Fingerprinting Kids :: essays research papers

Shouldp arents voluntarily create detailed identificationrecords(including fingerprints) on their electric shaverren inanticipation of possiblerunoutside problems or abductions?(1) Yes. You can never tell when terriblethings retract alone happento a child, so its best to be prepared. (2) No. Thevast absolute majority of missing children are not abducted. Whetherabducted ornot, fingerprinting leave behind do no good. It wastestime and money and pushesus that much closer to thecreation of the Orwellian theme Data CenterthatCongress rejected fifteen years ago. BACKGROUND Asof early 1983, 11 states had launched programstofingerprint children.( These were New York, Virginia,Florida, Georgia, NewJersey, California, Pennsylvania,Massach personatts, Nebraska, Connecticut,Rhode Island,Kansas, Illinois, and Indiana.) Most of this activitywasstimulated by the release of the Missing Children Actin October 1982.What the new law did was to legitimizethe use of the FBIs nationalcomputer ne ca rdinalrk,the NationalCrime Information Center (NCIC) fornon-criminalpurposes. All of the programs are voluntary. In many casesthe policedepartments retain the records, while in others thefingerprint cards areturned everyplace to the parents forsafekeeping. The apparent purpose of theprogram is tohelp provide positive identification to get together either childrenpicked up, or bodies recovered, with missing personnotices. Every year round 1 million children are reportedmissing. Of these more or less, about 800,000, are away fromhome for less than two weeks. About150,000 of the totalmissing are abducted of these two thirds are abductedby adivorced parent. Some of the reasons behind the missingchildren are not pretty.According to an article in Parade,"about 35 percent of runaways leave homebecause ofincest, 53 percent because of physical neglect. The restare"throwaways," children kicked out or simply abandonedby parents who moveaway. Every state has laws againstincest, child abuse, abandonment, childpornography andthe procuring of children, except they are rarely enforced."POINT Conscientious parents should have their childrensfingerprintsrecorded to help in the event of an abductionthey shouldnt wait until aftersomething terrible happens, butshould take reasonable move now. Thousands of childrenare runaways, and in many cases it is all butimpossible todetermine clearly who they truly are. People change,butfingerprints dont. Well-intentioned but misguided civillibertarians worryabout Big Brother. however they tend tooverlook the obvious benefits of theprogram andconcentrate on wildly originative fantasies about BigBrother.If they would come down to earth once in a while,and visit with and sharethe anguish of a family of anabducted child, they would quickly changetheir attitudes.Besides, in most cases the police do not keep therecords,the parents do. COUNTERPOINT Absent someshowing that the fingerprinting will actuallyhelp keepchildren saf e and help bugger off criminals who harm orabduct them,parents should refuse to have their childrenfingerprinted. In promotingthe child fingerprinting program,police officials tend to be vague abouthow the program will