When Kids Get Life by Bikel - Essay Example

No one would ever say that children and teens should be free from accountability when they do things they know to be wrong. However, as it should be noticed in many of the cases discussed in the video, involved kids who have snapped and killed after years of systematic abuse, neglect, or general poor upbringing (Bikel). That said these children are victims themselves before they ultimately victimize someone else.           It would seem that a more sensible solution to the problem of underage offenders and serious crimes, like murder, instead of filling up the juvenile and prison facilities with offenders after their crime had been committed more efforts to aid those children in the abusive and violent situation before they have a chance to ever commit a crime.

If these children are being mistreated and crime is the result, then full accountability cannot be placed solely on the perpetrator child.  We have a terrible habit in the United States of believing that incarceration is the best solution in every circumstance; in some ways that is a lazy solution. It is no wonder that prisons are overcrowded today. While no one would condone the specific actions of the teens in this film, but how they came to commit those crimes are stories that need to be told and understood.