibility for the upbringing and development of the child rests with his parents or guardians, shall use their best efforts to: a. Raise the level of public awareness of the importance of the social, spiritual and moral education of the child, particularly during his early years; b. Promote recognition and understanding by all those concerned with the upbringing of the child, most particularly his parents or guardians of their indispensable role. and the primary importance of their example, in the social, spiritual and moral development of the child; c. Encourage schools to develop guidelines and courses of instruction designed to foster the social, spiritual and moral development of the child.
Bahá’í International Community: 1985 Jan 25 Question of a Convention on the Rights of the Child
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It seems to me that simply understanding the spiritual laws regarding chastity, and the sanctions against sex outside of marriage between a man and a woman would go a LONG way to protecting children (and adults) from ego-driven uses to which some people are prone to put others. For many, the sex instinct can become an addiction that gradually drives the heedless into shameful and often dangerous and harmful acts. Yet used in the spirit and within the boundaries of marriage – thus sanctified – it can be a wholesome nourishment to the well-being of the human family.
The spiritual quotes are well-taken. It is not something that can be adequately legislated – without providing proper education that includes the physical, mental AND spiritual purpose of our existence and our powers.
Thank you for a response that goes to the Heart of the whole issue!
Spiritual solutions, as you indicate, must become rooted when the sapling is yet pliable. ‘Abdu’l-Baha had something to say about trying to inculcate proper attitudes too late in life…
I agree that we need to do every thing in our power to educate and protect our children. The witch hunt for sexual predators going on in the USA today is part of the problem, not the solution.
Thanks for that perceptive comment!
Universal energy laws are not human creations. They are remembered through feeling and practice. Other laws however, are human creations. These laws are conceived to extend ego-mind control, to impose ideas and judge morality. Every energy being already has core understanding of what is right. All strife that is created is based on fear and selective amnesia of universal intrinsic value. Inner knowing reveals that any thought not focused on being completely loving and accepting of all is limiting and false. To deny self-determination and equality is not grounded in absolute truth but in ego’s quest for power.
You said in your comment, “Other laws however, are human creations.” I must agree for most other laws, at least in this litigious age in which we live Still, there are the Laws the Messengers of God have left us–the Source of the kindest, most just laws we still have…
Views of what law is differ widely. To sense Love is all there is, is not necessarily viewed as a law. It is a given reality for those beings who choose to experience and explore the depth of it.