Is it right? -Life sentence for 88 year old nazi?

Greetings fellow earthlings! Your loyal geek Kevan here again. So anyway guys I have decided that besides just having rants about my very boring life in this blog, I'm going to add in a new segment called "is it right?", which will discuss controversial topics from all over the world. This is the first time i'm doing something like this, so please leave your comments and suggestions!

So, before you read on please check out this article here, which my post will be revolving around.

Just a summary of this article for those of you who got bored after reading the first sentence: Germany has recently convicted a 88-year old ex-nazi for war crimes, including murdering 3 Dutch Civillians as a SS Assassin. He will be spending the rest of his life in jail.

So what do you guys think? Should we convict this man- who claims he was following direct orders from Hitler himself, and even implies that he was brainwashed when he committed murder? Should we even still convict WWII soldiers for war-crimes- men who are about to die from old age and other natural causes anyway? This is what I will be discussing in this blog post.

I shall first present my stand on the issue. Personally I do believe that the old man should not be convicted. I don't even think that ex-soldiers should even be convicted for war crimes. The country that is convicted for war -crimes is the country that loses the war, like in this case Germany. However, in war, EVERYONE IS A MURDERER. If the loser country is convicted, shouldn't the victor be too, since it was probably responsible for more deaths then the loser country.

Also, the "murderer" in question, the ex-nazi, like many of his fellow nazis, had been subject to brainwash since young, which means that his actions during the war have been greatly influenced by external factors. Since his orders came directly from Hitler, not following them would have led to the murdering of him and his family. Considering all these factors my heart goes out to the old ex-nazi, who is, as he says himself, already "waiting for death".

Since I found this topic of enough substance, I decided to use it for my current affairs interview with Mr. Eddie Lau, our form teacher. While Justin, my partner for the interview, has the same views as me, Mr Lau feels that the the ex-nazi should still be held accountable for the murders he was responsible, no matter under what circumstances. He even gave us some vague modern-day example of some student leader having done something which frankly speaking I did not really think was relevant to the topic, but I still really appreciate Mr. Lau's effort in pushing his point forward.

So where do you guys stand? Do you, like me and Justin, pity the old ex-Nazi and think he should be allowed the rest of his life, or do you, like Mr Lau, believe that he should still be convicted anyway and held accountable to all the relatives of the murdered? Please your interesting and thought-worthy comments below! I eagerly reply your comments.

Signing off

~Kevan

Will you take the money?

If you found a wallet lying on the floor, right in front of you, and you pick it up, to find $200 and some important documents like NRIC, Cashcard etc. Now ask yourself, will you, hand the wallet over to the lost and found counter/ police/ the owner himself?

Ok I can probably predict your reply. With an angelic beam and innocent eyes you're gonna say : "Of course I'll return the wallet- I'm such a nice person and I love this whole world.

No seriously.

After years in the Singaporean education system any rounds of civic-moral education many of us are already programmed to answer this way- to behave like the pure-hearted beings we're supposed to be.

However, I want you to really look deep into your heart, and question your fundamental moral values: If you really had $200 in your hands, would you SERIOUSLY return it to the owner/authorities, or would you give in to temptation and keep the money?

So anyway you guys are probably wondering why I'm blogging about this. Well, just a couple of days ago my family and I decided to celebrate my younger brother's birthday at Downtown East resorts. Since we had checked into the resort in the afternoon and the party we had organized was not till late evening, we decided to burn some time at the arcade.

It was the classic tragic " i- left-it-there-and-it-went-poof" story. Since I was wearing shorts with no pockets in them, I was holding my valuables - wallet and phone, in my hand until my brother wanted to challenge me to mario kart. Being the muddle head I am, I had left my valuables on the chair next to me, and promptly forgot about me upon leaving the game. 5 minutes later upon hurriedly returning to find it, it was long gone.

It was largely my fault anyway. I could have left my valuables with my parents who were close by before rushing off to trash my brother at table soccer, but I had carelessly left them somewhere accessible to any random passer-by to pocket.

Since I was surrounded by teenagers at that time, the possibility that it had been a teenager like myself who took my valuables is the highest. Being the love-filled person I am, I'm simply going to ASSUME that the teenager who took my wallet had not eaten for 3 days, was starving, and desperately needed the money to buy food. And he had to take my phone to call the church and thank the lord or something like that.

So anyway, back to the topic. Before this episode I was, like many others, unsure whether or not I would keep $200 I found on the floor. In fact I would probably be more inclined to keep the cash. But now, after experiencing the fluster and desperation of looking for a lost wallet, I am absolutely sure that from now on, I will definitely return all lost possessions to their rightful owners.

I'm sure that many of you guys reading this have experienced losing prized possessions before-with the high theft rates in our class last year. To those lucky souls who as of now have not lost their possessions before, and everyone in general, may I urge all of you to follow your conscience, and return the poor soul his lost wallet.

Cheers!

~Kevan