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A Hawaii man has been sentenced to a year of probation after making his son walk a mile home from school

Robert Demond was convicted of a misdemeanor charge of second-degree endangering the welfare of a minor.

Demond explained that his son had been involved in some sort of rule-breaking at school. When Demond picked him up, he asked about it, but his son refused to respond. Demond then stopped the car and told his son to walk to rest of the way home to think about what he had done, reports the Garden Island.

The judge, Kathleen Watanabe, ruled that the punishment was “old-fashioned” and inappropriate. She said that it is dangerous for children to walk alongside the road due to potential pedophiles. It was a form of punishment no longer supported by the community.

Demond was sentenced to a $200 fine and a year of probation. His son’s age was never revealed in court docuмents.

If he had made the kid stand in the corner he would have gone to prison because that kid could have been bitten by a spider !

That is severely messed up.

1. So now the "community" decides which punishments are "supported" or not? The parents are no longer sovereign over their own children?

2. So now being "old fashioned" is literally a crime? And they also imply being old-fashioned is backwards and inferior, when it's actually the OPPOSITE.

3. Potential pedophiles? Really? Give me a break. There are no neighborhoods with THAT many pedophiles. A child walking a mile (which takes 20 minutes MAX) *just once* and a pedophile is going to kidnap him? If the neighborhood is THAT lousy with pedos, they have bigger problems.

4. It's not for the "community" or a particular judge to make prudential decisions for the parents. The parents get to weigh the potential danger of pedophiles, asteroid impacts, etc. vs. their child turning out to be a juvenile delinquent and/or going to Hell for eternity.

5. If the father had spanked the son the judge would have been just as upset. Anything short of, "Son, I am disappointed in your behavior. I feel angry at your refusal to open up to me...", etc. (spoken in a steady tone of voice, of course!) would be considered backwards and old-fashioned.

Heaven help us all.

 :dancing-banana:
When a relative's 10 year old  son was put off the school bus for two weeks for starting a fight, guess how Danny got to school?  Fortunately, his headmaster thought it was an entirely appropriate punishment.  It was about two thirds of a mile, all in a good residential neighborhood, on sidewalks with a crossing guard in front of the school.  Danny is graduating high school next week and there was never a repeat of the misbehavior.  

5. If the father had spanked the son the judge would have been just as upset. Anything short of, "Son, I am disappointed in your behavior. I feel angry at your refusal to open up to me...", etc. (spoken in a steady tone of voice, of course!) would be considered backwards and old-fashioned.

Heaven help us all.

Not so fast!

It needs to be:

"Son, I am disappointed in your choices"

and any talking about being angry is just begging for Anger Management courses.

 :alcohol:

Hey Wallflower,

You're right. If you look at the offender registry you need time for a long hot bath.
And that's just the ones who have been caught.  I was thinking teenager needing to walk it off.

I used to walk home from school at the same age In Long Beach CA and that was when the Freeway Killer was active in the area.

It is nice that dad now knows next time he can simply spank the kid in front of the whole school and the judge and under Hawaii law he is under his legal rights...

...oh but wait- he will be prosecuted and Federal civil rights violations.