[Thursday] night I heard on the news of a stabbing in Des Moines. Nothing out of the ordinary, I thought, until I heard the person behind the knife was about the same age as the person who was stabbed, and that was somewhere around eight years old (give or take a few since news can’t release details on juveniles).

At times like this, I have to think of the parents. True, this could all just be a very bad example of a product of a fine family. Experience suggests otherwise. Three questions come to mind:

Why did he have a knife? Easy enough for parents to miss, but still wrong.

What was that kid doing out, on the wrong side of Des Moines after dark and without supervision? Maybe they were staying over at a friend’s? To be frank, even that doesn’t excuse parents from responsibilities.

Why was that person willing to use the knife? This disturbs me most.

Now I realize this isn’t a utopian society and all, but habits and dispositions are taught and influenced at a very young age, either through direct influence in the house, or lack of influence in the house to correct street attitudes.

In short, I’m saying that family probably either condones violent habits, or doesn’t pay enough attention to correcting their child’s behavior at home.

I’ll admit I’m no guru, but I do have children, and I do understand how all the state’s child protection laws make raising any child extremely difficult. This still doesn’t fully excuse these parents from taking responsibility for their child’s actions.

Call the charge what you want, don’t put the parent(s) in jail (the child needs attention and guidance), but require community service to make sure the weight of this is understood and require parent(s) to take a full range of parenting classes.

In my opinion, this is the least that should be done.

If, in court, the parent(s) show themselves to be of extremely poor character, the judge should consider removing the child from that influence. Period.

There’s enough wrong on our streets without more being taught. It is a sad day indeed when I see that one child has stabbed another over a stupid piece of candy.

Chadd McCaw

Junior

Mechanical engineering

Member of The September 29th Movement