I live in the UK, and like many of the people that live in the UK, i am sick and tired of being bent over a barrel while the EU and human rights acts tell us that we cannot lock people up who kill children up after sexually mollesting them, in a cell for 23 hours a day with just a mattress and a bucket, as this "infringes on human rights"
Human rights are there for the defence of the innocent, not to be abused by the guilty, which is what is happening, and we are powerless to stop it.
The system is bursting with do-gooders who don't seem to have any grasp on the harsh reality on how the real world works. People, who if given a proposal to strip all human rights away from murderers and child molesters, will stop that happening.

My thinking is, that a democracy is all well and good, but when the people at the top level who have the power to change things, dont bother, or are too busy committing fraud by swindling expenses claims, what chance do we have as a nation?

not much.

what chance do we have as a nation?

not much.

So what are you going to do about it? Ever see the movie Braveheart? The Scots didn't like what was being done to them and they stood up for themselves, will you? :shrug:

Expressions like : The road to hell is paved with good intentions
work both ways
In improving it, what would you do ? Go back to fascism ?, Or a dictatorship ?. That said, these do gooders, in your opinion, might be misguidely going that path anyway.

I once read a quote that went something like this: "Democracy gives an air of legitimacy to things that would otherwise be intolerable."

Perhaps if the west redirected the resources currently devoted to "crimes" such as drug use, prostitution, frivolous law suits, etc. we could come up with a better answer.

Given the technology it should be possible to truly rehabilitate these people or better yet, anticipate and prevent violent behavior in the first place. Short of some extraordinary advance in this direction, what do you propose as a solution? Surely you agree there has to be some balance between victim's and perpetrators rights?

Perhaps the pendulum has swung a bit far to the left, but what to do? Innocent people are convicted occasionally, how do you handle that possibility? I do not believe that returning to a system in which we summarily hang people and / or throw them in dungeons like animals is the right answer. Even when said people behave like animals, society doesn't necessarily have to react in kind.

On the other hand, I don't think we should ensure that violent criminals have a "right" to Cable TV, etc. Clean living facilities, proper food and exercise should be provided by any civilized penal system. It would seem that we enter a "gray" area when we start discussing contact with other humans, recreation and entertainment and so forth. A prison labor force could be an asset, but such programs lend themselves easily to corruption and abuse.

I guess it depends on whether your goal is rehabilitation, punishment, or a combination thereof. I just don't think we have the necessary knowledge yet to effectively "solve" the problem, so we do the best we can with what we have...

Your thoughts?

I like the sound of that quote, Cowboy. It would be good to track it down.

My foremost feeling is this: that it is the LOCAL things that are precious to us; the things that affect friends, family, community. The further distant that the hand of authority lies, the worse off we are likely to be.

A recent instance can be seen in Belfast and the adventure of the Romanian Gypsies. For those outside the UK who did not follow this story . . . A stable working class Protestant area of South Belfast was recently invaded by more than a hundred gypsies from about 1400 miles away. The Gypsy families had a "democractic right" to be there, we are told, and to claim welfare payments. Despised as filthy semi-civilised crooks throughout central Europe, they descended on this small community. There was no relationship between the established community and the newcomers, save that all were "citizens of Europe". The Belfasters suffered a random mischance -- it was pretty well the worst thing that could happen to their community, short of being invaded by Somalis, but they were officially powerless.

To the enormous credit of the Belfasters, they chased the invaders out -- as would have happened at any other time in history -- for which several of them now face goal sentences. Such is the fate of those who refuse to tolerate the intolerable in a "democratic" Europe. The actual majority opinion within the community on letting in migrants counted for nothing, of course.