Boys like us

When first reports surfaced the humiliation-assault DVD allegedly made by a group of teenage Werribee boys, Today Tonight must have been thanking their lucky stars. But their reckless approach to journalism reminded me of Alan Jones’ behaviour in the days preceding the Cronulla riots.

In both cases, an ugly and abhorrent social underbelly is exposed, and outrage is the appropriate response. Or is it? Outrage features prominently in Internet responses and vox pops. “They need seven shades of sh*t kicked out of them”

In both cases an abhorrent injustice is alleged to have occurred. But a sensationalist response neither assists the course of justice, nor does it attempt to explore the question of why boys would engage in the acts of which they are accused.

Such responses simply reinforce a two-dimensional view of society, which is precisely the perspective that makes programs like Today Tonight and A Current Affair thrive. It’s a footy game of Us v Them. Battlers v Bludgers, and popular targets are “out of control youth”, “the ripoff merchant, still trading”, and “the crazy chauvanistic Muslim imam”. Pick a team and barrack like hell.

Channel Seven made the connection between the boys’ behaviour and the program Jackass on MTV. The response from Johnny Knoxville to the Seven Network, "No, they're not inspired by us - they're animals". Good. He’s on our team. Not one of them. Jackass is all about silly fun. Boys being boys. Not anything like this.

If we are interested in an authentic response to the reported acts of these Werribee high school students, and reported dispute between Lebanese youth and lifeguards in Cronulla, then we have got to go beyond Us and Them.

Is it so horrible that the seeds of such acts of childish cruelty might actually be resident in each of us? Absolutely. But is it so outrageous and abhorrent that we might have the same capacity to act so recklessly and violently as we have to act with such innovation and selflessness that inspires our fellow citizens to greater heights?

The Today Tonight dichotomy between heroes and villains simply projects the war of conscience that exists in each of us. The boys are alleged to have humiliated a teenage, mentally challenged girl for their own amusement and the amusement of others. Yet the process is repeated if our response to them is to vent our outrage in a public naming and shaming. In both cases, a scapegoat is identified and injustice is inflicted.

We have a very sound system of justice in this country. That these teenage boys showed no understanding of their teenage victim is either proof of their evil madness, or it is a sign of their immaturity. And it is precisely their immaturity that merits the need for a just consideration of their fates, which accounts for both natural justice and due process.

Their stupidity in identifying themselves on the DVD cover and credits, and the listing of the video on YouTube, makes it easier for the public to bypass the legal process in favour of a less just response. And you can bet the members of the mob won’t each sign their name on the DVD. Cronulla?

Perhaps Today Tonight, through their reckless approach to journalism, will be complicit in any acts of violence or self-harm that may emerge from this sad episode. Will the locus of shame and scapegoating extend to them? Should it?

The theological response I feel motivated to offer is through a simple story in John 8. Jesus comes across a group who are about to stone a woman who is caught sleeping with another woman’s husband. His response is to offer this advice, “Whoever is without sin should throw the first stone.” And in the story, the crowd disperses.

Mob justice is a blunt instrument of injustice, and there is an immense propensity for miscarriages of justice to be extreme. The greatest problem of such responses, particularly in retribution, is the difficulty for a contrary voice to be heard. There is no place for moral reflection in a mob.

And what will become of the teenage girl who was the victim of the alleged assault? No amount of indignation will ease the pain and humiliation of the intellectually impaired female victim. A compassionate response would attempt to convey our corporate sympathy to this family. Perhaps a statement expressing sorrow that people like us are capable of such stupidity is appropriate. But unfortunately nothing we can say or do will make the past undo itself.

And of the boys responsible for the alleged acts, surely society has an interest in their rehabilitation and redemption. If we can resist the urge to make an unproductive scapegoat response, perhaps we have some corporate responsibility to engage with our moral complicity in this episode. While our sins might not have been as extreme, each of us will have had cause to feel remorse.

The act of accepting responsibility for one’s actions and feeling remorse is a redemptive experience that should be extended to these young men. For such experience, and an understanding of consequences is essential to the development of moral awareness and behaviour.

The quest for our society is to find new ways for boys to explore their identity, sexuality, and their masculinity. The footy club model, while it offers a means of self-expression to many young men, it does not necessarily encourage them to consider the moral dimension of their desires.

The responsibility of education falls upon role models in families, communities, in sporting clubs and in the public sphere. Men have got to have a conversation with boys engaging the stereotypical dichotomies that are propagated in pornography and many other public institutions: To challenge the notion that masculine identity can be typified either by dominating or being dominated.

We have each got to take responsibility for the unwritten codes we have seen develop. To act in outrage is to avoid the tough questions that the alleged acts provoke. It is too easy to pin the blame on someone else. But if we are to learn from our mistakes, and those of people like us, then we must acknowledge our capacity to act immorally, and engage with the factors that make such action conceivable. Sensationalism, indignation and outrage just doesn’t cut it.