Anonymous wrote:
I can see there is room for improvement, but I am not going to vote for an unknown quantity who has shown herself willing to lie and mislead in her campaign. I will not reward that.

I'm not going to reward someone who uses a staff member -- who doesn't live in Virginia, so can't vote in this election -- in her campaign materials as a supporter.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:So I guess if a minor makes and executed a plan (however ineffective) to kill a teacher or shows around naked pictures of classmates it’s better to NOT show them actions have consequences. That can wait until they are adults so they can really ruin their lives.

How old is the minor? Because that covers a lot of ground, and my approach to a 7YO who does that is going to be significantly different than what I'd advocate for a 17YO.

Also, "actions have consequences" tends to be what black-and-white thinkers fall back on when they can't see the various sides of a story.

And if your first response to that comment is to wildly misrespresent my position -- "Oh, so you think it's OK to put hand sanitizer in someone's coffee?" -- you just proved how clueless you are.

Let’s say, for the sake of argument, the kids were 10 and 13, respectively. You know, just spitballing.

I can see there is room for improvement, but I am not going to vote for an unknown quantity who has shown herself willing to lie and mislead in her campaign. I will not reward that.

Anonymous wrote:So I guess if a minor makes and executed a plan (however ineffective) to kill a teacher or shows around naked pictures of classmates it’s better to NOT show them actions have consequences. That can wait until they are adults so they can really ruin their lives.

How old is the minor? Because that covers a lot of ground, and my approach to a 7YO who does that is going to be significantly different than what I'd advocate for a 17YO.

Also, "actions have consequences" tends to be what black-and-white thinkers fall back on when they can't see the various sides of a story.

And if your first response to that comment is to wildly misrespresent my position -- "Oh, so you think it's OK to put hand sanitizer in someone's coffee?" -- you just proved how clueless you are.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I had hope when someone recently created an alternative to AEM, primarily to get away from all of the “screens are bad” posts, but so far it’s a big nothingburger.

I don't like the overfocus on screens but that one poster is SO annoying that I'm coming around on screens.

Maybe, if you can't up your critical thinking to evaluate APS' use of screens on its own merits, you could just hide Our Lady of the Nature Eyeballs? Every good cause has some unfortunate supporters.

Anonymous wrote:FYI. Unless I missed it, at no point did the parent of the boy say with girl sent those pics. We don’t know how he.came into possession of the photos.

Maybe the boys dad left that part out because if those details came out any sympathy for his son and his friends would evaporate.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I assume if any of the prominent AEM posters are reading here, they’re shrugging off everything said here as uninformed. But let me say as a lifelong progressive, I am voting for Parisa, but honestly it’s in spite on the AEM posts and comments, not because of them.

To those posters: I understand that your guard goes up when people post here or elsewhere about opposition to the issues that literally define your day to day lives, but I say from real experience that shooting everyone else down and steamrolling the narrative will not work. It’s incredibly off putting and counterproductive.

As a Parisa supporter, I ask that you please, please consider a different approach.

Those posters aren’t even what has turned me off the most, though they have exposed some problems with the campaign itself. The ideas were good enough on their own, and they didn’t need to try to destroy the reputation of the current CA as a child-hating racist monster who supports police brutality in order to win. I don’t like this type of politics, especially at the local level. I don’t want to reward that kind of campaign with my vote, even though I probably agree with Tafti on needed reforms and was leaning towards her before that mailer and these misleading letters to the editor. Win at all costs does not work for me. Last time we had a slash-and-burn campaign in Arlington, I wound up voting for Garvey, even though I don’t love her (especially after all that trolley stuff) when the opposing campaign tried to paint her out as wanting to throw grandmothers out on the street for simply asking the question about whether heirs should be able to inherit valuable homes without ever paying back deferred taxes to the county.

I don’t think this kind of campaign belongs in Arlington. It’s too small a county to pit literal neighbors against neighbors in such a way.

Yes. While I agree there are reforms needed, I can't possible vote for Tafti.

Anonymous wrote:I assume if any of the prominent AEM posters are reading here, they’re shrugging off everything said here as uninformed. But let me say as a lifelong progressive, I am voting for Parisa, but honestly it’s in spite on the AEM posts and comments, not because of them.

To those posters: I understand that your guard goes up when people post here or elsewhere about opposition to the issues that literally define your day to day lives, but I say from real experience that shooting everyone else down and steamrolling the narrative will not work. It’s incredibly off putting and counterproductive.

As a Parisa supporter, I ask that you please, please consider a different approach.

Those posters aren’t even what has turned me off the most, though they have exposed some problems with the campaign itself. The ideas were good enough on their own, and they didn’t need to try to destroy the reputation of the current CA as a child-hating racist monster who supports police brutality in order to win. I don’t like this type of politics, especially at the local level. I don’t want to reward that kind of campaign with my vote, even though I probably agree with Tafti on needed reforms and was leaning towards her before that mailer and these misleading letters to the editor. Win at all costs does not work for me. Last time we had a slash-and-burn campaign in Arlington, I wound up voting for Garvey, even though I don’t love her (especially after all that trolley stuff) when the opposing campaign tried to paint her out as wanting to throw grandmothers out on the street for simply asking the question about whether heirs should be able to inherit valuable homes without ever paying back deferred taxes to the county.

I don’t think this kind of campaign belongs in Arlington. It’s too small a county to pit literal neighbors against neighbors in such a way.

FYI. Unless I missed it, at no point did the parent of the boy say with girl sent those pics. We don’t know how he.came into possession of the photos.

Agreed! I won’t vote Parisi because she said she would undercharge or won’t charge for crimes committed. The job is literally charging people. It’s ridiculous.

Also after following AEM for a while it is disheartening to see any discussion of issues in the schools, high poverty rates, and inequities silenced. Particularly by those not even affected by the issues being discussed.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:So I guess if a minor makes and executed a plan (however ineffective) to kill a teacher or shows around naked pictures of classmates it’s better to NOT show them actions have consequences. That can wait until they are adults so they can really ruin their lives.

100%

You want to know what results in adults ruining their lives, a childhood where they never faced consequences.

Yes. And what about the girl who sent the pictures to the boy in the first place? I'm very concerned about HER and not because her pictures got shown around. She needs to understand that's not only a possibility, but very likely to happen. But why is only the boy the focus here? He's found in possession of pornography, but she's the one who created and sent it! BOTH of these kids need a serious wake-up call. And if having to deal with legal authorities is that wake-up call, then so be it. I really don't think a little chat about how they shouldn't do these things or an in-school suspension is going to have the same impact.

It's about finding the appropriate balance and implementing discipline strong enough to nip this crap in the bud, not the second or third time....

Anonymous wrote:I assume if any of the prominent AEM posters are reading here, they’re shrugging off everything said here as uninformed. But let me say as a lifelong progressive, I am voting for Parisa, but honestly it’s in spite on the AEM posts and comments, not because of them.

To those posters: I understand that your guard goes up when people post here or elsewhere about opposition to the issues that literally define your day to day lives, but I say from real experience that shooting everyone else down and steamrolling the narrative will not work. It’s incredibly off putting and counterproductive.

As a Parisa supporter, I ask that you please, please consider a different approach.

Please, please post that request on AEM!

Anonymous wrote:So I guess if a minor makes and executed a plan (however ineffective) to kill a teacher or shows around naked pictures of classmates it’s better to NOT show them actions have consequences. That can wait until they are adults so they can really ruin their lives.

100%

You want to know what results in adults ruining their lives, a childhood where they never faced consequences.

I assume if any of the prominent AEM posters are reading here, they’re shrugging off everything said here as uninformed. But let me say as a lifelong progressive, I am voting for Parisa, but honestly it’s in spite on the AEM posts and comments, not because of them.

To those posters: I understand that your guard goes up when people post here or elsewhere about opposition to the issues that literally define your day to day lives, but I say from real experience that shooting everyone else down and steamrolling the narrative will not work. It’s incredibly off putting and counterproductive.

As a Parisa supporter, I ask that you please, please consider a different approach.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Haven't seen this one on AEM yet but elsewhere there is a letter about Stamos prosecuting 13 yo's for sexting. Anyone have the context? It suggests she has an office policy of doing so, which as the mother of girls, who I assume bear the brunt of this type of behavior, is not necessarily a crazy position to me.

It’s on AEM now, as presented it’s a ridiculous overreach by Stamos. Unfortunately I don’t feel like I can trust information from the Dehghani-Tafti campaign to be accurate so who knows what the real story is.

This. A couple of vague tweets without additional context are hard to follow. However, if a kid didn’t share the images I have a huge problem with any sort of prosecution or school discipline for that matter. But, I will still vote for Stamos. I’m not a one issue voter on this. Parisa has zero prosecutorial experience. It is a big job that requires making a lot of decisions and doing something. Not going to vote for someone wiith no experience running on what they won’t do.

The dad tweeted about it. My guess is he might not have sent pics to others but sounds like they were showing them to others. What’s would Tafti have done in Stamos place? Tell the parents of the person — a girl classmate, I imagine — that it is just boys being boys and no punishment is necessary?

I feel like there is so much cognitive dissonance in these discussions about what CAs should and shouldn't be doing. In this one thread we have parents saying that prosecutors should be using discretion and not applying a policy uniformly across all defendants, while others raise concerns about equity and unequal treatment of some groups of people -- which is a result of how prosecutors apply their discretion (and which can be overcome by applying a policy uniformly).

Same thing with the issue of whether or not CAs should commit to enforcing laws that they believe are unconstitutional - if you believe that a CA has the right to follow his or her own morals (and, for example, refuse to prosecute a physician for performing abortions), then are you on board with other Virginia CAs refusing to enforce LGBTQ protections that they believe are immoral? I don't know how people are reconciling these ideas.

I prefer to stick to rules and laws and limit discretion where possible, because the pendulum eventually swings the other way. We have a democratic process for changing the laws for a reason--it shouldn't be up to one person to decide what is right and what is wrong.

So I guess if a minor makes and executed a plan (however ineffective) to kill a teacher or shows around naked pictures of classmates it’s better to NOT show them actions have consequences. That can wait until they are adults so they can really ruin their lives.