Leading article: Juvenile crime and punishment

You can tell a lot about a society by the way it treats its children. In England and Wales the law says that a child is not capable of committing a criminal offense until they reach the age of 10. Before Labour came to power in 1997, there was a long-established legal presumption that a child under the age of 14 did not know the difference between right and wrong. This kept the prosecution of young people within sensible bounds, because a court had to be satisfied that it was in the interests of justice to convict the child.

Under the Crime and Disorder Act of 1998 this safeguard was swept away as the Government embarked on its mission to shift the balance of the criminal justice system in favour of the victim. But it is Britain's children who have become the unintended victims of this change. The number of young people dealt with in the criminal courts has risen exponentially - from 79,092 in 1997 to 96,188 in 2004.

And these are not young people randomly drawn from society, but children brought up in the most deprived circumstances, many from broken - or non-existent - homes. Now, the Centre for Crime and Justice Studies has argued for another rethink of our approach to the prosecution and punishment of children. It called for the age of criminal responsibility to be raised from 10 to 14 and for an end to a system of "cops, courts and corrections".

Such a reform would have the virtue of bringing us in line with our European partners, including France and Germany. In Italy, a country whose love for its children is internationally celebrated, the age of criminal responsibility is 15. It is also worth noting that in all these countries the rates of criminal conviction for young people are much lower than they are in Britain.

More to the point, a change of approach now might save a whole generation from careers in crime. Any reform, though, would need to be adequately supported by funds, and by alternative proceedings that addressed a child's educational, social welfare and mental health needs. Not for the first time, a government initiative has turned out to have adverse consequences that might have been foreseen, had more thought been given to the less obvious effects. Reducing the age of criminal responsibility has turned out to be just another legislative measure that makes our children old before their time.

Resource: Independent.Co.Uk

7 Ways To Improve Your Relationship

Good relationships don’t just happen. I’ve heard many of my clients state that, “If I have to work at it, then it’s not the right relationship.” This is not a true statement, any more than it’s true that you don’t have to work at good physical health through exercise, eating well, and stress reduction.

I’ve discovered, in the 35 years that I’ve been counseling couples, 7 choices you can make that will not only improve your relationship, but can turn a failing relationship into a successful one.

TAKE RESPONSIBILITY FOR YOURSELF

This is the most important choice you can make to improve your relationship. This means that you learn how to take responsibility for your own feelings and needs. This means that instead of trying to get your partner to make you feel happy and secure, you learn how to do this for yourself through your own thoughts and actions. This means learning to treat yourself with kindness, caring, compassion, and acceptance instead of self-judgment. Self-judgment will always make you feel unhappy and insecure, no matter how wonderfully your partner is treating you.

For example, instead of getting angry at your partner for your feelings of abandonment when he or she is late, preoccupied and not listening to you, not turned on sexually, and so on, you would explore your own feelings of abandonment and discover how you might be abandoning yourself.

When you learn how to take full, 100% responsibility for yourself, then you stop blaming your partner for your upsets. Since blaming one’s partner for one’s own unhappiness is the number one cause of relationship problems, learning how to take loving care of yourself is vital to a good relationship.

KINDNESS, COMPASSION, ACCEPTANCE

Treat others the way you want to be treated. This is the essence of a truly spiritual life. We all yearn to be treated lovingly – with kindness, compassion, understanding, and acceptance. We need to treat ourselves this way, and we need to treat our partner and others this way. Relationships flourish when both people treat each other with kindness. While there are no guarantees, often treating another with kindness brings kindness in return. If your partner is consistently angry, judgmental, uncaring and unkind, then you need to focus on what would be loving to yourself rather than reverting to anger, blame, judgment, withdrawal, resistance, or compliance. Kindness to others does not mean sacrificing yourself. Always remember that taking responsibility for yourself rather than blaming others is the most important thing you can do. If you are consistently kind to yourself and your partner, and your partner is consistently angry, blaming, withdrawn and unavailable, then you either have to accept a distant relationship, or you need to leave the relationship. You cannot make your partner change – you can only change yourself.

LEARNING INSTEAD OF CONTROLLING

When conflict occurs, you always have two choices regarding how to handle the conflict: you can open to learning about yourself and your partner and discover the deeper issues of the conflict, or you can try to win, or at least not lose, through some form of controlling behavior. We’ve all learning many overt and subtle ways of trying to control others into behaving the way we want: anger, blame, judgment, niceness, compliance, caretaking, resistance, withdrawal of love, explaining, teaching, defending, lying, denying, and so on. All the ways we try to control create even more conflict. Remembering to learn instead of control is a vital part of improving your relationship.

For example, most people have two major fears that become activated in relationships: the fear of abandonment – of losing the other - and the fear of engulfment – of losing oneself. When these fears get activated, most people immediately protect themselves against these fears with their controlling behavior. But if you chose to learn about your fears instead of attempt to control your partner, your fear would eventually heal. This is how we grow emotionally and spiritually – by learning instead of controlling.

CREATE DATE TIMES

When people first fall in love, they make time for each other. Then, especially after getting married, they get busy. Relationships need time to thrive. It is vitally important to set aside specific times to be together – to talk, play, make love. Intimacy cannot be maintained without time together.

GRATITUDE INSTEAD OF COMPLAINTS

Positive energy flows between two people when there is an “attitude of gratitude.” Constant complaints creates a heavy, negative energy, which is not fun to be around. Practice being grateful for what you have rather than focusing on what you don’t have. Complaints create stress, while gratitude creates inner peace, so gratitude creates not only emotional and relationship health, but physical health as well.

FUN AND PLAY

We all know that “work without play makes Jack a dull boy.” Work without play makes for dull relationships as well. Relationships flourish when people laugh together, play together, and when humor is a part of everyday life. Stop taking everything so seriously and learn to see the funny side of life. Intimacy flourishes when there is lightness of being, not when everything is heavy.

SERVICE

A wonderful way of creating intimacy is to do service projects together. Giving to others fills the heart and creates deep satisfaction in the soul. Doing service moves you out of yourself and your own problems and supports a broader, more spiritual view of life.

If you and your partner agree to these 7 choices, you will be amazed at the improvement in your relationship!

Resource: Selfgrowth.Com

Do the houses we imagine reflect who we are?

Imagine if you could have any house you wanted. Money is no object. You can place the house anywhere in the world (or off it) and you can build the house from any materials you wish.

What would that house look like? What would be the color and texture of the walls, the shape of the rooms, the quality of the light?

Everything in the unconscious seeks outward manifestation...
- Carl Jung

A Child's Dream House
When I was a child, I dreamed of a house shaped like a doughnut. Rooms would be arranged in a ring around a central courtyard, and the courtyard would have a glass roof, a steamy climate, and exotic tropical birds. All windows in this house would look inward at the courtyard. No windows would look outward at the exterior world. This was an introverted, perhaps egotistical, house.

As I aged, my dream house reshaped itself. Instead of an inner courtyard, it developed sociable porches and big bay windows. The house of my dreams reflected who I was becoming.

Carl Jung's Dream House
For the psychologist Carl Jung, building a house was a symbol of building a self. In his autobiographical Memories, Dreams, Reflections, Jung described the gradual evolution of his home on Lake Zurich. Jung spent more than thirty years building this castle-like structure, and he believed that the towers and annexes represented his psyche.

Can we know more about who we are by looking at where we live?
- Clare Cooper Marcus

Psychology and Your Home
Clare Cooper Marcus, a Professor of Architecture at the University of California in Berkeley, has written extensively about the relationship between dwellings and the people who occupy them. Her book House as a Mirror of Self explores the meaning of "Home" as a place of self-expression, as a place of nurturance, and as a place of sociability. Marcus spent years looking at people's drawings of memorable childhood places, and her book draws on Jungian concepts of the collective unconscious and archetypes.

If the houses we live in are so significant, what about the houses we imagine? What do our wishes say about who we are?

Resource: Architecture.About.Com

Water Soluble Vitamins In Your Food

If you want to keep your body strong and as healthy as possible, you need to feed your body vitamins. And this is especially true for water soluble vitamins which are not stored in the body. This means that they must be replenished every day through the foods that we eat.

All soluble vitamins are important,to a degree. But, without a doubt, two of the most valuable forms of water soluble vitamins are B and C. In fact, these vitamins are so important to the functioning of the human body that many popular foods such as breakfast cereals and breads are fortified with it.

One of the most important water soluble vitamins is Vitamin B
. Want to avoid anemia? If so, make sure that you get enough Vitamin B in your diet. This vitamin is also important in helping the essential processes of the body to function well. If you want to have good skin, good eyesight, and calm nerves, getting a good dose of vitamin B in your daily meals is a good start. if you want to naturally increase your vitamin B levels, good foods to eat are organ meats such as liver, meats such as beef and fish, and dairy products like milk, eggs, and cheese.

One of the strongest vitamins in our arsenal for fighting free radicals is Vitamin C. It is one of our stronger antioxidants. It is essential in helping to hold the cells of the body together and keeping them healthy from disease and illness. It is also important if you want to avoid losing your teeth because of gum disease.

You can find Vitamin C in a large variety of food products. Many people mistakenly associate it with only citrus fruits such as orange juice and lemons. But, in actuality, it is actually found in most of the unprocessed foods that we eat such as eggs, beef, chickens, and so on. If you eat healthy foods and avoid the fast foods, supplements should not be necessary. You should be able to get all of the vitamin C that you need in your everyday meals.

Anyway, due to the fact that both of these vitamins are water soluble, they are very much likely to be lost in foods through popular methods of processing and storing them such as freezing and canning. For example many canned vegetables such as beans and peas are stored in water. Some of the vitamins are washed away when they are cooked in the plant.

And over the weeks or months while they sit on the store shelves, more vitamins seep into the canned water in which they are stored. And even more are lost when you heat them for a meal. In other words, unless you are eating most of the liquid with your canned vegetables, you are not really getting the amount of vitamins that you think you are.

Sometimes, depending on where you live, it can be hard to find fresh vegetables. If so, but you still want good nutrition, buying frozen ones are the next best way to buy them.

Resource: Articlesbase.Com

Unsecured Loans Bad Credit - Overcome The Obstacles

Having a bad credit is an obstacle to way in to the credit facilities and its benefits. The conditions on which the bank offers the credit facility to the people mainly includes that the person has a good credit status. And if one lacks to fulfill these conditions he or she is deprived of the credit. This people have to undergo many problems in financial adversities. But all this is now over.

A bad credit borrower can also apply for the credit facility which is in the form of unsecured loans bad credit facility. This credit facility is one which will support all the bad credit holders with an amount that can be considerably used for the fulfillment of all the needs and requirements. Maybe it of household nature or the needs of educational or even occasional and external the amount can be used to the fullest for all the requirements. One can fully rely on this credit even in times of emergency as the loans amount is sanctioned within less time.

Unsecured personal loans for bad credit does not necessitate that the borrower places any kind of collaterals. Therefore one is not needed that that take any tension regarding their possessions. But one is needed that they assure the lender company that they will make the reimbursements of the loans amount availed on time without making any delays. One can also specify the alternative source for this purpose.

To avail this credit facility one can also make use of the online means. This means is well reliable as there are no hassles or aggravate procedures to be dealt with. Only a straightforward form is to be filled by the applicant with all the necessary details and submitted. The confirmations will be done by the lenders and the loan amount will directly be transferred to the bank account.

Bad Credit Payday Loans – Make The Optimal Out Of It

Bad credit often becomes obstacle in the way of getting entitled to the credit facility. Therefore the people who are for some or the other reasons not able to sustain a good credit approach have to face many hindrances in acquiring the required help when needed. But this is not the condition prevailing now. The bad credit payday loans are now been initiated for the support of the deprived people. This credit facility is been specially made acquirable for the poor credit possessors. One is just needed that they make the efficient use of the credit and one will be able to get the best of the support.

Bad credit payday loans will help you to get the best of the support. Also this credit attests to be very appropriate if used in a well manner. This credit will really bear out to be a golden chance. But for this purpose one needs that they make the timely reimbursement of the credit. This will assist the person to keep up a good credit approach and boost the credit worthiness in the market. Moreover this act will also help to overcome the triumph of the poor credit possessor and you will be able to sustain a good and high position in the market.

12 month loans to be acquired are very much effortless. As the lenders of this credit venture to put forward you the credit in most exceptional ways they have made the online mode accessible for you. With the way in to this mode one can now be pertinent for the credit facility from the serene of the house. You are just needed to fill in a straightforward form and the assent will be done in very less time. Also the finances called for will be passed on to the bank account.

Summary:

Bad credit payday loans are the fiscal aid offered to the poor credit possessor. The finances provided bears out to be the prospective one for the one who has a low position. Making the use of this credit one can overcome the low position and regain their lost creditability.

3 Month Loans - Get Easy Cash to Meet Your Sudden Urgencies

Introduction:

If you need money fast, 3 month loans is a small loan which provides fast relief to your money worries. It is for when you need cash urgently due to some unforeseen circumstances. It tides you to over your next pay day when you have sufficient money to repay what you have borrowed. So, when you are in front of some financial crunch and monetary policy research instant help, you can get 3 month to pay off the loan.

Features:

The remarkable feature of this loan is that its fair rates, fast approvals, superior customer service, no faxing requirement and no paper hassles. There is no credit checks and easy to qualify. Fill out a short and simple form and you will know within 2 minutes if you are approved or not. They specialize in no hassle pay day loan lenders service. Moreover, when a person is completely strapped and might precipitate kind of crisis engulfed, 3 month payday loans is one of the best options for fast money. The loan is available for both good and bad credit owners. So if you have bad credit or default or delays of miss payments etc. you can approach to lender without hesitation and can access loan benefits.

Loans Requirements:

To get eligible to avail this loan you must fulfill the entire stated requirement below:

o Applicants must be 18 years of age or over and have been in full or part time employment for the same employer for at least four months.
o Applicants must have had held a valid and current UK bank account for more than four months.
o Applicants must be UK residents.
o Applicants must provide the last two current pay slips and bank statements.

Summary:

To overcome the hidden financial clumsiness, apply for 3 month loan to get rid of the emergent financial need for money. The loan which will give you the speed and conveniences, pay day loan lenders had introduced 3 month loan to apply for instant need of cash. It is instant that you can apply for this while sitting at your place. The repayment of loan is easy and flexible. You can repay the amount within 13- 31 days. The repayment pattern is borrowers friendly. It saves your important time and avail you quick cash.

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