I may take some fire for saying this, but no, I believe not. It is not the government's job to force everyone (or even select groups of people) to pay money to support someone who may turn out to be a total failure anyway. The people have the freedom to help one another - let them help themselves.

Unless the parents are physically or mentally abusing the kids (and I don't mean the occasional spanking) then it is not the government's responsibility to "protect" anyone's kids from their parents.

Frankly, the role of the government is to protect its citizens, and not much else. Healthcare, education, and all other kinds of welfare are all fine and good if they can be afforded, but they are luxuries of a developed society and should be treated as such.

Fair enough. Unfortunately, that's not how things are set up at the moment.

What if the parent or parents...say...have a drug problem that depletes their resources enough that their older children have to skip school to work and feed their younger siblings? In other words, the parents are literally leeching off of their kids (under 18 years old) to support their drug problem...?

Is an uneducated populace detrimental to a society's citizens?

Again, I'm just playing devil's advocate. This type of thing is interesting to me, because there are so many variables in play that it's easy to make a case either way, IMO.

Where I am, unexcused absenses land you detentions and then eventually you get into a "meeting" with a principal or vice principal. Of course if you have an excuse, you get off scot free. I am 18 years old, so even though I am still in high school, I can make up any excuse I need to. This October, I am going to France/England for 10 days. This won't be a problem. If I just go to England/France without telling the school? Yeah, there's going to be a huge problem. If this lady is going to miss school for work, at least talk to a parent or whoever is responsible for her to sign her a note whenever she works and then do some catch up.

Wow if I were you I'd get kicked out of school in a month. I typically miss at least one day a week but sometimes two. Often I take the trouble to make up some bogus excuse but often I just let them use their own imaginations.

That's a good question.

In this case, the parents are clearly extorting their children for money, and that is wrong - but regardless of the circumstances, extortion is a hard problem to identify and control. So I believe we should consider all of our options before we decide whether or not the government specifically should involve itself in this situation.

Unfortunately, I will not be doing that here since that is probably a very loaded question. But I will consider this: the government is powerful, but the bureaucracy is not discerning. Even now, to determine who qualifies for welfare the government uses clumsy, inaccurate methods to survey the populace and sort those eligible from those that are not. So for an issue that, by my rule of thumb, probably already lies outside of the government's original role of protecting the people, the government would be an inefficient and possibly ineffectual solution to this problem.

That depends. In our society, where anyone can have a hand in their government as long as they're older than eighteen, regardless of their background, I would argue that it's definitely detrimental.

On a slightly separate note, however, it's interesting that in the first century of the USA, there were many more requirements to attain voting rights. First, you had to be white, (the racist elements of this restriction SHALL NOT be explored) partly because it was assumed (and to a large degree, correctly so) that anyone with an African heritage were uneducated and therefore unfit to hold a hand in government decisions.

Second, you had to be male. This was due, yet again, to yet another preconfigured construct of society for the time in that women were largely restrained from participating in society as a whole, and so the large majority of them remained uneducated bystanders of the machinations of greater society.

And lastly, you were required the possession of property. This was to prevent people who had no great stake in society from voting, since those people were also assumed to be ignorant of all its complexities.

Now you can take what you will from the obvious societal problems that partly inspired these requirements, but no one can deny that one underlying theme of these rules is the notion of suppressing the ignorant. The founding fathers were aware of the dangers that an uneducated society could have on any government with democratic elements, and so rather than developing huge, expensive, bureaucratic school systems as part of some brute-forced effort to educate everyone, they simply raised the barriers to entry and left it at that. Perhaps to a degree we should do the same...?

This is good. I don't mind where you stand on these subjects - we can both have our own opinions as long as we're both dead set on collecting all the data we can, not just on the issues, but on our opposition(s). This stuff is very interesting, and I appreciate the neutral point-of-view you are holding for the purposes of this discussion.

I also want to assure you that I don't pretend to know everything about these things, and I agree with you in that there are many variables in play here that make it difficult to devise any solutions for these problems.

Agreed. Deserved it.

So the student (who does very well in school) deserves to go to jail because she had to miss school to support her younger siblings? Explain your logic. Furthermore even if she was a lazy pothead who never did [censored], jailing somebody for missing school is one of the most utterly ridiculous, pointless, and backwards things I have ever heard.

It says so in the rules. She probably couldn't read it because she never went to school. Not really an excuse. There are other ways to support siblings, such as child protective services and crap like that. It's her job to go to school. She doesn't go, she can face the consequences, why make an exception? In PA if I would've missed 'x' number of days in a year my parents would've gone to jail, so I went to school. Everyone else follows the rules and goes to school, why bend the rules? Rules are rules, laws are laws. If you break the law and go to jail don't expect anyone to feel sorry for you. If you disagree with a law you work on getting it changed, until then it's your duty to follow it or you'll face the consequences.

Tell me, did you bother reading the article or are you just talking out of your ass right now? She's an honor student that leads me to believe that she can do quite well in school even if she misses a few days. And instead of jailing her, the messed up justice system of where she's from should have introduced said child protective services, maybe even give her a pat on the back for holding up the fort for as long as she did. Also, a law like this shouldn't exist in the first place. And rules can be changed if they are outdated or idiotic, we don't have to follow every [censored] up law like sheep.

Truancy laws have always been silly.

Also, the law is the law is not true. Many times breaking a law and setting a new precedent is the only way to change said law.

And the law svcks because I said so.

But the law DOES exist. So go ahead and run around breaking laws you don't agree with and see what happens. Seriously, it's the law, it's right there, it's specific and therefore there is no way you can argue in her favor.

It's like saying it's okay to smoke crack if you can still get good grades and do well at work. It's illegal no matter what and that's the end of it.

You do have to follow the law up until it is changed. I have no sympathy for the hippies who think they can do what they want and get thrown in jail. Like those Occupy aholes.

Okay I think I've found the source of the problem here. Never mind, trying to reason with you is pointless. Enjoy your hive mind.

This. Laws are broken for crackheads all the time and nobody says [censored].
Rules are made to be broken. There is a law where you can go to jail if you swear in public. Is that ever enforced? Nope. Are police officer's supposed to kick suspects in the head repeatedly? Nope, but they do. The judge who gave this ruling is a piece of [censored] and is the one who should be thrown in jail. She doesn't want her family thrown into CPS and wants to be able to see them. I hope that's you in your avatar, you served. You have a family you fight/fought for? If you were in the same situation you would do the exact same thing. You fighting for your country/family is the same thing as what the girl did. She worked 2 jobs and got straight A's to keep her family with her. You fight/fought for your country's/family's freedom. You didn't want your country/family enslaved by terrorists, she didn't want her family ripped away from her and have them in CPS. Now, i'm not saying Foster Homes and enslavement are the same things [in most cases anyway] But the fact remains that it's the same principle on different varying levels.

I would like to know what this Lanny Moriarty has done to all the junkies, gang-bangers, vandals, rapists, juvenile thieves and bullies in the area. I'll give you a clue, most of them are still walking the streets. To all the people who say she deserved it, it's the law, no exceptions, there are loads of exceptions, loads of people who do so much worse yet get to walk because of budgets or manpower issues. She didn't deserve to be made an example of, she was made an example of because she was there, she wouldn't run, she wouldn't fight. No exceptions if you happen to be the poor sod stood before the judge. Next time maybe this judge will really man up and pick on a cripple. After all, who cares if there are menaces to society everywhere, let's pick on whoever we've actually got.

Oh, and laws. Some are very good, they really ought to be adhered to. Murder is bad, no arguing. Some make sense and should be applied if the situation warrants it. I would say this is the case here. And some are just plain stupid. Made to hoodwink consumers and protect corporate interests, or allow people using religion as a front to evade taxes. Blindly assuming all laws are good and should be adhered to is not wise.

Insofar as you could not effectively argue in her legal favor, you are right. But this isn't just a legal issue, it's a political one, and it's worthy of discussion.

Okay i'm gonna go swear in public, i'm gonna go barefoot without my five dollar permit, i'm gonna go to Corpus Christie and raise an Alligator, i'm gonna go sit on a bench in Galveston, i'm gonna carry a pair of wirecutters in my backpocket, i'm gonna drive around with an open soda can, i'm gonna put a bumper sticker on my car, i'm gonna spit on the sidewalk, i'm gonna tell someone how and when i'm going to kill them, and last but not least i'm gonna go to jail, get released and demand a horse and shotgun. http://appellateblog.blogspot.com/2009/06/old-and-stupidfunny-texas-laws.html


Ah, i see. You're one of them. No point in arguing. In your mind you'll always be right.

The law is the law, indeed, but the law is not perfect. If you think that, you're blind and ignorant. It's not perfect, in the U.S. nor in my country, Norway. You're speaking of this girl as if she's a hardened criminal, she's not, she's just trying to make things work. And yes, she should have made some more suitable arrangements, besides, a few days from school will not be her doom. And at the end of the day, it'll only hurt her, if it does, her chances to get a job for example. Who the hell is getting hurt by that aside from herself? And even so, she already have a job, two in fact. She has already proven herself capable of being a productive member of society, which to me, seems to be important to you.

Add a prison sentence to that, and what does it add? How is sentencing this girl being a productive move and good usage of tax payers' money?

Although I agree with Sadist King, zen, Unconnected One, etc. I think it's important to point out that statements like this:
Are simply far too personal, fiery, and provocative to do much good for anyone.

So even though I really don't want to sound like a mod or anything, in the honest interest of keeping this topic unlocked, please keep the emotion down.

Yeah I got carried away too. I'm tired and got pissed off frankly, shouldn't have made that last post. Well goodnight everybody.

Yeah i might have overdone it a bit too.

A rule should never be enforced because it is a rule.
That is fundamentally misunderstanding the purpose of rules.
A rule is not there to be followed blindly. A rule is not made by infallible superbeings who know what is best in any circumstance.

A rule is there to serve as a compass. A rule exists so that you are forced to think deeply before you break it.

Anything else is madness.

I don't see what the problem is. Everything seems to be in order. Why victimize the offending party?

I do not know why anyone is surprised. Texas is one messed up state... especially since they figure a drug addict is ok for governor as long as he thumps a bible.

i was suspened from school for several days because a police officer thought I was 'hostile and uncooperative' when he pulled me out of class to interrogate me about an event that I never witnessed or knew anything about. Having top grades, no criminal record (not even a traffic violation). doing charity work, participating in school acitivies, never even tardy for class, and well respected by the faculty means nothing when law enforcement is involved.

It is pretty easy to see how what happened in that article can slip through the system...

Reddit? saw it a few days ago on there. IMO the judge should be stripped of all offices.

It's still better then most of America. And quite frankly this is getting way to political.