When Growing Up Erases the Past

I am a lover of anything moving related to law and justice, movies like Boston Legal, Suits, How to Get Away with Murder, and so on, and I have seen how those people usually treat those who commit offenses, and I have also heard some true-life stories of how some teenagers were punished legally just because of what they did, which were not true, but the law did a fast justice on them, and this reminds me of one small guy I used to know, though he is now a big boy. Then he stole a very small phone in the area I usually spent my holiday back then, and now anytime I visit that side, he is now into all this roadside mechanic work, doing very well, and I am not sure anyone even remembers what he did back then.

And to myself, I usually say, Is that silence good enough because it is a bit confusing?. Though they say people usually change for the better, does that mean that their records should be wiped on one hand? Though while I was growing up, I experienced some teaching that discipline never could. I have seen how some children do things and react due to hunger or what they have seen or experienced at home, things that we outsiders don't see regularly but they do.

But at the end of the day, after the deed has been done, those who were affected, I still think about them because to me, I believe that they have lost something plus all that fear they carry around because to them, everything is still hanging around them and nothing has been erased totally. And it always looks somehow to me that some will get a brand new start, while for others, let me say that they will continue to carry the memories around.

Where I come from, my country I mean, I have seen how a lot of young guys have fallen into early crimes and when I look at them, I see that innocence in their eyes because they are not wicked but situations and life didn't give them that privilege, they were pushed to it because of lack of employment, no proper guidance, no parenting, bad choice of friends and all those things and before you open your eyes, they will continue to fall into that mistake over and over again because no one to correct them.
And if you ask me, from my little experience and what I have seen, I will say that the answer is not to treat every minor as if they are an adult. Because that kind of treatment, if administered, can break those minors and turn them into another thing before they even understand what they did.

And on the other hand, I am not in support of letting go of all the things they did because it looks totally unfair because what I will say is that everything should be balanced in a way that punishment is not always the key but correcting them. I mean in a way that they will feel responsible for what they did without taking them away from how they can grow. Because if they are always punished and locked up, the truth here is that they, if not all of them, might not really face what they did, and if that mindset is always with them, trust me, they won't grow talkless of moving forward.

And when I look at that boy back then who is now a road side mechanic, now a gown up too now doing well for himself in the business he's doing and always avoiding trouble, assuming he was stucked with his past as a way of punishment and no one corrected him, maybe he is not going to be trusted by anyone today and at the same time, I took a flash back to the phone he stole because he hurt someone. And at this point, the answer doesn't look simple to me.

Thank you for reading.

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