Cynic wrote:
> On Wed, 12 Mar 2008 21:35:14 GMT, Palindrome wrote:
>
>>>>> Why are you comparing a mugging to a teabagging?
>
>>>> The suggestion seemed to be that whether the victim suffered any lasting
>>>> harm or lifelong trauma should in some way determine whether an incident
>>>> was a crime worthy of criminal proceedings - or something that could be
>>>> dismissed as horseplay.
>
>>> In which case you have misunderstood. The likely effect on the victim
>>> should determine whether an ill-advised and unacceptable bit of
>>> horse-play should be treated as a serious offence or not.
>
>>> IMO a couple of 14 year olds who drop eggs from a top floor window
>>> onto the heads of people in the street are behaviny unacceptably. So
>>> are a couple of 14 year olds who drop concrete blocks from a bridge
>>> onto traffic passing on the motorway below.
>
>>> I would recommend a good telling-off and temporary loss of privileges
>>> in the first case, but prison for the second. Do you believe that the
>>> likely effect on the victim is irrelevant, and therefore we should
>>> treat the offences the same?
>
>> They aren't the same offences, are they?
>
> No, and I did not imply that they were. It is *you* who was asking
> why I would not view a man who mugged a lone woman on her way home as
> being the same order of crime as a man who swung his dangly bits above
> the face of a sleeping woman for a laugh.
>
> The rest of your post also confuses the intent of the actor with the
> likely effect on the victim. I have stated that it is the latter
> rather than the former that would be the main determining factor for
> me as to whether or not I'd want to see the miscreant prosecuted.
>
> Thus I'd want to see concrete-block droppers prosecuted *regardless*
> of their intent or sobriety, because they will always have a high
> probability of doing serious harm.
>
Ah, "likely effect".
Insufficient evidence of exactly what was done, to make the call, IMHO.
I'm not a photographer but, ISTM, simple physics dictates that there are
a range of possibilities from one extreme, where all of her face was
visible to identify her and the dangly bits were somewhat distant - to
the other where the photo is basically of meat and two veg framed with a
bit of hair and face that might be her..
There is a great difference between the two photos, I would suggest.
Hence, I wrote, leave it to those with the evidence, including the
photos, to make the call.
--
Sue |