>>Isn't this story also about TEACHING kids
>>to be responsible citizens, instead
>>of busting them ?

> Indeed. Of course, part of teaching
> children is correcting their behavior.
> Sometimes this means making them stand
> in a corner, sometimes this means
> expelling them from school, sometimes
> this means prison.

I don't agree with repressive methods in general, but that must be me.
I belive there is much more to do in TALKING to our kids and stimulate their critical sense, make them THINK about things from different perspectives and try to teach them to think about the consequences before doing things.

Explain them to respect others by also respecting them.


Allow me to quote:

[...]
Raising Kids

And, a woman who held a babe against her bosom said, Speak to us of Children. And he said:

Your children are not your children.
They are the sons and daughters of Life's longing for itself.
They come through you but not from you,
And although they are with you yet, they belong not to you.

You may give them your love, but not your thoughts,
For they have their own thoughts.

You may house their bodies but not their souls,
For their souls dwell in the house of tomorrow, which you cannot visit,
not even in your dreams.

You may strive to be like them, but seek not to make them like you.

For life goes not backward nor tarries with yesterday.

You are the bows from which your children, as living arrows are sent forth.

The archer sees the mark upon the path of the infinite, and he bends you with

His might that His arrows may go swift and far.

Let your bending in the archer's hand be for gladness;
For even as He loves the arrow that flies, so He loves also the bow that is stable.
[...]

- Kahil Gibran, The Prophet -





> If a child on a playground is beating up
> another child, they will be punished.

Yes, but to what extent ?


> If a child writes a malicious program that > causes damage, they too should be punished.

I rather think they need some psychoanalithic help, and lots of love which they might have missed, forgotten in front of the television or in front of their computers, left to discover a very complex world, without getting many explanations about ethics and good behavious whatsoever...

...but it is obvious, in a word where things get solved with money, punishment, war...



>>Aren't they also victims of this messed up,
>>disgusting society, just like drug
>>addicts ?

> In a word, no. Your comparison is flawed.

To me it makes sense.
It was not meant literaly.
I say that cyber criminality is just like any other kind criminality, and often comes out of messed up situations, abandon, etc.



> That is, unless programming has become
> addictive

and isn't it in some cases ?
I think that many kids nowaday actually ARE addicted to their computers, as they are for them a possibility for evasion from a world they don't feel in control of.



> and people are selling copies of
> programming manuals on the street
> somewhere.

That happens too, in some parts of the world.



> Do you got kids ?
> I have two children.

Good, me too.


> Do you have a high school diploma?
> Your grammar would indicate otherwise.

Of course I do.
I only happen not to be coming from an english speaking country.
THey also do exist, and they also are part of the world.

I speak three languages (that are quite different from one another); which means I can communicate with people, even if with some errors here and there. I don't think my grammar was so completely unanderstandable, in the end, if you were able to reply :-)
How many languages do YOU speak ?
Just your own, right ?

This differs a lot with Americans assuming that the rest of the world just HAS to speak their language *without* even commiting errors, and without even complaining.
But yeah, this looks like the very same pattern that lead you think there are no other countries at all, in fact.


I apologize for the incredible amount of cerebral work this might have caused you to be able to understand me.


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