- NEWSDAY.CO.TT - A la Une - 16/Jul 04:37

Legal consent age: More common sense, please

RUDY CHATO PAUL, SR FOR THE record, I am no moral entrepreneur. Reports say this regime is intent on raising the drinking, smoking, and gambling ages. None of them affects me personally since I neither drink, smoke, nor gamble. Besides, I’m a proud, relatively healthy septuagenarian, legally qualified to engage in all of the above should I so choose. As we embrace the 21st century, we recognise that people have issues with everything and everyone. Addressing a person by the “wrong pronoun” is taken seriously by many. Our contemporary world sees new terms and phrases each day as the old ones suddenly become offensive. People are choosing to identify as whatever they wish. It is challenging to keep up with what is politically correct coming from an earlier era. Of course, all the changes are said to be progressive, moving toward a more egalitarian, non-discriminatory world. All the changes are initiated on the premise that they would make the world a better place. They are usually conceptualised by lawyers and written up in the form of laws. Apparently a few people on one side of the parliamentary aisle got together and decided that the drinking, smoking and gambling ages are the biggest obstacles facing us at this time. Lawyers, given their interest, relying on their seemingly only go-to strategy saw it fit to create new laws. Widen the net. After all, more laws equal the need for more lawyers; their way of pursuing their own self-interest, while simultaneously boosting job security through additional clients. And then a couple parliamentarians on the other side of the aisle introduced the race card, suggesting race is the reason for the proposed age increase in these behaviours. Given our adversarial political divide based largely on ethnicity, that was very much expected. Raising the age limit, however, is not really my concern. My concern focuses more on the enforcement of these proposed laws, given the number of laws we already have on the books which appear to be systematically ignored, or selectively enforced for any number of flimsy reasons. We can start with the death penalty. A couple days ago the Office of the Director of Public Prosecutor (DPP) issued a statement on the Dana Seetahal murder case. After 11 years the DPP’s office defends the "delay in filing case," stating that they are not sure if they are going to prosecute one of the suspects in the case. If this was the only such case it would be what we call an “anomaly.” But it’s not. My studies and analysis allow me to conclude that most murder cases take between 12 to 15 years before reaching the trial stages. Many of the mostly men are then found not guilty on several grounds, including but not limited to witnesses disappearing, witnesses dying, migrating, forgetting, providing conflicting stories. A recent phenomena of “files disappeared’ was recently added to the list. Of all the issues plaguing this nation, weed smokers are the least of our problems. All the weed smokers I know, and I know many, when they get high they simply get the munchies. Arguing that weed is a “gateway drug” is a narrative which has long been destroyed. If we are honest, sugar and junk foods are more addictive than weed. Wonder if the lawyers ever considered writing up laws to ban the sale of sugary drinks and junk food to our children. That would go a long way in addressing diabetes and the myriad other issues facing the health sector. Issues like schoolgirls coming up pregnant should warrant great attention and result in the men who impregnate these children to be hauled before the courts. After all, most of these young girls end up in the state hospitals to experience delivery. I have been reliable informed that the nurses provide the information to the state authorities. Yet we never see nor hear of the men involved being charged and hauled before the courts to answer to charges of statutory rape. If serious charges like statutory rape go unchallenged and unenforced, what makes these shysters think enforcement of age-related alcohol, marijuana or gambling would be? Who are the real beneficiaries of these laws? With home invasions on the rise, and people disappearing each day, is that the best use of the state’s resources? Would the police be present inside and outside of every Buju concert, every wedding celebration, every private party, every river lime, beach lime, boat ride, birthday celebration, wake, at every cremation site? Could the state’s limited resources be put to better use than seeking to be moral entrepreneurs? I noted “the law of more” being applied as the panacea to all our issues. We see it in other sectors: more police, more cars, more guns, more money, more buses, more laws. Perhaps what we really need is more common sense. The post Legal consent age: More common sense, please appeared first on Trinidad and Tobago Newsday.