IX JUVENILE CRIMINALS

 This subject would scarcely have been noted¹ a few years ago. True, there was in the past a small mixture of children in the grist ground out in the criminal courts. Usually they received some leniency², and were viewed with more curiosity than alarm. The juvenile³ criminal was regarded as a prodigy⁴ with a capacity for crimes far beyond his years. Something of the attitude obtained in regard to him which attaches to the child chess player or the child mathematician⁵. The child criminal is now common, and for the most part is a product of the city.

 

All crime is doubtless much more common in the city than the country, and the young criminal especially is a product of the crowded community. To those who look for natural causes for all phenomena⁷ the reason is not far to seek. The city itself is an abnormal thing. Primitive⁸ man and his ancestors were never huddled⁹ together in great multitudes, as are the dwellers¹⁰ in cities today. To a degree almost all animals are gregarious¹¹, but the units of organization are much smaller with them than with man, excepting possibly in the case of the ant and the bee, insects which seem specially⁶ adapted to live a highly automatic and cooperative life, such as human beings cannot possibly reach. But primitive men and their direct ancestors lived in small groups. They could not have preserved their life in any other way. They lived by fishing and hunting and by gathering¹² roots, berries and herbs. Later they tended their flocks and cultivated the fields in a simple way.

 

With the introduction of the modern machine, the factory system and the railroads, in the last century, our great modern cities were evolved. As they grew more complicated, new problems arose. The life of the crowded city is most difficult even for normal men and women. The adjustments are too numerous and too complex for an animal made with simple tastes and for a pastoral life. But, if it is hard for men, it is almost hopeless for children, especially the children of the poor who fill our prisons, asylums¹³ and almshouses.

 

Every child needs the open air and the open life of the country. He needs, first of all, exercise which should be in the form of outdoor play. No healthy boy wants to live indoors, even though his home may be a convenient city "flat." The woods, the fields, the streams, the lakes, the wide common with plenty of room, have always made their natural appeal to the young. And as sunlight kills most of the deadly germs, so outdoor life with exercise and play takes care of most of the unhealthy thoughts, habits and ideas of child-life. In the past, our schools both in the city and country have done little to help the young. For the most part healthy children have always looked on them more or less as prisons. Here they have been confined and kept from exercise and play, to study useless and unrelated facts and to commit to memory dry rules which are forgotten as soon as their minds are ready to retain anything worth while.

 

Schools should be made to fit the needs of children, and not children to fit schools. The school that does not provide work and play for the child which he is glad to do, has learned little of the psychology¹⁴ and needs of youth. Botany, Zoölogy, Geology and even Chemistry can be taught to children before they learn to read, and taught so that it will seem like play, and through this the pupil will acquire a natural taste for books. It is only within the last few years that the modern school has really begun to educate the child. It has been a hard fight that scientific teachers have waged with conventional education for the right of the child. What has been done is too recent and scattering¹⁵ to show material results.

 

Nothing is so important to the child as education. The early life is the time that character is formed, habits are made, rules of conduct taught, and it is almost impossible to up-root old habits and inhibitions and implant¹⁶ new ones in later years.

 

It is true that "the child is father to the man," and he is the father of the criminal as well as the useful citizen. Outside of the hopelessly defective¹⁷, or those who have very imperfect nervous or physical systems, there is no reason why a child who has had proper mental and physical training and any fair opportunity in life should ever be a criminal. Even most of the mentally defective and those suffering from imperfect nervous systems could be useful to society in a sheltered environment. Poor as the country schools have always been, the outdoor life of the country child is still so great an influence that he generally escapes disaster. He is not sent to a factory, but lives in a small community where he has fresh air and exercise.

 

Of course here as everywhere we must allow for the defective, the imperfect, the subnormals and the children of the very poor. These unfortunates furnish a large percentage of the inmates¹⁸ of prison, and most of the victims for the scaffold which civilization so fondly preserves.

 

The growth of the big cities has produced the child criminal. He is clearly marked and well defined. He is often subnormal even down to idiocy¹⁹. In most cases he is the result of heredity. Many times he may have fair intelligence, but this is usually attached to an unstable²⁰, defective nervous system that cannot do its proper work, and he has had no expert treatment and attention. He is always poor. Generally he has lost one or both parents in youth and has lived in the crowded districts where the home was congested. He has no adequate playground and he runs the streets or vacant, waste places. He associates and combines with others of his kind. He cannot or does not go to school. If he goes to school, he dreads²¹ to go and cannot learn the lessons in the books. He likes to loaf, just as all children like to play. He is often set to work. He has no trade and little capacity for skilled work that brings good wages and steady employment. He works no more than he needs to work. Every night and all the days that he can get are spent in idleness on the street with his "gang." He seldom reads books. He lacks the taste for books, and such teachers as he knew had not the wit to cultivate a taste for good reading. Such books as he gets only add to his unhealthy thoughts.

 

Many writers have classified the crimes that the boy commits. It is scarcely worth the while. He learns to steal or becomes a burglar largely for the love of adventure; he robs because it is exciting and may bring large returns. In his excursions to pilfer²² property he may kill, and then for the first time the State discovers that there is such a boy and sets in action the machinery²³ to take his life. The city quite probably has given him a casual notice by arresting him a number of times and sending him to a juvenile prison, but it has rarely extended a hand to help him. Any man or woman who has fairly normal faculties²⁴, and can reason from cause to effect, knows that the crimes of children are really the crimes of the State and society which by neglect and active participation²⁵ have made him what he is. When it is remembered that the man is the child grown up, it is equally easy to understand the adult prisoner.

1 noted   

adj.著名的，知名的

参考例句：

• The local hotel is noted for its good table.当地的那家酒店以餐食精美而著称。
• Jim is noted for arriving late for work.吉姆上班迟到出了名。

2 leniency   

n.宽大（不严厉）

参考例句：

• udges are advised to show greater leniency towards first-time offenders.建议法官对初犯者宽大处理。
• Police offer leniency to criminals in return for information.警方给罪犯宽大处理以换取情报。

3 juvenile   

n.青少年，少年读物；adj.青少年的，幼稚的

参考例句：

• For a grown man he acted in a very juvenile manner.身为成年人，他的行为举止显得十分幼稚。
• Juvenile crime is increasing at a terrifying rate.青少年犯罪正在以惊人的速度增长。

4 prodigy   

n.惊人的事物，奇迹，神童，天才，预兆

参考例句：

• She was a child prodigy on the violin.她是神童小提琴手。
• He was always a Negro prodigy who played barbarously and wonderfully.他始终是一个黑人的奇才，这种奇才弹奏起来粗野而惊人。

5 mathematician   

n.数学家

参考例句：

• The man with his back to the camera is a mathematician.背对着照相机的人是位数学家。
• The mathematician analyzed his figures again.这位数学家再次分析研究了他的这些数字。

6 specially   

adv.特定地；特殊地；明确地

参考例句：

• They are specially packaged so that they stack easily.它们经过特别包装以便于堆放。
• The machine was designed specially for demolishing old buildings.这种机器是专为拆毁旧楼房而设计的。

7 phenomena   

n.现象

参考例句：

• Ade couldn't relate the phenomena with any theory he knew.艾德无法用他所知道的任何理论来解释这种现象。
• The object of these experiments was to find the connection,if any,between the two phenomena.这些实验的目的就是探索这两种现象之间的联系，如果存在着任何联系的话。

8 primitive   

adj.原始的；简单的；n.原(始)人，原始事物

参考例句：

• It is a primitive instinct to flee a place of danger.逃离危险的地方是一种原始本能。
• His book describes the march of the civilization of a primitive society.他的著作描述了一个原始社会的开化过程。

9 huddled   

挤在一起（huddle的过去式与过去分词形式）

参考例句：

• We huddled together for warmth. 我们挤在一块取暖。
• We huddled together to keep warm. 我们挤在一起来保暖。

10 dwellers   

n.居民，居住者( dweller的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• City dwellers think country folk have provincial attitudes. 城里人以为乡下人思想迂腐。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• They have transformed themselves into permanent city dwellers. 他们已成为永久的城市居民。 来自《简明英汉词典》

11 gregarious   

adj.群居的，喜好群居的

参考例句：

• These animals are highly gregarious.这些动物非常喜欢群居。
• They are gregarious birds and feed in flocks.它们是群居鸟类，会集群觅食。

12 gathering   

n.集会，聚会，聚集

参考例句：

• He called on Mr. White to speak at the gathering.他请怀特先生在集会上讲话。
• He is on the wing gathering material for his novels.他正忙于为他的小说收集资料。

13 asylums   

n.避难所( asylum的名词复数 )；庇护；政治避难；精神病院

参考例句：

• No wonder Mama says love drives people into asylums. 难怪南蛮妈妈说，爱情会让人变成疯子。 来自互联网

14 psychology   

n.心理，心理学，心理状态

参考例句：

• She has a background in child psychology.她受过儿童心理学的教育。
• He studied philosophy and psychology at Cambridge.他在剑桥大学学习哲学和心理学。

15 scattering   

n.[物]散射；散乱，分散；在媒介质中的散播adj.散乱的；分散在不同范围的；广泛扩散的；（选票）数量分散的v.散射(scatter的ing形式)；散布；驱散

参考例句：

• The child felle into a rage and began scattering its toys about. 这孩子突发狂怒，把玩具扔得满地都是。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• The farmers are scattering seed. 农夫们在播种。 来自《简明英汉词典》

16 implant   

vt.注入，植入，灌输

参考例句：

• A good teacher should implant high ideals in children.好教师应该把高尚理想灌输给孩子们。
• The operation to implant the artificial heart took two hours.人工心脏植入手术花费了两小时。

17 defective   

adj.有毛病的，有问题的，有瑕疵的

参考例句：

• The firm had received bad publicity over a defective product. 该公司因为一件次品而受到媒体攻击。
• If the goods prove defective, the customer has the right to compensation. 如果货品证明有缺陷， 顾客有权索赔。

18 inmates   

n.囚犯( inmate的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• One of the inmates has escaped. 被收容的人中有一个逃跑了。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• The inmates were moved to an undisclosed location. 监狱里的囚犯被转移到一个秘密处所。 来自《简明英汉词典》

19 idiocy   

n.愚蠢

参考例句：

• Stealing a car and then driving it drunk was the ultimate idiocy.偷了车然后醉酒开车真是愚蠢到极点。
• In this war there is an idiocy without bounds.这次战争疯癫得没底。

20 unstable   

adj.不稳定的，易变的

参考例句：

• This bookcase is too unstable to hold so many books.这书橱很不结实，装不了这么多书。
• The patient's condition was unstable.那患者的病情不稳定。

21 dreads   

n.恐惧，畏惧( dread的名词复数 )；令人恐惧的事物v.害怕，恐惧，担心( dread的第三人称单数 )

参考例句：

• The little boy dreads going to bed in the dark. 这孩子不敢在黑暗中睡觉。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• A burnt child dreads the fire. [谚]烧伤过的孩子怕火（惊弓之鸟，格外胆小）。 来自《现代英汉综合大词典》

22 pilfer   

v.盗，偷，窃

参考例句：

• Staff were pilfering behind the bar.店员在柜台后有些小偷小摸的行为。
• When food stores close,they go to work,pilfering food for resale on the black market.食品店关门后，他们就行动起来，偷食品拿到黑市上出售。

23 machinery   

n.(总称)机械，机器；机构

参考例句：

• Has the machinery been put up ready for the broadcast?广播器材安装完毕了吗？
• Machinery ought to be well maintained all the time.机器应该随时注意维护。

24 faculties   

n.能力( faculty的名词复数 )；全体教职员；技巧；院

参考例句：

• Although he's ninety, his mental faculties remain unimpaired. 他虽年届九旬，但头脑仍然清晰。
• All your faculties have come into play in your work. 在你的工作中，你的全部才能已起到了作用。 来自《简明英汉词典》

25 participation   

n.参与，参加，分享

参考例句：

• Some of the magic tricks called for audience participation.有些魔术要求有观众的参与。
• The scheme aims to encourage increased participation in sporting activities.这个方案旨在鼓励大众更多地参与体育活动。