To the Editor:
Re “In Texas, Minor Misdeeds Can Get a Young Student Arrested” (news article, Oct. 21):
Aggressive police actions like those described in Texas schools — handcuffing, restraining and detaining young children, whose behavior is reflective of their immaturity and sometimes their special needs — can occur only when states fail to set a rational minimum age for prosecution in juvenile court.
When schools are unable to refer children to court or cannot delegate discipline to law enforcement, they develop more appropriate, more effective and safer responses to student misbehavior.
Yet contrary to international human rights standards and common sense, nearly half of all states have no minimum jurisdictional age, and 15 others, including Texas, permit the prosecution of children as young as 10. Even in those states where prosecution of younger children is generally prohibited, furthermore, carve-outs often exist for more serious offenses.
Such criminalization of childhood runs counter to developmental science, drives the school-to-prison pipeline, disrupts families, undermines public safety and needlessly traumatizes the young.
It is for these reasons that organizations as diverse as the Society for Adolescent Mental Health and Medicine, Youth Correctional Leaders for Justice and the American Bar Association have called on states to pass laws setting a minimum age of 14, while a host of others, including the American Academy of Pediatrics, recommend a minimum age of at least 12.
Texas would do well to heed those calls.
Laura Cohen Newark The writer is a professor at Rutgers Law School and the director of the Rutgers Criminal and Youth Justice Clinic.
To the Editor:
A 10-year-old accused of misbehaving in school should never face the possibility of arrest. Yet Texas schools are increasingly sending children as young as 10 into the juvenile legal system for nonviolent actions like vaping or “lashing out.” This is what happens when schools turn to the police and use punitive measures instead of supporting students.
A police presence doesn’t necessarily make schools safer; it risks exposing children to criminalization, disproportionately harming Black, brown and Native youth, L.G.B.T.Q. students and students with disabilities. Several states have taken a different approach and experienced improved outcomes.
In California, for example, state law generally prohibits prosecuting children younger than 12 and requires counties to develop alternatives. Restorative justice and teacher training programs have effectively addressed students’ needs without police involvement.
Children deserve schools that help them learn and grow. Displaying common childhood behaviors at school should never result in criminal charges.
Darya Larizadeh Oakland, Calif. The writer is the director of California Policy and Capacity Building, Youth Justice at the National Center for Youth Law.
The Elusive Truth
To the Editor:
Re “Shadows, Mirrors and ‘You Can See Everything,’” by Eve Sneider (Opinion guest essay, Oct. 28):
In her essay about the documentary “You Can See Everything,” Ms. Sneider suggests that “there’s artifice present in any work of nonfiction,” as if that is a problem only for authors or filmmakers trying to present a true story. She refers to the work of the author Janet Malcolm to support her claim.
The main point of her essay, it seems, is that art gets in the way of truth. But the problem is broader. Each of us carries around a set of beliefs that warp and shape our experience. Philosophers, most notably W.V. Quine, have called this our “web of belief.”
This web shapes all of our experience. It is not the problem of not being able to see everything, as the essay suggests, but that we are human beings with experiences that help us to understand what we are currently experiencing. Art may be what shapes the artist’s product, but life is what shapes everyone’s accounts of experiences.
So what happens to truth? Truth is what we continue to hold on to as we communicate with others and add to our webs.
Sharon Schwarze Wayne, Pa. The writer is a professor emerita of philosophy at Cabrini University.
The post When Children Are Charged With Crimes appeared first on New York Times.
