And the people who already attend church every Sunday? Do they get free reign to vandalize, drive drunk and criminally mischeive or whatever a misdemeanor in Alabama is (I’m guessing something along the lines of not returning the appropriate ‘Roll Tide’ for every ‘Bama!’)?
Because if the option was jail, a fine, or bettering myself though video games, guess how afraid I’m going to be of being caught jaywalking?
And thank you for responding exactly as I predicted in the OP as well. You didn’t even try to rebut my comment. You basically repeated it.
No, but seriously. I’d just pay the fine, which is what I likely would have done if the option to opt out of going to Mosque every Friday was axed. The arguments against this are pretty ridiculous and are just idle complaining because it involves “church” (i.e., Christianity). It’s merely an extra option; it doesn’t replace the options that were already on the proverbial table.
Because of the concept of unconditional conditions.
The government cannot condition receipt of benefits (a non custodial sentence) on a breach of the First Amendment. You learn that early on in Con Law.
Under your analysis, the government could offer double unemployment benefits to those who wear crucifixes, and only half benefits to those who would not eat a bacon sandwich.
It’s just more choices! How can that be worse than fewer?
The problem is, it doesn’t just involve “church”. It involves the government too – sending people to “church.” I’m not sure if you’re aware of it, but that’s somewhat frowned upon according the First Amendment.
You have to put forth an argument which needs to be rebutted. Aside from screaming “Unconstitutional!”, the only other thing you’ve done is put forth a rhetorical question, which I don’t think you’re looking for an actual answer to since none of us here are sentencing judges privy to each individual person’s case and background.
Don’t rebut anything, if you don’t feel it needs rebutting, but repeating something I said sarcastically in the OP, as some sort of argument in favor of what I’m railing against, seems a little weak to me.
Oh, do tell how you came about this less-than-wonderful straw man. Inquiring minds (mainly mine) wish to know.
Because they chose to go to church in lieu of paying those fines.
This is skirting dangerously close to playing semantics, but the government isn’t sending anyone to church, but rather allowing them the option of going to church in lieu of serving prison time and/or paying a fine. If you don’t want to go, you don’t have to go.
And why should the government give people who have commited crimes the option of not paying fines or going to jail simply because they are churchgoers?
Because no one is being given the option of not paying a paying a fine or getting out of going to jail because they are churchgoers but rather because, apparently, they’re not
Actually, if you must know, I haven’t been to church in years, and I wouldn’t have a problem with this if it involved any other religion.
The interesting thing is, either going to church is a punishment, or else we have a self-professed conservative who wants to let criminals off without any punishment. “Son, you’ve been convicted of a crime and must now be punished. Your choice is–a punishment, a different kind of punishment, or hey, we could just not punish you at all!”
So, in other words, you think non-churchgoers should be punished more harshly than churchgoers (although they can escape punishment by becoming churchgoers). And you don’t see a constitutional problem with this?
How are you determining which punishment is more “harsh”?
No but, iirc, it makes them less likely to commit a crime.
What about them? It’s impossible to accommodate every group. In this case, said groups weren’t accommodated simply because there are no public places of worship for any other non-Christian religion in the area. That doesn’t come off as discriminatory, which you’re apparently insinuating.
Anyway, I want to make sure I understand your position correctly. Since there’s no way to accommodate everyone, you would rather there simply be the option of jail or a fine rather than the option of jail, a fine or going to church for a year?
It’s not only quite possible, but legally mandated, in accordance with one of the fundamental principles upon which this country was founded, to accommodate everyone. It’s not even particularly hard. All you have to do is to keep church matters out of government.
