By the time jail time is even on the table, you have to be a year or more behind in payment and basically ducked every call the state makes to ask why. That or you made promises in previous calls you failed to keep.
Jail time should *never* be on the table for debts.
Confiscate his property, order any employers of his to use half of the pay for debt repayment – but jail time is just a waste of taxpayers money. If you have those money – use them to pay child support instead of paying for incarcerating him.
(Very ironic fact: it costs more to keep a drug dealer behind the
bars than an average drug dealer can earning selling drugs)
Failing to support one’s child is a form of neglect, meaning they are going to jail for harming their child. Also, as mentioned above, one has to be actively ducking or refusing the payments in the first place before jail is considered, meaning that said harm is intentional, making it a form of child abuse.
The character in this comedic situation chose to build a pointless device rather than see to the basic needs of one or more human beings that he was responsible for bringing into existence. Child abuse by way of neglect is still child abuse. Also, while we don’t know why he was an absent parent and required to pay child support in the first place, maybe the kid(s)’ mother(s) left him because he was spending all of his time building a giant vacuum cleaner instead of caring for his family.
On top of THAT, he didn’t even get around to actually using the giant vacuum because he apparently knew it would never work, so he was neglecting his child(ren) to do something he knew was pointless. This makes him a very special kind of stupid AND an asshole.
Also, he wanted to rob banks, and stealing is bad.
I really fail to see a scenario in which this guy isn’t a total douchenozzle and deserves to be in prison.
Personally, I would like to see more forms of bad/irresponsible parenting also punishable by jail time.
Pull another leg and he’ll be guilty of murdering and eating his own child, too.
He is guilty of one and only one thing – being too poor to pay some completely arbitrary amount of money that some judge decided to pin on him.
Being poor is not child neglect or child abuse, and it is not somethign that can be fixed by jail time (rather, it exaggerates the problem, making any future employment problematic).
If you can’t afford to support a child you shouldn’t have one in the first place. Except for rape, both parties involved in the conception of the child are expected to care for said child. A decent parent will see to their kid(s)’ needs before their own. Whining about “debtors’ prison” is not an excuse for being a selfish, irresponsibly piece of shit who probably shouldn’t have had kids in the first place and deserves to be surgically sterilized so they can’t subject any more innocent kids to shitty underprivileged lives while they rot in jail for being a horrible excuse for a human being.
What if you *could* afford to support a child, but lost very badly in divorce proceedings? Depression, accidents, illness… there are a lot of things that aren’t your fault that could nonetheless ruin your ability to make money, or consume it very quickly. In America, insurance likes to give you the finger at every opportunity, so you can’t rely on it.
Bad luck can screw otherwise decent people over and lead them to make bad choices. Being in prison is only insult to injury.
Or, just maybe, people wind up in prison due to bad choices. Perhaps jails exist for some reason other than to screw over unfortunate poor people. Maybe, if you act responsibly, you won’t have to worry about the indignity of jail. Prison time has a stigma attached it because it means people who served it DID BAD THINGS.
Is the system perfect? No, nothing is. But for every case of somebody getting a shit deal, framed, etc, there are hundreds of people who deserve every last second of time they get. People who go to jail for failing to pay child support almost always do so because they flat out weren’t paying it. Punishment for lack of compliance is called a ‘consequence,” which is apparently a foreign concept to some people. If you want a more philosophical approach, it can be considered a form of socially facilitated karma.
And then there’s the brilliant idea of suspending driver’s licenses and occupational licenses. I don’t quite see how making it harder for someone to legally earn a living is going to make them more likely to pay up.
Listen dude, Team Rocket *built* a vacuum cleaner the size of a stadium in episode 10 then a vacuum cleaner car later on or something.
Let’s face it: you blow.
Sturgeon’s Law applies to EVERYTHING. That’s the entire point of Sturgeon’s Law, and why the word “everything” is used. It was coined in response to a criticism that 90% of all science fiction is crap, and states, “Ninety percent of everything is crap.”
I am also fond of pointing out Stapp’s Law (also known as Stapp’s Ironical Paradox) with situations such as this: “The universal aptitude for ineptitude makes any human accomplishment an incredible miracle.”
Well, Sandman tried several times to go straight, but the system always kicked him out for his past. Just imagine how amazing he would be as a construction worker.
And being inside a jail is certainly going to help him pay his child support faster…
Debt prisons were outlawed for a reason.
By the time jail time is even on the table, you have to be a year or more behind in payment and basically ducked every call the state makes to ask why. That or you made promises in previous calls you failed to keep.
Jail time isn’t used willy nilly.
It is, just not for debt.
For missed court dates, however…
Jail time should *never* be on the table for debts.
Confiscate his property, order any employers of his to use half of the pay for debt repayment – but jail time is just a waste of taxpayers money. If you have those money – use them to pay child support instead of paying for incarcerating him.
(Very ironic fact: it costs more to keep a drug dealer behind the
bars than an average drug dealer can earning selling drugs)
Failing to support one’s child is a form of neglect, meaning they are going to jail for harming their child. Also, as mentioned above, one has to be actively ducking or refusing the payments in the first place before jail is considered, meaning that said harm is intentional, making it a form of child abuse.
The character in this comedic situation chose to build a pointless device rather than see to the basic needs of one or more human beings that he was responsible for bringing into existence. Child abuse by way of neglect is still child abuse. Also, while we don’t know why he was an absent parent and required to pay child support in the first place, maybe the kid(s)’ mother(s) left him because he was spending all of his time building a giant vacuum cleaner instead of caring for his family.
On top of THAT, he didn’t even get around to actually using the giant vacuum because he apparently knew it would never work, so he was neglecting his child(ren) to do something he knew was pointless. This makes him a very special kind of stupid AND an asshole.
Also, he wanted to rob banks, and stealing is bad.
I really fail to see a scenario in which this guy isn’t a total douchenozzle and deserves to be in prison.
Personally, I would like to see more forms of bad/irresponsible parenting also punishable by jail time.
Pull another leg and he’ll be guilty of murdering and eating his own child, too.
He is guilty of one and only one thing – being too poor to pay some completely arbitrary amount of money that some judge decided to pin on him.
Being poor is not child neglect or child abuse, and it is not somethign that can be fixed by jail time (rather, it exaggerates the problem, making any future employment problematic).
If you can’t afford to support a child you shouldn’t have one in the first place. Except for rape, both parties involved in the conception of the child are expected to care for said child. A decent parent will see to their kid(s)’ needs before their own. Whining about “debtors’ prison” is not an excuse for being a selfish, irresponsibly piece of shit who probably shouldn’t have had kids in the first place and deserves to be surgically sterilized so they can’t subject any more innocent kids to shitty underprivileged lives while they rot in jail for being a horrible excuse for a human being.
What if you *could* afford to support a child, but lost very badly in divorce proceedings? Depression, accidents, illness… there are a lot of things that aren’t your fault that could nonetheless ruin your ability to make money, or consume it very quickly. In America, insurance likes to give you the finger at every opportunity, so you can’t rely on it.
Bad luck can screw otherwise decent people over and lead them to make bad choices. Being in prison is only insult to injury.
Or, just maybe, people wind up in prison due to bad choices. Perhaps jails exist for some reason other than to screw over unfortunate poor people. Maybe, if you act responsibly, you won’t have to worry about the indignity of jail. Prison time has a stigma attached it because it means people who served it DID BAD THINGS.
Is the system perfect? No, nothing is. But for every case of somebody getting a shit deal, framed, etc, there are hundreds of people who deserve every last second of time they get. People who go to jail for failing to pay child support almost always do so because they flat out weren’t paying it. Punishment for lack of compliance is called a ‘consequence,” which is apparently a foreign concept to some people. If you want a more philosophical approach, it can be considered a form of socially facilitated karma.
Maybe they had some questions he couldn’t answer about why he was spending all his money on a giant vacuum cleaner.
It might make a difference to the sentencing if you live somewhere with a high villain population.
And then there’s the brilliant idea of suspending driver’s licenses and occupational licenses. I don’t quite see how making it harder for someone to legally earn a living is going to make them more likely to pay up.
Listen dude, Team Rocket *built* a vacuum cleaner the size of a stadium in episode 10 then a vacuum cleaner car later on or something.
Let’s face it: you blow.
… but the only child support Team Rocket has to come up with is catfood.
Even if coming up with said cat food is the only thing they consistently manage to do right, it puts them a level above this loser.
Well, to be true – the Meowth DOES look a bit starved…
Team Rocket is part of a global organization and Jame’s family is loaded.
So Sturgeon’s Law applies to super-villains, too?
Sturgeon’s Law applies to EVERYTHING. That’s the entire point of Sturgeon’s Law, and why the word “everything” is used. It was coined in response to a criticism that 90% of all science fiction is crap, and states, “Ninety percent of everything is crap.”
I am also fond of pointing out Stapp’s Law (also known as Stapp’s Ironical Paradox) with situations such as this: “The universal aptitude for ineptitude makes any human accomplishment an incredible miracle.”
Is this a jab at the Underminer?
Maybe, or maybe just pointing out the fundamental impracticality of SO many super villain schemes.
Or that devoting all your time and money to villainous schemes is going to leave you short on other important areas of your life.
Well, Sandman tried several times to go straight, but the system always kicked him out for his past. Just imagine how amazing he would be as a construction worker.