Kant and Today

Before you read the rest of this post, please check this link:

http://www.cnn.com/2008/CRIME/05/15/internet.suicide/index.html

Let it soak in.


Little more.


Ok,

Before I get to the adults in this case, I have to point out that, though she is a young woman and easily swayed by an internet hoax, how does a girl hang herself over insults? The logic of a teenager is flawed by youth, I am aware, but are the youth of our nation so weak, so immature, so easily hurt, that an online asshole (AFTER ONLY TWO WEEKS OF CONTACT!!!) can basically talk them into hanging themselves? In the past, people were getting married at 14 and 15. Kids had jobs as early as 8 or 9 (yes, child labor laws ending that. rightfully so). There were social structures that served to guide the children better. Now, who knows?

Please don't think that I am blowing off depression or other serious mental illness. Kids with these condition should be in counseling or getting medicine to treat their illnesses. "Meier's mother, Tina Meier, told CNN in November that her daughter had self-esteem issues and had struggled with depression since childhood." Was she getting treatment? Was she in counseling? Maybe her mother should have seen this sort of thing coming, if her daughter was so fragile, and prevented her from being on myspace.

To the dipshit insane person that tried to get this girl to kill herself. Is she fucking insane? What other defense could she offer? She's an adult that apparently has so much free time that she can sit around online and either:

"A federal indictment accuses Lori Drew, 49, of O'Fallon, Missouri, of using the social networking Web site MySpace.com to pose as a 16-year-old boy and feign romantic interest in the girl."

OR

"Authorities have previously said that Drew set up the account to find out what Meier, who lived in her neighborhood, was saying about her daughter."

Is either one of these reasons valid? Who has this much time? I have barely enough time to check my myspace and make it to work on most days, but this lady lacks any goal in life other than torturing a child in her neighborhood?

I look at our society and wonder what in the world we are doing. Where are we headed? Adults acting like children. Children do adult things. No one seems to focus on responsibility, respect, or honor. We are an empty society, hollowed out by empty, meaningless baubles, that dominate our attention and desire. When will this change?

I hope this woman, who got on myspace to hurt a child who's only fault was apparently not liking another girl at her school, goes to jail for the rest of her life. I wish the world would pay attention to this case, to see where we are headed, to change their lives, to shift our societal paradigms. I am not an overly religious person. I don't want this post to be seen as decrying the depravity of our culture.

Instead, I think of the Categorical Imperative, designed by Emmanuel Kant: "Act only according to that maxim whereby you can at the same time will that it should become a universal law." We should be basing our decisions on a similar principle. Would the world be better if everyone acted the way I am acting now? Do my actions serve as an example to the world?

Instead selfishness and immaturity dominate the adults of our species. So, I don't hold out much hope. And hope will not bring this little girl back.