American Values Unleashed?
I can’t get out of my mind a story in the news a decade ago, here in Schenectady: A 14-year-old boy forced a naked schoolmate to crawl on his hands and knees around the neighborhood of their public school, on a leash. At the time, I was horrified, and thought “Where could he have learned something so degrading? And, how could someone so young be so cruel?” A very kindly older lawyer, who served as the boy’s law guardian in Family Court, later told me what a nice teen he appeared to be.
I’m tempted to say the young man might have a good future in army intelligence. However, he’s currently serving time for a murder he committed a few years ago, after his release from a junvenile detention facility. When he was arrested for the murder, his outraged mother was interviewed on television. She looked the camera in the eye and righteously claimed, “He’s a good boy. He’s never been in trouble with the law before.”
- I don’t know where I’m going with this, or what conclusions to draw, but I felt a need to share my troubled thoughts.