While one school of thought holds that parents of juvenile delinquents should be punished, others are of the opinion that teenage offenders should be penalized for their wrongdoings. This essay will first closely examine both views before concluding that I agree with the latter.
On the one hand, it is understandable why some people believe that parents of adolescents offenders should be penalized. The key rationale in favor of this thinking is the lack of parental love and compassion. Unless parents care about their offsprings, children will commit crimes to seek attention from them. In tandem with this, parents are children’s role models. When parents commit bad things, their children tend to mimic that bad behavior. Therefore, the youngsters may become felons in the future. For these reasons, the belief that parents of young offenders should shoulder responsibility of their children’s wrongdoings seems perfectly justifiable.
On the other hand, I side with those who say that children criminals should be punished. Perhaps the foremost reason would be that children are mature enough to be aware of the crimes they commit. Moreover, society does not tolerate any criminal behavior, regardless of the perpetrator’s age. In addition, their crimes may take a toll on victims mental and physical health. For instance, if juveniles criminals commit rape or cyberbullying, victims may suffer from long-lasting psychological effects such as depression and self-harm. Thus, juvenile delinquents have to receive punishment that fit their crimes in order to deter them and serve as threats against juveniles engaging in petty theft and other offenses.
In conclusion, while there are good grounds for thinking that parents should be punished for their children’s misdeeds, I would contend that children should bear full responsibility for their own misdeeds.