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BNP #4 June 1998 - CONTENTS
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How about
Maximum Tolerance Justice for all?

'Zero Tolerance Policing' is the flavour of the month in some law and order circles.
'Zero'. What springs to mind here? Not much I suppose, the absence of anything.
The last social experiment with 'zero' in it was Pol Pot's 'Year Zero' where he decided that very strong measures were needed to obtain the sort of law and order he had in mind. So he murdered millions of the people he felt might not agree with him. When Vietnam invaded Cambodia to save what was left, Pol found that he'd killed all the bright ones and there was no one left with the nouse or the inclination to save him.
Before that we had 'Ground Zero', which atomic bomb mathematicians use as a measuring point for assessing degrees of destruction from instantaneous to the lingering slow demise.
So much for zero.
'Tolerance'. The dictionary describes tolerance as: "acceptance of other people's rights to their own opinions or actions; ability to endure something".
It is usually seen as the sign of a civilised society. Lack of tolerance is usually found in extreme right or left wing regimes and it is quite often the drawcard that gets the crowds to the rallies in the first place.
The "I'm mad as hell, and I'm not gunna take it anymore!" style of jingoistic politics needs a target group; who better than the people they're not going to take it from anymore. The message is simple: The world will be a better place when we arrest/imprison/exterminate, whatever it takes, all the troublemakers who don't fit into our idea of society.
'Policing'? It's hard to see what the police would have to gain from ZTP. Their job is hard enough already without having to become RoboCops, charged with cleaning up the city, fighting it out in the front line while the backroom boys tally up the arrests and set the targets.
It is probably too late anyway to have ZTP on the streets. We must get to the core of the problem.
Bring in Zero Tolerance Childcare for a start. Put giant banners in all Day Care Centres that say: "You do the wee, you wait and see!" That should bring the little beggars into line quick smart.
Schools are way behind the times too. It's true there are some boarding schools that are like gaols but it's not enough. Our children are going to have to get used to the idea of getting locked up for things like hanging on street corners and being rowdy in public places. Mandatory sentencing for jumping the tuckshop queue, gaol for jostling in the corridors, lashings for laziness; we must prepare them for the real world.
Nobody should be spared.
Let's have Zero Tolerance Expense Account fiddles, Zero Tolerance Tax Evasion, Zero Tolerance "I'm sorry, all your savings seem to have disappeared but we might get you 5c in the dollar next year sometime".
Or let's get right back to basics with gems like Zero Tolerance Fidelity in Marriage, that should provide a few laughs in the corridors of power.
Don't be fooled by cries of, "We must make the hard decisions. It's time to get tough on crime", and stuff like that.
These are the easy shots, making the thin blue line a bit thicker and banging-up as many people as possible.
The hard part is to create a just and harmonious society which, of its own accord, gets a little better as each day passes.

 
Zero Tolerance Justice is not a new idea. In fact, this very country was colonised by it.