{"id":8594,"date":"2010-05-14T13:29:08","date_gmt":"2010-05-14T17:29:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/anglicansamizdat.net\/wordpress\/?p=8594"},"modified":"2010-05-14T13:29:08","modified_gmt":"2010-05-14T17:29:08","slug":"a-magistrate-is-scolded-in-britain-for-calling-16-year-olds-absolute-scum","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.anglicansamizdat.net\/wordpress\/a-magistrate-is-scolded-in-britain-for-calling-16-year-olds-absolute-scum\/","title":{"rendered":"A magistrate in Britain is scolded for calling 16 year-olds \u201cabsolute scum\u201d"},"content":{"rendered":"

From here<\/a>:<\/p>\n

A magistrate who branded two boys ‘absolute scum’ after they desecrated a cathedral faces disciplinary action.<\/p>\n

The 16-year-old boys wrote racist and sexually-abusive graffiti in prayer books, and bent a priceless John The Baptist cross out of shape at Blackburn Cathedral, causing \u00a33,000 damage.<\/p>\n

Pages were also torn out of the prayer books and insults written in the prayer and visitor books included: ‘I will kill all Jews. Don\u2019t underestimate me’, and lurid sexual comments about \u2018the vicar’.<\/p>\n

They were caught after they wrote their names in the visitors’ book.<\/p>\n

Chairman of the bench at Blackburn Magistrates’ Court Austin Molloy labelled the boys ‘absolute scum’ during the sentencing yesterday at the Youth Court.<\/p>\n

But he was immediately criticised by the court clerk who stood up and objected to the use of the ‘inappropriate language’.<\/p>\n

The mother of one of the boys said she would be making an official complaint.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

I would agree that the scumminess of the miscreants has not yet had the time mature to the degree of perfection or completeness to warrant the use of \u201cabsolute”;<\/em> perhaps the magistrate should have said \u201clesser scum\u201d<\/em>, although this seems overly generous.<\/p>\n

Here is a brief history of \u201cscum\u201d<\/em>:<\/p>\n

<\/strong><\/p>\n

scum<\/strong>
\n1326 (implied in scummer “shallow ladle for removing scum”), from M.Du. schume “foam, froth,” from P.Gmc. *skuma- (cf. O.N. skum, O.H.G. scum, Ger. Schaum “foam, froth”), perhaps from PIE base *(s)keu- “to cover, conceal” (see hide<\/a> (n.1)). Sense deteriorated from “thin layer atop liquid” to “film of dirt,” then just “dirt.” Meaning “lowest class of humanity” is 1586; scum of the Earth is from 1712. Adopted in Romanic, cf. O.Fr. escume, Mod.Fr. \u00e9cume, Sp. escuma, It. schiuma. Adj. scummy first attested 1577; transf. sense of “filthy, disreputable” is recorded from 1932. Slang scumbag “condom” is from 1967; meaning “despicable person” is from 1971.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

It is a shame that, on a rare occasion when the law was not an ass, a court clerk felt impelled to analyse the \u201cappropriateness\u201d<\/em> (an overused and meaningless epithet) of a magistrate’s description of 16 year-olds who, for recreation,\u00a0 enjoy writing \u201cI will kill all Jews\u201d<\/em> in the Prayer Book.<\/p>\n

Britain has become a strange place.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

From here: A magistrate who branded two boys ‘absolute scum’ after they desecrated a cathedral faces disciplinary action. The 16-year-old boys wrote racist and sexually-abusive graffiti in prayer books, and bent a priceless John The Baptist cross out of shape … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"iawp_total_views":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[254,1],"tags":[2080,2225,2267,1522],"class_list":["post-8594","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-political-correctness","category-uncategorized","tag-christianity","tag-political-correctness","tag-the-fall-of-the-west","tag-the-law"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.anglicansamizdat.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8594","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.anglicansamizdat.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.anglicansamizdat.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.anglicansamizdat.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.anglicansamizdat.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8594"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.anglicansamizdat.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8594\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.anglicansamizdat.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8594"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.anglicansamizdat.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8594"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.anglicansamizdat.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8594"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}