The coming of age of the crack baby

During the late eighties and the early nineties, the media was awash with stories about crack babies and the impact these developmentally impaired children would have on society as they grew up. A great deal of the talk was exaggerated and not based on any real evidence. As it turns out the problem was never really as big as it appeared at the time. It seems the human placenta does a pretty good job at protecting the new born fetus from its mother’s abuse. Research has shown that most of these children appear to learn normally as they mature.

However, when during that era exaggeration was the norm, the pendulum has swung and now the media does everything in its power to either downplay or ignore the issue. “Crack” babies do exist. They are not a myth. If their symptoms are due to more than crack, like some argue, it does not change the fact that certain individuals in our society were irreversibly brain damaged during their time in the womb. If this damage was caused, by alcohol, neglect, or a combination of other drugs besides crack cocaine, the fact remains, they are here and they are becoming adults at an alarming rate.

These individuals are impulsive, explosive, have no remorse, populate our jails, and are responsible for some of the most heinous crimes in recent history. Among some in society it is a foregone conclusion that just because children of abusive drug and alcohol addicted parents seem to learn somewhere in the normal range that somehow they are ‘okay’; after all it is not now and it has never been politically correct to ‘label’ children. But ability to learn has nothing to do with psychopathic or sociopathic behavior. In fact some of the worse antisocial personalities in history have tipped the high end of the IQ scale.

So what do we as a society do with a segment of our criminal population that no amount of confinement or punishment can ever stop from reoffending? Can we, in good conscience, release an individual back onto our streets that we know will make a victim out of some poor soul as soon as he gets the chance?

The solution to this problem is simpler than it appears. We know who these individuals are. A quick look at prison disciplinary records will make them stand out like clothing at a nudist camp. Until we possess the technology to fix whatever damage their brains incurred in childhood there’s no need to let them back out – ever. End of problem. Fuck their civil rights. Let’s worry about the civil rights of victims for a change.